No Starbucks Here!

Here I have finally arrived – I guess its beeen 2 days now. The fours hour drive from the airport was crazy! The driver used his horn more times in 4 hours than I have used mine in 9 years of driving at home! Seriously! Despite the insane way we dsarted around buses cars bikes cows people and motorcycles with 6 or more people piled on them it was strangely peaceful to sit in the backseat & take it all in! 

We stopped where there were “nice” restrooms … Wow, if those are the nice ones I probably couldn’t stomach the not-so-nice ones!

The villages we passed were completely chaotic. I kept waiting to get to the nice area of town, but after passing a few dozen villages I figured out the nice areas were the ones with actual structures. Everything leans against something else and there are animals running everywhere. Trash is strewn over all the streets and everywhere really. I found myself thrilled to see in one viallage a heap of white garbage bags – it was great to see something so organized in one place!

The compound where im staying is wonderful. It is in a similar village with tarp huts and concrete rooms as houses. But the House of Hope is gated with a clean wide driveway and a large orchard planted with trees and lots of chickens running around. Inside thee building where I live are large tile rooms. My room is on the second floor and has its own air conditioner. It is so noisy all the time but so much cooler than the rest of the house. There are a staff of indians who work here while teams are visiting who do everything from cleaning and our laundry to bringing chai tea to each person as they are waking up. 

Behind the house is where the staff lives. Behind that are the buildings for the sewing school & the orphanage.