Monday, January 11, 2010

DAY SEVEN - January 3rd, 2010 - Kanpur


Breakfast was at funny mans house today. He is the sweetest man I have met so far on our trip, and such a character but it can be hard to remember all peoples names so I call him funny man.. At his home he showers us with gifts including scarves and shirts. We take multiple pictures with all the members and watch a movie about the new temple in Delhi that funny man says is the “Unique wonder of the world.” It is inspiring to see sucha n amazing project all done by volunteers out of pure love. Next we are escorted by anther Rotary Club of Kanpur to see one of the projects they sponsor in the city. They take us to a girls home, it is not an orphanage but a place that girls go to when their parents are in jail or die and they HAVE family but no one is able to or wants to care for them. Or they can be runaways that don’t want to or cant return home. I ask about adoption but because these girls have families still an adoption is not an option for them. I fall in love with all the sweet innocent faces and wish I could take them with me. Next stop is to the boys home, the club only began sponsoring this home about 1-2 months ago so the differences in the two homes are very noticeable. The boys never get visitors so they are very excited to see us there and push and shove at eachother to get to us to have their pictures taken. There is no electricity and not enough space for the 100 boys that live here, but the rotary club is working on fixing all these issues. We decide to hand out Canadian Flag Tattoos to all the boys before we leave and they are all extatic to receive them, putting them on and showing them of with pride!!
Next we are escorted to a beautiful country club where we attend a Rotary meeting and lunch. Some of the people here have travelled over 12hrs by train to meet us today. The food is very good and the company is even better! On the way home Erin and I get a chance to stop at the big temple in Kanpur for a quick tour. It is huge from the outside but not much space is available to the public to view inside. On our way out we are approached by a young Indian girl asking us where we are from and practices her English with us. Later as we are leaving she runs up and asks us if we will take a picture with her. We are happy to and she invites her more shy girlfriends over to join us. They are all very excited to meet us and she asks if she can kiss my cheek when we leave. It’s all very honoring to have people treat me with such respect and I feel kinda like a star. But what did I do to deserve this?
We are then brought to our next event, evening Tea with another club, which turns out to include a meal as well, but we are set to go for dinner at Another club in 1.5hrs so we all try to eat lite. Dinner is hosted by another rotary club across town and there we are treated with beautiful leather wallets and purses. The club surprises us with birthday cake to celebrate recent or upcoming birthdays so Lori and I are asked to come up to cut the cake. During dinner most of us sit together not really interacting with other members of the club. I realize that we are so exhausted from all the meetings and tours that we have no energy left to be social. I feel bad for the club as they have gone out of there way to host us and we are not the most lively of company. When we return home Erin gets some medicine to help her digest as she has been in a lot of pain for a few days now. Our host gives us some beautiful anklets and toe rings as a sweet surprise and we exchange facebook and email. I will miss this family a lot, they have been so amazing, I just wish we had more time to spend with them. We haven’t even had time to share a meal with them. I hope that changes soon, I would like at least have some time to play some badminton with the host kids as they seem to love to spend their days outside playing this game.

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