After a few grueling hours of travel, our group finally got to India-safely. I got off the plane in Hyderabad voicing the excitement of being home. It was great to be in my home state of Andhra Pradesh for our launch which was a 3-4 day retreat preparing us for our 11 month journey. Yet, although we were in Andhra Pradesh there was one huge problem; I couldn’t speak the local language, Telugu, fluently. Usually it takes me a couple weeks to be comfortable in my broken Telugu, but was even
harder to try and turn it on so fast. I felt as though I could have been a better help for the squad had
Our squad on the streets of Hyderabad…
yes everyone was staring.
yes everyone was staring.
I known Telugu fluently. It is a hard reality for me to know I am a minority (within our squad) of the majority (Indians), but can’t Telugu well. The best I could do was to be the “tour guide” and in all honesty, locals saw me as that (a few people even came up to me and asked if I was their guide), so I did my best to fill the role.
My squad was really understanding and didn’t hold my linguistic deficiency against me. I think they appreciated having someone with an Indian background with them. I had to save face for peoples’ reaction to Indian culture. For example, crossing the street, the stray dogs and the buffalo, the beggars, and of course the ever persistent auto drivers and their gritty, but safe driving. It’s always fun to hear others’ reaction to it all. I loved the questions people asked about India though. They definitely sparked my love for India and my heritage, and even challenged me to go deeper in my Indian American identity and knowledge of India.
India traffic…there’s no obligation to stay between the lines
One thing I thought about throughout launch was how I was going to process being involved in a different ministry in India other than the one our family is involved in. It’ll be quite an experience to work elsewhere where everything is completely different. Its almost as though I’ll walk familiar terrain, but different territory wherever in India our group does ministry. Its just a matter of time before we know where we are placed. From what I know (which isn’t much), it could be anywhere in India.
So with that said, I’ll leave this blog with a “to be continued…”
