If you weren’t aware, India was one of main reasons I picked the World Race route I’m on. I had always been intrigued by the culture, so bright and beautiful, and wanted a taste of it myself. That brings me to another point; I really hadn’t had Indian food, at least not good Indian food, before coming to India. Let me tell you if you haven’t experienced it firsthand, it is delicious!!! From the spices in the curries, to the naan and paratha, your taste buds go on a journey. We’ve learned though that most restaurants you enter to not expect them to have the items they either show on the menu or the pictures on the walls. Every time we went to our favorite cheap restaurant, called Thalis and More, we’d ask if they in fact had thalis and the answer we received was always “No.” This always guaranteed a laugh. The India I had in mind prior to arriving wasn’t exactly the India I came in contact with, but I loved it none the less. This is a beautiful country that is in need of your prayers as the most unreached people groups to the Gospel live here.
Our team lived in an area of Hyderabad known to have government officials and Tollywood stars (like Bollywood, but the language of the movie is Telegu) so it was a relatively nice and clean area. The only time we experienced seeing cows in the road was in Agra where the Taj Mahal is located, but I’ll get to that later. The people are nice and most speak at least some English so it wasn’t too difficult to get around. While we were in a more modern area, India is still a pretty conservative country and so our daily dress consisted of leggings that had to cover our ankles and a kurta (pretty much like a dress with sleeves that go to the elbow and a high slit up the sides). Our transportation for the month consisted of Uber and tuk-tuks/autos. Yes, Uber is here in India and the first time I experienced it was here. The autos are the most frequent mode of transportation for most of the locals. There are small yellow three-wheeled golf cart like vehicles that are meant to hold 3 adults, but we managed at times to fit 6 or 7 of us in them. There were times we weren’t sure the auto could make it up the hills of Hyderabad with us all crammed on top of one another’s laps.
If you haven’t read any of my prior blogs from this month or seen any of my Facebook posts, our ministry was with an organization called Sarah’s Covenant Homes (SCH). They care for special needs children who have been abandoned or taken from parents and placed in government care. The Indian government then sends these children to SCH to live there until they are adopted or if past a certain age, will live there for the rest of their lives. There are currently 4 foster homes with one or multiple foster moms living at each house along with ayahs who are the local Indian caretakers.
We came alongside and were assigned to help with a group or individual children during the weekdays (from 10am to 12:30pm and then from 4pm to 6pm). I was assigned to work one-on-one with two different boys from the middle floor of Courage home in the morning and then one-on-ones with two different girls from the top floor of Courage. The first boy, Elijah, who is around 10 or 11 years old is autistic, but gets around well. The second boy, Isaiah, is 3 years old and has limited mobility and is being developmentally as he is just learning to crawl and is not yet speaking. There is hope though, as prayer and physical therapy are helping! The top floor is a home for children who are blind or deaf. The first girl I was assigned is Jasmine, who is around 11 years old, and she is blind and autistic; she is the “wild” child of the group and loves to bounce and dance around. The last girl I worked with is Mae, who is around 6 or 7 years old, and is blind. She is very new to SCH but is already a fast learner picking up on English and being able to speak it in just the 3 short months she’s been there, but who also has a stubborn streak at times. Having one-on-one time with these 4 children plus the other numerous times I was able to spend with the other kids on the floor, blessed me in so many ways!!
On the weekends we were able to go to the mall and see a movie and have popcorn. We felt like we were back in the States, if only for a couple hours. Another weekend we went to Qutab Shaih tombs and the Golkonda Fort which were both fun and exciting. My favorite weekend we’ve had so far as a team was our trip to the Taj Mahal (to read about the crazy adventures we had in Agra, please go to my next blog).
The Lord was working on me surrendering some things to Him this month. Learning what it means to lay aside what I think the race should look like and letting Him show me. I also wasn’t aware that later that month we’d be going into team changes which would require me to let go of a lot of things I didn’t even realizing I was holding onto.
