So here I am laying on my magnificent mattress, dim lights seeping in through the other rooms. Since I last wrote I have gotten a heater, a spacious living area, and waffles. How did I accomplish this? What lovely fortune came upon me to grant me such a great set up? Well I’ll tell you.
My room flooded. It straight up flooded. Apparently I had a leaky ceiling that no one thought to mention, and it seems that Atlanta’s winters get very rainy, very rainy. So after a full day of pouring I can back from work to find a nice little puddle covering my floor. At first I wasn’t too concerned. I was upset that a lot of papers that I had on the floor were now ruined, and to get around in my socks I was forced to parkour myself everywhere, but I got over it and I made due, that was until my team leader found out. My TL is the definition of a worrier and tends to blow things out of proportion, so when he started raving on about mold, mildew and my certain death I was skeptical. I had had a very long day and all I really wanted was to sleep in my bed, but he wasn’t going to let me. I argued. Oh man did I argue, but in the end I came to realize that he had a decent point, and that I should move out into the big room for at least that night.
My TL demanded that he talk to the church about this, and he kept reassuring me that he was going to get it straightened out. By that time I didn’t care anymore. I was half asleep by then. It took me about a week to realize that I wasn’t getting my room back. I dragged out my prized bed (No one as taking that from me. They would have to pry it out of my cold dead hands) and moved all the furniture around so that I could set it up next to the heater. Originally I planned on setting up an elaborate mattress fort as my room (because who wouldn’t absolutely love that?). Sadly, in the end, it would’ve taken up too much space in order to fit my bed inside (*see previous comment on losing bed), so I scrapped the idea and traded my privacy in exchange for sleeping comfort. Worth it.
Moving on. Two weekends ago I had the incredible chance to go and visit an actual Hindu temple. My team had had it planned for over a week as part of our required diversity training. I didn’t sleep well the night before so I almost opted out, but I am so glad that I didn’t. The temple we visited is the sixth largest one outside of India, and one of the biggest in the country. The entire thing is made out of marble, and nearly every surface is intricately carved to show religious idols and cultural symbols. I was completely blown away by the interior worship chamber. I would’ve taken pictures except they weren’t allowed. We did get the chance to sit in on a worship though.
It was incredible to watch. Being immersed into an entirely different culture that way was something I was not expecting. I felt like Kevin Costner in Dances With Wolves, or Tom Cruise in The Last Samurai (insert Avatar joke here). The men sat in front while the women sat in the back. A row of big doors opened up like the Chamber of Secrets, revealing robed men swinging incense and chanting in what I’m assuming was Hindi (sorry if that’s misspelled). Then more robed men walked into the kneeling crowd, saying more incantations and letting people kiss their feet (I do not partake). When they were done everyone got up to do their own prayers, which involved a lot of walking around, kneeling down quickly to bow one’a head, and then getting back up to repeat. It looked like they were exercising. It was absolutely awe inspiring to watch the worship. Afterward we went to a buffet close by that served temple-goers vegetarian Indian cuisine. It was certainly not home grown Indian specialties, but the potatoes were good.
The next weekend we had yet another awesome diversity experience. Atlanta is the birthplace of Martin Luther King Jr, and the city has turned his old neighborhood into a big museum and tribute to his life and accomplishments. I wasn’t really planning on visiting it when we first arrived (saying that now I could never imagine why). MLK is one of those rare historical figures that absolutely deserves the praise that he receives today. He may not have been a perfect man, but he devoted his life to helping others and he helped changed the history of this country for the better (and let’s be honest his voice was beautiful).
It was great to tour the museum and learn more about his life. It was even greater going inside the house that he was born in and see where he was raised, but without a doubt the most impressive part of that whole day was visiting the actual tomb of Martin Luther King Jr. The weather was rainy and cold, and there weren’t many people around, but I walked along the long stretching fountain and past the eternal flame to go and stand in front of where the legend was actually buried. There in the middle of the fountain were two graves, one for him and one for his wife, each carved with their very best quotes, and I just stood there and took it all in. It’s a moment I don’t think I’m ever going to forget, standing there in the rain. I don’t know how else to describe it, it was such a powerful feeling. We didn’t linger around it long, but we didn’t have to to feel its impact.
As if that weren’t a heavy enough experience for one day, we immediately went to a holocaust museum (I’m not even kidding). We wanted to get all our diversity taken care of while we had the free time to do it. We took a tour around the place with a Sunday school group. Every wall was full of black and white pictures and propaganda posters, telling the story from the start of the Nazi regime to the liberation by the allies. The tour guide gave us the history lesson as we went, I had heard it all before, so I spent a little more time looking at the photos, but she had good things to say. At one point she asked the group to give an example of a ghetto. One of the girls from the Sunday school group said, “like near Grant Park?” We all started laughing uncontrollably (take a wild guess as to where we’ve been living. Did you guess near Grant Park? Good guess, and no, it’s not a ghetto. It’s just full of poor people). It was, again, very humbling to tour a place with so much history, and despite it being the greatest atrocity to ever be done by human beings, I always find genocide fascinating to study. I’m sad to admit that, but it’s true. At the end of that day I was absolutely drained, so I stumbled back into my “room” and passed out for the rest of the day. I had seen a lot.
The week after ‘diversity weekend’, as I’m calling it, we had a very big ISP planned. Every day after work that week we would be visiting an elementary school to help tutor children that were all refugees from all over the world. Our job was to assist the teachers and help the kids with their homework. The first day we went I paired up with my teammate Sara and we helped out a class of third graders. It did not go very well. The kids were all very quiet and not very vocal about the help they needed, and once we did get the chance to help we both realized that 3rd grade was a lot harder than we remembered. Their math already had letters in it! Letters! I knew most of the material, but for the life of me I could not explain it in a simple way. It definitely didn’t help that they didn’t speak English well. There were kids there from Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, all over the place.
The next day we decided to switch up and work with kindergardeners (something more on our level). It went far better. The kids were all crackhead hyper and loud, but they gladly asked for our help when they needed it and seemed to enjoy us being there. I helped kids with their spelling and reading and watched them all peddle Pokemon cards like they were drugs (We did that in my day too, but in those times Yu-Gi-Oh was the good stuff. I miss those days). Over the next several days I continued to help the kids out, teach them about Nelson Mandela, and impress them with paper airplanes. I was the boss. On our last day we spent some playground time with the kids and I rediscovered how awesome monkey bars are. Then we helped several different classes as they did a workshop with Home Depot, putting together different wooden toy kits (it was like Legos but with nails). One of the kits was a little wooden truck. I got to lead the kids in a bunch of races across the gym floor, they basically threw the trucks half the time. Afterwards the kids all said goodbye and we helped put all the heavy furniture away. I kind of miss being called Mr. Alan.
So it was a very interesting two weeks, filled with a lot of diversity and small children. I’m so glad I’ve had the chance to see the Hindu temple and visit MLK Jr’s tomb. It was all an incredible experience and it makes me so glad that I am in this program (other than my room flooding, damn it). I get to head back home very soon for my Christmas break. I’m extremely excited to see everyone again and to play my xbox (the withdrawal is killing me. The struggle is real). Until then I’m going to wrap up my work at the FEMA office and yell at people when they come into my new “room”. Until next time.
I'm straight out of High School... 