When my mother was my age, she lived in Bombay, India for a while. She went to find God. Living on bananas and Chai tea and came back barely over 100 lbs, and while she ended up finding God later in life somewhere else, in India she found more of herself.
We arrived and were dropped off by our taxi on a pretty random street corner and had to navigate our way to my good friend and host's house. Neil (our host) was surprised we'd found the place. I was too, frankly.
Side note:
Let me tell you about Neil for a second. He's truly incredible. Not only is he friendly and caring, the glue to his world-wide social network, but he's brilliant.
He has an answer to everything, he knew more current world affairs, literature, poetry, politics, cultures, religion, history than anyone I'd ever met in my life. He'd whip out the most incredible dates and titles in their original languages, etc. The cliche, "A walking encyclopedia" never applied to anyone I'd met thus far in my life.
The next night, he and I stayed up very late just talking. The conversation turned to religion; namely my religion... It's hard to combat reason with faith. There's no logic. you can't argue for a metaphysical other world very easily. because that's the point of faith, right? there's no proof. And it's hard to try to explain what "knowing God exists" feels like.He was genuinely curious, and sincerely respectful, but I hope I didn't offend him when I said, "Neil, talking to you is... exhausting!"
I desperately wanted him to know that I didn't have faith in God out of naiveté, but out of a personal, thought-out choice.
My first week in India I told her about the chaos. The noise, the heat, the trash, the dirt, the language barriers. She said she'd felt the same way: very overwhelmed by a very different world. In her frustration and wandering she stumbled into a western hotel. it was clean and quiet. it had AC. She bought a coke and just soaked in this unexpected sanctuary. She said that lobby was a momentary haven and that a drink had never tasted better.
We both got acclimated pretty quickly to the chaos and even learned to love it. but I loved that story.
So once upon a time, Ann and I decided to go to Mumbai (Bombay), India. We wanted to see another piece of India before I left this magical place, and for sentimental reasons I wanted to be in the same place my mother was.
So here we sat, shaking with excitement in our airplane seats in going to the economic capital of India. As we descended, huge, gorgeous high rises come into view. Stunning wealth obviously present in the city. The closer we got to the ground however, the scenery changed. Suddenly, for miles across, blue-tarped roofs appeared. A giant stretch of shanty towns spread between us and the airport. They seemed endless. We'd been working in the slums of Hyderabad, but these were far worse than any community we'd been in.
My stomach dropped. we were speechless. This was a problem so much out of our reach of solving.
We arrived and were dropped off by our taxi on a pretty random street corner and had to navigate our way to my good friend and host's house. Neil (our host) was surprised we'd found the place. I was too, frankly.
Maybe we were trying to reconcile our idealistic view of the world, development, and the human spirit, with the reality of a problem far beyond our control to even make a dent in. We were discouraged and disheartened and frankly a little ill. We were trying to be good company, but neither of us was in a party mood. Neil took us out to see the best and the brightest upper-class yuppies of mumbai. Another night, it would have been a blast, but I think we were a little... deflated.
Neil was such a kind host and didn't ask questions or judge.
Side note:
Let me tell you about Neil for a second. He's truly incredible. Not only is he friendly and caring, the glue to his world-wide social network, but he's brilliant.
He has an answer to everything, he knew more current world affairs, literature, poetry, politics, cultures, religion, history than anyone I'd ever met in my life. He'd whip out the most incredible dates and titles in their original languages, etc. The cliche, "A walking encyclopedia" never applied to anyone I'd met thus far in my life.
The next night, he and I stayed up very late just talking. The conversation turned to religion; namely my religion... It's hard to combat reason with faith. There's no logic. you can't argue for a metaphysical other world very easily. because that's the point of faith, right? there's no proof. And it's hard to try to explain what "knowing God exists" feels like.He was genuinely curious, and sincerely respectful, but I hope I didn't offend him when I said, "Neil, talking to you is... exhausting!"
I desperately wanted him to know that I didn't have faith in God out of naiveté, but out of a personal, thought-out choice.
Our second day in Mumbai, I woke up anxious. There was something gnawing at my inner soul. When we presented the idea of the trip, our team was really unenthusiastic to say the least. We were met with a lot of opposition actually. Ann and I went against the warnings and concerns of our group, because we had felt good about the trip, and were a little stubborn. I woke up with the fear that they'd been right, that we shouldn't have come. Or maybe it was a guilt for being so privileged compared to what we saw flying in. Whatever the cause, I was not very good company. Not having a plan for the day was really stressing me out. Normally I can go with the flow. But for some reason, I was panicked by the lack of structure.
We wandered around old town (which was beautiful and interesting--so much history) and we decided to get on a boat for a day tour to Elephante Island. I desperately needed some solid plan, and so I jumped on that one.
When we got there, a persistent little Indian Man, Chandra Kahn, stole our hearts and convinced us to let him be our tour guide. He showed us incredible caves, taught us some very interesting things. He was charming company, even brought us to his own home and offered us homemade tea. At the end of the tour when he dropped us off, he just gave us a big hug and started walking away--he'd completely forgotten about being paid, he just wanted to show us his island! When we called him back to give him some money for the tour, he shouted with the largest, most contagious grin, "This will buy me beer!"
So we pretended like we didn't understand what he was saying.
Perfect solution, right? I'm embarrassed to this day, but I couldn't see another way to finish our dinner besides pretending we didn't speak English. Eventually he sort of gave up. and we hurriedly ate our dinner (with our fingers). I'd never felt so out of place. So homeless, and so hopeless (at least for the night). We walked out of the hostel, and discovered the streets were dark. Understandably afraid, we shuffled to the pier: lit, lots of people. Then found the famous, 5-star Taj Mahal hotel.
Turns out the food--we'd had so much trouble sitting down to eat-- made us sick. We finally got in touch with Neil, whom we asked for the key to his apartment so we could call it a night. Sick to our stomaches, tired, and dejected by this rough trip, we just wanted to go to sleep. We took a taxi to see him, and for some RANDOM reason, the taxi that took us to meet Neil, waited for us and took us back to the Taj Mahal Hotel. We thought we'd pop in just for a minute and get a coke, and get a different taxi home.
When we walked into the lobby, an darling cute old gentleman was tearing up the piano keys with soft jazz. I recognized the song he was playing, and without thinking twice, I stood beside the piano, and sang from the bridge to the end with him. Delighted, he insisted we continue. Brilliant pianist, he knew every song we could think of; we had a blast pouring through his fake books and making up harmonies. Also a fervent Catholic, the man was spouting praises and thanks to God, when we looked through some of his original songs of worship as well.
(To watch a video click HERE )
Ann and I sang beside him for the next two hours, gathering a very small audience in the lobby. I thought people might be confused why these disheveled white girls were singing in this lobby, but no one seemed to question, everyone just seemed to be enjoying the music.
This was a little piece of heaven for us to be able to sing with this incredible man.
(Turns out, THIS was the exact same hotel my mother had stumbled into, and experienced as a haven, almost 40 years ago! Isn't that poetic?)
Two nice young men in our lobby audience (who claimed to be our biggest fans) offered to see us safely home. On the way, Sheersh and Ankit took us to go see the queen's necklace, the famous, beautiful shore line of Mumbai. They bought us fresh-sqeezed juice in the train station, and put us safely in a cab back.
I can't really do the sight or the feeling justice. I think it would be impossible to describe; I can't say it any other way besides night had turned to magic.
We snuck out of Neil's early the next morning. Headed back to the states, I knew that was my last Indian adventure, but what a lovely adventure it was.
When we got there, a persistent little Indian Man, Chandra Kahn, stole our hearts and convinced us to let him be our tour guide. He showed us incredible caves, taught us some very interesting things. He was charming company, even brought us to his own home and offered us homemade tea. At the end of the tour when he dropped us off, he just gave us a big hug and started walking away--he'd completely forgotten about being paid, he just wanted to show us his island! When we called him back to give him some money for the tour, he shouted with the largest, most contagious grin, "This will buy me beer!"
When we landed back in the mainland, I felt refreshed. My faith in humanity had been boosted. Then our phones didn't work. we couldn't get ahold of Neil. Every plan we made fell through. We bounced around internet cafes trying to find something to do, but we ran out of money. we lost our phone. we panicked. we found it, but it wasn't working. we ended up getting dinner take out of this local dive restaurant that felt authentic. We couldn't find a place to sit that wasn't another restaurant, and we didn't really want to eat on the back-streets of Mumbai as it was getting darker, so we crawled our way up behind a shoe cobbler's office to a hostel lobby where there was an empty reception desk. We sat on a padded bench and unwrapped our now extremely appetizing food. We were homeless, exhausted, frustrated that every single one of our plans had fallen through, and starving. Then the front desk man came back, and told us that we couldn't sit there and eat. But we had no where else to go...
So we pretended like we didn't understand what he was saying.
Perfect solution, right? I'm embarrassed to this day, but I couldn't see another way to finish our dinner besides pretending we didn't speak English. Eventually he sort of gave up. and we hurriedly ate our dinner (with our fingers). I'd never felt so out of place. So homeless, and so hopeless (at least for the night). We walked out of the hostel, and discovered the streets were dark. Understandably afraid, we shuffled to the pier: lit, lots of people. Then found the famous, 5-star Taj Mahal hotel.
Turns out the food--we'd had so much trouble sitting down to eat-- made us sick. We finally got in touch with Neil, whom we asked for the key to his apartment so we could call it a night. Sick to our stomaches, tired, and dejected by this rough trip, we just wanted to go to sleep. We took a taxi to see him, and for some RANDOM reason, the taxi that took us to meet Neil, waited for us and took us back to the Taj Mahal Hotel. We thought we'd pop in just for a minute and get a coke, and get a different taxi home.
When we walked into the lobby, an darling cute old gentleman was tearing up the piano keys with soft jazz. I recognized the song he was playing, and without thinking twice, I stood beside the piano, and sang from the bridge to the end with him. Delighted, he insisted we continue. Brilliant pianist, he knew every song we could think of; we had a blast pouring through his fake books and making up harmonies. Also a fervent Catholic, the man was spouting praises and thanks to God, when we looked through some of his original songs of worship as well.
(To watch a video click HERE )
Ann and I sang beside him for the next two hours, gathering a very small audience in the lobby. I thought people might be confused why these disheveled white girls were singing in this lobby, but no one seemed to question, everyone just seemed to be enjoying the music.
This was a little piece of heaven for us to be able to sing with this incredible man.
(Turns out, THIS was the exact same hotel my mother had stumbled into, and experienced as a haven, almost 40 years ago! Isn't that poetic?)
Two nice young men in our lobby audience (who claimed to be our biggest fans) offered to see us safely home. On the way, Sheersh and Ankit took us to go see the queen's necklace, the famous, beautiful shore line of Mumbai. They bought us fresh-sqeezed juice in the train station, and put us safely in a cab back.I can't really do the sight or the feeling justice. I think it would be impossible to describe; I can't say it any other way besides night had turned to magic.
We snuck out of Neil's early the next morning. Headed back to the states, I knew that was my last Indian adventure, but what a lovely adventure it was.
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