Hey sorry i haven’t written in a bit but I have been all over the place the last week and a half. A lot of this will be a series of random stories that have happen over the last two weeks, some of the writing will be directly from my journal.

Some days here i don’t even feel like a servant because the work is so easy it’s like I get way more out of it then I put in. It sometimes feels like I’m selfishly here because of how much i get out of each day. Then there is a flip side, which is days like today, when things are so challenging that you don’t know what to do. I don’t know if i told you or not about the boy Vignesh or not, but just in case I didn’t I’ll back up and tell you. Here is a little context first. Every year from May 1st to June 3rd the children are on summer break. During that time most of them will have a random family members come and take them to their village, usually it’s an uncle or Grandmother ect. Well this is really great for the kids who get picked up but for the others who get left behind it just makes them feel like crap because no one comes for them. Vignesh is one of those boys that no one is coming for and because of that he is acting out in ways I’ve never seen him behave. I few weeks ago he picked up a giant rock with the intention to throw it at one of the other boys. I quickly jumped in and disarmed him. I literally had to hold him till he calmed down it was super scary to see him like that. All the while the villagers are starring at me like what is that guy doing to that boy. Things have totally gone down hill since then. I tried to sit down and council him through a translator and that really seemed to go over well until the other day when I walked in on him choking another child. I tried to get him to stop verbally but he would not so I had to restrain him again, at that point he literally was screaming like he had a demon. It’s really hard to watch such a sweet boy turn into a monster in fact its heart breaking. Today he went on a rampage throwing things at the other children he even went as far as to punch one of the other little girls in the back. He is totally unwilling to yield to my correction and it makes me afraid that he may do something really bad like stab someone. This has all led me to becoming very protective, we need to take action immediately with this child but no one seems to be hearing me on the matter.
I shamefully confess that i want to put him over my knee and spank him till I break his rebellious spirit. It bothers me so much because i feel like I’m in a very tough place because I have to be the bad guy. I can’t just sit back and allow the other children to feel endangered. It’s like what Batman said in the end of the new Batman movie about being the villain because that’s what the city needed him to be to keep the peace.

I know people are encouraged and inspired by what I’m doing here but sometimes i feel like my weaknesses are totally getting the best of me.

On a brighter note i never thought I would see the day when certain things stop bothering me but i have, here is a small like.

1) Not having toilet paper, humbling but it’s just the way it is.
2) Tons of flies during the day on everything/ tons of mosquitoes at night.
3) An insane amount of bugs crawling on everything and me i own.
4) RICE and only RICE, in fact food might be over rated.

I have to say the encouragements far out weigh the challenges but when I’m going through the hard moments it doesn’t seem like it is never ever going to end. For instance I got sick Sunday morning and i was thinking I can’t go on (I’m such a baby) but then things got better and I was feeling ok, I can’t explain it. It’s like when things are going good i feel so silly for feeling challenged in the first place. I’m really grateful to God that I haven’t had to deal with any really serious sicknesses

Being here day in and day out I’m starting to see ways that i can do more. Like after looking at the invisible children site I started thinking maybe I’m actually supposed to do something much bigger then I’m doing. I’m kinda torn between the ability to do so much more and help lots of kids or keeping things small and intimate so these kids here feel really special. I have a fear that if i really started trying to build something big it could be done but it would require me to really involve myself in a way that removes me from the kid’s every day lives. Tom Lombardi said something to me tonight that blew my mind. He said rocky I want you to remember something ” you being there is enough” It resonated because I get so confused by my own thoughts. Some days i feel like I need to buy something new for the kids or take them somewhere, Just o make an Impact of them. But i do think the truth is that me being here every day doing the little things means the world. I can’t tell you how many times just this week i was able to comfort a sad child. That is the main reason I’m here is to be their family, that’s what I told myself from the beginning.

Four letter words

So this is kind of a funny story, everyday I try various ways to get the children to remember the English I’m teaching them. Some days they seem to remember things very well other days they don’t seem to be grasping anything it’s like a hit or miss. Well the other day we happened to be watching a Hindi film that had English subtitles. Now this is rare, usually sit there like a sack of rice staring at the TV expressionless, unamused and totally clueless to what’s happening. But This was kind of cool because i was able to know what was happening in the film. Out of nowhere the kids start slowly reading the English subtitles. To tell you the truth i didn’t even really notice until the most random thing happened. I was shaken from my daze as 25 or so grade schoolers start repeating a four letter word that appeared on the TV screen. I was stunned what to do? If I make an ordeal about it then they well know that that is a bad word. If I ignore they might forget it but I’m thinking what if they don’t and they manage to pick up this one word then what do I do. I can just see I now “Rocky enna can you pass the *#@‡” or Rocky enna have you seen my *&$#. To be honest it was really hard not to laugh about it because it was just so not what I would ever expect.

Frog
Tonight another really funny thing happened. All the children were sitting around eating dinner. Keep in mind they eat on the ground, no table no chairs not even forks or spoons. It sounds really lame but it’s not, some of the most awesome moments happen around dinnertime. Well all the children are sitting around eating and I was being my normal irritating self. I noticed behind me a little frog so I quickly grabbed it and set it on the ground in front of one of the little girls. It began to hop around and they all started to scream and scurry around. Just then the frog hopped across Maria food, everyone totally started cracking up. I guess you had to be there.

I had the awesome opportunity to take two of the boys to the city the other day. Keep in mind that these kids only leave the orphanage for two reasons. The first is to go to the hospital the second is to go to school. It’s a little bit discouraging for the kids to not be able to really go anywhere. Knowing this i spoke with Malar who over sees all the programs in Chennai. I asked her if it would be ok if i took the boys to the inner city for the day. Surprisingly she said that would be fine, keep in mind these kids have never been to the inner city. There life takes place in the slum and slum only. Now when i say city I’m not talking Manhattan or Los Angeles it’s a city not really like any other that I’ve been to. It’s pretty run down compared to anywhere else but nonetheless it has big buildings and fancy lights and big shops with cool stuff. I decided to take them to Spencers Plaza, Which is a really big mall. Now imagine never ever getting the opportunity to see a mall in your life let alone a big shop with air conditioning then going to a huge mall. As we walked up the steps Vicki and Kunal literally started to shake with excitement, in fact if Vicki’s smile got any bigger his head would of turned into the shape of the moon. We soon entered and their eyes were just bouncing all over the place they were pointing and looking with excitement. For lunch I took them to their first American restaurant “Subway” having no Idea what they would like I kept it pretty simple. I got them both an Italian BMT. I waited in anticipation to see if they would love it or not, I was fired up as they started gobbling down their subs. After lunch i mindlessly decided that it would be a good idea to take them to the toy store. I honestly didn’t even think about the fact that these kids have never be inside a toy store before. Let me first say it was next to impossible to keep these kids with 40 feet of me, I’m not joking i could not keep them from running off and playing with everything. I was terrified that i was going to be responsible for loosing to orphans in the middle of the city. Literally every second one or the other would hand me something and say some thing that I guessing was “PLEASE BUY THIS FOR ME” “OH AND THIS ALSO” “AND IF IT”S NOT TO MUCH TO ASK THIS AS WELL”
It was actually hard saying no but what was i going to say to the other 31 children who didn’t get anything? I did at one point lose both of them which was pretty scary but i found them :0) I’m responsible i promise. I did find something that all the children could enjoy; Connect Four, which I must say, is a big hit.

Every day I’m loving the kids more and more they are just so incredible I’m so grateful for all the ways you have encouraged and supported me, you help to make this possible and that means so much to the kids. If you don’t believe me tonight vicki said in english “You my family” I tell you it was so priceless, oh by the way he is the one in my profile photo on Facebook.  He is so awesome he is my little pieynn (son)

I have one more cool story to tell. Friday night i had Saravana sleep in my room he happens to be the oldest boy. He is seventeen but his body for some reason hasn’t developed correctly he looks as if he is eleven or twelve. He has zero muscle mass and high pitch voice. I mean all around he is a little boy not a seventeen-year-old teenager. Altho he has not had very consistent schooling he is extremely intelligent. He understands about 80 % of what I say which is incredible because most of the really educated adults cant comprehend as well as him. I really like working with him in fact I maybe teaching him a trade because he for many reasons is unable to finish school.
As we were lying down for the night to go to sleep I asked him to tell me the story of his life before coming to the home. He paused for a moment and then told me as follows. My father had a dress shop and my mother was a house wife. It was my sister my brother and I we were very happy, we lived in one small village. One day my mother fell sick so we went to TB hospital. The doctor said do check and see if family has Aids. First my mother the doctor says is positive, then my father he also. My sister is negative my brother also negative. Then me positive. 2005 my mother die two months my father also die. My family say you go to hostel (aka The orphanage). Like Forest Gump he just shut down. I sat there for a moment then I asked him one more question. Saravana how do you feel about it. ” I sad….Why I only Aids?…..” He said nothing else that night before going to sleep. Before he went to sleep I told him i love him and that I’m his family.

Well I must go for now because I have a ton of things to get to. O hope your well and will talk to you again soon.

Love Rocky