Always Carry a Towel

So i've been away from this thing a coupla days. All kinds happening lately, it seems, but very little time for visits to the café and typing away at this little journal. My day has come. Your day has come. Our day has come. An Update. It's thursday, and when last I wrote, it was friday. So much happens in such a short period of time. I've been to and fro between hotel and Mother House and Kalighat, the place at which I volunteer with regularity. The mornings begin early. 5am. Roll out of bed, grab some clothes, a coupla bottles of water, and head downstairs to meet everyone for our 2km walk to mother house. Even at 5am the streets are stirring. the smells of diesel and dung and death predominate, rotting things everywhere, and yet at such an early hour, with the heat not quite 30degrees, it seems refreshing. A good way to prepare myself for the 38-ish degrees averaged during the rest of the day. This place is not for the faint of heart (or those prone to heatstroke). We attend Mass each morning with the Sisters, then take some time for breakfast (Chai and Dutch Navy Rations). The biscuits are good. And they contain a lot of energy. A simple meal, but it provides enough to get through much of the morning. Leaving Mother House, a small group of us heads over to volunteer for the first bit of the morning. We usually leave MH by 730 and arrive at 800, to clean the floors. The rest of the morning consists of talking with patients, providing massages and company as we go about preparations for the rest of the day. After break-time we serve lunch to everyone, sometimes passing food out to patients, and when necessary helping to feed them. It's a busy morning, but it's a rewarding one. Around noon we're able to go back to the hotel for a rest, and for our lunch. We get lunch either at the hotel, or in one of the tiny shops littering Sudder Street. Lunch the other day was not so good. It left me violently ill, a story i shall now recount. Several of us went for lunch at a local restaurant, ordering cheese and garlic pizzas. Dairy around isn't exactly safe, I suppose, but we thought it worth a try. It didn't hit me that day, but a day later, I started to feel queezy in the morning. I went back to the hotel to sleep it off, and left in the afternoon to volunteer. That went well. And yet. And yet, later that night, all was not well. Waking up to the sounds of my roomate puking into a bucket, I noticed that my stomach was making less-than-pleasant noises and that I wasn't feeling so well. It was at this point that I slowly rolled out of bed, and then picking up speed, dashed for the washroom. Dashed for the washroom whereupon reaching the threshold, sprayed vomit across the floor. Now it's a good thing the bathroom is completely tiled. The shower is nothing more than a faucet in the bathroom wall. And so all would be cleaned up. No drywall to muckabout with. This did not, however, stop the fact that i was puking, my stomach muscles heaving, and screaming for release. Directing my mouth towards the toilet (less to clean up later) this lasted a good 15 minutes as my body attempted to expel the infiltrating agents. That taken care of, I directed my attention towards cleaning the floor of my loosed dinner (which had been quite good, as it turned it). It was much less pleasant, if not a little spicy on the way back up. Curry is only enjoyable in one direction. The following day was punctuated by the loss of a great deal of fluid, as I tried to keep down water, and water mixed with an electrolyte solution. While sleeping much of the day (and later, much of the night), my entire body ached with the pain of the last night's strain. This morning, sleeping in, I woke feeling a great deal better. I even managed some jam & toast. I drank a few more litres of water, and am even now, outside the hotel, checking email and finally offering an update to this little blog. To those of you who've been checking, you've now got something to read. and for now, this is all I have to leave you with. There are so many things, so many experiences I've had in the preceding days that I just don't know how to translate into words. And so, as I continue to think about them, as I continue to digest what's going on, I'll update what bits of my experience I can. Because right now, right now I'm still at a loss for words of how to describe how the work and the experience to date -- how God is using these things to transform me. I'm noticing subtle things -- but I guess they'll become more apparent as time marches on. Whatever the case, I find comfort in these wise words -- i shall always carry a towel. Life is too messy not to.

take off, eh?

the beard and the hair are gonna be allowed to grow until my return. no more prim, proper, nice andrew. well. those things might stay. i'm just gonna look a little fuzzier in three months. cell phone is on vacation, and so am i as of today. see you in india!

Words of Wisdom

Visited the family doctor. His advice for international travel? 1. Don't get hit 2. Don't get bit 3. Don't get lit 4. Don't eat shit 5. Don't do it Well. There goes all the fun. What am I going to do now? All that's left is volunteering and sleeping. Grrrreat. Just grrreat.

This Just In

The left-handed approach can be easily employed anywhere, whether in the middle of the desert or at home in North America. Caveat: Do not confuse desert and dessert. It could get messy.

imminence

Maybe I'm a bit slow, but I think I've just realised that I'll be living in India as of next week. Eek. I'm glad the weather here in Cambridge is co-operating. No doubt we'll arrive in Kolkata to two inches of snow and sub-zero temperatures. No doubt. I already miss my roomates, and I've only been out of the house for 5 days. What am I gonna do when I'm living on the other side of the planet? It'll be different, to be sure. There are always postcards, but somehow I think asking and answering questions in post-card form will prove a little - err -- slow.