LifetimeS Work

Today was Sunday so I went to church. My driver from yesterday, Ramu, came to get me as well as my coworker Melissa and my boss Curt. We drove only about 1 mile to the Bangalore 1st Branch in Indira Nagar. It was great that it was so close. There are three branches in Bangalore and about 4,000 members in India. I thought that was a pretty good number until I remembered how many people live here. There were quite a few people in sacrament meeting and everyone was really nice. I met an Elder Charles who served with Heidi's brother in Bangalore. The talks were really great, but the singing was the best art of the whole meeting. They sang just fine, but the bishopric sang really loud and slow so the chorister had to turn around and look at them several times. Also, they pronounce a "b" sound instead of a "v" so the opening hymn was the greatest when we sang "Love at Home." I have never enjoyed "Lub at Home" like I did today.

After church we ate lunch and then went to a temple in Bangalore. You can't wear shoes in the temple, which I understand and respect, but I had big issues taking my shoes off and walking around that place. Who knows what diseases I picked up. My boss told me just to remember the ground there is no different than at home. I assured him I would not take my shoes off and walk around in a public place at home either. We couldn't take any pictures of the temple. It was neat, but very commercialized...Disneyland-like. We walked through with our guide who lives there and then ended up in a gift shop. Our guide described that the monkish men who live there and take care of the temple are all volunteers and live by four principles. No meat because meat makes you less charitable. No sex because sex contaminates your body and mind. No alcohol because it fogs your mind. And no gambling because gambling makes you lie. He also described that the most important lifetimeS work is answering who are you. I got a kick out of that...him implying we had more than one life.

We went to the Bangalore Palace. I loved the outside of the Palace. It didn't look anything like you would think Indian architecture would look, but it was great. It was designed after Windsor Palace. The inside was not what I expected either. The queen still stays there sometimes so I expected it to be really nice and elaborate. It wasn't. They tend to build things and then just let them age. The grounds were also a bit surprising. It was pretty bare and where there was greenery, it wasn't very nice. We had to pay 200 RPS to get into the palace and then another 500 RPS to take pictures. That is about $20 which is practically robbery around this place. It was worth it though.

There are lots of homeless people here and for some reason I feel differently about them than I do about homeless people at home. There is a raised sidewalk over the street I live on. I have walked across it every night and there are people asleep up there on mats with blankets over them. It's not that I expect to see things like that here, but it just seems so much more ok. Even though I've seen it a billion times, I still am shocked with I see homeless people sleeping in Pioneer Park in Salt Lake. I guess I just think that at some time this country would run out of jobs and some people would have to be homeless, or that's just what they do. It's just different than at home.