High and Lifted Up

When I first got to the work site I just thought this work was impossible. I mean, surely THIS can’t work. People cannot live here. We just needed to evacuate everyone and start over. Surely, that could be the only way. This just won’t do. As the week evolved and the functionality of this community came to light, I saw true beauty in what was happening. This work is about more than building a house – it’s about watching people being lifted up.

This community lifts itself up, lifts each other up. You’ll see a child crying, and it doesn’t even matter whose child it is, but the closest older child will lift him up, kiss him gently on the cheek and carry him off to another child – a little chain-link system of lifting up.

We too are here to lift people up. This simple house is more than four brick walls with a roof. We’re literally helping this family lift itself up off the ground, getting them safely above flood levels, above the open sewers of the street. We will see them high and lifted up, as God does.

It’s our ultimate unifying desire, to feel the loving embrace of being lifted up.

All this time, we too are being lifted up. We’re being held in the loving embrace of God. We’re being lifted above the “sewage”, the messes, in our own lives that we may trudge through and wallow in. We’re being transformed – our eyes open anew to the realities of this world – the realities of the poor, the importance it is for each of us to have someone look us in the eyes and say, “Yes, I see you. You are a child of God and I love you.”

The lyrics of “Open the Eyes of My Heart Lord” kept coming to my head as we were working this week…
To see you high and lifted up
Shining it the light of your glory
Lord, pour out your power and love
As we sing Holy, Holy, Holy.
Open the eyes of my heart Lord
Open the eyes of my heart
I want to see You
I want to see You.

I want to see You

When this week began I was not prepared, not ready, to see the things my eyes were being opened to. That’s the amazing, transforming power of mission trips. God’s power got me through until I was strong enough to see on my own what He wanted me to see.

Habitat has a saying that it’s not about the house. No, it’s not about the house. It’s about life, beauty, our common bond. It’s about doing the right thing. It’s about being love in the world. It’s about lifting up.

Namaste, Kat

Superman

The man in this picture is not exactly the portrait that comes to mind when we think of Superman.  No leaping over tall buildings in a single bound for this guy.  Not exactly the uniform we expected either.  The emblem on the T-Shirt looked familiar, but that blue plaid wrap and the whole thin as a rail appearance while straddling the sewage drain just did not seem to fit the superman image I’m accustomed to.

That is, until I thought more about him on our last day in the slum.  It was that time when we were dedicating the house, or at least our part of the work on the house, and heading to the air-conditioned hotel and a nice congratulating meal at the end of a week of hard work.  I thought about him while we got on our air-conditioned bus and began to bounce down the dirt roads and past the place where they kill and pluck each chicken so it is fresh since there is no refrigeration.  I thought abut him when we passed that cart that was carrying “fuel” for fires which is another way of resourceful living by people who scoop up dung from the cows, mix it with straw, form it and dry it to sell for cooking fuel.

That is when I came to see this man as the real superman for a completely different set of heroics.  This the man who gets up every day, aged as he is, and finds another way to make it through the day.  Not until Friday afternoon at 4:00 when it’s time to leave but all day, all night, every day, every night.  Suddenly the measurement of hero was not about being faster than a speeding bullet; it was about being steadfast in the face of whatever life throws at you.  And the image of “good” was reformed and now defined as being able to hold a nearly naked child in this place and offer a smile and comfort, as he did.

When we get back, help us remember that the hero’s are the ones we left behind.  We pray that God has strengthened them through our work as your prayers and your reading of our posts have strengthened us.

The last shall be first…

Today is our last day on the worksite.  It is a day of goodbyes, but also a day of new beginnings, new understandings and new connections. We have witnessed the gut-wrenching poverty, heart-warming hospitality, and the life-altering working conditions of these beautiful people.  My hope and my prayer is that in the touching and often tearful goodbyes, that our hearts will break open to the fullness of God’s love that we have experienced in this place.  As the last day here, may it also be the first day of new opportunities for this community, and for us as we move forward, changed by this experience.

We know that this kind of living conditions breaks God’s heart.  May it also break ours.

Namaste, Linda

More Information

Bhalalswa, the community in which we are providing service, was created about ten years ago, when a slum  closer within the city was removed, and the people place in Bahlalswa.  Families removed were given 12 square yards of property, or 18 square yards of property; thus the small homes in which we are working, and the need, for space,to build multiple stories.  One team, in digging for a septic tank, has evidence that the area was filled at one time.  So, the people were moved to a poor location, with too small of space, a distance from jobs, with poor infustructure.  Overall, a tough hand, with subsistence  living conditions. We are told that most of the residents are day laborers.  Some of the residents may cook with bottled  gas.  There are others who cook with fodder from processed sugar cain.  The sugar cain fodder can be seen in a cement tank depository on a corner in the community.  At this point, I do not know how it gets there.  Maybe the residents collecting acquire the fodder, or maybe it is supplied by a governmental service.   More later.

Kurt Daniel

Cricket and More

There is good news in the witness of Rev. Andy Stoker’s first ever cricket pitching performance.  That is….we don’t have to worry about losing him to the British or the Indians for this highly competitive game that none of us really understand.  On one of his first pitches a local teenager hit the ball so far it went past the hogs, past the sewage, past the water buffalo, over the pile of bricks and over the standing water that is a breeding ground for mosquitos.  Andy was quickly put back to work on his best skills – learning Urdu and Hindi from the locals and carrying bricks.

Andy is a gift to our church and a gift to this trip.  He is breaking down barriers in communication that can only happen when the people you are trying to reach realize that you respect them.  But Andy is not the only one.  What is most enjoyable to me as the person here who has traveled to India the most, is to watch how others respond.  Shock and Awe is not just a code name for a military campaign.  It is the response of everyone who is willing to confront the contrasts and contradictions of this remarkable country.

Without exception this is a group that is responding to the call of Jesus……”come, and follow me.”  Our mission is an exercise in faith, a “boot camp” of community building, a search for understanding, and a willingness to avoid the drive to bring closure and instead to embrace process.  To those reading this at First Church, know that if you ever traveled to where we are working you would be welcomed because of the kind hearts and giving spirits of this remarkable team.

While none of us will miss the environment in which we are working, all of us will miss the connection to the people we are learning from here in Delhi.  And here is a closing comment about what we are learning.  During our ant like routine of carrying bricks from one pile to another, I witnessed a grandmother washing the hair of her grown daughter.  It  was a 30 minute wash and included laughter and conversation throughout.  As we discussed in our small group devotion time, there is an opportunity to redefine poverty and wealth – absence and abundance.  in the US we have such a tendency to use economic definitions for these terms.  But their is wealth in a relationship, abundance in the family, when a mother and daughter take 30 minutes to car for each other in a most personal way.

I hope today, with someone you care about deeply, that you take a few minutes to redefine abundance and invest some time in that relationship.

Frank Roby

100 Paces

100 paces. That’s what I counted Tuesday when I walked from the 5′ tall stack of bricks with four loaded on my arm to relocate the stack closer to the meager home we were beginning to build. That’s 100 paces one way. Round trip makes 200 paces. I did that for almost 6 hours straight….breaking to carry gravel or sand instead of bricks. I was not alone. More than a dozen of us dedicated our day to this routine. Hot, little shade, the stinch of raw sewage, and an uneven stone and dirt 8′ wide path shared with half dressed children, stray dogs and an ox or two.

What kept us going, smiling and motivated to do this over and over and over although we were drenched in sweat, covered in orange brick dust and aching from the load we were carrying? The people of this community.

They watch our every move because we are the first white people many have ever seen, but mostly because they are curious and kind and want to know us. With huge cultural and language barriers it would seem a relationship on any level would be out of the question. However a smile breakes all walls and has helped us create the foundation for this community to trust our presence and excuse our invasion into their lives.

Our walk up and back the path hundreds of times is a walk through their “homes” because their lives are lived on the street. During our 100 paces we saw men sitting cross-legged next to soapy buckets of water to bathe, an old lady brushing her long hair with oil, women sorting baskets of grain, others washing their dishes in mop buckets, children playing, elders sleeping, homeowners sweeping their dust-laden stoops.

There is a rhythm, a calm, a routine and a sense of pride in the people and their daily movements. There is obvious care shown to their belongings, but especially to their children. There is warmth and gratitude extended to us, the invaders, because they see through our continual 100 paces that we are dedicated to them, and that what we are doing is making a positive difference in their lives.

This is a slum. Poverty on a level so overwhelming we are often left speechless. But this is their home, and it is an extreme privilege to be welcomed here, to work here and to learn about life here.

Counting my blessings, Karen McCleskey

Making Masala

Like any good recipe, making masala takes a variety of ingredients, paying careful attention to the proper order, good guidance, and patience. Unfortunately, I learned today that despite my early enthusiasm for learning to make a traditional Indian dish, “masala” translates to “mix” and my masala would not involve chicken, curry, or any other traditional spices.  Instead, it would involve sand, rocks, cement powder, and water.  This was not your traditional Indian masala, but rather, as you and I know it, cement.

The day involved hauling LOADS of sand, rocks, cement bags, and water in order to mix cement and mortar in the streets so we could continue to build our brick walls (all three sites in a similar process).  For the group it was a constant shuffle of bringing the right ingredient at the right time to make the perfect masala.

 – Andy and Jennifer Scripps

Step 1, haul the sand. 30 buckets of each.  Follow the same process for the rock, as necessary for cement (vs mortar).

Step 2: Haul cement (50 kg bag). Our cement expert carried it on his head.  The team preferred to share the load and go two per bag.

Step 3: Mix cement and sand

Step 4: Haul the water.

Step 6: Add water to mix, and mix.

Step 7: Don’t forget to haul the brick

 

Step 8: Pass the brick to the mason.

And eventually you make a wall (site with walls at floor height after day 3. This is the same site that had the wooden house on it day 1).

Correction! Correction!

Posting late in the evening can lead to typographical errors which can lead to some pretty serious misinformation.  In my Tuesday night posting I had stated that the home dimensions were 15′ by 30′.  I meant to say 15′ by 13′.  Obviously a significant difference.   But the actual dimensions are less than that.  Today I step off the interior dimension of the home we have under construction, and it is 8′ by 12′.  And remember, part of this space will be a steep stairway to the second story.  Another matter.  Both gray water and sewage on the surface are significant problems, both for our neighborhood and for the country as a whole.  Part of our construction task is building a septic tank, which will be located under the first floor of the residence.  There is no space for it to be anywhere else.  If Habitat and its partner organization are successful with their intended building in the project area, there will be many homes with septic tanks, and therefore less sewage on the surface.  We will hope for this outcome.  At this point I believe the septic tank will capture outflow from the toilets, but probably will not capture water from washing.  So, looking forward, the neighborhood will continue to have gray water flowing in ditches on the surface.  I also stepped off the distance of the walkway; that is, the area between the homes facing one another – 8′.  We had a great day on Wednesday.  We accomplished much work, and we had great interaction with our fellow works, the owners, and the neighbors.  We did not come to necessarily to be appreciated, but it is certainly nice to be such.  

Kurt Daniel

Pics from Michael’s camera : A day in the life

We all love Delhi traffic! :

One of our three work sites:

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Salvana, one of the homeowners:

Megan Stoker workin’ hard!:

Neighborhood children always greet us with a smile:

Rats!!!!!!!

Our first day in Bhalaswa slum was simply indescribable. Trash everywhere, raw sewage and the accompanying smell, tiny homes filled with lots of people, cows, pigs, chickens, and as we soon learned…….rats. We were on our first break of the day. Our leader, Linda Roby was sitting on some bricks when suddenly a rat appeared from nowhere, hopped over several bricks, ran by inches from Linda and disappeared into a nearby pile of rubble. I was laughing at Lindas terrified expression when two more rats appeared. One ran between my legs. This being a church trip and with the Reverend Linda within a few feet, I screamed like a girl, and shouted “Golly!!!!!!” or something similar to that. Just as quickly, these rats disappeared as well. Linda and I did the heeby jeeby dance where you stomp your feet and your whole body shudders. Then, just like the rest of mighty Team India our work team laughed, shrugged our shoulders and went back to work.

Randall McCleskey