From Myrtle Seaver on 11/3/09

Yes, a new blog entry!  So much has happened since  our return from India in March, I will try to catch up with some new information as well as some memories of the mission trip.  I was very, very ill when I returned, it took some time to recover completely……but not only am I well and healthy now, I am thinking of returning to India in January for the 2010 mission trip!   This is still a matter of much prayer, but in the meantime I am going ahead with preparations such as a visa, tickets, a much needed new suitcase, and all of the things that need to be acted on well ahead of time. 

Tom and Peggy Nixon (and I) plan to leave on January 19, Peggy has booked Sky Mile tickets for the 3 of us, and this is a big savings since we each pay our own expenses for the mission trips.  Mel Gentry had knee replacement surgery on  10/6 and has not booked his flights yet, but of course he plans to go.  I look forward to seeing the Joshua family and all of the children, the ladies in the Old Folks Home as well as the workers in the homes.    Also looking forward to the sweet, rich buffalo milk chai (tea) that Murial Joshua makes for us several times each day, not low calorie but  so delicious.

I am part of the Piecemaker Quilters of Westview Baptist Church here in Sanford; our group is making bedcovers for the 10 ladies in Maggie Old Folks Home. We have pieced the colorful tops adding only a piece of muslin in place of batting since the weather is mostly hot in South India.  They will be machine quilted to make them more durable; laundry is done differently in India.

This photo was taken at the very end of my tour, I was really sick the last 3 days in India, and the long flight home was a nightmare.  And yet I do want to go back again, taking lots of precautions, the most important one is that I will be with my family the whole time, no tour group for me in 2010.

Update post-India

Most of you know that our India team has returned safely, and here are a few updates during and post-trip. 

Myrtle wrote on Feb 26:

Our days have been long and busy, so much to see and do. We went to the Sunami Church in a village in the middle of nowhere and had a church service. Mel preached and Tony interpreted. It was a small block church with a metal roof, there was electricity and  2 ceiling fans (most welcome) as well as 2 florescent tube lights on the wall. There were many geckos on the walls to keep the bug population in check. We each gave a little talk to introduce ourselves, and while every sits on the floor on a plastic tarp, we had chairs. After the service each person came up to us with one word “PRAY.” we put our right hand on their head, prayed for them, always ending with “in the name of Jesus Christ, amen” and then the next child, young person or old lady would be asking for “pray.” They seem to think that God will listen to our prayers more than theirs because we came from far, far away. It’s 11 am, time for breakfast, lunch is at 3 or so, dinner about 9:30 or 10 pm. 

Tom and Peggy returned safely after their tour to the deserts of Rajastan, and Myrtle followed not so safely, about 5 days later. She was also on a tour, but fell ill during the final days. When she arrived at the airport in Orlando, she had to be taken directly to Florida hospital, where she stayed for about 5 days. She is back home now, and is recovering very well. Still a little weak, but getting stronger by the day and will soon be back to her normal energetic self. In spite of her illness, she had a fantastic time in India, and talks of it all the time. Keep her in your prayers as she continues to improve.

 

Sara Nixon

Communications, Hands of Compassion International

Excerpts from Peggy’s e-mail, March 3, Rajastan, India

Peggy and Tom have moved on from their time with the Joshua’s in Ongole, and our now touring the desert area of Rajastan. Here are a few excerpts from Peggy’s most recent e-mail:

We had a wonderful time with the Joshua’s. One evening, Muriel, Nori, Minnu, Vejay (the driver), Myrtle, Tom and I went to the Bay of Bengal. We left about 6:00 (were to leave no later than 5:00) and got to the sea about dusk. The drive was through lots of little villages and took about 1 and half hours, due to the people, cows, water buffalos, auto-rickshaws, carts, and everything else on the road. People were finishing in the fields for the day and headed home. The beach has raft fishing boats pulled up on shore, which are about 15-20 feet long and 3-4 ft wide, flattened logs tied together and curving up on the ends. They had nets piled on them. Further down the shore were the boats with motors. When the tsunami came, the raft boats were replaced with the motor boats. We took off our sandals and stood in the sea, it was very warm and the waves gentle. We stood there as dusk turned to dark and the stars came out. It is so dark there and we saw more stars than we ever see at home. We had some cookies and soda, and then when we were ready to go back up to the road, we realized we had left all our flashlights in the car. Vejay, Minnu and Muriel lit our path with cell phones…

…We went out to Santamagulur and took pictures of the kids, they are so sweet. There was an old lady sitting in one of the rooms rocking her grandchild/great grandchild to sleep.  She had a sari tied between the legs of her cot and had tucked the baby in there and was swinging him/her back and forth.  He had one little leg hung over the side of the sari and finally she slowed her swinging as he fell asleep….

…We are in Gadjer now, which is very beautiful. We will go walking/exploring as soon as I am done here.  There are camels everywhere, they are pulling carts and we have seen some small groups of them just standing on the side of the road. I guess they are free-range camels We are at the edge of the desert, though where we are staying looks like an oasis. The wind blows the sand just like in the movies. I can’t imagine living here. In the summer is is 130 degrees…

Stay tuned for more from Tom, Peggy and Myrtle. Myrtle is on a different tour than Tom and Peggy are, and I will post more as soon as I hear from them again.

Sara Nixon

HOCI Communications

 

From Myrtle, The First Day, Ongole, India

Here I am, finally in India ! What a sensory overload, the noise, smells, dust and amazing sights everywhere. I left Sanford about 9:30AM on Wed, arrived at the Joshuas’s at 6:00AM Friday Sanford time, but 7:30 PM here in Ongole. I flew first to Miami, then to London, where I had a 5 ½ hour layover, then flew another 9 hrs to Delhi, arriving at 2:30AM. I was met by our tour guide, who took me to the hotel for 3 ½ hrs of rest. I met Peggy and Tom for breakfast in the hotel, and we were driven to the domestic airport for another flight to Chennai. When we arreived, we were met by Minnu Joshua. After securely tying our suitcases to the car top we began the drive to Ongole, about 6 hours away, with stops.

Are you tired yet just reading about this long, crazy trip?

The drive to Ongole was on a 4 lane toll road, and these are some of the  things I saw on my first afternoon in India: Many lorries (trucks) of all sizes, with brightly painted flowers and designs all over, always on the back in large letters PLEASE SOUND HORN. The number of beeps had different meanings, but were always loud and constant. The general belief seems to be that if the horn sounds, the road will magically expand to make room for all the traffic, regardless of size, speed or available road width…many bright yellow 3-wheeled cabs, full of people…a herd of water buffalo going south on a noth-bound lane…buses…motorcycles with the man driving, the woman in a bright sari riding sidesaddle, sometimes with a child or packages on  her lap, some times 3 or 4 people on a motorcycle…farm tractors pulling loads of  rice straw,  or a load of bagged rice piled high, with people on the top…a truck with 4 people, farm tools and 7 large black goats in the back…a very large monkey running across all 4 lanes…carts and wagons pulled by oxen…more water buffalo and cows in the road…herds of goats…add to this all of the people, bicycles, carts, cars, cows, dogs, goats as we drove through small towns and villages. Walking along side the road were women with huge loads of rice straw, or reeds, or a load of sticks to be used to cook the evening meal. These loads were always carried on their heads…Then there were people working in the fields, more water buffalo, goats, oxen and cows. Even 48 hours with almost no sleep could not make me close my eyes, there was so much to see!

But when we finally arrived here in Ongole, the welcome was awesome. The family, Murial (Joshua’s widow), daughters Nori and Chintalli and son Tony warmly greeted these tired jet lagged travelers. As we went upstairs to the second floor living quarters we were greeted by all of the smiling children who were spaced along the stairs. They showered us with hands full of bright yellow flower petals. At the landing were more children with flower garlands to put around d our necks as a sign of honor and welcome. (We had to take these off after just a few minutes to show that we are humble). We were served a nice meal about 9:30 and finally to bed. And this was just the first day!

From Peggy, The First Days, Ongole, India

India always has something fascinating to look at, smell, taste or hear.

On Sunday morning I woke very early, jet lagged and bit groggy, to the sound of someone speaking (not English) over a loudspeaker. It sounded like a tent revival or TV preacher, except every few sentences, the speaker shouted Aloha. The man spoke for 10-15 several minutes after I woke up, with regular shouts of Aloha. This is odd, even for India. When Tom woke up and I told him about it, he said it was very unlikely that he was really shouting Aloha and most likely it was hallelujah. He is probably right, but it sure sounded like Aloha.

This morning, Monday, I woke to another man on the loud speaker (again, not English) who inserted sheep noises into his speech. It sounded sort of like this, “Something, something, something, something, something, baaaaaaaaaaaaa. Something, something, something, something, baaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Something, something, something, something, baaaaaaaaaa.” This went on for several minutes and with one final baaaaaaaa, he was done. I asked, but no one seems to know what it was all about.

Each morning I have heard what sounds like an ice cream wagon playing “you are lost and gone forever, dreadful sorrow, Clemintine.” After Minnu, the oldest son, picked us up from the airport in Chennai, he took us to lunch where we listened to Credence Clearwater Revival while we ate our fried rice, Tandori chicken and buttered naan.

From Mel: February 23, Ongole, India

Tsunami Baptist Church.

On Dec. 26, 2004 a massive earthquake created a tsunami of monumental proportions that swept across Indonesia and other southeast Asian countries reaching as far as India. On the east coast of India in the Bay of Bengal, the tsunami swept ashore and destroyed many fishing villages along the coast.

Rev. Paul Joshua and his family went to some of the fishing villages to see if they could provide aid for them. He discovered that their means of employment had been wiped out, as their boats and fishing nets were destroyed. Fortunately, the loss of life was not so great as in other countries. Rev. Joshua wrote to me that if there was financial aid available, so that some of these villages could be helped. 

My wife’s sister, Sue, told me that she wanted to donate some funds that she would know for certain would aid those directly affected. So in February 2005, I arrived in India and Rev. Joshua and I set out to see how to best help. After interviewing some of the fishermen, we learned what kind of nets, leads, and floats they needed. We went to supplier and spent about $1200 buying supplies. We then took these to several villages and presented them to the village leaders to assist them in getting their fishing started again.

One particular village was quite interested in why we would do this. We explained that we were Christians and the love of Christ directed us to respond to their need. There were no churches in the villages along this particular coast as the fishermen had been looked down on, and their spiritual needs basically ignored. They asked if we could start a church for them in their area. Some in the village promptly donated a piece of land and we dedicated that ground and broke grounds for a simple, small place of worship for them.

The next year, 2006, a medical team accompanied me to India and we set up a combination medical clinic and church dedication for the same day at that fishing village and dedicated the TSUNAMI BAPTIST CHURCH, a name of their choosing. The building was almost complete except for some of the windows that were installed later that year. In February, 2008, we dedicated pastor’s quarters so a pastor could live on the field in this fishing village.

In November, 2008, a typhoon broke the windows of the church and we provided funds through Hands of Compassion to replace them. And that leads me to the present.

One night this week, our team of 4 from Florida went to the Tsunami Baptist Church to worship with them and encourage them. What a blessing it was to see their joyful faces and hear them sing the songs they had learned. Each team member gave a word of greeting and I preached for them from Isaiah 6 about our responsibility to be witnesses for Christ.

As we were returning back to our home in Ongole that night, I shared with our team how this was just one more example of how God can bring the home the truth of Romans 8:28. There is no doubt that the tsunami of Dec. 2004 was a tragedy of epic proportions, yet now we find the Word of God being spread in new areas as a result of this experience—in Indonesia (this is another story of God’s working) as well as here in India.

For all of you who have prayed and supported the work of Hands of Compassion, I am glad to report to you that you have shown love and care for a group of poor fishermen who were considered “throw-a-ways” by the world, but looked upon by God as His children who yet needed to know of His love for them.

Just a word to our sponsors of our boarding home children: all of your sponsor donations for the children are spent on the children you sponsor. We receive funds from other sources to help build this church and strengthen others. 

Be sure to check out our new web site at Hands of Compassion International http://www.handsofcompassion.org/

I am heading back to Florida from India at 2:30 am on Tuesday morning so I will leave any further epistles to be written by those I leave behind. Thanks for your prayers for us—and if you could see the horrendous traffic here, you would know how much your prayers were needed.  

Love in Christ from Ongole, India.

Mel  

From Mel: February 19, Ongole, India

Visiting in India involves a lot of sitting! It seems that everywhere I go, almost instantly there is a chair readily available for me to sit in. Maybe it’s because I am a guest or perhaps it’s because I am old. In any case, be prepared to sit—and be prepared to drink!

Upon arrival at Pearl’s Home in Santhamagalur, we head up to the 2^nd floor of the building where caretaker’s quarters are located. Don’t get some American apartment pictured in your mind. A flat roof about 15×20 was built on top of a small building where some of the boarding home children sleep. Then about a 10×12 block wall enclosure was built on that roof in one corner to provide a bedroom/living area. So now you have a one-room sleeping area with a 5-foot porch along one side and an 8-foot porch along the other. This porch area is covered by a thatched roof. On this porch is another bed for outside sleeping, a small cooking area, and a bathroom.

In these quarters, one of Joshua’s older brother lives along with his wife. God certainly has a mansion prepared for them in heaven. From these meager living arrangements, they live happily and oversee the well being of 35 boys and girls in the boarding home there. Sitting in their tiny home on the one chair that was given to me (others sat on the bed) I was offered the customary cup of hot tea to drink while recovering from the trip to get there. As usual, they had found the largest cup available to serve my tea made from rich water buffalo milk and sweetened generously with sugar. Most of them drink tea from something like a demitasse cup—but no, not me, I get the biggest cup they can find.

After socializing enough, we walked about 2 blocks to where Joshua’s tomb is located at the Maggi Old Folks Home for prayer. Afterwards, we moved back into the shade in the yard and sat outside to visit some more. After a brief respite, up came a young man down the dusty road with a sack in his hand. And, would you believe it, out of that sack came a cold 7-Up for me to drink. We then visited briefly with the caretaker couple of the Maggi Home before walking back over to Pearl’s Home. (Interlude: would you believe that even as I sit at the computer typing this, Nori, Joshua’s oldest daughter walks up with a large cup of hot tea for me to imbibe while typing! The kidneys are working just fine here.)

Now at Pearl’s Home, we sit and visit with the children. When we enter their room, they are all seated on the floor in straight rows with the boys on one side and the girls on the other. They are arranged with the smaller children in the front and the older ones in the back. Their faces are filled with smiles and full of anticipation. They sing a few songs for us with much animation. They also want to sing for me, the song, “Hallalu”, as I taught it to them several years ago. They gleefully sing as they jump up and down as their turn comes to them.

Muriel, Nori, the caretaker, and I are sitting at the front as the children are seated again. Now it is our turn. Muriel translates for me as I challenge them about their schoolwork and remind them of the advantage they have in acquiring an education and being cared for in a Christian environment by loving adults. After this the children come by one by one and the girls receive a toothbrush, toothpaste, hair decorations, and a ballpoint pen. The boys receive the same except no hair decoration, naturally. Then, just before the final prayer, each of them receives a large sucker (they call it a lollipop) and I remind them to not forget to use the toothbrush. (We will make another trip later out to Santhamagalur later and they will receive more goodies—we spread it out to bring more joy into their lives).

Now we head back up to the caretaker’s quarters where we are served a meal of chapatti and chicken curry. Since this food is “village fare”, it is hot and spicy and the chicken has a lot more small bones to pick out of the curry. They have set a stool in the middle of the room in from of the one chair that I will sit in. This stool serves as my “table.” The caretaker apologizes that he has no fork or spoon for me to eat with but I assure him that it is no problem for me to eat with my God-given fingers, and proceed to eat, mashing the chicken with the fingers of my right hand to remove any bones. Then, tearing pieces of the chapatti bread, I finish off the curry. Then rice is added to my plate and it is mixed with the chicken curry, too. After eating that, more rice is put on my plate along with some curds (like sour cream, somewhat lumpy) that is salted and this is mixed together and eaten to “settle the stomach” at the end of the meal. It is quite a challenge to chase all those rice grains around on your plate with the tips of your fingers after they have been slavered with curds! You should try it sometime—especially when others are sitting there watching to see how well you succeed it getting it to and into your mouth!

Well, by now you have probably worked up an appetite and are ready to head to the kitchen to get something to eat—like a good hamburger or a slice of pie. If so, enjoy it for me, too. Where has the time gone? I am sitting here at the computer and darkness has crept up on me without my noticing it. I have to go now and get my shower (always a cold one here) and get ready for dinner. I will leave the dinner up to your imagination. The food here is healthy and plentiful and I NEVER lose weight in India.

 

From Mel: February 18, Ongole, India

Monday our plans included a trip to the village of Santhamagalur where one of our two children’s boarding homes is located. This one is Pearl’s Home, that is named after Mary Lou’s mother, Pearl Godwin. This village is also where Maggi Sowbagia Old Folks Home is located. It is named after my mother, Margaret, and Muriel’s mother, Sowbagia.

Traveling on a journey in India is always replete with interesting and unusual experiences compared with a trip in the US. I was reminded of this today as I read an article in the newspaper (in English, as I do not read the local tongue, Telegu). The article read as follows: “On a busy Monday morning recently, traffic came to a standstill on the local flyover (overpass), as a ruminating bovine stretched out on the middle of the road. Continuous honking ended up in vain and a traffic cop had to be summoned to get the cow that strayed onto the flyover out of the way.” This article was accompanied by a photo of a car stopped behind 2 cows lying in the middle of the road.

On our trip, we had passed numerous water buffalo on the road and they merely saunter across and in the road, paying absolutely no attention to the passing cars and trucks. In fact, the article quoted above had this to say as well: “Buffaloes especially couldn’t care less even if you keep honking.” We also passed on the road, herds of goats that were
being moved from one area to another. If you look carefully, you will usually be able to spot their herder/shepherd—sometimes close by, and at other times passing the time of day with someone along the side of the road. The animals are seemingly left to their own defenses. Usually this is no problem as car owners and drivers have no desire to strike
an animal and have to be involved in the roadside haggling of determining the value of a now dead or injured animal, to say nothing of damage to their vehicle.

The journey to Santhamagalur usually takes a little more than an hour when the roads are in good repair. However, since the rainy season has just passed (it was still raining when I was here in November), in many areas the roads have deteriorated considerably, and the journey is now closer to 2 hours. In your wildest imagination you would have a hard time trying to visualize “road repair” here along the way to the village. In one spot there were about 6 or 7 women dressed in faded saris squatting down in the road sweeping up road dust/dirt with small brushes. In this cleaned area, small rocks were being laid by hand to fill the holes in the road. The dust/dirt was being removed so that the new tar would stick to the previous road surface. The small rocks that were being placed in the holes were being “made” by more women over on the side of the road with hammers breaking up larger rocks to make smaller ones. Then hot asphalt was being poured by hand over these rocks and smoothed out with a hand tool. While quite different from our methods in the US, it still provides employment for people who would otherwise have no job or income.

Now back to the journey. Other than being slowed down due to animals and poor roads, the part of any trip here has to do with the stops you make along the way. Our first stop was to buy flowers from a vendor. Flowers? Yes. Paul Joshua, the former director of our Hands of Compassion program here, who died last July, was from the village of
Santhamagalur, and Maggi Old Folks Home was the last project he worked on for us. It was decided that he would be buried in the yard near the old folks home as this was a project dear to his heart. In this same village, out in their rice fields, are the burial sites of his mother and father, as well as Joshua’s brother who died on January 31.

Now to the flowers. When we go to this village, the family always arranges flowers on top of the tomb, all the children and adults gather around, and we have a time of prayer. This is very similar to our custom of putting flowers at a grave site on a special day, like a birthday, Christmas, Memorial day, etc. For the family here, it is an expression of respect and showing their feeling of love and loss.

Another stop along the way is to buy drinks. The family here is always concerned that “Uncle” (that’s me) would be thirsty in their hot climate. At this stop I was offered a bottle of Coke, 7-Up, or Fanta Apple drink (a Coke product). I chose Fanta Apple as I had never had one. The first thing you read on the bottle is: No fruit. It was merely
flavor in a fizzy drink. All in all, not too bad.

One surprise stop was when Minnu, Joshua’s eldest son, headed off from to car to look for something. To our surprise, he came back with two small plastic bags that were literally undulating in his hand. Upon opening the bags, we found 13 small turkey chicks. There were 6 yellow ones and 7 brown ones. When I asked him what he was going to do with them, he said that he was going to leave half of them in the village and bring the others back to town with us to Ongole. He said that turkey meat was expensive and it would be cheaper to raise them. However, his uncle at the village told him there was no place to keep them in the village as the roaming cats and dogs would eat them as the
chicks had no mother to protect them. So we brought them all back to Ongole, they are in a small cage—and the children in our boarding home here love taking care of them! Whether they will ever get eaten is another question.

As this epistle is staring to get long, and I imagine that your coffee has gotten cold or your Coke has lost its fizz, I will plan to write more next time about our visit with the children in the village and our food. Food is always an interesting subject. So, till the next epistle—so long for now.

From Mel: February 16, Ongole, India

I left Florida on Friday morning (got up at 4 AM to head to the airport–Mary Lou, too, got up to take me) to start the trek to India. The flight was somewhat different this time as I went to Atlanta first, then on to Boston to connect with Air France. I have never flown out of Boston before. From Boston on to Paris and finally from Paris to Chennai (formerly known at Madras), India.  The flight arrived at about 1 AM Sunday morning, India time. This would have been 12:30 PM Saturday Pensacola time, or 29 ½ hours after departing.

Minnu, Rev. Joshua’s eldest son, was waiting at the airport. It is always such a relief to see a familiar face among the literally hundreds of faces standing outside the airport anxiously looking at you when you arrive. It is like waking through a gauntlet to get to someone you know!

We went across town to Joshua’s sister’s home arriving there about 2:30 AM, waking most of those in the home. After drinking some hot tea and visiting briefly, I got to lie down with plans to get back up at 6 AM to start the drive to Ongole where our work is located. I awoke each hour looking at my clock before I turned the alarm off at 6 AM. After a breakfast of chapatti (India fried flatbread) and chicken curry, accompanied by hot tea, we finally got on the road at nearly 8:30. The drive took 5 hours but we made 4 stops along the way. One was to get gas for the car (about $4.00 a gallon here!), one stop for a drink, one stop when the car (almost on its own) turned aside for us to get an ice cream cone at a famous dairy along the way, and one stop for our hired driver to eat breakfast. These stops added about an hour to the trip, which should have only taken 4 hours.

The boarding home children were lined up along the steps going up to the 2nd floor where I was staying at Joshua’s home. Each child had a hand full of flower petals which they tossed, smiling all the time, on top of my head and in my face. At the top of the stairs one of the children was holding a beautiful garland of flowers to put around my neck. As is the custom here, you are greeted like a king upon arrival! It is really hard to act humble in a setting like this!

Due to jet lag, it was difficult to stay awake through the visiting and eating and checking emails until a reasonable night hour to retire. Finally, though, the comfort of a long stretch on a real bed and a real pillow was enjoyed and needed.

Welcome to our new blog!

We are so pleased to have an HOCI website and blog! Mel is on his way to India at this very moment, and Tom, Peggy and Myrtle leave Wednesday February 18 to meet him in Ongole. Please keep them in your prayers as they travel. Team members will be posting to the blog during their trip, so I encourage you to check back frequently during the coming weeks to hear about what’s happening in India.

Thanks for reading!
Sara Nixon
HOCI Communications