What we thought was going to be a much needed day off… ended up being a community visit day. We couldn’t get a hold of anyone here at the hospital to let know that we wanted to hire a car and go touring around for the day until the morning of. The soonest those arrangement could be made were for the next day. So instead of a day off on the beach, we hop in a hospital van and ride off to a remote village about 45 minutes away. The purpose of this trip was to speak with the village leaders about malnutrition and the services the hospital offers as a part of their mobile clinics. Before any mobile clinic can be sent to a village, the hospital must get permission and trust from the village leaders to believe that what they are doing is out of good will and not exploitation. By convincing the village leaders, the people of the village will actually attend the clinic and the hospital remains in positive relations with their neighbors. The mindset is that if the leaders say it is ok, then it is ok.
So we get to the village and they are oh so happy to see us, honestly. A friend back home has commented to me, while here we are like a new animal at the zoo! I think that’s sadly accurate. First things first, we must be welcomed into their village. This includes our first Indian dots! One of the villager women meets us at the top of the stairs leading to the porch of the ‘town hall’. She says something and then places a dot our foreheads with red and yellow powder. When Beth, Julie and I received our dots, we then had place the same dot on the woman’s forehead. This means that we were reciprocating the blessing she gave us of finding a good husband if not married and a long an happy life if we were married. Jeremy, however, does not place a dot on her forehead. It is not custom for the men to place these wishes upon the women. The symbolism of the woman giving Jeremy a dot is to wish him to be a good husband to his current or future wife. Once we were properly welcomed we took off our shoes and entered into their town hall (aka, a room about 12x12 with a wooden desk, a few chairs around the periphery and natural stone floors). As mentioned before, it is respectful to take shoes off when entering temples, schools, homes and any other place considered clean, holy, or important.
After the first village visit and fllip flops in the OR, we have quickly overcome our fears of bare feet. So we slip off our shoes and are shown to chairs on the side of the room. After we enter about 50 village women file in and sit cross legged on the stone floor with more women arriving throughout the meeting until the crowd spilled out onto the covered porch. Needless to say, the room was full! There were numerous men (village leaders) there as well, but for the most part, the crowd consisted of women. The mobile clinic is primarily for expectant mothers and children, so this made good sense.
The meeting began by appropriately introducing and welcoming the visitors who had come: the doctors and of course their guests of honor, us. Again, we received roses just as we had at the school and at the nursing ceremony. In addition, Jeremy honorably accepted a bouquet and coconut on our behalf.
The meeting began with an introduction and input by 2 village leaders, continued with the medical director and community health director (both physicians from the hospital) speaking on the need for women to step up and the importance of proper healthcare. The meeting lasted about 1 hour and was a VERY hot 1 hour as we were packed into this small room without ceiling fans. Needless to say we were pretty sweaty! There were ceiling fans in the room but were not turned on for some reason. At the start of the meeting, they did however remove a few clay tiles from the roof for ventilation! Sky light! Well, unfortunately I don’t believe these 4 little missing shingles helped a whole lot, but oh well.
Once everyone had finished speaking , they look at us to say a few words to the room full of people! Oh great… another on the spot speech creation. Luckily, Julie and Jeremy were sitting closest to the front and one of the doctors translated to the village members for us. Once we were done with our chai tea (best we’ve had yet) and snack (we’ve dubbed Indian chex mix), we are invited on a tour. We have learned that you will never get away without a snack or drink when visiting one of the villages.
On the tour we were shown just about every aspect of that village. We started our tour with the school. The children did their prayer and pledge of allegiance for us, we had our awkward Q&A time, and then we moved on to the houses. We were actually able to go into one of the huts and see for ourselves what living in this village was like. The house we visited had a grass and bamboo veranda with laundry on the line and a potted Tulsi plant (google it). This was more for summer living as it is usually gets too hot to sleep in the houses during the “hot” months (it’s all hot to us). As we enter the front door, there was the main room. It contained a TV up in the corner and not a single piece of furniture. The kitchen was a TINY room with a gas burner (this household was fortunate because they had a gas burner, otherwise most use fire for cooking). The bathroom was tiny, with just a toilet bowel set in the ground. Again, I did not see even one piece of furniture in the entire house. Most everything is done at floor level. Even the gas hot plate in the kitchen was set on the floor.
The village leaders also took us into their livestock barns (a bamboo/wood boarded hut with a very low grass roof). These are more commonly seen for cattle or goats, the chickens just roam around wherever. We kind of wanted to take a chicken home with us since we’ve been vegetarians since arriving a week and a half prior. After the homes and livestock, we were brought to the convenient store where we enjoyed a ‘cold drink’, aka Pepsi, courtesy of the shop owner. It was a HOT day, so the soda was a real treat! After our refreshing treat, we continued onto the goat barn, two temples (one Hindu, one Buddhist). Before entering the temple we remove our shoes as a sign of respect (we remove our shoes for EVERYTHING now!) and are allowed to approach the area of prayer and take pictures, however, as mentioned before we are not allowed to take a picture with the temple or any of its deities. It is believed that the gods and deities have their own aura and it is a sign of respect not to share in that aura by being with it/them in the picture. (hope that makes sense). The Buddhist temple concluded out tour, one of the village leaders stated that he will likely win the next election because he can claim that he facilitated our visit. Whatever works for you, sir! We were also invited back for mutton, because had they known we were coming in the first place they would have slaughtered a goat, and they did not get to do that for us on this day. Of course, no need to slaughter a goat on our behalf!! So now we are left with our dotted foreheads and loading back into the hospital vehicle for our drive back.
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We got back around mid afternoon and had missed lunch, but with all that talk of chicken and mutton, we had even more of a craving for meat. So the 4 of us jump in a Rickshaw and head out to a local non-veg restaurant for a late lunch, and I think we all ate like we hadn’t seen food in a month! We had some butter chicken, a traditional mutton dish, and buttered nann!! I think the restaurant workers were a bit surprised at how much we ordered and that we pretty much ate it all! But as Beth puts it “Might as well keep our title as the American Spectacle. Seems that one will travel with us no matter where we go or where we go.” The ENTIRE meal for all 4 of us, yes that includes Jeremy, was $11!! Certainly cannot beat that :) After dinner we went down to the local market for a bit and then took a Rickshaw back to the hospital so we could sit on our balcony and digest!
-On the tour we were shown just about every aspect of that village. We started our tour with the school. The children did their prayer and pledge of allegiance for us, we had our awkward Q&A time, and then we moved on to the houses. We were actually able to go into one of the huts and see for ourselves what living in this village was like. The house we visited had a grass and bamboo veranda with laundry on the line and a potted Tulsi plant (google it). This was more for summer living as it is usually gets too hot to sleep in the houses during the “hot” months (it’s all hot to us). As we enter the front door, there was the main room. It contained a TV up in the corner and not a single piece of furniture. The kitchen was a TINY room with a gas burner (this household was fortunate because they had a gas burner, otherwise most use fire for cooking). The bathroom was tiny, with just a toilet bowel set in the ground. Again, I did not see even one piece of furniture in the entire house. Most everything is done at floor level. Even the gas hot plate in the kitchen was set on the floor.
The village leaders also took us into their livestock barns (a bamboo/wood boarded hut with a very low grass roof). These are more commonly seen for cattle or goats, the chickens just roam around wherever. We kind of wanted to take a chicken home with us since we’ve been vegetarians since arriving a week and a half prior. After the homes and livestock, we were brought to the convenient store where we enjoyed a ‘cold drink’, aka Pepsi, courtesy of the shop owner. It was a HOT day, so the soda was a real treat! After our refreshing treat, we continued onto the goat barn, two temples (one Hindu, one Buddhist). Before entering the temple we remove our shoes as a sign of respect (we remove our shoes for EVERYTHING now!) and are allowed to approach the area of prayer and take pictures, however, as mentioned before we are not allowed to take a picture with the temple or any of its deities. It is believed that the gods and deities have their own aura and it is a sign of respect not to share in that aura by being with it/them in the picture. (hope that makes sense). The Buddhist temple concluded out tour, one of the village leaders stated that he will likely win the next election because he can claim that he facilitated our visit. Whatever works for you, sir! We were also invited back for mutton, because had they known we were coming in the first place they would have slaughtered a goat, and they did not get to do that for us on this day. Of course, no need to slaughter a goat on our behalf!! So now we are left with our dotted foreheads and loading back into the hospital vehicle for our drive back.
-
We got back around mid afternoon and had missed lunch, but with all that talk of chicken and mutton, we had even more of a craving for meat. So the 4 of us jump in a Rickshaw and head out to a local non-veg restaurant for a late lunch, and I think we all ate like we hadn’t seen food in a month! We had some butter chicken, a traditional mutton dish, and buttered nann!! I think the restaurant workers were a bit surprised at how much we ordered and that we pretty much ate it all! But as Beth puts it “Might as well keep our title as the American Spectacle. Seems that one will travel with us no matter where we go or where we go.” The ENTIRE meal for all 4 of us, yes that includes Jeremy, was $11!! Certainly cannot beat that :) After dinner we went down to the local market for a bit and then took a Rickshaw back to the hospital so we could sit on our balcony and digest!
Becky
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