India deserves better

o.k. so I couldn't not write in this thing. I guess we'll see how long it lasts. There's so much to write about. So much to think about and analyze but India deserves better. I will though, tell you how my day went yesterday.

I went to CEMCA (COL's sister org. In New Delhi) and met with Usha and some other colleague's. Great, great intelligent and hilarious people. I'm feeling very thankful to have such "resources". However, they treat their "peon" "chai guy" like shit. Absolute shit. Now, I have nothing against servants in a country such as this. It's worked for years but the way they treated this guy. While I was sitting there one of the higher up guys directly insulted this peon as he brought us our chai, the director insulted him a little later on. They directly cut him down for doing his job, chastize him for doing it right and scold him if he doesn't do it. He seems like such a sweet guy. Very, very eager to help out and extremely respectfully (namaste'ing all over the place).
Anywhoo, one of the assistants took me to the hospital to get my HIV/AIDS test (you need to have proof of negativity before you can register to live in India for more then 180 days) Oh my god. I understand that not everything has to look the same or have such a western biomedical sterile image to it. But some sterility is always good. Which ones are the doctors? Oh they're the ones in jeans and expensive designer reboks and nikes, sometimes they carry stethoscope. The nurses, however, are decked fully out in 1950s American nurses uniform, crisp white hats, white stockings and time pieces. Makes me think of your nursing aid picture mom. All in all I wouldn't mind the look, feel or approach to the hospital (really guys, this hospital made the ones near the xiyuen in Nanjing look like the taj of all hospitals) if it worked. But it doesn't appear to. Yes India is chaotic, its one of its many charms, but usually amongst the Chaous is a secret order, something that somehow makes everything work. After waiting 3 hours and being dragged from one side of the hospital to the other I really felt that the chaos was pure chaos.
That sounds negative, doesn't it? I don't mean it that way. Really, it's beautiful.

Oh, don't worry folks, I made sure he opened a fresh needle when he took my test. However, the sterialization box for the needle after it was used..I don't know about that. Something about the massive amount of dried blood around it made me feel a bit quezy. It did however give me fresh drive for my job. I got to see many of the methods Dehi has for HIV/AIDS control.

I start work tomorrow and I'm so nervous I could puke.

As a side note - today is Krisna's birthday! I'm a little disappointed that there's not more happening. Just a few more Krisna statues adorned then normal and a bit more thikis (sorry for my spelling).

I'll talk to you guys later. Miss and love you all.

PS: To the WCB LSD crew - for some reason my emails to the @wcb.ab.ca crowd is coming back to me, sorry about that! Hope your all doing well! Drop me an email!