Well, as you may have noticed, I have since returned from India; about a week ago in fact, only, like, I've been too busy to actually post anything, i've returned to a poorly little brother, fortunately, it's half past nine here so he's all tucked up in bed and I have a little time for myself!
So, yeh, India.
Well, it was a time. Not necessarily a good time, but a time nonetheless; and I think, somewhere between jumping up and down at the Taj Mahal, passing out on top of a camel, and letting Anita draw henna all up my arms, I fell in love with it.
I wouldn't know where to start telling you about it, the horrendous poverty coupled with the cruelty and the prejudice, the being followed around like some sort of God just because you're pale skinned, the stunning children whom I fell head over heels for, the beggars who are SO persistent but never aggressive, and it was so colourful! The best and worse of humanity: it really is.
The second week was so hard, we had temperatures of 50+ degrees celsius and only five hand fans between all of us to keep us cool, I drank so much water and ate so little and hardly got any hand fan time because every time I managed to get one then someone else was always just as hot and I kept giving it away and, God, it was no wonder I passed out. But the children were INCREDIBLE, just amazing, absolutely stunning.
The most poignant thing for me, I think, was wen we spent a few hours at the other school the woman who set up the school we worked in in Dundlod set up. It was a school for street boys in Jaipur and there were 11 boys ranging between about 7 and 14 by the looks of them. The eldest lad, Rahoul (I think that's how you spell it) he was so sweet and really looked out for the younger boys and he had all burns down the one side of is face and neck where his step-sister had thrown boiling water over him and thrown him out and he was just the dearest thing! And smart too, though he couldn't afford to go to a regular school, despite the fact that he should have been in grade 10 and despite the fact that, to us, the cost was so little, only about £300, but to him...
Well, long story short, Flora, whom I've never really talked to before but who is absolutely incredible, she put this idea to me that we, the two of us, and maybe some of our friends if they want to help to (Wolkins has already said that she will), raise money all this year and then next summer we go back and we take Rahoul the money to be able to attend a proper school and then we stay and we work with those boys for a few months. So we've emailed the woman who set up the street school and the school in Dundlod and asked her if we could and she seemed overjoyed!
Flora and I both finish uni next year (although se's younger than me, her course was a typical three year one, whereas mine was four years) so we thought, since neither of us have taken a gap year, that we might stay on for the year, so we could really do some good!
This sounds so ridiculous doesn't it, but I could so see myself living there, so long as I had some *motivation* to do so, some good that I could be achieving by being there, then I think I could live there, despite all the curries and the heat (ironically, the day we arrived back in England was the hottest day of the year so far in the UK). I think that the boys and the street school count as motivation enough, and the children at Dundlod, I miss them already and I promised them that I would write (and visit hopefully).
I need to buy a lead to download my photos from my camera to my computer but when I do then I'll put up some pictures of our time in India and the amazing children we met there.
Bruce
ps) there's one little girl whom we met in Delhi when we went to whichever of the four forts it was that we visited that was in Delhi, I think that was red fort, red fort or amber fort, though I think Amber fort may have been the one in Jaipur, but anyway, tis little girl, she was LOVELY, just beautiful, named Sunita, grubby as heck in a raggedy old dress but spunky and sweet and full of live and so smiley, she was a beggar girl (obviously) and about eight years old I'd guess but absolutely precious, I admit I broke down and gave her money. Anyway, point being that I can't get her off my mind, I'm tempted to see if I can't go back sooner that next summer, maybe at Christmas if I can raise the cash, and if I can go back then, just for a week or two, I'll see if I can find her, I'll go back to Delhi and see if I can find her again! I'm going to obsess over tis you realise, I'm going to obsess over Sunita and te street children and the children in the school in Dundlod and, God, yeh, I know, I'm weird aren't I.
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bengleman's journal
melancholy
