The Kan-man

Kan.

The con man.

Sometimes I feel like he's playing us. He's too darned adorable and he knows it. He knows how to get what he wants, when he wants it.

You see him with kids younger than him, older than him, adults, whatever, whoever. He walks his walk adn talks his talk and no on better be in his way.

Kan will be 13 on his next birthday. He is on scholarship at Assumption, as many kids like Kan cannot afford to go to Assumption. The tuition is 1,000 bucks a year! That is... well... a lot to ask from the people here. He's in 4th grade.

Yupp... 4th grade.

Kan may be a mastermind of deception, but he is a blessing in my time here. He brightens my day all too often, he is easy to love, and easy to hate at times... depends on his mood... not yours.
But, all in all, the kids has heart.
He gets things done.
His way or the high way....
Kan.
the con man.
master of intruige and artistic manipulation.
product of a world where white people just keep coming, they have for almost their entire history, and they just keep coming
with presents
and money
and so why would you need to work?
You can just lay back and relax,
island style,
and as the first president of the country said:
"Money will rain from the sky."

Island

Its really wild to think that people live in the middle of nothingness and everything.

What more nothing is there than the vastness of ocean, waiting for you to get lost in it and claim you as its own. Stretching forever in every direction... except in the one you can see the nearby atoll of Arno...
Nothing in every direction... nothing to do... no where to go... nothing to look forward too except what is already here and already around you.
This place forces you to live in the present or in a future that probably will not exist.
At the same time the ocean is life itself... water, and a world exists bneath it full of possibilites... food, fun, and mystery all lie in on blue expanse...
It is much easier to focus on the nothing though than on the everything.
I guess that its the same for people when thinking of God.
Its a lot easier to feel alone and abondoned, than accompanied and safe, its alot easier to blame God for doing nothing, than to blame yourself for not trusting God or doing what you were supposed to do in the first place.
Majuro.
30 miles long.
1/4 miles wide.
surrounded by nothing.
and everything.

A Quicky...hehe

The world is falling.
Stars don't stay in the sky too long.
These are the yells of the crazy man that works at the Project.
He may be a prophet and no one would know, or he may be a crazy guy.
I like him, I am not afraid of him.
I think he's fascinating... probably because I'm crazy too.
He is emblematic of this entire experience. Insane.

Yesterday one of my community members insinuated that the comments I had made about discerning whether I should stay or not were for attention.
I almost decked him in the face.
Its because of al this community business that I told anyone in the first place.
If it wasn't for that I wouldn't have said a world and left or not left and no one would have ever known I was thinking about it.
Asshole.

I probably won't go. I think God wants me here and I'm being very stubborn about it. Though, thats a bit presumptious... I don't know for sure what the eff God wants. I sometimes wish he was more Old Testamenty and sent some angels or some fire or something cool and exciting.
That's how I feel today, the sisters helped me a lot... and so did Alex... bow to the women in my life as always... though I called Aaron and that was helpful too.
The only reason I'm feeling like I should stay is because other people have said I'm doing something here, not because I asked, they just did... and even in I make JQ's time as a JVI more fun, get some kids to act in a play, give Tara something fun to do, and play with kids... even if I just love a little, I may learn to love a lot. That's something right? In the end I'm simply here to love.
I've been worried I'll hate instead. That's why I wanted to leave.
I don't want to hate these people.
But maybe my lesson is that I already learned to love people that I feel are easy to love.
Maybe I need to take it a step farther.

Finally, thank you for reading and commenting and reading. You are all in my hearts as well, and I think of each of you everyday, both friends from home, friends from college, family, and those in my greater JVI community.

More pictures will come.
They are far more interesting than my rambling.
I would also like to share some of the amazing people here with you.

Love,
Mike
still a bit of an arrogant baffoon.

Sisters make thigns better

This si Sr. Monica.
I'll tell you all about Sr. Monica next time because i've run out of time hardcore a lot.
BUT.
for now, all you really need to know is, a valuable piece of advice:
Sisters make things better.
It doesn't matter what it is: pains, aches, cuts, bruises, depressions, loneliness, sorrows, worries, headaches, frustrations, broken sould, broken hearts, or diarrea.
Sisters make things better.
Thank you, and goodnight.

PS. Where are my parents?
Anybody?
Anybody?
Bueller?

The Matress Saga pt. 5

I sleep the same now.
Not very comfortably, still rather full of aches and pains and for disgustingly long periods of time, and frequency has exponentially increased as well.
The others though are happy under the illusion of my increased pleasure during the slumbering hours...
Generally, my mood is the same as well. Generally uncomfortable and with, on a daily basis, an exponentially increasing desire to retreat into a cave and be alone. Be in darkness. Be in nothing. Not spend time with others, with god, or even with myself. Just be left alone and be that way permenantly.
This is beginning to sound a bit morbid. Its not.. Its jsut a deeper solitude I seek and I don't like it, and I can't get it, and I don't even know why I'm trying if I don't like it and it prevents me from doing anything. But, maybe its a big sign that there is nothing here I want to be doing.
Its hard to decide whether something is really meant for you to do or not. Sometimes you hold on more to the idea than to the reality. Neither is good in excess... as it goes for the majority of things.
Balance.
Equilibrium.
Moderation.
Maybe I am meant to learn not that I can get through anything; that I can't get through everything. I am limited, I am human, and the gut feeling is always right... but the gut feeling is not always the same as the feeling I want it to be or not want it to be or think it is or think its not. Its a gut feeling, its too vague to always figure out. Maybe what was meant to happen didn't, and the original plan should've been scrapped.
Maybe my gut says I should be in Nepal, not with JVI.
Maybe it says I should stick it out, not be in Nepal, but not do it for JVI.
Maybe JVI is the desired gut constant, the thing my gut wants me to finish wherever it is because my gut will learn.
Maybe my gut is retarded because I've been feeding it too much sugar and that's like lead paint to gut feelings master person kid guy girl place.
Maybe my gut is right when it says that any other place... even one of the other islands... any single OTHER place JVI could have sent me I would have loved no matter the difficulty or uncomfortability.
Maybe my gut is right when it says because of that I should be here.
Maybe my gut is right when it says because of that I should leave.
Jiwaan tyestai ho?
That's life?
We'll see what happens in this story.

The Matress Saga pt. 4

The community bought me a mattress.

It was very nice.

There was Green or Blue and I picked Green.

I've never bought a foam matress before, not for 35 dollars and not at a supermarket especially.
But simple living huh?

I be honest thought... the little scrounge of a matress I had before was way way more comfortable. But I won't tell anyone if you won't.

The Matress Saga pt. 3

Sleeping on the wood felt better than the mattress! I liked not having it anymore. I would like not having this place anymroe for so many reasons, and I love being here for so many reasons. Apostolic availability is what I signed up for after all....
Can we go pack to the pictures of puppies?
I wish people left comments.
I wish calling america was easier.
I wish i knew peoples numbers to call them if i could.
I miss air conditioning and computers, and common sense and reason and logic and effeciency.
I miss rural India, and cows and goats and chickens, I miss farming adn having to walk 3 km to the itnernet, i miss hills and mountains and rivers full fo trash.
I miss Navin, Basante, Binita, and Prasant, and Pratiksha, and Aamaa and baabaa, and thuliaamaa, and mark and tenders, and suz and john, and nisha and sarah, and molly long. where are you molly long? and arielle too where did you go?
I miss choclate cake, cold air, snow, walking, arroz con leche, people who don't think america is the be all and end all of life, i miss nto seeing white people all the time, or only hite people all teh time, but not this awkward mix of to much adn too little...
I miss devanagari, i miss andy, and i miss warmth, i miss not sweating, i miss real food, and bad food, and cheap food, and anything but more processed american crap made doublepriced by importation. I miss wanting to learn a language, i missed loving the things that were hard about life, i missed being so bappy that everything i found inconveniant, walking, food, not showering, going to the bathrrom, sleeping on hardness, bugs, life, love, time... was infinately negligible, a small and unnoticable price to pay for the beauty around me and the happiness in my heart, for seeing god in teh small things, for the God of Small Things.
I don't like missing God becaue of my own challenges.
I'm glad I'm here... it's miserable and impossible to want to get up in the morning.
I think I'll learn something, and if I don't I'll have wasted one of God's greatest gifts to me.

The Matress Saga pt. 2

It hurt my back.
I wanted to cry...
I couldn't sleep very well.
Someone how Kalimpong I could, maybe it was because my soul and mind were happy and my bodily pain seem insignificant, while here my boduily pain is magnified by my indifference, and slow but steady downward spiral into the darkest pits of purgatory.
Wow... that felt dark.

The Matress Saga pt. 1

I used to have a matress that sucked.
It made me cry....