Lucky for us, breakfast and lunch are provided for us everyday, and there are about 6 women who rotate cooking and cleaning for the compound. The three who come the most are Barathi, Isparama, and Mary. Because they are with us most often I have the most relationship with them. Out of those three, Mary is my best friend. She speaks only a few words in English, those words being chai, coffee, sister, hello, and goodbye. Mary is 26 and married with 3 kids. She has the heart of a child, yet the maturity I long to have at 26. She shamelessly looks through all my stuff when she sweeps my room, and the other day she took my pictures from home and displayed them on my backpack for me to see later. In my previous blog post I talked about how foreign physical touch is here, but Mary is one of the brave women who gives hugs and plays with your hair. If I’m watching a movie, she stand behind me and watches while braiding my hair. If we pass each other in the hallway, she will intentionally bump into me, or if she’s feeling crazy she might chase me. If I’m standing in her way, she will sweep my feet and giggle until I playfully hit her or join in on the game. Everything she does she does with joy.
Mary teaches me how to better peel kiwis, wash my clothes, and she ties my saree for me. Next, she’s going to teach me how to make chai. The other day I was washing my water bottle while she was making chapatti, and so she invited me to sit down with her. This hangout turned into a tutorial, soon Daniella and I were making dinner! I see so much beauty and grace in her, I am anticipating tears when we leave India in 2 weeks. In Africa we did not have a problem with the language barrier because nearly everyone spoke English, but here the opposite is true, so it has been amazing to see how you can grow in love and trust without language.
