under the heavens

india, January 2002.

The plane ride was long enough. After some eight hours of being strapped into a flying metal tube in close proximity to a bunch of strangers I am glad to stretch my legs in the New Delhi terminal. Devin and I see what looks to be our party at one end of the oddly smelling baggage area and a group of four men approach: Vijay, his brother, two friends and lots of smiles. We gather our belongings and they lead us to the taxi. Even before we sit down, my legs know there will be trouble. There are only five small seats. What with the six of us, the taxi driver, our hefty suitcases, and a miniscule trunk space hardly worth mentioning, we have a brutally long journey ahead of us. For most of the journey we speed and bounce along unpaved dirt roads at breakneck speeds. The night is dark and unfamiliar. Suddenly there are lights, and we slow. It seems to be a police checkpoint. We inquire.

“This is normal. They check the driver’s papers. But they may want money.” As in… bribery?

The driver slows to a crawl, but curiously doesn’t stop. We hear muttering and a flashlight is shining through the back window. If this were Texas, I imagine we’d be promptly unloaded as illegal immigrants. Suddenly there is loud crack and shattered glass is flying everywhere.

“Dou-ven! Get do-ven!” and we are speeding away, tires peeling.

“The driver did not have his papers. Or did not want to pay… not sure.” Vijay says with a shrug. “Sorry about that,” and a chuckle. I am wide-eyed and tense.

Nine hours later, the morning sun shining brightly—with moans, at least from me—we unpack our bags and ourselves from the taxi in the small compound of huts that was the home of pastor Vijay Golden, his parents, his younger brother, his older brother, and his older brother's wife. The noisy greetings initially distracted us from the otherness of the surroundings. What was the smell? I am fairly delirious from lack of sleep. With Vijay's near fluency in English and our complete lack of Punjabi, it was an unspoken rule that he would be our translator for the duration of our visit.

"Hey!" with a flurry of hellos.

"Praise the Lord!" and hubbub.

"Brother, this is..." and Vijay was pointing to someone else, and we were all shaking hands and embracing.

"Hallo!"

The family cow, for its part, mooed a greeting as well. Vijay's mother beemed a large and toothy smile. Wearing a dusty purple saree with long gray hair captured by a purple scarf, the deep, dark wrinkles on her hands and face spoke of a life very different than I have ever known. The smells are more shocking than the sights. Listening to the seemingly endless introductions the smells assault me, confuse me. Shortly we stow our belongings in one of the small huts made of brick and concrete-mortar—just big enough for the two rough but sturdy cots that would be our beds for the next eleven days.

"Devin, these covers are dirty… and they stink."

bathing.

We are both thinking of showers after our frustratingly lengthy taxi ride on top of our flight from Austria. It has been a long day.

"Vee will get it ready for you vight now."

Vijay's admirable English falls a little short in pronunciation. The "bathing area" was built only very recently. The roofless brick enclosure rises maybe 4 1/2 feet and the simple square design is roughly 5 feet by 5 feet wide. On one side is a rickety gate made of cheap metal, not wide enough for the opening which allows it. A passerby on that side would get an eyeful. The cracked concrete floor was at a slight angle so that the water or refuse would spill into a channel, taking it into the open sewer-ditch on the street leading into the compound. Conveniently the entire "bathing area" doubled as a bathroom area. The air is now chilly enough for me to see my own breath as I awkwardly stripped down inside the bathing square. The wall doesn't even come to the top of my chest, and as I quickly learn--white attracts. I am attended by the neighborhood children, several of whom have been watching us since our arrival from neighboring rooftops, and who run and hop to nearer buildings to get a better view. While three or four of them giggle and dart forward and back, I squat lower, feeling rather like a monkey, and splash myself with water from the a tin bucket. Though the Golden family had graciously stoked a large fire over which to hold the bucket and heat the water, by the time it has hit me and run off I am freezing... I am ever so glad I brought a bar of Dial antibacterial soap and my Pert Plus shampoo. They afford me a brief sensation of clean in a strange universe of dirty. Splash. Scrub. Freezing! Splash. Scrub. Freezing! Laughter from somewhere above and to the my left... my right.

Conveniently, we later learn, the entire area doubles as a large toilet.

under the heavens.

Even though it’s late now, it's challenging to get alone time for prayer or solitude or simply sanity. Personal space, people, personal space. Sandeep, Vijay's sixteen year old younger brother, tends to follow me closely. Literally. In conversing I often have to inch away because his face gets uncomfortably close to mine. He is precious, but his breath is rank. Sandeep also enjoys impressing me with his English. This evening I try to explain that I'd like to find a quiet place to pray alone.

"Okay, I come with you and show!" he says with great enthusiasm. His bright, irresistible eyes brook little disagreement. Like myself, he is tall and lanky and he nimbly climbs the homemade ladder to the flat roof of one of the taller huts. There are no electric lights to be seen save the wobbly beam of my flashlight as we ascend. Electric power was introduced to the area a few years back, but rolling blackouts prevent much usage for the better part of the evening. The heavens are so bright here, and so familiar. For a moment, a brief moment, we share the silent wonderment of being under the stars. God, this is the same moon I had looked not too many years ago, when I was six and camping in my backyard in Bowling Green, Virginia. And the consistency of this moon and the hope to which it alludes—the odd familiarity of these heavens, is but an echo and moon-reflection of the glory of all Your consistency and the worldwide hope which you make blazing clear.

"Look! Vhat is the name of that coon-stuhlation?" Sandeep asks, stumbling over the new word I have only recently taught him.

"Maybe I could... time to pray... you know..." I half-heartedly stammer.

So much for alone time.

"Look, look! Here! Look!" he exclaims, laughing and grabbing my arm—pointing to a constellation... or distant building... or bat...