Here, throw me the baby!

Alright.  I have the afternoon completely off, absolutely no plans, for the first time in goodness knows how long, so I decided that now would be a good time to write about my Christmas.

I will begin with the volunteers' Christmas drama.  The whole thing was a bit haphazard and thrown together last minute, as we really didn't get around to starting on it until we only had about 2 weeks left to write, block, practice, and perform it.  But despite that, I think we did quite well with it.  The basic idea of the drama is that Mother Theresa, who has been looking for a home to begin her work but has  not yet found somewhere, has a dream the night of Christmas 1948.  In the dream, we are at Mother House where a group of MC Sisters is preparing for Christmas.  There is a knock at the door, and Mary and Joseph enter.  Slowly, the rest of the nativity also comes in, including the baby Jesus, and the various branches of the Missionaries of Charity join them.  It ends with a touching scene where Mother Theresa asks Mary to join her in bringing the baby Jesus to Sr. Nirmala, Mother's 2nd Sister.
We performed on Christmas Eve, just before Mass.  There were a few little mishaps and last minute changes, but people seemed to enjoy it and I think it went well.  Sophie, Jenn, and myself all played MC Sisters, John was a shepherd, and Jeremiah and Devin were Mary and Joseph, so all of the Seattle group still in Kolkata participated.
After the drama, we all went to Mass, which was lovely.  Afterwards, people gathered in the courtyard for hot chocolate and fruit cake (there's so much incredibly good fruitcake in India!) to mingle and wish each other Merry Christmas.  I must admit, up until this point, it didn't really feel much like Christmas, but having all of those people gathered together, smiling and chatting about Christmas plans really brought out the holiday spirit.  It was good to have that finally happen.

Christmas morning, after a breakfast of fruitcake buns, nutella, and chai at Mother House, I went to Shishu Bhavan.  All of the kids were adorable dressed up in their fancy Christmas outfits with bangles for the girls and shined shoes for the boys.  As we had had quite a few Christmas celebrations already, with the performances of the Shishu Bhavan Christmas drama, there wasn't much of a celebration that morning.  I think it was best that way, though.  It was just nice to get to spend a quiet morning with my kids.
Coming home that afternoon, I stopped a number of times to talk to some of the shop, food stand, and travel agency owners I've grown fond of over the past few months.  I couldn't help but think of how lonely Seattle is going to feel when I get home and, walking down the street, there won't be someone every few meters who I can stop to chat with.  In any case, I had a number of good conversations.
The Seattle group had planned to get together with a few other volunteers to carol while we all walked to Nrimal Hriday, Mother's first home at Kalighat temple, to volunteer together in the afternoon.  Unfortunately, a few of us were sick, so we ended up caroling to the Metro station and Sophie, Jenn, and I rode the Metro with 2 other volunteers to Kalighat, leaving Jer, Dev, and John to get some rest.  Caroling was a lot of fun; we got a number of weird looks and a few people joined in.  I'm also really glad that a few of us still chose to go to Kalighat together.  I haven't been in a long time because I'm now helping with volunteer orientations.  But that places has never failed, not once, to put me at peace with the world.  I have never left there without a smile on my face.  There has been a lot of changeover, and some of my favorite ladies are gone, but I got to see quite some of my old friends and I made some new ones.  I did dishes, which was always a relaxing activity, and hung out with fellow volunteers on the roof afterwards, drinking chai.  I really do love that roof.  Something about it is so peaceful.
The final plan for the evening was dinner with the Seattle group (we really have started doing everything together, we're a single entity now) and a few other volunteer friends of ours at a fancy Italian restaurant called Fire & Ice.  After a confusing taxi ride and walking about half of the way there, we arrived about a 1/2 hour late for our reservation, but luckily early enough that not all the tables were full.  The food, although truthfully only mediocre, was incredible because it did not taste like masala.  I do love Indian food, but it is so nice to break away every so often.  The company was also delightful, although Jer sadly had to stay home because he was quite ill.  It was definitely a good close to Christmas day.

Yesterday, Boxing Day, was for the most part a normal day.  But in the evening, the Seattle group got together for our exclusively Seattle Christmas celebration.  The six of us got together over a picnic of tuna fish & veggie sandwiches, fruit salad, Pringles, M&Ms, Oreos, and fudge and just had a fun time talking and being together.  We had decided that instead of getting gifts for each other, we would work together on getting gifts for our Indian friends on Sudder St., so we worked a bit more on getting those together.  We've grow quite fond of our occasional Seattle picnics, and this was definitely, I think, the best way we could have celebrated Christmas together.  I love those kids.

There was one final Christmas celebration, that I'm aware of, today.  All of the MC homes with children were invited to a party at the governor's mansion, and as John, Jenn, and I all work at kids' homes, we were all invited to come along.  The party was a lot of fun.  The governor's mansion was enormous, and though we didn't get to see much of it, it was obvious that it was quite grand.  The party was on the back lawn, which was absolutely enormous.  There was a bouncy house for the kids, although the volunteers definitely all took a turn in it as well, a live band, and a group of Indian dancers.  It was really nice to see the kids outside of their one room at Shishu Bhavan, running around, dancing, bouncing, and being the energetic little fireballs that they are.  We probably all got fed a bit too much sugar and did a bit too much frolicking, as everyone was sleeping on the bus ride home, but it was entirely worth it.  I love my kids with all of my heart and it was so good to see their gigantic toothy grins.

So, all in all, my Christmas in Kolkata was absolutely amazing, even if it did take a while before it felt like Christmas.  I hope that everyone else had incredible Christmases, and like I said, I'd love to hear all about them.  
And now, I will relax.  Finally. 

A few days ago, I went with one of the many Irish ladies I've met here in Kolkata, named Mags, to visit a village about an hour outside of Kolkata, by train & cycle rickshaw.  We went in order to deliver some monies to help a local Anglo-Indian woman, Susie, add 2 classrooms to a school that had recently been started up at the village which was being run by Susie.  Mags was helping out a friend of hers who is having some trouble back home.  The friend is funding the building of the school and watching over the start-up until Susie is able to run it completely on her own.  
A little background on Susie:  She was a teacher before this school started up, but had to quit because she lost the ability to walk and could not get out to the school where she worked.  
Upon arriving at the village, we were greeted by Susie's son who just turned 16 a few days ago.  He and his brother had to quit school for a few years in order to help out with household chores so that her husband could get a job and keep money coming in.  The very first thing this boy says to Mags is, "Auntie you cannot come in.  I am studying my books.  It is very messy."  This was the kids' day off from school.  And this boy was studying because he was finally getting the chance to go back to school.  How beautiful is that?
Anyways, we went next to visit the school, where Susie told me a bit about the curriculum, the changes that were to be made to the building, and the children that she and one other local teacher were taking care of.  The children live in the classroom during the school year, so it is much like a boarding school.  Susie also lives in the classroom because there is no way for her to get around easily, so it makes more sense for her to just stay there.  They are teaching the standard Indian curriculum so that when the children are ready to move to another school, they will be on the same level as all the other children.
The classroom itself was really quite nice.  Nothing by Western standards, but you can tell that a lot of time and love went into it and that the children have it really well there.  They also have a computer, which you can tell by the way Susie lit up when I inquired about the computer classes that was listed on the childrens' grade sheet, is a rarity for smaller schools.  It's only the one computer, so only one of the classes have it at their disposal, but she was definitely proud of it.
All this was wonderful, but what was really touching is how open she was about her life and how easily she welcomed me into her home and workplace.  Immediately, she offered to have her husband make chai, and I was also given an omelette that I hadn't asked for.  She gave me some background on her husband and sons, as well as some problems that she was currently having with her sister.  She even went a bit into her struggles when she lost the ability to walk and her health began to deteriorate so much that she could not talk.  She's obviously doing much better now.  
It's just so beautiful the way that the Indian people are so open with you.  Nothing is hidden.  People bathe on the street.  They are willing to tell you all about their life having known you for only a few minutes.  They welcome you into their homes and feed you until you're ready to burst.  I can't help but love it.
We also visited a Hindu family that lives behind the school and who are less well off than Susie's family currently is.  They were incredibly excited to see Mags, who knows them quite well, and took us both immediately inside.  We were then offered sweets.  Now, this isn't any ordinary offer, though.  The sweets they offered were not in the home, but had to be purchased at the local sweet shop about 5 minutes' walk away.  But that trip was made with joy.  They were just happy to be able to share what they could with us.

The day before this and the rest of that afternoon were absolutely exhausting for me, as I felt like I never stopped moving.  But having that time in between where people were simply excited to have me sit there and listen to them or eat sweets with them was absolutely wonderful.  It's afternoons like that that give you the energy and the ambition to keep going in this city that never stops.  Thank goodness for teachers and Hindus.

An official announcement

Ahem.

I have changed my flight home.
I will be arriving at LAX airport on 29 February 2008 at 7:20 PM.  I will then spend some time with my family, and will leave for Seattle on 11 March 2008 at 12:40 PM, arriving in Seattle at 6:01 PM (with a layover in San Fran). 

I love and miss all of you back home.  But I need some more time with Kolkata to feel ready to leave.  I will see you all in March.  Be prepared to be assaulted by my love.

Namaste,
Melissa

Ta ta, namasted, goodbye, okay

So, Friday was definitely not one of my better days.  My morning at Shishu Bhavan went well, but the events that followed were frustrating and upsetting.  I was considering just hanging around my room for a while in order to be mopey, but I hadn't gotten a chance to go to Kalighat lately as I'm now also helping out with volunteer orientations Monday, Wednesday, Friday afternoons, so I chose to not be a bum and visit my lovely ladies instead.  It was definitely the best decision I made today, and perhaps even this week.
I had been hoping to be able to do some laundry in order to get out my aggression on the bedsheets and frocks, but when I entered the washroom, they seemed pretty well staffed so I headed to the women's section.  I visited a few women that I had talked to before, then sat down next to a woman I hadn't visited with yet.  I started asking her how she was, and she began to tell me a story I didn't understand.  I must admit, I wasn't giving her my full attention, so I was mighty surprised when she began to cry.  She had been touching the bandage on her head, so I knew that she was telling me about how she had received her wound, and it was clearly a hard story for her to tell.  As I comforted her and began to listen to her with my full attention, I realized that any pain and suffering I have felt in my life does not even begin to compare to what she had gone through, which she was telling me all about right now.  And then, she smiled.  She finished her story, dried her own tears, and smiled.  And that was the biggest comfort that anyone could have ever given me.  To know that my own suffering was not even a fraction of what she had felt in her life and she could still come out smiling was such an inspiration to me.  
Needless to say, the rest of my evening went quite well.  I had a cup of chai on the roof of Kalighat and watched the people below, I went home and had dinner with the incredible friends I've made here, and had a good nights' sleep.  And I smiled.

In other news, we have two darling new babies at Shishu Bhavan.  Their names are Sonali and Jyotsni.  They were sent to us from one floor down, the baby ward, because they were both diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.  Sonali is taking a while to adapt to the new environment and continues to look a little bit scared whenever she's away from Jyotsni.  Jyotsni, on the other hand, has taken to our floor quickly and is a little spitfire, rolling around in her crib to get from one place to the other!  I enjoy them both immensely.
Shishu Bhavan Christmas play practice continues, but because I have chosen to spend more time with the physically handicapped children, I haven't been helping out too much with that.  I do, however, have a new project!  I am making posters for the 6 new children we have taken in recently.  I felt honored to receive this project as it allows me a chance to share what I've learned about the kids in the last 2 months.  I feel it's a really good way for me to share my experience here with others.

I still love and miss you all!

Namaskar,
Melissa