Back to the early 20th century

Old-fashioned laundry!

Don't I look thrilled

    A series of unfortunate events has led us to feel like we are living in the 1920's. Until Tuesday, we had been able to do our laundry in the neighbors washing machine, however, said washing machine is now broken. "No problem," we thought, "we can just take it over to the Chatterjee's washing machine." Well it appears that rats enjoy eating the electric cord to washing machines (who knew?) so theirs is out of commission also. We were crossing our fingers that one of them would be fixed by the time we ran out of clothes, but we were not so lucky. So alas, we are now washing our clothes by hand since there is no such thing as a laundromat in Dhamtari. It is quite an unfortunate process of sitting in the shower with a bucket of water (after turning on the "water heater" for a perfect amount of time-too short of time the water is cold, too long of time and you blow the fuse) with detergent and immersing each piece of clothing and performing our own agitation cycle (I'm sure some of our older readers can relate). On top of that, we have no laundry line, so we have various pieces of clothing draped over chairs, couches, and the table. We have also stolen both neighbors laundry lines (we had a lot of laundry to do).

Raina in her saree

          Moving on, Friday was graduation day for the nursing school, so they had a big ceremony and dinner celebration (we were excited that we didn't have to cook). Everyone gets dressed up in their nice clothes, so some of the students told Raina she needed to buy a saree for the program. They took her to the saree shop and she picked one out and had the tailor make the under shirt for her. Throughout the evening people kept coming up to her and saying, "Mam you are looking very beautiful tonight!" Meanwhile, I just stood there in my hiking shoes and khakis feeling under-dressed (I failed to bring nice clothes to wear). The program was very similar to a US graduation, they had a main speaker, the principal spoke, and they even did a lamplighting ceremony like they did at Mt. Carmel for Raina's graduation. Following the graduation program, they had dinner and a cultural show, which was very good. Each group of students (1st year male, 1st year female, 2nd year male, etc.) had a performance, and most of them were dancing, but a couple groups sang. Everyone wanted their picture with "Raina the beautiful" so before the night was over we probably took 40-50 pictures (there was a line, it was ridiculous). Below is a video from the culture show we thought you might enjoy.

           Saturday was a nice day of relaxation (although I still had to teach from 8-9am). We cooked a big American breakfast (scrambled eggs, toast, & hash browns) and decided that we ate enough that we could skip lunch. So after our Hindi lesson at 5:30, we were very hungry, but neither of us wanted to cook. We decided (I use 'we' loosely; Raina decided, I gave in) to venture out and take our first stab at an Indian restaurant (again 'restaurant' is used loosely here; really just street food). We found a place called the Eats Restaurant not too far from the hospital that actually had a place to sit and order, so we tried it. Without really knowing what we had ordered, we were pleasantly surprised at how good it was. It was actually some of the best food we've had since we've been here, and as of yet no G.I. problems! We got enough food for 2 meals (and then some) for a grand total of about $8.00 (at the Indian restaurant in Columbus we spent $50). We will certainly be back to eat there(barring any late onset of diarrhea).

Clothes hanging inside

This morning (Sunday) we made breakfast consisting of parathas and cream of wheat (we accidentally bought just a bag of plain old wheat instead of flour in Raipur last week, so after I experimented with adding water and cooking it we've been eating a lot of cream of wheat), then we went to church in the chapel at DCH. Following church we began the laundry extravaganza. Lunch was grilled cheese and popcorn, and dinner will be our leftovers from last night. I realize I keep coming back to the subject of food, and I believe it is because I have not eaten meat in over 3 weeks, and I never seem to be satisfied. I could NEVER be a vegetarian-however when your choices here are mutton (complete with all the innards)  or veg.....I end up eating veg. Anyway, Raina is working on lesson plans for this week, and we plan to spend the rest of the evening relaxing and reading.

          We are both feeling more and more comfortable in the way God wants to use us while we are here. I have realized that being in my comfort zone is not at all what God intended for me on this trip, and I think He is using this opportunity to teach me how to go with the flow and explore other unknown abilities I have (like teaching). Raina seems to enjoy teaching-although she is baffled as to exactly what to teach because she doesn't feel like the students will ever use the Trauma information that she is giving them, but the students absolutely love her, and I think she has realized that the relationships she is forming with some of them are more important than any work she could do. The first few weeks were difficult because we had so many of our own expectations, and now God has shown us that he doesn't really care what we think or want, He will use us where He needs us-even if we aren't really "needed'! We are starting to get a little bit homesick (Raina interjects here with A LOT homesick)...especially with the new laundry development and we really miss all of our family and friends (and dog). Thank you everyone for your continued prayers, we could not have done this without your support!

God Bless,

KC (and Raina)