Surfin’ the waves of the Ganges…
February 9th, 2009 Posted in Uncategorized
Sunday is our official day off - no hospital responsibilities! We started the day by attending a small fellowship service with two members of the staff here. The hospital has a Christian affiliation and each day begins with a short devotion service conducted in Hindi with singing and bible reading. On Sunday, people are free to attend their own services in the city. At the Christian fellowship meeting, songs were sang in both Hindi and English, with drums and clapping accompanying. The service leader gave her homily in both English and Hindi so that we could understand. The meeting was held in a simple elementary school classroom. We sat together on the floor. Despite the lack of ornate decorations or typical church proceedings, there was lots of love and friendship in the room. We had a great time. Also, we reached the service by a bike-driven rickshaw, which was like a roller coaster over all the bumpy, unpaved roads.
After the church service, we gathered together with some other hospital staff and their children and took a trip to the Ganges River. It was about a 20 minute ride by Jeep and we were able to get outside the city center and see a lot of beautiful, green farmlands. Many homes were built with thatch roofs and horse-drawn wagons were a frequent site. Many cows and sheep were along the road, which sometimes made for a close encounter with our jeep! (No causualties, though!).
The river is very low this time of year so we had to walk down a huge set of cement stairs to reach the water. Many people were jumping in and bathing. We, however, only dipped our pinky fingers into the water (the Ganges are very polluted). At the water’s edge, a few simple boats make of plank wood were available to take us across the river. It was a short boat ride (and quite wobbly), but a very memorable experience.
After we got back from the Ganges, we went shopping right outside the hospital walls in the city center of Fatehpur. We stopped in a few sari shops to look at fabric, which was gorgeous. Each shop has its customors sit on the floor as they pull fabric choices out for you to look at. At one shop, we were nearly buried up to our chest in fabric. We knew we had to buy something or face an angry shop owner suffocating us with saris 
We ended the day with dinner at one of the hospital staff’s home. They prepared vegetarian food - stuffed pita like bread (called Chapati) with sweet tomato chutney and fresh papaya for dessert. It was delicious! A new friend of ours, named Theresa (after Mother Theresa) joined us as well. She is from the south of India and is also only here for a month. She is in training to be a superintendent nurse.
And that brings us to the end of another day. We’ve started using a net over our bed to keep out the mosquitos. We both have the look of a teenage boy given the number of mosquito bites all over our faces
The hospital does a number of general surgeries and we’ve been called in at some odd hours to see cases. It’s been an eye-opening experience so far and we’re trying to soak up as much as we can.
Namaste!