Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Team India (I couldn't think of a good title)

Attempt 2. The good part about my last post being deleted is that now I get to write about more stuff. First, I want to pick up where Antje left off because I feel that the couple of sentences about our meal to celebrate the 4th didn't do justice to it. I think I speak for us all when I say that food is the thing we miss most about home (just kidding,it's for sure you guys but food is second!). That's not to say that we don't enjoy the food here because we definitely do, as Rita is an amazing cook, but eating American food made us realize just how much we miss it. The girls ended up getting good 'ol fashioned cheeseburgers, while I got filet mignon (about 20oz. of filet for $8? Yes please!). Dexter decided to order a "Whopper" which we thought was the same as the other burgers but with different condiments. To say we were wrong would be an understatement. It was literally the size of his head and weighed 5 pounds. Even if that's an exaggeration, it's not much of one?the thing was HUGE. Anyway, finished the ridiculous amount of food, which was a team effort and we topped the meal off with some apple pie and a nice food-induced coma on the drive home. Great conversation, great company, and way too much food? Perfect way to spend the 4th abroad.



On Tuesday of last week Prem took us to the India Bible Society headquarters because he had a meeting to attend there. While he was in his meeting we got to look around the exhibit that they had there, which was basically a visual display of the history of the Bible's translation into different languages. It was really interesting seeing some really old versions, some as old as the 17th century. By far the best part, for me at least, was seeing a piece of the Qumran Scrolls (aka Dead Sea Scrolls). The particular piece we saw was from the book of Isaiah and dated back to the 1stor 2nd century BC. My parents should be happy to know that contrary to my previous belief, there really are things older than them out there (just kidding, love you guys). They also had some other cool novelty biblical things like the entire Bible on one page and the book of John made into an image (I can't explain it, but a picture is worth a thousand words...literally, I guess)





I wanted to take some time to write about a pretty cool opportunity that Dexter, Antje, and I got to experience. On two consecutive days last week a teacher at the school was absent and Rita asked us to fill in as substitute teachers. This particular class was the Vocational Training class, which is a class for some of the older kids where the emphasis of the curriculum is put on practical life and job skills. The first day was...let's say "rough". Antje was working on another project for the first day so it was only Dexter and me running the class. We were initially kind of hesitant to be assertive with our authoritative role. In addition, the kids' only previous perception of us was as the goofy American kids who liked to joke around and play games. This DEFINITELY did not bode well for our control of the class. At several points during the day we told the kids to do something and they simply replied "No." That was frustrating, to say the least, and made us feel like we had lost control of the class. However,by the end of the day I think we had figured out the necessary balance of being assertive yet not unapproachable. This balance went a long way the next day. The kids were much better behaved and Antje being there made it much easier to give each kid more attention. Overall, it was a very teaching (yet positive) experience.



-The Team's worst blogger (Brian)

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