Blend

Today, after the church service, we went to Mr. Tirupati Reddi's house for lunch. Mr. Reddi is a Hindu man who donated all the land our school is located on and currently lives in the village directly behind us. He is a farmer and we occasionally see him around the school paying visits in his white dress shirt and white lungi with a towel thrown over his shoulder. This is the traditional attire for older men that we see in our area. So Mr. Reddi invited all of our staff and many of the villagers to his new home for lunch and served us all some great food. After finishing our meal, we were standing out front chatting with some of the staff kids and witnessed something I've never seen before. A man was standing outside the front door of the new house, holding a large melon of some kind that was on fire and moving it around through the air. He then took the melon and smashed it on the ground. Except it didn't break apart all the way, so he picked it up and smashed it again. Then he placed one piece at each edge of the stairs going into the house and someone came with a pot of blood that he poured over each piece. Actually it was colored powder mixed with some liquid, not blood, but it looked like blood.

All the while, we stood a few feet away watching with some major curiosity. Other cultures and religions are much more interesting to see in real life than they are to read about. What is the most fascinating to me, is that a Hindu man donated all of this land for a Christian school to be built on. And not only this, but he is active in the school and pays regular visits. Today he had all of the staff for lunch, and then provided dinner for all 450 students as well! And even more generous than this, he is paying all of the teacher's salaries now who haven't received  them in three months because the money from the division is extremely delayed. He is an incredibly nice man and it is awesome to see different lifestyles blending together, sharing food and space.

Lately we have been talking about how we feel like our time here is ending and that we should be going home shortly since we have passed the half way point. The only problem is that we really aren't going home that shortly...and we still have about three months left. It's hard to get rid of this mindset for some reason. But I keep reminding myself that this is a once in a life time experience and NOW is my chance to learn more, because there is always more to learn about and ways to blend with this culture by spending time with these people we have come to love so much. It's so important to live in the now. Every day we make a choice about what our attitude will be and where we will involve ourselves and if we don't put our effort into NOW, that time is wasted. And that time is precious!

-B