I Should Have Disappeared

There was a surprise party in the afternoon for me. I hated it. I cried through the whole thing.

I finally pulled myself together for the program for the kids in the evening. When I arrived there was no electricity, the whole neighborhood was out. But we did something and were able to put a line from one of our co-wokers houses to the Children's home and we were up and moving at 8:15.

We fed the kids and they were very happy with the food. I had it catered by a Chinese restaurant and those guys were great. They brought and did everything, even the clean up. Good move on my part.

We had our short meeting, gave out gifts and went home. It was nice, after the fiasco in the afternoon I was real relaxed in the evening.

I'll put pix up later. Too tired.

I Am Actually Happy

Today is my birthday. I like to ignore it and hope it goes away.

It's not just the getting older thing, it's that I've had miserable birthdays for a long long time.

So, this year I boldly proclaimed that I was NOT celebrating it. We are celebrating all of the kids in our children's Home birthdays tonight. My name will Not be mentioned and the party is Most Definitely Not For ME.

All that to say, I have been inundated with happy birthday wishes, gifts, chocolates, phone calls* and emails since last night at 12:00AM. It's not even 8 O' Clock in the morning and I've had a better birthday than I've had in probably 20 years.

Maybe I should just disappear now til tomorrow so it doesn't get spoiled...

* All of O.'s relatives in Rajasthan called from the village while I was writing this post to wish me happy birthday, EVEN his father. He spoke in their village language, which I don't understand, but I got the sentiments none the less.

Anti-Conversion Law In Gujarat

We got the news last night that the law that had been sitting in the Gujarat State Assembly since 2003 that would prohibit converting from one religion to another - Passed.

The Amendment to the Freedom of Religion Act passed saying that one person cannot convert to another religion without informing the district magistrate (mayor) first. Kind of an oxymoron if you ask me - A Freedom of Religion Act that says you Can't convert without asking government's permission....

The archbishop of Gandhinagar said, “it is outrageous that the civilian authority should be given power to judge matters of faith”.

With you on that one.

So, in light of this new Amendment to the Freedom of Religion in our state we've made the following plan:

"Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart...On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord,... For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."

Taken from portions of 2 Cor. 4 (vrs: 1, 3-5, 17-18)

Rain gods

Once Again I seem to be losing my mind. These pictures are supposed to be loaded on my Flood Relief Blog. Ai yi yi.

Anyway, they're cool, so I'll keep them. Our team to AP returned on Sat. and I got these this morning. As they were traveling through one village there was a procession of people dressed as the gods, trying to convince their goddess to ask the rain gods to have mercy on them.


The darkness is so deep.

Militant Nation

I was looking over at the wood cutting factory behind my house today and saw a tent and a bunch of people in Orange. I thought it was a wedding or maybe because on Saturday Navatri starts and Diwali soon after (2 big Hindu festivals).

Then, a little while ago my nephew, Prakash, says, "The RSS* are training next door."

I said, "I saw them, I thought it was for Navatri or something. So what are they training for?"

"They're learning how to beat people."

"Heh heh, no really, what are they training for?"

"How to beat people."

He went on to say he saw them in another location near to where one of our pastors lives. The pastor, who as a younger, non Christian man, was involved with them, told Prakash what they're doing.

Lovely.

I guess they are in training because of the holidays coming up and I'm sure the Pope's recent comments on Islam play a factor.

Hello, just because he lives in all Roman Catholic Vatican City doesn't mean the rest of us do. Thanks a lot for making bad situations worse.

*RSS is a Hindu extremist organization. They'd like India to be all Hindu. They're main fight is with the Muslims because they're more, but they are also the Christians main adversary in India.

The End Of The Middle Of...

O. did finally return from Rajasthan and the problems there. But he has to go back. Probably on the 25th. His younger brother and sister are there now dealing with things.

The situation is presently in the legal system, so let the lawyers fight it out. At least it will be over - eventually. Til then, O. will be running back and forth.

He's still somewhat stressed out and it's hard for him to concentrate on anything else. More of Satan's ploys.

O.'s Troubles

This Land Problem in Rajasthan is a mess. I cannot even stand to write about it except to say that O. is STILL there. The Land is still NOT registered back in his name.

1 of the 6 brothers is still not signing. He and some others have made a political issue of the whole thing.

O. was evading police on Wednesady night while Praveen's father sat in jail. That got solved through prayer and God's grace AND THEN the next day the "enemy people" went to the mayor of the city to stop the registration saying that we were doing it by force and that we were just here to change people's religion.

Well, that's always a Hot Topic - changing religion. It got everyone fired up.

Fact is, it's our land, they stole it, we BOUGHT it back from them and now they're not willing to sign.

Satan is behind it all. It's SOOOO stressful for O. He cannot even function. He was on the verge of a breakdown on Wednesday night. Pray for him.

Yes, yes, we'd just let the land go too, but his father lives on it, is unwilling to go anywhere else, and because of the problem O.'s father and sister are constantly under threat of beatings and abuse by the neighbors. O. and his entire family was born on the land for who knows how many generations. O.'s mother is buried on the land. So, there's a lot of stuff going on.

Floods in Rajasthan

I meant to load these pictures on my other flood blog, but since my internet onnection had been down for 3 days, I am rushing to do everyting at once. Hence - here they are over here. I figured I'd keep them.

This is the condition of Pastor Johnny's house after the floods and rain. He is one of our pastors and is seen here with his wife and mother.

Green Baby?

For each of my three children, there has been a fruit.

That sounds like the beginning of a B-rated movie.

But really, with E., my first, I couldn't eat enough plums. I ate as many as I could get my hands on. For C., it was strawberries, I probably ate over a pound a day in my later months.

The funny thing is, E. is my darker skinned child and looks GREAt in Lavender.

C., who is several shades fairer than E. and of a pink complexion, looks fabulous in Pink.

For this baby, the fruit I can't get enough of is Guava. Have you ever eaten Guava? It's heavenly. Not overly sweet or tangy, it's actually peppery in flavor. You can eat the whole thing, just cut off the top and bottom and then cut it in slices and add a little salt. Yum.

While looking for the above picture I learned a few things about a guava. It is a berry and it actually has 3x as much Vitamin C as an orange. Go me.

Every culture has it's wive's tales when it comes to whether or not you're having a boy or a girl. In the US we often get predictions from the shape of our pregnant bellies. In India, it's whether you crave tangy or sweet.

Tangy means girl. Sweet - boy.

For E. & C. I definitely craved tangy. Both plums and strawberries are tangy.

But a guava is not tangy at all. Hmmm, we'll see in 5 months if the wive's tales are true or not.

But back to the title of this post. I ate purple fruit and E. came out dark. I ate red and C. came out pink and fair. I'm eating Green this time around...?

Funny, unrelated Plum story. On Sunday one of our Children's Home girls was looking at my hair and said,
"Mommy Sahib, your hair is the same color of that fruit, you know the one that's purple on the outside and red in the middle."
I said, "Plums."
"Yeah, that's the one!"

Addendum

Since writing the above post I have discovered that Guavas have more that 5X the amount of Vitamin C as Oranges. They're like way way high in Vit. C. Way high. (I eat the green outside, white inside ones - not red inside).

Also, while thinking about my unborn child's skin - he could be Olive skinned toned - couldn't he?