kolkata! its the new indian name for calcutta. the city of poverty. its true, there are a lot of desperately poor people here. it doesn’t help that every year during the monsoon the entire city has to swim through five feet of water. i’ve been doing things like being mauled after giving homeless kids under overpasses one rupee coins. and getting attacked by a deranged crow that attacked me from behind, drawing blood. so if i come down with some rabies-like bird flu in the near future y’all know where it came from. and trying to avoid being suckered in to buying powered milk for “needy” mother’s “starving” babies – they sell it back to the shopowners as soon as we leave. as if i’m the first person to wrestle with the issue – it is really tough to know how to deal with extreme poverty as a mere passer-through without just perpetuating it by breeding dependence.
kolkata surprised us, though. although there are way too many millions of the world’s bottom billion here, there are also millions living well above the poverty line. kolkata is the cultural capital of india. there are more well-versed english speakers, expensive coffee and confectionary shops, and well-stocked bookstores here than anywhere else in india. yes, you read that right!
we (devin and i) are staying at the couple-hundred-years old calcutta ywca – because our friends are staying there and also because they have an atrium with a dirt tennis court. we’ve had some pretty intense games. we’ve also been eating some amazing food. if north indian food is savory and spicy (actually most of the time its pretty bland), then bengali food is sweet and tangyyyy. i have embraced eating with the right hand (that is – exclusively the hand). i’m going to miss that part about india. i won’t miss the stuff necessity sometimes forces you to do here with your left hand.
yesterday we went to mother teresa’s house and grave. there are now thousands of nuns following in her footsteps all around the world. devin is going to volunteer at the missionaries of charity home for the dying – really wish i could too but unfortunately i leave tomorrow so there isn’t enough time. did some soul searching while reading about her life in a little museum – while right above us a bunch of nuns were making vows committing the rest of their lives to the service of the poor.
