March - April 2009
The ride from the airport to our shelter for our one month ICO – In-Country Orientation was an uneventful one. Must be that everyone was too tired and eager to go to bed at 1am in the morning. I call it ‘shelter’ because it does not resemble like a Hotel in one bit and does not have the fine ‘homely’ facilities like in a Guesthouse. The shelter is a simple structure like an old hospital building abandoned and made into a temporary shelter for the aged…hmmnn…. Everything smells like old wood and dust, and there were tainted lavatory, western-indian style toilets, wobbly and skeletal beds with mosquito nets treated with medicine for anti-malaria and there hanging the controversial dust covered ceiling fans. Everything is covered with dust, not only the ceiling fan, and some dusts were all around residing ages ago and began to turn into permanent wall paper or placemats or outer layer of the banister or sand carpet along the corridors. No wonder, I got cough and phlegm every time I woke up in my steel bed and stone pillow. Thanks to my wonder pill “anti-allergic celestamine”, the nights went undisturbed. Frankly, if we stayed there for more than a month we will turn into the ‘Sandmen/women’ from the desert of Oogly.
These and all did not discourage me one bit, the more I see the dust the more I want to be like a sand woman. So sand woman I became. Woman to Dust, Dust to Woman. That’s how it is! But hey, no matter how many times we clean the dust, it’s still there the next second. Well, at least new dust comes in and old nearing permanency dust will be gone. A cleaner was assigned but still some old permanent dust (‘dirt’ in technical term) still resides along the corners of the room and on the bathroom floors and tiles…lurking and inviting more dirt to come…
Enough of these dusts, the rooftop is the best part of the shelter. The best place to see Delhi by night. It’s a nice place to breathe and relax in Delhi from the dusty roads. Never knew that Moon and stars gazing is that fun until I met Cristina, the surreal one who never ran out of stories of war in Romania and other countries and Joe, the music crazed hippie who never ran out of tales of personal adventure and teenage romance gone awry (?)... Miss you guys! The rooftop had also became the venue of all volunteers to chat, sing, dance and drink after the grueling Hindi, Bengali and Oriya language classes. It is also the haven of those volunteers who are insomniac! Well, I’m not one of them but sometimes I sympathize…err…quite a lot of times actually. Thus, when I came to my placement, I longed for sleep and sleep I did as early as 8pm until 7am in most days.
The ‘Shelter’ is the meeting pot of all new volunteers from all over the globe. I can say now I am proud to have met these inspiring and dedicated and admirable volunteers from America, Canada, UK, Romania, etc. They never cease to amaze me by their tales of adventures and work in their placements.
The ride from the airport to our shelter for our one month ICO – In-Country Orientation was an uneventful one. Must be that everyone was too tired and eager to go to bed at 1am in the morning. I call it ‘shelter’ because it does not resemble like a Hotel in one bit and does not have the fine ‘homely’ facilities like in a Guesthouse. The shelter is a simple structure like an old hospital building abandoned and made into a temporary shelter for the aged…hmmnn…. Everything smells like old wood and dust, and there were tainted lavatory, western-indian style toilets, wobbly and skeletal beds with mosquito nets treated with medicine for anti-malaria and there hanging the controversial dust covered ceiling fans. Everything is covered with dust, not only the ceiling fan, and some dusts were all around residing ages ago and began to turn into permanent wall paper or placemats or outer layer of the banister or sand carpet along the corridors. No wonder, I got cough and phlegm every time I woke up in my steel bed and stone pillow. Thanks to my wonder pill “anti-allergic celestamine”, the nights went undisturbed. Frankly, if we stayed there for more than a month we will turn into the ‘Sandmen/women’ from the desert of Oogly.
These and all did not discourage me one bit, the more I see the dust the more I want to be like a sand woman. So sand woman I became. Woman to Dust, Dust to Woman. That’s how it is! But hey, no matter how many times we clean the dust, it’s still there the next second. Well, at least new dust comes in and old nearing permanency dust will be gone. A cleaner was assigned but still some old permanent dust (‘dirt’ in technical term) still resides along the corners of the room and on the bathroom floors and tiles…lurking and inviting more dirt to come…
Enough of these dusts, the rooftop is the best part of the shelter. The best place to see Delhi by night. It’s a nice place to breathe and relax in Delhi from the dusty roads. Never knew that Moon and stars gazing is that fun until I met Cristina, the surreal one who never ran out of stories of war in Romania and other countries and Joe, the music crazed hippie who never ran out of tales of personal adventure and teenage romance gone awry (?)... Miss you guys! The rooftop had also became the venue of all volunteers to chat, sing, dance and drink after the grueling Hindi, Bengali and Oriya language classes. It is also the haven of those volunteers who are insomniac! Well, I’m not one of them but sometimes I sympathize…err…quite a lot of times actually. Thus, when I came to my placement, I longed for sleep and sleep I did as early as 8pm until 7am in most days.
The ‘Shelter’ is the meeting pot of all new volunteers from all over the globe. I can say now I am proud to have met these inspiring and dedicated and admirable volunteers from America, Canada, UK, Romania, etc. They never cease to amaze me by their tales of adventures and work in their placements.
@ the 'Shelter' steps...
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