India Update

The India team spent 4 very short days with the TruthSeekers. We had a wonderful time with them, learning about India's history and and religion. We learned about Phule, Ambedkar and Bali Raja. We washed people's feet and let them know that they are valued and empowered. We will explain more about what we did there in later posts, but if you would like to check out truthseekers go to www.truthseekersna.org.

We went to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, which was also short and rushed, but worth the trip, because the buildings are beautiful. It was so hot, that we had to leave early, but that gave us more time to hang out with our new friends.

Now we are in Mumbai. Today we went to the biggest dump in India, over 500 acres of land, with visits from 3000 dumptrucks a day. Over 5000 adults and 2000-3000 children work as ragpickers, sorting through the trash to find recyclables. Many of these children live near or at the dump, have little to eat and can't afford to go to school. The Hindustani Covenant Church hosts informal education everyday from 10-2pm, so that children can learn to read, write, do math and speak english. We got to visit them today. I spent most of my time encouraging young women who attend school and are learning mendhi to make some money. Most of the other women played, sang, and taught english to kids ages 6-10. All of us received Henna designs. Stay tuned for photos.

Tonight we are going to the Gates of India and the Taj Hotel. This will be a striking contrast to where we were this morning, and we will wrestle with the reality of the very rich living near the very poor.