A Whole New World

I’ve been back for about two weeks now and it still seems a bit off. Like I’m not really here, like it’s just a dream and any minute now I am going to wake up to the sound of the guy on the street yelling “paaaaaaaaper!”, covered in a light layer of sweat, and Leah across from me in our dim lit room. I keep waiting to get more bug bites, or to not understand anyone on the street, or to constantly be on guard in order to avoid cow poop or holes in the sidewalks. I guess you could call it adjusting back to life here but it’s more than that. Everything is pretty much the same as it was before I left. The food is the same, the people are the same, it all pretty much looks the exact same. Except the world I came back to is completely different in my mind. Driving down the shockingly quiet streets is like watching a movie on mute. Everyone is driving on the side of the road they are supposed to, they follow traffic laws, they use their blinkers instead of horns, and it is just eerily quiet. Plus there are no cows or people playing frogger to cross the street. And the grocery store. It was like walking into a dream. Rows and rows of labeled, neatly stacked, familiar food in endless quantities. And the sparkling cleanliness of everything. The feeling of not constantly having the urge to put hand sanitizer on or taking a shower and actually feeling clean. And of course the water. The first time I went to brush my teeth I grabbed my water bottle forgetting I could use the faucet. Or being at a restaurant and not instantly refusing the water they put out on the table. There are so many little things that I never would have thought twice about before I left and now every little thing is a reminder of where I am, and where I was.

Honestly it’s all a bit overwhelming. Not just the things I took for granted before leaving but looking back at the stark differences between here and India. I grew and adapted to living there, it was difficult at first but by the end of those nine weeks I was so wonderfully comfortable there. And it’s so difficult being back and trying to tell stories or explain things that many people find shocking. Because my time there was different. At times it was hard and frustrating but it wasn’t this strenuous experience that everyone seems to morph it into when I tell them about it. It was remarkable. To work for such a wonderful organization that works at a different pace than western organizations do. Filled with the most remarkable people doing work for kids that have endless light to give this world. And to be immersed in a culture with the most genuinely kind and giving people I’ve ever met. And to see the other side of the world as more than just a tourist but as a resident living and working and surviving there. It was all remarkable and indescribable. And I think that’s a part of the problem I am facing. I’m having an incredibly hard time describing this experience to people because every aspect of it was like nothing I have ever experienced before.

So yes, India was like living in a different world, but after being back for a few weeks I realize now that it isn’t here or India that’s changed or different, it’s something within me. My world has changed, because I have changed and seen amazing things and lived in a beautifully different place. My whole world has shifted along with my entire outlook on it. It’s me, in a whole new world.