My India Group

I thought that it might be helpful to give a little bit of information on the field study members that I will likely be referencing regularly as I tell of my adventures in India. But I willl warn you, you won't here much mention of the Bylakkupe people over the next several weeks. They are off and gone and I won't see them until the mid semester retreat in the middle of October. I'll spot light their group members first, proceding alphabetically, and then I'll introduce you to the village people (and I'm sorry if that reference brought the chorus of YMCA or Macho Man to your mind...fyi, I have a goal to teach the children in the village to dance to YMCA...I'll get video documentation)

BYLAKKUPE PEOPLES

Ben & Kate:
Ben is our India facilitator. This is his second trip to India. His first experience was last summer when he conducted research in McCloud. He is a sociology major studying identity. He's a good guy and a good resource for anything India or research. Or first night in Delhi, our travel group wished that we'd had him as a cultural broker to teach us how to eat our breakfast. It would have been a lot less embarrassing than having the nice pajama-clad manager come to our room to show us how to break our meal and dip it into spicy goodness. Oh well.

Kate is Ben's wife and she is awesome. She has some field study experience as well. Last year she conducted a field study in Ghana. She has been adopted as the group big sister. She is sweet and wondeful and so kind and helpful and enjoyable. She was telling me her conversion story the other day and she is just amazing. I can't think of anything negative about her, or anything negative coming from her. She graduated in anthropology recently and her research is on Tibetan folklore.

April:
What can I say about April? She is great. I think of her like a little sister. She is a lot of fun to be around and is always providing a dialogue of just about anything that pops into her head and it is highly enjoyable to hear her many disjointed thoughts. She's a good, happy kid and I enjoy being around her. I can't quite recall her major, I think it involves middle eastern studies and her amition is to become a religion professor. Her research is focused on Bhuddist views of suffering. April is great. She is one of those people who I naturally feel comfortable teasing, in a friendly way, of course.

Melanie:
Melanie is essentially one of my favorite people of all time. I am so excited to be sharing parts of this India experience with this girl. She is a psychology major, soon to graduate, studying compassion in Tibetan Buddhism. She is one of the most fun people I know. She has a fabulous sense of humor that keeps us all laughing, and she is a great leader, a hard-worker, a talented vocalist and just a really together person. She also keeps me in line, which, let's be honest, is something that I pretty much need on a regular basis.

VILLAGE PEOPLES

Ashley & Nate:
Ashley & Nate are fabulous. I love them both and am excited to be with them in the village. They have been married for about a year and are one of the cutest couples I know.

Nate is a good guy and is so cute with the village kids. He and Ashley will be the acting facilitators in the village and Nate will handle business matters, as that is most appropriate in this patriarchial society. He is an advertising major and is researching something relative to that.

Ashley is an anthropoly major and is studying women in education. She is really nice and kind. This morning she was showing me pictures of her family. I'm excited to get to know her better these next few months.
Gwen:
Gwen is probably one of the most intelligent people I have ever met. She is amazing. She is a nuerocience major and is here doing an internship at Shanti Ashram, a nearby NGO, where she is doing something with health. She and I share a room and will get to know each other really well, I'd imagine. We tend to have adventures when we are together, especiallly after dark. Yesterday we had a good ol' time trying to get home from Covai as we waited half an hour for a bus that didn't stop for us, even when we chased it down, and when we caught another bus it got a flat tire. But it was a fun adventure and we laughed the whole time.

And then there is me. I won't bother with another picture of myself. If I had to try to describe myself as a member of the group, I would probably say that I am the really optimistic, excited one. I am loving India! And I love the people that I get to enjoy it with. It's a good life.