Monday, July 26th - Travel to Dharmapuri

(Note: Read the previous posts, below, if you want to hear about the trip in chronological order.)

We got up very early to leave at 5am for the Bangalore train station. (As you can see, Rosy and Ruby were almost too tired to see us off.) There was actually very little traffic at that hour-- I remarked that it was the fewest people I'd seen in India. James noted that the frequent power outages prevent things from keeping going, 24 hours a day. I like that, a society that actually sleeps.

Getting on the correct train was a bit interesting-- I was glad we had Thangaraj (and his little son Ignatius) with us, and even so we had to move back and forth several times, and when the train did come we still had to trot over to the right car. (Note that it was so early in the morning that when we arrived back in Bangalore a few days later, the train station did not even look familiar to me. I was sure I had never been in that place before, till we got into the actual station itself. But, as always, at least there was chai!)

The train ride itself was glorious, though the more complaint-prone members of the team might disagree. It didn't seem long at all to me, because we soon were traveling through about one of the most beautiful places on Earth. I don't like to underestimate God, but I sort of didn't know there were places so beautiful. Red plowed fields, rows of banana trees, grazing goats, lush green crops, forests of palm trees-- all in front of the backdrop of mountains rising up so abruptly, silhouettes frames against the gray sky so starkly, that they hardly seemed real.

We got to the hospital mid-morning, and let me tell you, if you have to go to an AIDS clinic, it might as well be one in such a beautiful location. The actual hospital just opened last August-- the last time the Pathways group visited, it was still being finished, and all that was open yet was the small, definitely less hospital-like clinic building opposite (which is what's pictured at left). That's where the nutrition program is now located (they get balanced mixes of grains, nuts, etc. and grind and package them for patients who need daily nutrition supplements in their diet), as well as some tailoring classes. While the hospital and classes do also serve people without HIV, they are an invaluable service for people in the area who are HIV-positive. Often regular hospitals will refuse to treat, let alone operate on, HIV+ people, or will charge them prices that are prohibitive for most people, because they say they have additional costs in needing to replace supplies that they cannot use on other people after that patient. It is also hard for HIV+ people to find work, so the tailoring classes give women skills they can use to earn money from home. (FYI, the lower picture is the waiting room in the new hospital.)

As long as I'm giving background-- one of the reasons HIV/AIDS is a big problem in this area is because while it is in a pretty rural area, Dharmapuri (about 65,000 people, according to a quick Google search I just did) is located along the national highway. Truckers who go away for work, often up to a couple of months at a time, visit prostitutes or have affairs in the big cities they go through, and bring the disease back to their wives (and often their future children, if the family is not diagnosed or the woman does not have access/information to seek treatment that will help prevent mother-baby transmission). A lack of education about HIV and how it is spread, as well as (not surprisingly, given the former circumstance) great stigma on those who are infected, exacerbate the problem.

So anyway... back to our story. That morning that we arrived in Dharmapuri, we prayed with a few patients who had come in to see the doctor, and heard a little bit about their stories.

After lunch, we went out into a village-- crowded and small quarters, but cleaner than I'd pictured-- and did some health presentations (on such topics as how germs are spread, personal hygiene, nutrition, etc.) Unlike in Bangalore, most people here don't speak English, so everything was with translators.

In the evening again we went to another village-- where we were instantly mobbed by children, rock-star style (like, before we'd even climbed out of the ambulance). The kids mostly could speak English, and that first group all asked "what is your name?" and "what is your country?" I tried inquiring the latter question of a couple of them, but I don't think they quite got the joke, solemnly replying, "India."

One girl asked me "pray for this child," indicating a younger girl accompanying her. I crouched down and said we could all pray together, at which point the girl broke off into a rapid prayer in Tamil. Apparently it is not so important that we be the one doing the praying, but that we show up and join in.

We then did our health presentations again-- this time, it was mostly the children gathered, with the parents and older people sitting in doorways or leaning against a house across the street-- and then an enormously cheesy Indian AIDS awareness movie was shown.

Oh, and a final gem to leave you with today-- at right is an utterly adorable, sweet little girl (and her beautiful mother, or I assume her mother, anyway) with whom I engaged in an enchanting game of peekaboo. You don't need to speak the same language-- baby-flirt is universal. :)