How did one month go by so fast? It seems like just a moment ago that I stepped out of the Chennai airport, but now here I am again, ready and excited to go meet my darling husband for more travel adventures, but sad to leave India behind. My last full day in India was perfect. Julie, Michael and I went with Onyx, another nurse named Cristy, one doctor and a health aid on their mobile clinic run to the villages. The ride out in the morning was incredibly beautiful. The bustling streets of the small towns outside Vellore were slowly transformed to isolated dirt roads that led into small villages. Along the way we saw monkeys swinging in the branches, banana trees intermixed with palm trees, rice paddies of the deepest green and the rugged red hills of Tamil Nadu that create such a lovely background for it all. I was almost bounced out of my seat several times as the mobile clinic hit deep potholes, scrambling to grab the bottles of medications that shot out of the boxes on particularly large jolts. We arrived at our first clinic site and while the men set up the tables, Onyx motioned us to come with her and the other women on a walk. She led us on a narrow dirt embankment through the fields of rice paddies, her blue sari swishing as she walked. We continued to walk until she motioned us to stop beside a water-filled field, and we watched as one of the village women in front of us stooped down and grabbed handfulls of green plants from where they grew on the water.
"Ground nut." Onyx said.
I wasn't sure what a ground nut was but I nodded in approval and accepted what they handed to me to eat. I've learned that refusing food in India is a futile exercise. They will feed you whether you are hungry are not. Luckily it's all delicious! The ground nut basically tasted like a raw peanut, and was just a little smaller and covered in a white husk. We stayed out in the middle of the green sea of rice paddies before walking back to the clinic site, and on the way back we attracted some interested and friendly glances from the people in the houses lining the path.
The clinic site consisted of a folding table and chairs under a tree where the doctor saw patients and the mobile clinic bus which served the purpose of private exam room, pharmacy and laboratory. I loved watching the many pregnant women stroll up to the bus, their bellies round under their sarees. They were giving urine samples to be screened for albumin and glucose. Positive test results meant they'd have to make the trip to CHAD for further testing. They all were so lovely in their elegant sarees, jewelry and with fresh flowers adorning their silky black hair. I have to think that a sari would be very comfortable maternity wear, and it still looks so beautiful. They just let out the waist wrap to accomodate their growing baby. I smiled watching the efficient and caring way the nurses doled out medications through the bus window, ensuring that each patient knew the proper way to take their pills. Many of that patients were 'chronic card carriers', a term the CHAD staff uses to describe someone with a chronic disease like hypertension or diabetes because their health record is kept on a white card that the patient carries for life. The patient is supposed to bring the card with them to every visit so that their course can be monitored. The card system is also used for obstetrics patients whose pregnancy and delivery details are charted on a pink card. The system works well and the patients get good continuity of care through CHAD this way.
After finishing clinic, Julie, Michael and I walked around the village a bit and took in the sights that make up everyday life for the people there. A barefoot man in a dhoti herding twenty goats and two cows. A woman sweeping her porch with a homemade wooden broom. Children chasing each other between the palm-roofed huts. In India, there are so many wonderful things to see in the moments of everyday regular life. Even the simplest act, like washing clothes, is an intricate dance of several steps that involves the actual immersion of the clothes in water, the vigoroys scrubbing and the beating of the clothes against a rock or other hard surface. There is so much here that captivates my attention that I find myself snapping photos of things and actions that at home I'd find boring, like sweeping the floor, building a house or boiling a pot of water. India does such things with so much personality and innovation that it's constant entertainment.
Our next stop with the mobile clinic was for pediatrics, and we all grinned watching the masses of chubby Indian babies and toddlers that were carried to the clinic on the hips of their mothers. They don't wear diapers here, but instead are often stark naked on the bottom half or in open clothing that makes the whole process easier. The people here would be horrified by all the money American parents spend on diapers that are then thrown away. The pediatric patients had simple needs, like rehydration salt solutions, cough syrup or allergy medications, so we finished the clinic within two hours. Onyx made a home visit to a man with leprosy who because of the stigmata of his disease, would not leave his home to come to the mobile clinic site.
The next stop was our last, and also where we broke for lunch. Like the day before, we spread straw mats on the floor and sat cross-legged together. This time there were more people than the day prior, which meant more force-feeding attempts. :). We were all much too happy to oblige them, and we sampled spicy eggplant, a fresh and sweet carrot dish amd several other scrumptious concoctions that they brought from home in round tin containers. After we finished eating and washed our hands, Michael, Julie and I were prepared to get back to work but the group clearly had other ideas. It's very typical here to have a post-lunch relaxation time, and they were in no hurry to get back to the clinic. The doctors and nurses asked us to sing, which we three are not accustomed to but we agreed to. Julie chose to impress them with her rapping skills and performed the first few verses of 'Ice Ice Baby', while I went with the more traditional 'Amazing Grace'. They liked both, and thanked us for sharing music with them.
After the concert it was back to the clinic bus to see more patients, and we finished around 4 PM and packed up to head back to CHAD. We stopped along the way at a roadside stand for coffee, and while we waited we fed cookies to the monkeys that scampered in the trees overhead. We would extend the cookies in our hand and the monkeys would watch from above, the brave ones making their way down to reach out and grab the cookie from our fingertips. I was quite impressed by one very tiny fellow who fit the whole cookie in his mouth. We could see the outline of the huge cookie in his tiny cheeks as he tucked it in there and climbed back up to enjoy his feast.
We took pictures of our wonderful CHAD friends before we headed back to the hostel, thanking them for allowing us to experience a completely different side of healthcare in India than we saw in the main CMC hospital. After tying up a few loose ends before our departure, we decided to visit The Golden Temple just outside Vellore that we had heard so much about. Although we have toured a lot in our short time here, we really hasn't seen much of Vellore other than the CMC hospital, campus, Darling's and Gandhi Road. We took a rickshaw to the temple and arrived at the main entrance to the paths that led to the site where it stood. I was amazed at the large amount of people there for a Thursday evening. Because you couldn't take anything in, even your shoes, I volunteered to hold Michael and Julie's things while they went in and they'd do the same for me afterwards. Sitting outside the temple I made quite a few friends. Having light skin and blue eyes does not make one conspicuous in India. A group of four little girls came up, kissed my hands, gave me flowers and posed for a series of pictures which they then demanded to see on my digital camera. Soon their mothers joined in on the fun and we had quite a photo shoot. I had several families invite me to go into the temple with them, and others who just watched me with sweet smiles as they passed by. Two security guards were particularly fascinated when I took a picture on my iPhone, which led to a whole discussion on its capabilities and price. They were shocked to learn the cost of it when they asked me how much I had paid for it.
"Two-hundred." I said.
"Mmm two-hundred. Ok."
There was then a rapid-fire exchange in Tamil before he said,
"Two-hundred rupees, or dollars madam?"
I told him it was dollars and he insisted on examing the iPhone himself, paying great deal to my Peekabo Barn application I use to entertain pediatric patients on my rotations. Even after they had left, one walked by me again and I heard him muttering and saw his smile of disbelief.
"Two-hundred dollars."
Something that so many of my peers in the U.S. have completely rocked his world, and I understand why. It must seem like such a silly and frivolous expense to him, which honestly, it is. But...I still love my iPhone.
Jules and Mike re-emerged and I went in and was immeadiately surprised by the beauty surrounding me. The crowds and dirty sidewalks were transformed to peaceful gardens with statues, long rectangular pools with fountains and an intricate maze of covered tile pathways that led to the Golden Temple. I walked slowly as the evening darkened around me, my step in rhythm with the music that flowed throughout the gardens. I could catch small glimpses of the temple as I wove through the paths, its gold facade shining despite the sun having set already. It wasn't until I was right in front of it that I could fully appreciate how lavish it was. As long as a basketball court and two stories high, it was a fanciful structure resting in the middle of a blue pool, connected by a bridge and completely covered in gold leaf. It was adorned with crystal chandeliers whose light cast such a glow that it looked like the temple itself was luminescent. I circled the entire thing on the rim of the pond, listening to and watching the chanting ceremony going on at the base of the temple. It really was lovely, but I had a bit of a hard time reconciling the building of such an expensive and elaborate temple in an area where people don't have running water or access to healthcare. It seemed that the guru of the temple, Amma, had foreseen such questions and made sure to address it on a large sign outside the temple:
"One may ask why build a golden temple and not a school or hospital? The wisdom gained from the golden temple will build thousands of schools and hospitals."
I wasn't sure where these temple-wisdom-inspired schools and hospitals were, but the temple surely was a spectacle and quite an experience as I exited it and was blessed with sacred water, a silver metal cone was placed on my head, red powder was rubbed on my forehead and I was handed a cup of rice. I'll either have to read about this or ask my Hindu friends the significance of it all because I was quite baffled by it all but enjoyed the experience.
We met up with Cristine and Aylin for our last dinner at Darling's. Everyone was to order their favorite dish, and Julie was almost in a panic worrying that her favorites wouldn't be ordered. In the end, they were, and we had a savory last supper of sweet mint lime juice, fresh lemon soda, kulcha, vegetable kofta curry, bhindi masala, cashewnut masala, eggplant masala and the mushroom pepper curry. We took pictures with our favorite jolly doorman at Darling's, and he informed us that he'd counted the number of times we'd been to Darling's: thirteen. We realyzed he'd actually underestimated it because there were times when we would come for lunch as well as dinner and he wasn't on duty then. Quite impressive I must say, but Darling's is hands down the best, especially the Aradhana A/C Vegetarian Restaurant on the first floor. It was our absolute favorite. Not only because of the incredible food, but because of the charming waiters with their kind smiles and sense of personal style, wearing their white tuxedo shirts with bowties and pure class. My two favorite waiters were a young man with a cherub-like face and a winning smile, and an older man with a magnificently groomed handlebar mustache and a carefully-formed swoop at the front of his hair. We almost told them it was our last night, but in hoping we will return to Darling's for many more meals in the future, we just ate, talked, laughed and enjoyed as usual.
Last night we packed, drank red wine out of mismatched cups from the kitchen and said goodbye to our lovely friend Aylin who leaves for Australia on Saturday. I enjoyed my many chats with her during the past month. She talks with such animation in her hands, using them in a wonderful way to tell hilarious and interesting stories. She told us she wants to come visit the States soon, and we all encouraged her. With the last of our dear Australian friends gone, it really hit me that my time in India has come to an end.
I came here expecting to enjoy my time and learn a lot, but I didn't expect to fall in love with a country so drastically different than my own in so many ways. I've eaten the spiciest food of my life, walked barefoot in places I never would have before, been blessed at Hindu temples, fed monkeys and held baby goats, cried for patients that die of diseases that don't exist at home, learned another world of medicine, was welcomed into homes for food and fellowship, felt crushed by the amount of people yet simultaneously enjoyed being part of the crowd, became quite good at eating everything (even rice) with my hands, smelled terrible things and lovely things and most of all experienced the warmth and kindness of the people here every single day. When I reflect on India I will always think in bright colors because that is how my experiences will be stored in my memory. Every moment here was exciting and rich. Julie described so well how we all felt by saying that being in India was like not wanting to take a nap when you're a child. You are afraid on what you'll miss out on if you close your eyes for even one second.
I typed this at the Chennai airport, waiting for my flight to Singapore. I am happy to have had one last comical memory in my mind as I watched the airline counters opened for check-in. With four lines open simultaneously, you can imagine the cutting opportunities that provided for eager Indian passengers (refer back to 'Everyday India: Cutting). The Air India agent was beside himself trying to organize the lines in which women and children with fourteen suitcases between five of them stood in the middle to see which one moved first so they could jump in. I've learned my lesson by now, so when a man tried to inch past me with his luggage cart, I deftly blocked his move with a sidestep and a smile. One month in India has made me street savvy in a few things at least, even though i havent quite finessed the art of the Indian squatting toilet.
I can't wait to see Landon tonight. One month of watching the sun rise while he watched it set made the miles of separation between us seem endless. I'll meet him at 7:30 PM tonight in Singapore to begin two weeks of fun adventures in Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. I can't wait to share my pictures with him, though no one picture can fully capture what I felt and saw in the moment it was taken. I guess that means that we'll have to go back together to India. I feel like it is written.
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