This morning we were privileged to get to worship at an English speaking Christian church in Delhi, the Delhi Bible Fellowship Church. The church is located in the basement of the school where many of the girls attend. We met some of the Diversion house girls at the church as well as many Indian believers. The church service was very similar to our own service with contemporary songs, greetings of visitors (we were pretty obviously visitors!) and the preaching of a sermon (the pastor spoke on Genesis). How beautiful and surreal to be attending church in India!
After church we met some of the members while snacking on chai (tea) and cookies. Outside the school was a beautiful garden area and we enjoyed taking some photos and talking some more with the girls.
From church we were taken to a 5 star hotel for the lunch buffet with more types of food than you could imagine. The idea of going to a fancy place was for us to see the contrasts that exist in India and this was definitely a hotel accessed only by the elite. In fact, even before pulling up to the hotel our car was searched for bombs and then going into the hotel we had to have our bags x-rayed and we had to walk through a metal detector. The hotel was cool, calm and clean which was in itself a stark contrast from anything else we'd seen.
The afternoon we were able to rest to overcome jet lag before being picked up to go to the Catalyst house again. We had planned many crafts and activities to do with the girls and had brought all the supplies with us so tonight we planned to make something truly American with them...chocolate chip cookies. Beth had arranged for Angie to get all the supplies for the recipe and we went to town trying to make batches of cookies with about 30 girls. Needless to say, it didn't quite happen as we planned. It's rather difficult to have that many helpers in a kitchen about 5'x5' in size. But the girls who were really interested stuck with it. I was impressed that they persevered and beat rock hard butter by hand and eventually got a dough that vaguely looked like cookie dough. The next problem was the oven, which was a toaster oven, and a temperamental one at that. I'm not sure we really did get a batch cooked because it kept shutting off halfway through baking. Nevertheless, we had fun and the other girls who dropped out of the baking had fun coloring books that we brought.
The best part of the evening was when the girls surprised us all by giving us each a gift of a sari! We were so surprised and taken aback because here we had come to serve them, and they in fact served us. They dressed us in the sari (not an easy task - I'll have to Youtube this next time I wear it) and then fixed our hair, affixed a bindi dot to our foreheads and applied henna to our hands and arms. Henna is a way of beautifying themselves, sort of like semi-permanent jewelry. It was such a precious gift that they shared their traditional culture with us.
We ended the day by sharing a meal with the girls at their house.
After church we met some of the members while snacking on chai (tea) and cookies. Outside the school was a beautiful garden area and we enjoyed taking some photos and talking some more with the girls.
From church we were taken to a 5 star hotel for the lunch buffet with more types of food than you could imagine. The idea of going to a fancy place was for us to see the contrasts that exist in India and this was definitely a hotel accessed only by the elite. In fact, even before pulling up to the hotel our car was searched for bombs and then going into the hotel we had to have our bags x-rayed and we had to walk through a metal detector. The hotel was cool, calm and clean which was in itself a stark contrast from anything else we'd seen.
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| The outside of Catalyst |
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| Making cookies |
The best part of the evening was when the girls surprised us all by giving us each a gift of a sari! We were so surprised and taken aback because here we had come to serve them, and they in fact served us. They dressed us in the sari (not an easy task - I'll have to Youtube this next time I wear it) and then fixed our hair, affixed a bindi dot to our foreheads and applied henna to our hands and arms. Henna is a way of beautifying themselves, sort of like semi-permanent jewelry. It was such a precious gift that they shared their traditional culture with us.
We ended the day by sharing a meal with the girls at their house.
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