India Part I

I don’t know how one place can steal your heart again and again... but I do know that India keeps digging a hole deeper inside me. My love for this wild, hot, overwhelming land is stronger than ever. I’ve been back in the states for a few weeks now but as soon as we landed, I started packing up our home, moved to a new state, found a house, moved again and have(almost) unpacked all of our things... and I've suddenly realized that I haven’t even had a second to think about everything that happened across the sea. 

India was HOT. I’m talking dripping wet all day long, frizzy hair, sticky, hot. We arrived in the Himalayas and had an amazing festival among the unreached where people got to hear about Jesus for the first time! Thousands came to our field each night. When we prayed, mute began to speak, deaf ears were opened, blind whited-out eyes received their sight and the demon possessed were set fre! God really showed Himself to these beautiful people and their faces are still there when I close my eyes. One morning, we got to have a women’s gathering in one of the most beautiful villages... over one hundred women came to hear about Jesus. Tears streamed down their cheeks as they heard about their beauty, value and purpose in Him. Broken hearts were made whole and every one of them received salvation! It was an amazing time! The day after our festival we drove to the deep jungle to have church and got to baptize around 20 people in a rushing river... it was picture perfect!

After our festival we had a chance to visit a few breathtaking cities. Even though we have lived in India and travel there a few times a year, we have never gotten to do really tourist activities like visit the Taj, famous old forts, ride elephants and camels... so that’s what we did! It was fun and exhausting! Especially because it meant waking up at 4 am to catch trains and flights every morning. I didn’t see any other foreigners with kids... but we sure did get a lot of stares! Leona was super! We had diaper blowouts for over 2 weeks of the trip... but other than that.... super! 

Our first stop was Varanasi, the birthplace of Hinduism. We visited this city a few years ago and found that not much had changed at all.. life moves at a slow, steady pace there. The things you see are unlike anything in the world. Bodies are burned and dumped into the famed Ganges river, people meditate and sing and bathe and drink from the shoreline each morning. “Holy” men charm snakes, cows and fish and monkeys are given food for good karma, women shave their heads as an offering for their gods... we walked the tiny alleyways of the city in awe.

 The other places we visited were Delhi (my home away from home), Agra and Jaipur. The Taj Mahal was literally breathtaking. I’ve never been so overwhelmed with the beauty of a building before! And the love story behind it was like a fairy tale. Jaipur is a new favorite city of mine. The forts were incredible and the views were stunning. We did some fun shopping there too and made lots of friends with shop owners, sipping chai. I really love that each city is famous for a specific type of creative art. In Jaipur it was the stamped textiles made from vegetable dyes in every color! Agra is famous for it’s marble, Kashmir for it’s rugs and scarves... India is the creative person’s dream!

 The most challenging part of the trip did not end up being our backpacks... it was carrying the baby! You'll see that I'm holding her in almost every one of these photos. She did not want to be put down (or it was impossible to put her down on the dirty, crowded roads) and would rarely let Samuel or Lauren hold her. Some days I could feel my arms shaking because I was so physically exhausted... it was like vacation when she sat in the stroller! She did great with the food and even ate spicy things. We rationed her snacks really well and actually had some left over at the end of the trip. Washing everything by hand was no problem... I just dont think I can bear the smell of Deft detergent anymore! I actually preferred washing clothes with their bars of laundry soap. Our saving grace with the wee one was a few episodes of Strawberry Shortcake on the Ipad, in-flight magazines and pages of stickers. She watched Tangled 4 times on one of the flights home! With no sound! Sometimes you just have to let them do what they want... especially on a long trip when everyone's just exhausted. Lauren was laughing at me one day because I was feeding Leona breakfast on a train, reading to her, packing a bag and applying lipstick all at the same time... gotta do what you gotta do.

 India is a stunning place and there are exciting things to come! Can't wait to return!