Second Anniversary - Incredible India

Cancer diagnosis

Today is the second anniversary of my Stage IIB breast cancer diagnosis. It truly feels like another life. In the two months leading up to that day, we were:

-planning our Labor Day wedding at Stanford

-wondering which exotic locale we would visit on our extended honeymoon

- traveling to Cabo San Lucas, Miami and Ft. Lauderdale within two months' time

-finding a weekend that worked for me and Las Madrinas (Jenn and Tara) to plan a shower/bachelorette

-buying a wedding dress that I picked up days before diagnosis, and which still hangs in its bag in my closet

-hell, even setting up this blog so Angel and I could regularly share our ideas, comings, goings, recipes, wines and anything else we fancied

When I look back on that time it doesn't seem like it was ever a part of my life. But it was. It was a wonderful time filled with love, hope and promise.

Cancer changed everything immediately. Most of the changes weren't good; most of the experiences were quite difficult. We've learned that cancer forever transforms your life. But none of the items listed above are things I couldn't do now simply because I had cancer. 

This last point is what #Delhi2013 and A Fresh Chapter is all about. Yes, cancer was - and is - a really big deal. Although we all still experience varying levels of side effects, we are here and we can invest in building inspiring, powerful post-cancer lives. Cancer did not rob us of ourselves. We are here.

India day 3

Day 3 was dedicated to orientation on the NGOs we will serve. Unlike our expectations, our orientation began with picking up the volunteer coordinator in what is easily one of the nicest neighborhoods on this continent. (Think Bel-Air or Beverly Hills.) She took us to a large, lovely Montessori school not far from her home to tell us about the placement & serve chai and cookies on a terrace in the middle of the school. The children at the Montessori are graduates of the programs in the slums in which we'll be working. They still live in the slums and I was thrilled to see them learning in such a beautiful environment.

From there we went to the NGO in Okhla. It was a perfect juxtaposition of Indian wealth and poverty coexisting. As soon as we opened the car door at Okhla we all realized we had to walk across a dirt road that doubles as a sewer. I thought I knew what raw sewage smells like. I didn't.

We quickly passed through the gate to the community center & from then on all we heard was laughter and excited, whispered greetings, all we saw was women and boys with wide smiles in classrooms (the girls learn at a different location) (they also have a state-of-the-art computer lab several LA nonprofits I know would drool over), and all we felt was the joy of the people. During the debrief at Home Base the Country Director said this experience will teach us there are different ways of thinking about poverty. Yes, it will.

We were just there to meet people; the real work starts today. (Unfortunately, I will miss it as my lymphedema started bothering me again and I had to bandage myself last night. I'm hoping a day of rest will help.)

After lunch and an extended Hindi lesson, we were divided into teams and given an hour to accomplish tasks designed to make us feel more comfortable in the neighborhood.  The assignments:

Take the Metro three stops away (during rush hour), come back to Home Base. (This team had a man on it so they couldn't ride in the women-only car. The woman on the team was the only woman riding on the packed car - it was fine.)

Walk into town, find a taxi stand & negotiate some fares, then find an auto-ricks haw stand and negotiate a ride back to our community between 20-25 rupees. (They got back for 20 rupees, but when they realized he dropped them on the other side he refused to take them further.)

Walk into town and purchase eggs, potato chips and other groceries.

My favorite: walk into town, purchase bread, butter, cheese, tomato & cucumber, take them to your flat to make grilled cheese sandwiches, then find at least 5 people to whom you can give the sandwiches (they didn't negotiate much so they had to make them on hamburger buns, but they gave out 10 sandwiches - that was the hardest part!).

My team: walk into town and purchase stamps (the post office closed at 4 - before we left), cold medicine (we quickly found the pharmacy), and an international landline calling card. It was fascinating because we couldn't get a calling card. Indians have so completely embraced mobile technology that no one uses landlines. We visited upwards of fifteen to twenty shops. (We would have had no trouble finding an iPhone5 or Samsung Galaxy.) My favorite stop was the bankers who tried using Google on their iPhones to find a local shop that sells them. No luck. I felt like I was in 3 worlds at once.

No wonder the tourism agency here is called Incredible India.