Pre Calcutta Thoughts..
In less than 24 hours, I’m on my way to hopefully be what will be an experience of a lifetime. As the time for departure has gotten closer, I’ve found myself searching the Internet for stories by people that have been there. They are few and far between, especially by people around my age group (the 40 plus age group!).
Most of the blogs I’ve found haven’t been all that inspiring. I’ve found one or two that were very good and caught the emotive side of working with the Missionaries of Charity on Bootsnall–but other than that, pickings have been sadly slim. I haven’t found any blogs that have gone into any depth about the intellectual richness of the city, either. Volunteers blogs about their time there seem to focus exclusively on the day to day volunteering and the various forms of escape they’ve needed to sustain themselves in what must be a very challenging situation.
Many volunteers only go to help out on their way to another destination, or perhaps go for no more than a month. I haven’t found any blogs by anyone who has been a very long term volunteer like I am planning on being (I am planning on being there for 5 months, with a view short breaks thrown in for my sanity).This is why one of my major goals while there is to write a blog with daily journal entries describing the experience of both volunteering and of being in the city itself– so that future volunteers can read it and get more of a visceral, immediate idea of what it will be like.
I wonder what it will be like to be in this dirty, crazy, and polluted city for so long and how it will impact my state of mind, spiritual life, and health.
I think right now my biggest worry is about health and the risks that I am about to take. Even on the streets of Calcutta, rickshaw-wallahs have the cough of tuberculosis, let alone in some of the homes Mother Theresa established that I will be working in. And that’s just one of the many contagious illnesses that I’m about to expose myself to. I even worry about simple things like food poisoning so on, because I’ve had the luxury to prepare my own food for over a month now and I am no longer accustomed to having to eat whatever is served to me.
I think about my own spiritual life and path, and I wonder how will being in a place with so much suffering day after day fit in with my beliefs? What will it be like to live for months on end where people practice a caste system and people are doomed to the be the lowest of the low because that was who their fathers and grandfathers were? How will this experience change how I look at humanity as a whole?
I worry about the noise, the lack of privacy, all the people packed together in tight, stifling conditions. I think of the strong smells, the choking fumes of car exhaust, the mud and the human excrement in the streets…I can only imagine what it will be like, and even my imagination fails me now.
I worry about how I will deal with taking care of myself, with validating taking care of myself, when I will be surrounded by people who literally have nothing and are dying on the street. How will I walk by them everyday? How will I look at that child lying in the street with nothing? How will I look at myself?
I think about why I have wanted to go be a longterm volunteer in Calcutta for years and years, and now that I’m actually going to do it, I wonder what put it into my mind as a young girl. How did she think such an experience would impact her young life? Now that I’m actually doing it, how will it impact me and everything I think and believe about who I am–my identity?
I think about the growth ahead, for which I am both excited and nervous. I have the sense that a tremendous amount of self growth will happen in the five months ahead, and I have no idea who I will be when I am done. It’s scary and tremendous all at the same time.
At the same time I am thinking about all of this, I think about the tremendous cultural capital Calcutta is. I think of the challenge of learning Bengali… of meeting writers, artists, and poets … Of watching films and going to book fairs… How can all of this exist next to the other side of Calcutta?
I’m about to find out.
gigi
Tags: 1
illuminate.gigi
Online medicine order: indian pharmacy – indianpharmacy com
canada drug pharmacy: canadian pharmacy 24 – canadian pharmacy checker
canadian pharmacy ed medications Licensed Canadian Pharmacy best online canadian pharmacy
legitimate canadian mail order pharmacy my canadian pharmacy review canada drugstore pharmacy rx
medicine in mexico pharmacies: Online Pharmacies in Mexico – mexican online pharmacies prescription drugs
top 10 pharmacies in india: Cheapest online pharmacy – indianpharmacy com
https://indianpharmacy.icu/# buy medicines online in india
medication from mexico pharmacy mexican pharmacy mexican pharmacy
Online medicine home delivery п»їlegitimate online pharmacies india reputable indian online pharmacy
https://canadianpharmacy24.store/# reliable canadian pharmacy reviews
cheapest online pharmacy india: reputable indian online pharmacy – indian pharmacy paypal
canadian medications: Large Selection of Medications – pharmacy rx world canada
indian pharmacies safe indian pharmacy delivery world pharmacy india
canadian pharmacy mall: canadian pharmacy 24 – pharmacy canadian superstore
best online pharmacy india: Generic Medicine India to USA – Online medicine order
canadian compounding pharmacy canadian pharmacies that deliver to the us canadianpharmacymeds
medication from mexico pharmacy mexico pharmacy mexican pharmacy
india online pharmacy: top 10 online pharmacy in india – best india pharmacy
prednisone 250 mg: prednisone 10 mg over the counter – prednisone 200 mg tablets
how to get amoxicillin over the counter antibiotic amoxicillin amoxicillin 30 capsules price
amoxicillin capsules 250mg amoxicillin 250 mg price in india amoxicillin cephalexin
http://zithromaxall.com/# where to buy zithromax in canada
where buy cheap clomid without prescription: cheap clomid price – where to buy clomid without dr prescription
zithromax generic cost: zithromax 500 tablet – zithromax buy online no prescription
https://amoxilall.shop/# amoxicillin 500mg buy online uk
https://prednisoneall.com/# prednisone 20mg prescription cost
cost generic clomid without insurance how to buy generic clomid can i get clomid
prednisone buy no prescription 60 mg prednisone daily buy prednisone no prescription
http://clomidall.shop/# where buy clomid without insurance
http://prednisoneall.shop/# prednisone 50 mg canada
cost of prednisone 5mg tablets: prednisone 5mg daily – no prescription prednisone canadian pharmacy
prednisone 50 mg price: prednisone 10mg buy online – prednisone brand name us
can i purchase generic clomid pills can you buy cheap clomid no prescription where can i buy cheap clomid no prescription
http://amoxilall.shop/# amoxicillin in india
order amoxicillin online no prescription: amoxicillin 500mg price – buy amoxicillin without prescription
amoxacillian without a percription: amoxicillin 500 mg without prescription – medicine amoxicillin 500mg
can you buy amoxicillin over the counter in canada amoxicillin without a prescription amoxicillin over the counter in canada
zithromax capsules price zithromax z-pak where can i buy zithromax uk
http://zithromaxall.shop/# zithromax 250 mg pill
http://clomidall.com/# where to buy clomid no prescription
purchase prednisone from india where to buy prednisone 20mg no prescription best pharmacy prednisone
https://amoxilall.com/# amoxicillin 500 mg
where to get cheap clomid without a prescription: how to get clomid without prescription – where can i buy clomid no prescription
zithromax for sale 500 mg: zithromax antibiotic – buy cheap zithromax online
where to get cheap clomid prices can i purchase generic clomid tablets can i purchase generic clomid prices
prednisone 5mg daily prednisone 20mg price in india buy prednisone 20mg
http://prednisoneall.com/# prednisone buy cheap
https://zithromaxall.com/# zithromax buy
over the counter amoxicillin canada: amoxicillin without a prescription – amoxicillin 500 mg for sale
zithromax over the counter order zithromax without prescription zithromax 500