I FINALLY got to experience the construction rotation this
past week. I was able to go out with them a couple of times actually and it
totally lived up to all the good things I’ve been hearing about it. I’ll be the
first to admit that the idea of doing construction work in the melting Indian
sun did not sound appealing to me in any way. I know that I am here to do work
and it isn’t about having fun and being “comfortable” but I think there is a
difference between hard uncomfortable work and hard uncomfortable Indian
construction work work. But just for the record, my personal reservations had
nothing to do with me not participating in the rotation until now, that was
because my other responsibilities prevented it. And to be honest, all the
volunteers talked about the construction rotation with such enthusiasm that my
curiosity has been peaked for a while. But the wait is over! I have experienced
the construction rotation! And it is hard. And it is super sweaty (but lets be
honest you are always super sweaty in India no matter what you are doing), and
the tools are the most basic you can get, and the labor is all you (without the
help of tractors or machines, etc.)—AND IT IS A BLAST! We are working on building
latrines in one a colony named Chettipunniyum. It is the cutest little colony
just past what I call the Daybreak of India because there are all these
brightly colored houses and apartment buildings down the road from it. The days
I was there we were moving a lot of sand and bricks by loading them into buckets
which most of us carried on our heads--with our hand helping of course, we aren’t
skilled enough to carry things on our heads without our hands-yet. Since I am
staying a year I am going to try to learn the art, but who knows if a year will
be long enough to master it. It's way easier the carry things on your head.
There was a little bit of wait time from when we got there
and when the Indian construction crew got there so we used that time to hang out
with the residence some. I think this is key to why construction is so
fun—because even though it is hard work, you are surrounded by the people you
are serving. Seeing their circumstance and their smiles defiantly kept me
going. The surrounding include the colony Hindu temple, jungleness and monkey
families, which of course helps too. There are a couple of older ladies that
live towards the front of the colony that come out to visit with us and
“monitor” the work. They will talk for Tamil for whole conversations and I know
they know we don’t understand, I just don’t think they care. We don’t really
care either though because we just smile and nod and participate in the
conversation as much as we can anyway. They seem satisfied with it so whatever.
The lady in the pink shirt one, invited me into her house the
other day. She was very excited to show me around the different rooms, show me
the different kitchen gadgets she has, and have me take a picture of her in
front of her favorite picture of Jesus.
The Indian construction staff brings a lot of party to the
construction rotation as well. All the crew is great but especially Milo and
Deverraj—simply because they are so animated and incredibly funny. Milo is the older one and Deverraj is younger. Deverraj and I are actually the same age, which he had a really hard time believing. That was a funny conversation. They both love
calling us “Sista” (it is really sister but it comes out sounding like sista)
and are constantly giving us high fives. They wear turbans which also adds some
flare. Last week they were doing some work on campus and I walked over to say
hello. I could only see Deverraj who called out to me-“Sista! Sista! Sista my
friend hello!” We talked for a few minutes and it was great but his other half,
Milo, was missing. I asked where he was only to be see Milo’s turbaned head pop
up out of a hole he was digging inside off with his broad smile and of course
the enthusiastic “Sista!!” I laughed SO hard. He looked like an real life whack-a-mole
game. If ever I am having a bad day all I need to do is think of Milo coming
out of that hole and at the very least I get the biggest smile on my face.
So......"Can we fix it? Yes we can!" (I’m not going to lie I was
totally singing the Bob the Builder theme song in my head all day long—apparently I
have watched that show with my nephews more times then I realized.)
