REPRESENT

(a mid-blog)

sitting there, my mind started to think off on a tangent. although we may not see how others view us, how do we represent ourselves to the world? do you show yourself as attractive? unappealing? proper? offensive? strong? weak? ... the list goes on.

i mean think about it, how did we come about these self-expressions?

there has to be some sort of filter. a guide. something that has narrowed our decisions to get us to where we are now. for some, it could be an event in our past, good or bad. or it could be someone we look up to; god, a family member, or a friend. there is a theory that says culture is the fastest way humans adapt. in other words, it is the fastest way to get humans to change.

like teenagers watching mtv and drooling over the latest one-hit-wonder. groupies.

how sensitive are we to culture? if you are who you claim to be, do you show it?

the reason why i mention this is because of something that happened at the bank the other day.

customer: "can i please have a copy of this check before i deposit it?"

teller: "i'm sorry sir, our policy does not allow us to make copies."

customer: "why not?? the branch where i live makes copies for me all the time."

teller: "sir maybe that branch makes an exception for you every time, but according to policy we cannot make copies. i'm sorry."

customer: "give me the check. what's your manager's name? i'm going to report that this branch has horrible customer service!"

if one teller represents all tellers for that bank, shouldn't we all have a unionized image? one person can ruin everyone's reputation.. if you catch my drift.

take for example these "christians"

really now? -______- aren't they supposed to love thy enemy?

and i'm sure you can all relate to this one:

oops i mean ***COPS who try to get at you for the most nonsense reasons! this is where you say, "you call this disturbing the peace??? REALLY?!"

have we forgotten who we represent? we decide how we want to portray ourselves based on things that are important to us. sure, you may hate homosexual people, but what about the others in that group you claim to belong in, do they also? sure, you say you protect the people but instead you're taking advantage of your powers? has it gone to the point where we forgot who else we are affecting? more importantly, the ones right under our noses, those amongst ourselves. the people who wear the same badge you're wearing!

there's no i in team!

If you are who you say you are, be it. Representation requires attraction, and if you're ruining it for everyone... that's not attractive at all.

REPRESENT

Hyderabad, India; day 2/4

Day 2 - the Leper Colonies

Leper Colony 1.

shunned from society, the lepers are forced to live in the outskirts or in little encompassed communities such as these:

as soon as they see our truck, they quickly gathered up on the sheets by the entrance to form an audience-like crowd because they knew something was in store for them. some even brought their previously used bags because they knew they were being fed today.

the kids were so grateful.. they would say thank you after you give them food and even after you answer their questions. lol. a group of girls asked me about school. they were like, "are you in college? what do you study? have you graduated? where? what do you want to do?" of course my usual response to those questions are "UH... getting there... not sure yet?? im still trying to find it..." and i'd say it in total embarrassment. i've been taking baby steps alright.

Leper Colony 2.

this is actually one of the fortunate houses within this leper colony that we visited. This house in particular belonged to our tour-guide/church-friend Sarah and her hubby Abraham. Limited electricity..

and only sunlight lit the kitchen.. she would have to light wood to cook. she said to us, "I'm praying for an electric stove"

they were blessed with a huge speaker! and a blanket. (that poster was her wedding sign; and those are their real names)

couple doors down was a "hospital". The lepers would come here every morning to get their lesions disinfected and banded. The lady doing the bandaging is actually Sarah's mom! The elderly lady getting bandaged started to cry a little when we got there. She was saying that her leprosy has not healed yet and it has been going on for too long and she just wants it to stop. Basically with leprosy, it progressively eats away your skin and through to your bones painlessly. so one day you can have a pinky finger, and next week it's just a stub and you didn't even notice. In this woman's case, she fears her foot is eventually going to deteriorate and she will be forced to walk on crutches.

a few of the neighborhood kids were running around playing. they ran up to our hands, grabbed them, and tugged us to come play with them. Julian and Sierra couldn't resist the offer

We returned to the main place where they gathered because the trucks with our food finally arrived. It was mainly women and children, very few men?

i took this pic from afar. looks like she was explaining to the other one what exactly was going on.. or they could be playing a game. I really feel for these kids who are born into these types of communities. They have no choice but to live within the walls of the leper colony without knowing what's on the other side of the wall? .. ??

passin out rice..

i dont know if you can see it on your screen, but if you look at these ladies' fingers, they have the lesions from leprosy. you can see that their limbs have been eaten away. They have no fingernails and some were missing whole fingers

day 3 next!

Hyderabad, India; day 1/4

finally... 4 months later!

Dear Mac Users,

firstly, i had planned to empty out my memory card before i went to India. so i saved my photos in a folder and hit delete and my mac looked like it deleted everything.. but for some reason my canon said it only had 140 picture space available? ?!!?!? a little frustrated, i figured that's all i would need.. right? well after my india trip i found out that with macs in particular, you also need to delete the photos in your trash box. -____-. then you'll be back at the however many gb's you started with. keep that in mind.

My friend Julian and I have always wanted to travel to a 3rd world country to help out (see bucket list post). so when Jubilee Church had an ad for an opportunity to go to India, we saved up our $$$$ and made it a reality. =)

I woke up super excited. "I'm going to INDIA!!!" i screamed. I've only been talking about it for.. ever. I checked my luggage.. made sure i had my itinerary.. and brought along a little pouch for rupees. Julian met at my house.. prayed a little prayer with mom & grandma.. and Vinny was ready to send us off to SFO airport.

like i've said, I love the airport. So many different cultures all in one building. The plane ride, however, was a dreading 16 hrs.. complete with tv's on the back of the seat in front of you, and uncomfortable back rests. Julian and I were still looking for our group, but we figured we'd see them once we've landed. off to india!so this right here is the airport in india. The golden arches never fail to stray from you, even if you're 1938749183 miles away... haha. We eventually found our group. the weather was wonderful. warm, around the 70's... (at night).about an hour later, we settle down in our hotel rooms. looks like your everyday hotel room, right? Coz it is.. Our group leader, Pastor Michelle Bernal, said "This is your oasis, you have a shower, toilet, and bed. We'll come back here after our missions, but when we're out there, there's no turning back. You'll have to wait til we get back to the hotel".we started out at 6am. i guess india wakes up early? I could hear the toots from the car horns and the vroom's from the motorcycles. almost everyone had either a motorcycle, or was traveling by taxi (the mini yellow cars). They looked like.. hmm.. the kid rides in the middle of the mall that cost like 50cents to ride. All automobiles looked shrinked compared to the auto's in the U.S. that's julian.and that's india's common ant! huuuuuge ant! about 3/4ths of an inch.

our first mission was at the dumps. as you can see, they made their own tents out of whatever they could find.. there were hundreds of them.. india doesn't really do much about these dumps coz very few people care.. and because there are so many, funding for them is an issue.

i pulled back the blinds in the bus and the first thing i see were these 3 excited faces.. they were SO happy to see us! They waved and we waved back. I turned to julian and said, "dude we're really here!" before we got off the bus, Pastor Michelle said, "keep all your stuff safely hidden. they will steal. and remember, we are there blessing, we are here to love them and pray for them."

they loooooooved to get their pictures taken. they'd always tug on me and say "one photo!" haha. it was cute. they'd make some silly face, then grab my arm to look at their picture and laugh their hearts out as if it were their only form of entertainment

we brought them some candy and every kid would come up to me asking for more. lol. i'd tell them, "i'm sorry i dont have enough..." i felt sooo bad.. but we packed them some food to hand out in the church (white building). we brought rice, oil to cook, and something from the lentil family called dahl.

we told them to form a line before we could pass out one of each, but since they were so hungry i think i saw a few people come in twice, or using their children to get seconds. we wanted to be fair, so we tried to give one per family. they had to have a ticket to get the food.. then we saw fake tickets.. then they crowded at the door! "one at a time!" it was chaos.. you can see julian at the door trying to hold them back because they would barge in like 10 at a time and we couldn't keep track of who was getting what. we even had to form a barrier by holding hands with eachother so nobody could sneak a bag for themselves. i felt horrible but if you're hungry, you do what you gotta do to get food, right.

some of the group members were amazed at how rowdy it was getting. we were giving them food, but they can't just steal seconds... we had to be strict.
we closed up all the doors of the church so nobody would snatch a bag. it made me wonder, how long do they have to wait for another batch of food? who gives them food? how long do they go without it? Pastor Michelle said many organizations like us help them out, but on some days nobody would come at all. they can be food-less for up to 3 days =\

afterwards, we ventured off into the neighborhoods

one of our group members brought her guitar and started singing christian songs to them. in this one she was singing Jesus Loves Me and she changed the lyrics to "you". =)
i'll have more tomorrow! so stay tuned.

currently:

i'm at daddy's feelin like a bed-potato coz just this past tuesday i woke up with a bad fever. 102degrees. =\. vinny took care of me all day. (thank you). i was hot & sweaty with goosebumps, had a throbbing headache, and dry coughs w/ phlegm. (how could a dry cough have phlegm? hah, trust me, it hurts). so today i went to my union city doctor and he said i have bronchitis. =T. he gave me a prescription for phenergan w/ codeine (yes, codeine) for the painful cough and augmentin for the infection caused by bacteria in my bronchioles. on top of that he suggested i continue using tylenol to reduce the fever. o_o. siiigh. such nice weather outside! i have work tomorrow though, i dont think i can make it. i already called out one day. eep. oh well. more tomorrow! back to water & rest..