TV

We are a home without at TV. When we moved here 5 years ago, the cable-wallah couldn't believe it when I told him.

But there we have it - the truth - our last TV was in the village of Tumbagarah. On a monsoon day similar to today a bolt of lightning struck it and it died. Sheba had just gone through the trauma of discovering a husband who wanted to watch every European Cup football match and probably thought it was divine mercy on her. Maybe it was. We never got it repaired and it probably is mouldering in some garbage tip there in Jharkhand.

But not having a TV does not mean that we don't know what is on it.

The papers and internet and other sources are enough to keep us abreast with some of the trends. After various series of 'reality shows' which included riding motorcycles across India, living in a house with various celebrities, losing weight in the company of other weight-challenged brethren - the latest is a notorious skin-showing lady who is acting the simpering bride as 10 men woo her - the finalist getting to marry her live on TV.

But the cake has to be taken by our dear friends from Turkey. Now, for the first time ever official clergical representatives from 4 faiths try to convert 10 atheists on TV - with the prize seeming to be a trip to the holy place of the faith that they are converted to. Read all about it: here.

At the end of the day, Neil Postman was right: we are amusing ourselves to death.

Finding out

Web sites are interesting beasts.

One of the things you can find out from even a simple blog like the one you are reading now is whether a person has come to it using a public search engine like google or yahoo. Not only that, most of the time you can find out what words they used to find the site.

The Jeevan Sahara Kendra site gets between 0 and 20 hits a day. I checked it up yesterday and found out that one of the search strings which someone used and which got them to our site was:

"after meeting prostitute how quick we can go for hiv test in india"

Our hope is that the person who made the search and came to our site was able to pluck up courage and make a call about coming for testing. We are glad to be able to provide real answers to people who are worried.

Our hope is further that not only will the man who looked come for testing, but that he will also change his actions.

Why we need in-patient care for people with HIV

Why do we need in-patient care for people with HIV?

Two simple reasons:

1. Admitting patients with HIV saves lives. Many people who are called "terminal cases" are not. They are very sick and if they get admitted and given supervised treatment for their infections they can recover and live wonderfully productive and meaningful lives. A terminal case can only really be said once the person has died.

2. People with HIV still are discriminated against in health-care settings. So many times they are not admitted for care because medical professionals are afraid to treat them - or they feel that there is no point in treating them.

A small story:

Harish and Tahira are a couple from a distant suburb (names changed of course). Both have HIV. They found out about their status almost 10 years ago - well before most of the current treatments for people with HIV were available.

Harish got sick. Very sick. He needed hospitalisation. Badly.

Harish's brother was working as a driver for the principal of a famous South Mumbai school. This man's son and daughter were working as doctors at CMC Vellore. Harish's brother urged Tahira to take Harish to Vellore for treatment - an almost 2 day train journey.

They took the journey. Harish slipped into a coma. A gone-case it seemed.

It seemed.

But due to the loving and expert care he recieved at Vellore, Harish recovered.

He and Tahira are alive today. Working. Raising their family. Donating for others with HIV.

After years of being away from their son - who they sent to their relatives because they thought they would not live long - and that they could not look after him - the couple has now brought their son back to live with them.

Why do we need in-patient care for people with HIV? Because too many people with HIV who have died - could have been saved. Could have been living a life like Harish and Tahira.

How much longer do people with HIV have to wait before they are treated as people rather than as a disease?

Removed from Facebook

As of Saturday evening I have been unceremoniously removed from Facebook.

Login as usual got me a message that our account has been disabled.

A small statement said I could find some Frequently Asked Questions.

One of which said that for legal reasons they cannot show me what it was that according to them caused them to disable my account.

Its interesting to be without Facebook - especially since over the past few months it has moved in under my skin. I realise now - going cold-turkey - how much and how many times I would check up on "it".


Facebook is superb at a few things:

1. getting you in touch with all sorts of people who you never knew still existed - and also getting to know the odd new person along the way.

2. exposing you to a non-stop stream of nostalgia, ideas, current events, pictures - mixed in with the mundaneness and wierdness of the people you know (or think you know).

3. getting 'into the lives' of a few folk who use it to broadcast themselves. They aren't many (at least proportionally for me - among the 900 odd contacts we had only about 20 regularly - and I mean regularly - wrote what they were up to - but then some of them did that 4 - 6 times a day)

4. getting you supremely bugged at the multitude of inane quizzes, games, "applications" that so many jump into. I learned early on to keep hiding them when they show up - but there are so many of them out there...

At the same time, Facebook was a huge time-sucker. A massive draw on my thoughts. A different world.

I don't think I will join again. At least at this point since the powers to be have put me in limbo.

The melancholy pink box I got is reproduced below for posterity:



The scary thing finally is how much I put my trust in it. Its a computer programme, for crying out loud, which exists to help those who run it get rich.

OK, that's crass, but there is truth there isn't it? My account can suddenly be disabled, nullified, yanked - with nothing for me to do. I meekly sent of an email, and now I need to wait for the powers to be to reply. Its not like I can go to the neighbourhood police station and lodge a complaint (Chehera-kitab? Wo kya hain?...)

So as of now - Facebook (at least Andi Sheba's participation in it) R.I.P.

Sweets

Its time for sweets! Joash - one of the young guns in our church fellowship - and all-round nice guy got into St. Xaviers college - his first choice and dream. The pedas (some of the best I have tasted) were dropped off by his Mother as he wanted to make sure that the whole JSK team celebrated along with him. Joash has volunteered with us for the latter part of his summer holidays - and has made friends all round in the JSK team.

We were just about to have our weekly meeting - a time where we review what went on during the week. One of the high-lights is each team sharing who their five most needy families are - folks who are most on the brink - and need our inputs urgently.

One of heart-rending ones we heard today was of a young girl who is the lynch-pin around which her family turns. Both her parents have HIV. Her mother has a stroke and is 1/2 paralyzed and barely able to speak. Her father is notorious for hitting the bottle. And hitting others. And being hit. Last year his arm was broken during a drunken fight. Her three younger siblings look to this girl, who we will call Reshma.

In all this misery, Reshma is still in school. This year she is plunging into her 10th standard - at the end of which are the dreaded SSC exams. Joash spent the year studying for it. Today we celebrated the fruits of his success - an admission to college considered the best for studying the 'arts' stream in India. Reshma yearns to study - and is deeply frustrated because she finds herself unable to hit the books. The demands of the home, of feeding and cleaning and looking after the broken dysfunctional family she is in seem overwhelming.

What do you even tell this brave girl? We have tried to come along side her and encourage her. Her mother is getting some physiotherapy through our staff visits to the home. We have tried and continue to try and engage her father. Our staff helped her father get anti-retroviral medications from the government - but recently found out that he has not been taking them He goes once a month and picks up Rs. 1200 worth of drugs - free - from the govt. centre - and has been bringing them home and stashing them in a cupboard - but not swallowing what could be life-saving meds.

That's why we talk it out at our Friday afternoon meetings. We talk and pray. This next week offers another chance. Another set of small doors that may open into the corridor of hope for brave girls like Reshma.

Can we dream that Reshma will bring us sweets next year at this time? Can we put our dream into reality?

Buying a fiddle

A number of years ago - Dr. Joseph Samuel - a dear friend of ours was visiting us. We had just moved to Thane. Asha was about 3 years old.

Among Joseph's many talents is his beloved violin playing. He had brought his violin along and Asha was enthralled. She even 'played' a little bit on it. Joseph told us that we must start her on the violin as soon as possible.

Mum and Dad came back from a trip to the UK later that year with the sweetest little violin imaginable - a 1/4 size baby.

Our baby was ready. The violin was on hand. Now the challenge of getting a teacher. None were found who were willing to take Asha on at that age.

And so it was till last year when we were blessed with an amazing teacher. Elaine Thomas heads up the Jeevan Asha Balwadi of the Covenant Blessings Church and is the wife of Pastor Benny. Growing up in a musical family (which included her brother - Pastor Basil DeSouza) Elaine loves the violin and signing. Sadly, arthritis in her fingers had kept her from playing and teaching for many years. But just over a year ago she reported that her hands were better and that she was willing to take Asha on.

A year has gone by. A year in which Asha has thoroughly enjoyed learning music. Besides the violin Elaine teaches her theory and how to sing. The pupil adores her teacher - and it looks like it is mutual. Elaine has told us that what she wants most from Asha is that she will use her music to praise God. The first steps are well on the way. Asha has a wonderful ear for music and should soon be playing her first simple songs with us in our house fellowship.

Today we took a big step for her. Her 1/4 size violin had become far too small. It is time for something bigger. A 3/4 sized violin was decided on.

And so the long train ride from Thane to CST station. A short taxi ride to the venerable Furtados music store opposite Metro Cinema - a place I had passed everyday as a school boy going to Cathedral school. Then into the store filled with the most amazing collection of musical instruments. Not only instruments, but also musicians - jamming away on the keys and electric guitars - filling the place with sound.

We were there for 3 items. The violin. A stand. A music book. The first two were straight forward. There was only one company that supplied the 3/4 size. A Chinese company called Granada. We chose one. Gulped at the price, but pressed on and took it. Same for the stand. A beautiful powder coated black number. Same gulp at the price. We left the store clutching these two precious pieces and walked around to the sister store around the corner.

This store was devoted to pianos. Steinways. Bluethners. Others. A man was tickling the keys of a Steinway. Playing an amazing repretoire of warm music. Rows of music books. We got ours. Eta Cohen's Violin Method- Student Book 2. Paid (gulp again). Out of the store and into the street. Got a taxi back to CST. A slow train that ended in Thane. Rickshaw home.

Then music lesson time. Asha was thrilled. Elaine was thrilled. We have ourselves a fiddle!

Takes a lickin... and keeps on tickin...

Our camera is kaput. Given so generously about a year ago. Today its in Delhi - waiting to be repaired with its cousin which belongs to Victor and Sarah - also kaput (the camera - not our relatives that is).

No camera means no images of Enoch's last 3 weeks of lego glory. He has just devoured the train set which has survived over the years more or less intact. We brought it down from Mussoorie this time, and Enoch has just *enjoyed* making engines, setting up track, making bridges - the works.

The remarkable thing is this - the Eicher lego collection is now at least 30 years old. And some of the first pieces were hand-me=downs from some hoary time before that!

Evidence is in the engines. We have 4 of them. Last year when we were in Mussoorie, one seemed to work reluctantly. Without much hope I brought them down here to see whether something could be done. It could. Just opening them up and doing a minimal clean and a few drops of oil - and hey presto - these little 4.5 V beauties are actually performing.

The kicker is this: the engines had their date of manufacture on them. Sturdy German things, the little engines were housed in rather ungainly (and heavy) boxes (see pic above, harvested from the internet).

But here it is. One engine was made in 1978. Another in 1977. Another in 1975. And drum-roll please... one was made in 1969. That's our birth year folks. 40 years young and this little German beauty is still working.

How much abuse those magical plastic bricks got over the years. Still they click together crisply! Amazing. And how the motors still whirr away happily when given their needed 4.5 Vs....

To come back to the dear camera - a 3 year old (max) thing. Kaput. Even the much touted Macbook that I am using to type this. Had to get a new hard-drive. Nothing is permanent it seems - other than old vintage pieces of lego (and that of course only for a while).

It is no secret that Enoch's father is just as excited about the legos as Enoch himself.

Come and join us one of these days!