Some thoughts on these effects I'm feeling....

I have been in India for over six weeks now, and have decided to extend my time here. The closer I come to leaving the more I dread leaving the children, I did not expect to let myself become attached, but I believe that it has happened. As much as I have changed and grown is as much they are a part of me. I can only hope that in these few months my effect has been half of what theirs is on me. I am leaving from Delhi on May 16, instead of May 3. I am going to spend the last two weeks of my time in India traveling around, I am considering some different options, but have not finished planning my trip. I would like to go to the North to Himachal, or far East and into Nepal. I think that I will choose the later, because it will enable me to see more of India, and well I've always wanted to go to Nepal. This would send me through Pushkar, Varanasi, Darjeeling, then Katmandu, from there I would fly to Delhi, and the fly to Paris from there on the 16th. My plans are very loose, so I am looking for advice on where I should go.

My time at the orphanage is coming to a close, I have been reflecting on my experiences and about these children. I started here being petrified by the way that the children were treated and by the conditions in which they live. Through time I still find myself angered by there mistreatment and lack of resources, but I started to see the beauty much more clearly. I know that the women who work at the orphanage need to have a tough skin. They live there life's seeing children who have lost love and if they they have too much love for them they also risk a world of hurt and loss. So to find the balance which they live on would be very difficult to achieve. They love the children, but are quickly prepared to let go. It is this aspect that I have the most admiration for them, and strive to be able to inflict change in these types of places by having such strength. I feel pain when I think about the skewed ideas of punishment and the darkness that fills the life of these children. Between the age of 0 to 7 the children only go outside once or twice a year. Unless they go to school, which only a few have that luxury. Most of them, even if they are of age, don't attend school. The punishment I am talking about is the use of hitting. These children have been punished so often in this way that it is very difficult to get them to listen to any other form of discipline. Some of the women, the other volunteer and myself hate the idea of hitting a child, but we have all been in the position where it becomes the only option. I feel that those women who are in the orphanage more permanently and show the children love with out abuse, they are making a huge difference in the orphanage and in the children's life. I feel that with more time, and more Hindi, I could do the same. Since I don't have that I can just let this be a lesson and vision into my future. I think that the children are misbehaved and beyond wild because of these aspects in their life, which I despise. They are however happy, they live with all this pain from their past, in the present, and to continue in their future, but the keep a measure of real happiness. The women show them an unorthodox love and volunteer's like myself pop into there life's for short periods to give the affection. Somehow this becomes enough, along with the companionship of their peers. They don't expect to lead extravagant lives, but will be happy with the ability to live. This is beautiful. These are the people in the world who I want to work to better their lives. Even with all of their setbacks, a chance at education would be so huge for these kids, also to reform the mistreatment that becomes so natural for good women to inflict. These thing seem so small in our world, but I am learning that our world is very removed from the real world. I wanted to help and see to the world, but two months ago I did not expect that this trip would turn into a scream for change, that I might actually be able to make heard. So this has changed, my goals for the future. I can feel it being created here and will spread though nations. Hopefully I do have the ability in which I imagine myself having and can one day have real resources.