Sunday, May 6, 2012

my prep for part two

     So, now that part one of my year has officially come to a close, we are moving on to part two. This is the part that is going to get a little crazy, mostly because I will be in India. Right now I have been focused on gathering my supplies: proper shoes, shots & medications, long skirts, food, etc. Many of you may have already heard about my previous adventures to India, but for those who have not I will provide a brief introduction to where I will be and the organization that I will be working with.
     I will be in Chennai, India. If you haven't recently brushed up on your Indian geography (which is expected of no one), this is in the Tamil-Nadu region, taking up the south eastern portion of India. They speak Tamil there, with which I can only manage to say "hello--vanakom" and "thank you--nandri" (spelled phonetically). It is incredibly hot there plus a thousand degrees of humidity. It smells completely awful and there is trash everywhere. This may all lead you to wonder, what in the world would make me want to live in India for three months, especially since I have already experienced all these horrors twice! But really, once you get to know India all of these things don't matter. You put on what I will refer to as your "India eyes." I don't think I can adequately describe what I find so enchanting about being in India in just a couple words, so I suppose you will now be forced to rediscover it with me through my blog posts this summer (I've trapped you).
     My main focus when I am in India will be with the organization Rising Star Outreach of India. It is an organization that my family and I have been working with since they were starting out. It was created by a family friend who encouraged us to come out and volunteer in the organizations early days and since then we have all been hooked. My first trip to India was the summer before my freshmen year of high school when I went with my mother and two older sisters. I anxiously awaited my next visit which came four years later, the summer before my freshmen year of college, and after spending a semester interning in the office and keeping close ties with the organization here in the states, I am now going to be spending an entire summer in India working as a volunteer coordinator for the organization. I was thrilled when they offered me this position, because (I'm not afraid to say it) I think that I'll be great at it, and I think that it will be great for me.
    Rising Star Outreach is an organization that works in aiding the leprosy afflicted. If you have now become nervous of me developing leprosy I will calm your fears and tell you that this is highly unlikely (...and that there are about a thousand other diseases and parasites in India that you should be much more concerned about, but I promise I'll be careful). Because many have not crossed paths with anyone who is leprosy afflicted, I am linking to the Wikipedia article that can give some background info, because whoever wrote that said it better than I could. And...here you go.
    For more information please explore Rising Star Outreaches website (www.risingstaroutreach.org) or feel free to ask me any questions through blog comments, e-mail, or facebook. And hey! If you have ever been wanting to take a service trip or wanted to see India, then it's not too late to come and volunteer for a session this summer!!

peace. love. and part two

1 comment:

  1. Okay, just so you know, I'm now a hooked devotee of La Vie est Belle...love you sf or amf or whatever...

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