Report of 28 Jan '07
Hello from the B -
My stomach is rumbling and I look forward to eating at our cafe soon. The residents run it and the food is tasty; I often hope for Western food, but might be in the minority.
We are well. The lady w/ the butt gash, Ms. M, is finally to head back to Kolkata this week. The rehab team plans and executes this: a social worker preps ahead of time that the families are where they say they'd be, tickets are booked (a must in this overpopulated country) and then the residents are taken. I had my Bengali friend, Gopa, explain this to Ms. M over the phone, and Ms. M was delighted. After the call, she took my hands in both of hers and said something fervently. It was not necessary to know the language to know that she was praying, so I sat there and looked on. It was wonderful. I knew she was praying for anyone associated with me, and me, and the depth of the affection was evident though I could only catch the occasional "Allah" (Ms. M is Muslim). We finished the prayer and Ms. M stated that she was now "kush" - in Hindi, this means "happy." I'm glad she is kush.
I am at our other center now and one of the patients here, Ms. B, is to be sent home as well. Her little baby is now with her, having been brought from the orphanage for the trip. The language of the mother is universal, isn't it; as I was examining her, her baby (in another resident's arms) was crying and Ms. B looked around to see what was happening. Finally, the child was handed to her, he put his thumb in his mouth and simmered down, while Ms. B rocked him and spoke gently to him in a language that I did not fully understand but recognised as Mother-ese.
Lots of fun interactions last week. My brother, Vinu, and I saw our childhood friend Farshid in Mysore. Farshid is an avid environmentalist, pursuing his Ph.D. in Ecology, and blogs at notes-from-the-field.blogspot.com. More than that, tho', Farsh is a genial, easygoing, salve for the soul - we laugh a lot when we are together. His parents were in Chennai for a friend's son's wedding, and we also got together. It was great to touch base w/ old friends, and laugh and love. We also got to see a play on the Bible, which our neighbor was acting in. Greg Brown, now an intern making his 2nd trip to India after his 1st one last year as a student from my med school, also visited us and that was great; obviously his first trip did not scare him off. His professor, who is of Indian descent, also came w/ him, and wasn't as happy w/ things in South India. The 3 Weiss men and I went out for b'fast - bonding over sausages and eggs was great.
Tutoring was looked after by the boys as we headed to the play. Navin leaves on a school trip this week - 4 days to Kerala. Naren hits the home stretch as he crams in the last month before exams start on 1 May. We are very blessed to have our neighbor, Usha, who is a child education specialist, and she has given Naren lots of pointers on studying, and adolescence, and emotions. She has also sat Scott and me down over lunch to talk about what we ought to do at this time, and we hugely appreciated every word.
I'd better wind up. Oh, nearly forgot - I will be in the U.S. from 9 April to 1 May attending a conference and then speaking around the country. I look forward to it.
Unw -
Renu
My stomach is rumbling and I look forward to eating at our cafe soon. The residents run it and the food is tasty; I often hope for Western food, but might be in the minority.
We are well. The lady w/ the butt gash, Ms. M, is finally to head back to Kolkata this week. The rehab team plans and executes this: a social worker preps ahead of time that the families are where they say they'd be, tickets are booked (a must in this overpopulated country) and then the residents are taken. I had my Bengali friend, Gopa, explain this to Ms. M over the phone, and Ms. M was delighted. After the call, she took my hands in both of hers and said something fervently. It was not necessary to know the language to know that she was praying, so I sat there and looked on. It was wonderful. I knew she was praying for anyone associated with me, and me, and the depth of the affection was evident though I could only catch the occasional "Allah" (Ms. M is Muslim). We finished the prayer and Ms. M stated that she was now "kush" - in Hindi, this means "happy." I'm glad she is kush.
I am at our other center now and one of the patients here, Ms. B, is to be sent home as well. Her little baby is now with her, having been brought from the orphanage for the trip. The language of the mother is universal, isn't it; as I was examining her, her baby (in another resident's arms) was crying and Ms. B looked around to see what was happening. Finally, the child was handed to her, he put his thumb in his mouth and simmered down, while Ms. B rocked him and spoke gently to him in a language that I did not fully understand but recognised as Mother-ese.
Lots of fun interactions last week. My brother, Vinu, and I saw our childhood friend Farshid in Mysore. Farshid is an avid environmentalist, pursuing his Ph.D. in Ecology, and blogs at notes-from-the-field.blogspot.com. More than that, tho', Farsh is a genial, easygoing, salve for the soul - we laugh a lot when we are together. His parents were in Chennai for a friend's son's wedding, and we also got together. It was great to touch base w/ old friends, and laugh and love. We also got to see a play on the Bible, which our neighbor was acting in. Greg Brown, now an intern making his 2nd trip to India after his 1st one last year as a student from my med school, also visited us and that was great; obviously his first trip did not scare him off. His professor, who is of Indian descent, also came w/ him, and wasn't as happy w/ things in South India. The 3 Weiss men and I went out for b'fast - bonding over sausages and eggs was great.
Tutoring was looked after by the boys as we headed to the play. Navin leaves on a school trip this week - 4 days to Kerala. Naren hits the home stretch as he crams in the last month before exams start on 1 May. We are very blessed to have our neighbor, Usha, who is a child education specialist, and she has given Naren lots of pointers on studying, and adolescence, and emotions. She has also sat Scott and me down over lunch to talk about what we ought to do at this time, and we hugely appreciated every word.
I'd better wind up. Oh, nearly forgot - I will be in the U.S. from 9 April to 1 May attending a conference and then speaking around the country. I look forward to it.
Unw -
Renu
posted by Renu Weiss at
9:27 PM
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