300

i really love this movie...and the indian edited version makes it even better.

we have our friends projector so we watched 300 hundred tonight.

you know the men are manly when they can wear briefs and capes and still be really really manly. i mean like......spartan manly.

i still don't really have words but this movie inspires me (and yes its more than the six packs). it makes me want to give myself deeply to something and fight for it with all that i am. it inspires me to overcome my fears. and i wouldn't mind a manly spartan man to come and fight for me any day.

i wonder if other women have the fantasy of being so loved that as your husband is going to his death its you he pictures....i would like to be loved like that.

i wonders if movies really do destroy any real since of love for me??? hmm.....

the pastor's tea is in 3 days!!! i can't believe its happening.

i love that i got to chat with laura on line. i love that i feel so restless but unless i rest i hurt. i love the message. i love david teems. i love that Christmas is coming soon. i love that you can forget that it was thanksgiving weekend this weekend.

Snakes and sickness

so on Friday, Sonny (st member) and two boys from the gatch got to go to the botanical gardens. it is the largest banyan tree in the world. its really cool.
well on the way out of the gardens....we kinda got lost. not lost really but i didn't know that to reach the main gate would take an hour!!!!
however during that hour we found three snakes. two of the snakes were in the water and the third was just actually a snake skin....it was 8 ft. long!!! it was so awesome. we picked it up and the boys took it home to show everyone. i can only imagine what everyone thought.

Beth and Sarah have the same weird fever thing i had. its fever and extreme joint paint and just pretty much makes life miserable. i am sure that between the tree of us over the past 3 weeks have logged hundreds of hours of movie/TV shows on DVD because its the only thing we can do and not move but still be entertained. pray for us and them. today my feet are killing me...i know it sounds like i am making it up but I'm not.

i love that i got to see my friend gordon and his wife last week. i love that sister karina knows my name and what we do. i love that my room is clean clean clean for the first time in three weeks!!! i love Lilly and Alistair. i love that lilly can make me laugh and still makes her husband of over 30 years laugh. i love that the word "terd" is funny. i love that the word "terd" is not listed in teh spell check and comes up as a mistake.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

so for breakfast i just finished a piece of frozen peanut butter pie and a cup of french coffee.....and i am thankful for that!!!
we had a really good thanksgiving. we have about 25ish people at our house from four different countries (Holland, New Zealand, America and England (real pilgrims here folks!!)) and we had a feast. Sarah is an amazing cook and made home made stuffing and mashed potatoes. we had four desserts. and tandoori chicken in place of turkey. it was by far the best thanksgiving i have had here. and i ate so so so much food. so much food that i felt rather ills and so so so tired.
here is a video link that Sarah made:
http://www.facebook.com/n/?video/video.php&v=7654894179
this morning we had heaps of dishes to do but i was quite happy to do them because my main responsibility yesterday was to get the rolls for our dinner...what i am trying to say is that sarah beth and her team were amazing.
after dinner we had to go around the room and share what we were thankful for:
i said that i am thankful for a life that i couldn't of planned, asked for or even ever wanted. it gives me faith that God has a plan and i am were i should be.
it was such a nice evening.
even got to talk to my family and one of my aunts in Texas.

God really does put the lonely in families. and you know that verse....whoever gives up house and home for me shall get it back......that is true as well. i have family here...brothers sisters, moms, dads, uncles, aunties, from all different parts of the world. its quite amazing how God fulfills His promises....not in any way i could of planned, but i guess that is why He is God.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!

i love peanut butter pie. i love that we had gravy packets and it tasted just like home!!. i love that this morning we finally opened our french coffee that our English friends had bought us a long time ago and it was divine. i love that our friend Henry went to the same boarding school as the prince of England. i love that my aunt patsy makes me laugh. i love that my dad and step-mom are worried about me. i love that i get to go to the gardens today with two guys on the servant team and two guys form the gatch.

Om Shanti Om

This is the new and improved Sharu khan.....and this is the poster of him they are using to promote the movie!!!

There is nothing like a good bollywood Hindi movie that can make me love India more. On Friday night we all went to see a Hindi movie called Om Shanti Om. this movie is huge here right now.....i know that in America we have huge blockbusters but this is HUGE!!!!! The star Sharu Khan is basically a god here. and in this movie he got all buff for the first time. and he looks good.

if you have never seen a good Hindi movie...they are great. It has beautiful people, in beautiful clothes, dancing and singing. it is really an experience.

and yes...we sat through a 3 hour movie in another language and was totally entertained. that is the beauty of Bollywood.

so if you ever get a chance...go see a bollywood movie. it will make you love India.

Here are some links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Om_Shanti_Om

http://www.omshantiomfilm.com/

I love that veggie tales makes me happy. i love this sound ange sent called "i wanna". i love that the matthew perryman CD laura sent me softens my heart. i love the book i am reading now "half of a yellow sun". i love that i used the end of a sari to block the whole in my room where pigeons have been nesting......i will defeat them!!!! i love that yesterday in boggle i spelled "sword" and words. i love that i am alright at boggle even though i am such a horrible speller. i love that the pigeons are looking at me right now plotting how to get in our house!!!!

It was a dark and stormy night......

............and all was quiet in Kolkata!!! So the storm totally missed us. It didn't even really rain. The wind blew some time last night before we went to bed but no storm. we had filled up all our water buckets, i bought a little extra food. all our water bottles were filled....and nothin'.
but i heard that bangladesh was hit really really hard....inches and inches of rain.
pray for them.

i love boggle. i love that my mom might come visit in februrary. i love that my mom called me this morning. i love that today is cold. i love that i have blue playdho sitting on my desk.

a storm is coming

so i got an email from ange asking about the cyclone.....i thought...what cyclone:

checked the weather channel on line.....and tehre is a cyclone coming.....it says we could have winds tonight up to 80mph!!! what is that!!! i thought these things only happened in florida. so my hurricane instincts are kicking in.....making sure we have water food etc. i might even board up our windows if i had some boards.
will let you know how it goes.

i love waking up in the morning and feeling that happy feeling. i love love playing boggle. i love that yesterday at boggle i spelled, lancer, lanced and lance....thats 8 points!!!! i love my burt's bees lip balm from my mom. i love thta the servant team helped me address over 170 envelopes for the pastor's tea!!!!

God's promises

So sometimes, i don't let God take care of me...or anyone for that matter. and its always better when i do. i was given a hard no today....not really a no but the usual you have to wait that i often here due to the fact that i am a wild stallion. and Today God showed me this:

"in repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.
You said, "no we will flee on horses.
Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; He rises to show you compassion. For the Lord is a God of Justice. Blessed are all who wait for Him!
Isaiah 30:15-16 and some of 18

and then He told me this:
I will fight for you.
I will keep you.
I will not forget you.
Do no fret.
I will direct you.
I have engraved you into my hands.
You are mine.
You are precious.
I am honored.

so.....yes folks....it was a good day.

went to the doctors, got some test, will no tomorrow.

i love Peter in the bible. i love that beth brought us home KFC. i love that we are ging to watch grey's and i am totally obsessed with that show. i love that my room is totally out of control messy at this point. i love that sarah prints us off colored coded calenders for us to use.

throwing eggs off our roof

so, maybe my fever came back...everyday, since wednesday......its getting better.

but today we had three guys from the gatch over to our house today. i think i have written about them before.

well today we had an "egg drop contest". i found a whole bunch random things around the house; a pack of klenex, a box, newspapter, sari scraps, tape, plastic bottles and a tupperware container and the boys had to make an egg protector. then the contest was to see if they could make an egg protector that would protect the egg after we dropped it off our roof (5 stories)

we started by dropping their contracption from me standing on a chair...and their egg made it.

then we dropped the protected eggs out our window.....and the egg didn't break.

then we went up on my roof. josh (a servant team member) made a parachute and attached it ot eh box that became known as the egg box. this is when i realized the randomness and wonderfulness of my life.

i looked over the edge of my 5 story flat and down below were to amazing teenage guys from the gatch and a servant team member trying to get people to not walk on that part of the side walk so they wouldn't get killed by a flying box.

and then on the roof with me was our friend S, and josh.

and there was something so freeing about throwing a box with an egg wrapped in Kleenex, and sari and put in a plastic container with a bright red, sari parachute off my roof. i smiled and giggled and thanked God.

and the eggs....yes they put three in the box...never broke...even after falling 5 stories from our flat.

the boys did such a good job.

i Love that i haven' been feeling well and even though i am 31 i want to talk with my parents. i love how good of a job my roommates have done taking care of me. i love playing. i love that today i got to take a nap. i love the we all blog stock each other in WMF!!!! i love that the three of us were looking at pictures from the board meeting and were jealous........how was it ange and court and jesse and liz and everyone that was there?????

a weird kind of sickness

on monday i did my laundy. i accidently poured a lot, alot of soap inside the laundry. so it took me fore ever to get all the soap out. and by the end my wrist were on fire.
the next day at sari bari, i got to make rolls, check blankets, wash and dry blankets. i loved it.

(on a side note, sari bari is awesome. we are starting to wash, dry and pack the blankets here. they are specially folded and put into plastic bags when we send them. its so amazing and so professional. sarah has even designed a numbering system so they can be tracked. its like a full on real amaing business. One of the ladie, C, was staring at all the blankets on the self in bags and i asked her what she was thinking. She said " manish, they are just so beautiful". i agree)

so at around 4:00 at sari bari my knees starting really aching and i started limping (i hadn't felt all that well since monday) and then my wrist starting hurting and by 6:00 i was in so much pain. i finally laid down. and to sit and get back up was so painful. i thought that maybe i had squatted to much when i did launday and hurt my wrist as well????
i went home that night and my knees were swollen and my wrists hurt so bad.
i woke up the next morning and felt even worse. to move it hurt and i felt feverish.
then the fever came during the day. not really high but up to 101.5 and my joints just ached. i was walking around like a crippled women.
then last night i took more medicine and woke up with no fever.
and my wrist and knees still hurt but not anything like yesterday.
and i feel a bit better.
weird eh? our downstairs folks have had a similar type fever but theirs lasted for 3-4 days.
so pray for my knees and wrist. i don't know what i would do if i couldn't move around and play and do what i wanted to do.
and yesterday i watched 8 episodes of the Cosby Show!!! and it made me cry and laugh again.

i love the Cosby episode where theo gets his ear pierced. i love that a girl on the servant team is a nurse and can understand a lot of medical jargon. i love that tomorrow is Kali Puja/Dewali and the sky and roads will be filled with candles and fireworks and Christmas lights. i love that charoletet and Julian and maya and her family are coming to spend the night. i love that the cosby show makes me miss my dad sooooo much. i love that i get to go on a trek in march. i love that this morning there is no fever!!!!

baby steps

sometimes i resent baby steps. i can see where i want to go and see who i want to be or what i want to happen.....and sometimes it just feels like i will never get there.
i get so impatient and judgemental and i forget that life is mostly about baby steps. its not about the sprint but the journey.
that is defiently part of getting older.... you learn you have to wait...a lot....but that things will change.
i remember praying on a rock when i was 17 to Jesus, that i would follow Him if He would fix my family and make me not angry. of course, you can't know when your 17 that is would take God 14 years and lots and lots of baby steps to answer my prayers.
so right now....i mind my self in two place....my impatient self, wanting to change things now and have everything fix now so i don't have to hurt and walk through things......but now i have this mature voice of God's Spirit calling me to walk through it all and learn and grow and have grace for myself and the people around me.
i pray for courage to walk the right road.

today we found P!!! and guess what....she was the women who's daughter was taken by her husband....Her husband brought the little girl G, back this past week!!! her husband got really sick and thin so he couldnt' care for G anymore. that is amazing!!! i think that prayer did that.

i love that tomorrow i get to take sari bari ladies to the doctors. i love that on saturday we are going to have three boys over from the gatch and have an egg drop contest. i love that i my friend just popped up on skype. i love that the word dookey makes me laugh!!!

I think that no one can see me.....

so i am having this realization in my life. i have this fear, like most people, that if you really knew me you wouldn't love me. there are all these reasons why i believe that, reasons that i won't go into now, but.....
what i am finding is that i think that no one really knows me. i think that i am hiding behind my walls and no one knows or sees any of my insecurities or faults. so i think i am hiding and all these people that think i am wonderful and amazing i have a hard time accepting their love because i think " they don't know me. if they really knew me...they would leave".
but i think that is a lie.
my friends and family know me. i may not express my inner most thoughts with people but i wear my brokeness just like everyone else. people know me.
and i lift my head up long enough to realize that no one has left me. in fact, i am surronded by friends and family who love me.....and not just love me...adore me.
and i am humbled because of my self-loathing and my inability to accept what love i am being given.
and humbled at my crappy job of hiding my wounds.
so to all my amazing friends and family...you know who you are, thank you for seeing me and loving me.....and maybe loving me even more because of my brokeness.

i love sarah and beth. i love that my friend michelle turned 30!!! i love that renata and kim are pregnant at the same time. i love that srah fights for my dreams. i love that silas, in addition to mad counseling skills, can also fix thing. he is fixing our door and window. i love that my friends ange and court love fall so much.