Liz in India

I was listening to the YouTube song in my previous message, "If the Savior Stood Beside Me," when I opened the following email from Liz, and saw the photo. If anyone has the Savior standing beside her, it's Liz. I could see him reflected in her smile. Here is her email.

"I have a much better attitude today about everything. I went back to Mercy Home (the atrocious gov't orphanage) and even though I still wanted to cry on the way home, it was better. I was able to enjoy my time with the kids more because I wasn't shocked by how they have to live. I passed out toothbrushes and toothpaste, oranges, bananas, crayons and paper, and globs of coconut shampoo. I was there by myself (just me and the driver who doesn't speak English) so I had to communicate with made up sign language. I did recognize a couple words. I cleaned a couple infected wounds and gave a gaunt, sick looking guy some electrolyte/salt replacement powder that I threw in my water bottle. The other volunteer had noticed that he looked sick on Monday so I had my eyes peeled for him. I fed bananas and an orange to the guy who's stuck in bed and can't feed himself. At least he was clean this time (Monday he was laying in his own waste).
Today we (me, Paige the nurse from NY, the health educator, a nurse, and a physical therapist) went to two tribal villages. There were many contenders for the dirtiest child in India contest, but they were so cute. The health educator had them all sit down and we bought 1 rupee crunchy bread like things from a bike vendor who bikes his way around to villages selling his food. There was also an ice cream man, believe it or not. I took his picture. So the kids learned about washing thier hands and not going to the bathroom near food and crops. I don't know how much handwashing there will be since there's one water source for the village... but it was worth telling them about. Paige told me a lot of the kids have TB and she's even seen smallpox in the tribal villages. By tribal I mean the native Indians who somehow managed to not be integrated into the rest of the country as it was invaded by various groups. They're casteless, below untouchables if you can be that far down. Like all kids I've met so far they loved having thier pictures taken. The kids in the 2nd village obviously hadn't seen a camera before. I had to show them what I was doing before I was able to win them over. Then they threatened to trample me when everyone was trying to be in front of everyone else so they could be in the picture. They didn't seem to realize that if they're too close I can't get a picture of anything.
Other than that, I played with the kids at my orphanage, Shenalaya. There's one kid, Mohit, who's got some kind of muscular problem. His feet are splayed out sideways (so he falls a lot, especially because he loves to play soccer) and his hands are really twisted. It's hard for him to speak to. His parents left him here, "temporarily" and they were paying for him to stay here up until a couple months ago. They've never come to see him and they'll never be back. But everyday he sits and waits for them while the rest of the kids play. Today in the classroom he signed that he wanted a photo so I did a self portrait of the two of us. He put his little arm around me and gave me a kiss. The kids here are so sweet and I just hate it that their parents leave them here (or like Radah the11 year old girl with HIV, who was left at a train station) because they're not perfect. There's the kid with down's syndrome and all the cute, happy guys with CP who are perfectly smart (from what I can tell, not being able to speak Hindi).
I'll try attaching a picture of the kids at the village.
Love,
Liz"