As I listened to the Muslim call to prayer this morning, I groped my way to the bathroom to get my eyes unstuck.  My voice is going out tonight.  Steve has some sort of cold.  Great!  I guess I am going to have it too.  Hope I can preach tonight!

I couldn’t take another greasy meal for breakfast, so I ate mango and almonds in my room.  At lunch today I ate Thali: rice with five little bowls of different curries.  One was bitter melon and still had the seeds in it.  I kept them to try to plant at home, but they had been stir fried...  (they didn’t grow : (  The hotel waiter noted that I had not been present at breakfast.  I think we are becoming friends!  We can’t speak to each other as his English is very limited.  But I always smile at him and he gives a fatherly smile back.  The hotel staff asked Alfred what we Americans are doing there.  They said we are their best guests ever - clean and friendly.

At team meeting today I learned that I would speak for 45 minutes at the training for the Indian workers.  With translation it would only be about 20 minutes.  I worked out an outline of some practical things I have learned as a Bible worker at home.  

I slept for about 1 1/2 hours this afternoon.  It felt so good.  Before we left for the meeting tonight Alfred had us all pose in the hotel lobby for a group photo.

Yissy, Nathan, Toni C., Pr. Kelly, Rachel, Pr. Clark, Lisa, Steve, Toni M.

On the way to the meeting tonight we were held up by a wedding procession - noisy and eerie with the smoke of the Hindu priest’s incense burner and the drums...  I shared my brother’s CD with the driver.  Locksmaya had a CD player in the car and played it all the way to the meeting that night.

When we arrived late at the meeting site the children were already tired of singing and Pr. Ravi was walking around smacking them with a stick if they stopped clapping to the music.  I would have talked to him about that if I could have.  I know it is their culture.  But some cultural things should be superseded when you profess Christian love!  I sat down near the boys who were beating the drums and asked to try.  The youngest one gave up his drum and the 12-13 yr old watched me pessimistically as I picked up the rhythm he was beating and played right along.  The chorus of this song had a fancy part in it with an interrupted rhythm and a special little drum ditty.  The first time through I missed it completely; but by the end of the song I had it down, and the boy grinned his admiration.  It was much more fun to play the drums than listen to them!

Everyone was tired tonight.  It seemed even hotter out tonight.  The one who usually sings (the “long-prayer pastor”) was sick and came late.  The power went off before we started.  No microphone or projector or light shining over the meeting sight.  Pr. Kelly taught them all how to say “Happy Sabbath” in English.  Even the adults tried this and smiled at themselves.

The girls had gone to another village.  So I had the children’s story about Samuel and a health talk about heart disease.  Pr. Kelly preached about the creation of the world.  Someone had a flashlight which was pointed at Pr. Kelly most of the time. When he got to the part about “Let there be light” the power came on for a while then went off.  Later as he was talking about how much the Creator loves us and wants us to know Him, he said “Satan wants to keep us in the dark, but God offers us light.”  And the power came on again - perfect timing!  The people seemed to understand the message tonight!

On the way home we passed the same wedding procession again.  They take only a small step every 15 minutes or something.  At each step the priest does something.  The young dancing men were still keeping time with the drum beats, but were pouring sweat.  The driver said that this will continue until 2am.  How exhausting!

My eye seemed a little better this morning!  After our worship and team meeting this morning, we went shopping at a mall where the rich people in Kurnool go.  I got in trouble with a store clerk for taking a picture with my camera!  Thankfully the translator saw what was going on and took me back to the store owner’s office to get permission to take pictures to show my family back home.  Now the clerk who was angry with me was posing for a picture.  Funny!

The check out lanes at the western styled chopping mall (from the stairs going to second floor).

Bought curry leaves, notebooks, and a rosewood spoon for gifts and a small, bright red rug for my house ($1.80 US dollars).  Got to ride home in one of those three-wheeled auto-rickshaws.  It felt like an amusement park ride!

After lunch I helped Lisa cut out felts and fell asleep for an hour.

"Small Toni" and Rachel as we walked through the village to pray with people.

Went to another village to visit house to house.  This time Toni Crumley (called “Small Toni) and I (called “Big Toni”) went with one of the Indian Pastors (the one I thought of as “The Long-Prayer Pastor”) and he translated for us.  We heard so many sad stories and prayed for sick people, poor people, church leader’s families, young mothers, one couple with 6 kids!...  one of the situations that really broke my heart was the plight of a widow who had 4 adult girls.  A young man of the village wouldn’t marry one of those girls because he would have to take care of the whole family (a tradition born out of necessity).  These girls were passed by for economic reasons, even though they were beautiful and intelligent and hard working.  The widow and her girls did all they could to get enough food for themselves.  The mother was asking us to pray for a miracle - that somehow her girls would get to be married and live a normal life.  It seemed impossible, but I prayed.  I have thought of them several times since I have been home and prayed again that God would provide loving men to marry each of those four girls and bring joy and help to that family.

The girls leading the children in some English songs.

Back to Ballawallan.  I sat with the adult ladies tonight.  Pr. Kelly spoke this time; it was definitely inspired.  My throat hurt tonight and now my infection has spread to the right eye.  On top of that I am constipated.  I don’t know if I got dehydrated from the heat or had gotten a little zealous with the charcoal trying to get rid of the other issue a few nights ago.  Ridiculous!  How many times I wished I were a healthier person.  (And as I write this now April of 2012, I am reminded that I need to work on that NOW before I go back to India again!)

Both eyes were stuck shut this morning.  Ugh!  So much for the eye infection improving.  But the other problem cleared up as I was the only one who wanted to eat the little watermelon that was given to us.  I tried to eat a lot of the seeds.  Must have been just the type of fiber I needed.  This is not a usual conversation for me, but I want you to know what it is really like on a mission trip.  Silly things become big problems.  But not so big that God can’t use silly things like watermelon seeds to remedy them.

Pr. Kelly had to go to a different village, so Alfred took us three girls to our village.  Alfred has been to America before (both of his children live here) and he speaks enough English to communicate well.  He is a very jovial fellow who treated us like grandkids.  On the way to the village he had the driver stop for cold pop (a real treat here) and cookies.  They recycle the bottles... Mine came without a lid altogether... I never thought orange pop could be so scary.  The first cookie I ate had something hard in it.  It was dark, so I laid the hard thing on the floor of the car hoping to get a look at it back at the hotel.  The other girls were munching away and it was all I could do to keep from telling them - but Alfred may have gotten his feelings hurt...

Pr John (translating tonight), Toni Minikus, Toni Crumley, Rachel

Many people were missing from the meeting tonight.  We heard there was a wedding in the next village.  But the talks went well and the church members enjoyed the new tambourine we got for them.  (theirs was missing 70% of it’s “jingles” so was too quiet)

On the way home Alfred told us that it is our love for the people that attracts them.  The fact that we were not afraid to hold their children (they don’t wear diapers of course - Rachel experienced the result at least once).  The fact that we don’t appear to care that they are all dirty and untidy and poor is what attracts them to us.  He said these people will consider us friends for life because of this.

Rachel holding a dear little baby seemingly unmindful of her wet lap.

Our conversation was interrupted by a high pitched scream from Rachel.  She was sitting in the middle and therefore saw the driver narrowly miss a baby pig in the road.  Locksmaya slammed on the breaks - not because of the pig, but because of the scream.  He wanted to know what was wrong and couldn’t believe that scream was for a pig!  After that, every time he saw a pig he imitated her scream and chuckled. (funny!)

Couldn’t get my one eye to open this morning.  Apparently the little girl’s spit also has those foreign bacteria that we Americans are not used to.  I had a full blown eye infection.  Lisa Odenthal had a little bottle of saline solution in the first aid kit.  That would have to do.  I was afraid to look for any other kind of eye drops in case they were made with local water that would only add to the problem.  (We were told not to let local water get into any of the orifices of our bodies when we washed.  I doubt anyone followed that rule as it was too hot and dusty to not shower all over!)

In our team meeting this morning the church leaders gave us a proposed budget for the cost of us holding a two day training for all 86 of the workers in the area.  These workers  have entered 264 of the 7,000 villages in the Kurnool district of India.  Only four of them had been formally trained in a Christian college, and they were the leaders in the conference.  The other 34 had little or no official training.  The Adventist church there in India will hire any Christian to work as a Bible worker - whether or not they are from our denomination.  Apparently the differences we have between Christian denominations are minor compared to the differences between Christianity and Hindi or Muslim beliefs.  Many of these men go to a village and tell what they know of the Creator God who came to earth to die for their mistakes.  The workers receive VERY little pay and stay in homes at the mercy of the village people.  When they are received by a few people they set up a church - meeting in a home or outside.  If they are not received they move on to another village.  They are more like the apostles of Bible times than any people I have met to date.  And some of them don’t know the “basics” of Christianity that we take for granted here!  We were asked to share the Bible doctrines we know and some practical things like how to give a sermon.

The meeting at the village went well despite the fact that we forgot the projector and had to sing extra until someone could drive back and get it.  We didn’t get back home until 11:15pm tonight.  Everyone was exhausted.

Into a routine now.  After breakfast downstairs in the hotel’s restaurant, we all meet in Pr.  Kelly’s room for worship then a team meeting.  All afternoon I struggled to understand how to use my computer’s powerpoint program.  I had the health talk for the meetings tonight.  Everything went well.  But my eyes were burning like crazy - from all the smoke in the village and the dust from the long drive there and back?  Did two charcoal poultices but they didn’t seem to help a bit.

Me, Lisa, Toni C., Yissy, Nathan, Pr. Clark, Pr. Kelly: waiting for breakfast at our hotel.

Our third day in Kurnool began like all the rest.  The Muslim call to prayer was making a good alarm clock.  From the time I decided to follow God, I have devoted time in the morning to spend with Him.  The methodical call to prayer of the Muslims is admirable in that they DO devote time every day to worshipping Allah.  But what do they say to him and what does he say to them?  Their relationship appears to be very ordered and respectful, but devoid of the connection and practicality that I have enjoyed so much.  I prayed to God that He would never let me make our time together a mere tradition - empty of real connection and practicality.

Our team met every morning for a worship time together.  Sometimes the conference leaders joined us in the singing and sharing of what we had each individually learned about God and ourselves in our own personal worship time.

Pr. John and the Conf. president at a team meeting time.

The students arrived today and we ate lunch all together at the hotel.  Pr. Kelly let me borrow one of the Indian cell phones to call Mom and Dad.

At 5pm we headed out to visit one of the villages that would be transporting people to Ballawallan for the meetings.  A typical Indian village: “houses” were built side by side, sometimes with a space to walk between them but commonly with no space at all between.  The houses were mud brick coated with stucco and generally 12ft x 12ft.  The wealthier ones had two rooms of that size.  The floor was often cement and there was a little chimney in the corner where a fire of a few sticks would be made to cook the meals if there was rain or no space to cook outside the house.  A few metal pots, pans, plates and spoons hung on the walls.  And there was usually a shelf or two carved out of the brick walls where extra clothes or a blanket or two were kept.  Some people were very proud of their electricity which allowed for a ceiling fan - a luxury that I wish everyone in India could have - it was SO hot in those little houses with no windows and 110F outside and inside (maybe more inside).  The beds were cots made of stout sticks with loosely woven bark strippings for the “mattress.”  Some people had metal pole frames with nylon strippings.  The bed was propped up against one wall and taken outside for sleeping on hot summer nights like this.  A few people had brightly colored pictures on the walls from advertisements or political propaganda.  A Hindu would have an image or two on their shelf that they would pray to.  A Christian had a picture of Jesus or Heaven.

Inside a house (maybe 10' x 10')

Cooking outside.  The family bed in the foreground.

A nice village neighborhood.

Skinny, full grown bantum chickens scratch for even skinnier bugs.

Outside (and sometimes inside) skinny little chickens ran around with the pigs, cows, and wild dogs.  Sometimes you would see a duck, goat, donkey, and occasionally a monkey.  You don’t mess with those monkeys!  They have nasty teeth and dispositions to match.  We were warned not to feed them or approach them.

Don't feed the monkeys!

This milk cow was tethered, but usually the "holy" cows roam wherever they choose.

The village well in the middle of the day.

Villages had one or two wells where the higher caste people would get their water first and then the lower castes.  One village asked us to please provide another well for them because there were too many people there trying to use one well and by the time the lower caste people could get the water, the day was far spent and they missed precious time in the fields.

A “sewer” line (i.e. an open run off of “water,” etc.) ran down each narrow street just outside the house doors.  Some places had stones where you could walk on the edge above the mess, which I carefully did!  Everything liquid (or not so liquid) ran along here through the streets and provided a wonderful breeding ground for maggots, mosquitoes, and...

This first time in a village all I could see were filthy, raggedy children; curious, toothless faces of adults; and trash everywhere.  One young woman holding a baby warily watched us come down the street with our ever-present entourage of native children following.  When we reached her, she ran around to the back of the house to hide.

We began our visit at the church, where Pr. Kelly gave a brief talk on Daniel chapter 3 and how the God of Heaven protected the three boys who loyally, trusted Him.  Then we were paraded through town led by a few church members banging on drums and the children singing and skipping along.  This was our advertisement for the meetings I guess.  People could get a look at us and see if they wanted to come to the next village to our meetings.  We stopped at certain homes pointed out by the local Bible worker and with the translator’s help prayed for the families living there.

Pr. Kelly praying with a family in their doorway.

Night had come and our driver got lost trying to get us to Ballawallan.  Children were waiting for us there.  They were intrigued with Rachel Odenthal and Toni Crumley.  I was already “old hat.”  Or maybe I was acting too “adult” to be interesting to the kids...  but I was so exhausted from the time zone change and heat, that I hardly knew which way was up that first week.

About 200 people came to the meeting tonight.  About 50 were non-Christians.  An owl sat in the tree just over the stage where Pr. Kelly preached.  You could barely see it in the darkness above the cloth “roof” of the stage, but as it flew, the children I was sitting with all started whispering and pointing.    

Everything was late tonight because we waited for the tractor to arrive from that other village with a wagon load of people.  We didn’t get back to the hotel until 11pm.

The kids lining the tailgate of the tractor that came from another village.

A full tractor load!

Woke up at 5am again to the Muslim call to prayer.  Ate my roll and orange, left-over from the airplane, for breakfast and got dressed to go to a church in another village with the rest of the team.  Discovered that I had diarrhea...  My roommate, Lisa, also confirmed that I had a slight fever as well.  I would have tried to go with them anyway if it weren’t for my diarrhea issue.  They don’t have toilets or even outhouses in the villages.  You just use the open countryside!  I wasn’t “cultured” enough yet to do that in broad daylight, especially among my American friends.  So I stayed at the hotel under a heap of blankets trying to sweat it out, using charcoal powder for the diarrhea.  The shower wouldn’t get cold enough to do a hot/cold shower...  prayed for a quick recovery and patience, as it was frustrating me to have to miss out on things.

At one point that afternoon a big wind came and blew dirt around until the air was thick, like with fog.  Looking out my window I saw fewer people in the streets, but some still pushed their way against the wind trying to cover their faces.  An oxen-drawn cart with some big rolls of some kind of material was having a particularly difficult time.  The rolls wanted to blow off the cart and the drivers were having quite the time holding on to them.  The power went off for about 5 minutes.  I guess it was an Indian version of a dirt blizzard.  It lasted about an hour and left as quickly as it came.

Ate an orange and some almonds for lunch and didn’t have any “rumbles.”  I did feel like someone had punched me in the stomach, but at least I was safe to travel by meeting time that night.  The drive felt shorter and cooler tonight.  

[The college kids were supposed to arrive today, but the church officials kept them at the conference office in Hyderabad because there was a riot going on in the city and it wasn’t prudent to drive a car load of luggage and white-faced people through town.]

Children were waiting for us.  I played thumb wrestling with some of them and learned a few names.  One girl, about 12 years old, did some sort of strange wave/salute to me.  I tried to imitate it.  She was a very forward girl always pushing her way to the front.  She would make a good leader someday, if she learned to be kind.  I taught them “God is So Good” in English, and the translator taught it to me in Telugu.  The ladies put jasmine flowers in my hair.  We were meeting outside the church tonight.  A stage sort of thing was created for us to stand on (watch that last step!  the wood wasn’t securely nailed down on that one, and my first trip off the platform was nearly a crashing one).  A sheet was hung for a screen and some sort of power supply was rigged up to the light pole to run the projector and PA system.

Our stage and projector screen in Ballawallan.

While we were singing, there was a scream and brief pandemonium as a scorpion came out from some rocks and scuttled onto the plastic tarps 6 feet from where I was sitting with the women.  I tried to appear calm as I went over to stand near Pr. Kelly!  He got a better look at it than I did and said it was the largest one he’s ever seen (like the size of his fists).  I would have liked to get a better look, but as fast as it moved I couldn’t bring myself to move toward it!  The men chased it off by throwing sticks at it.  I guess you don’t kill a scorpion as it may be someone’s relative (the Hindus believe in re-incarnation). 

Pr. Kelly had the children’s story about Daniel and the lion’s den and talked about alcohol.  Several people pledged to not drink alcohol after his candid explanation.  I shared about where evil came from and why God gave free choice to His angels and humans.  The translator was pleased and said it was very clear.

At one point in the children’s story a little girl next to me tugged at my sleeve and wanted to whisper to me (they were practicing their English on us tonight - all 8 words of it : ).  As I leaned down she accidentally spit a little, trying to pronounce our words.  A drop of spit flew right into my eye before I could blink.  I wanted to run for my water bottle and rinse out my eye.  But I didn’t want to offend her or interrupt the story by standing up and walking across the crowd.  I couldn’t rub my eye because my hands were filthy from shaking all the kid’s grimy hands.  So I blinked a lot and let it water.  Yuck!

The ride home was uncomfortable as every bump jolted my sore stomach.  But Pr. Kelly kept my mind off of it by having me tell my life story to him.  Slept good that night.