January 1: Drums, Dancing, and a Long night

Yesterday was a rich representation of Indian culture. Music played a large part of the day. Our first introduction was to an Indian drumline. Technically it was folk dancing and drumming, but when a bunch of men do fancy footwork in unison, shaking their hips, and beating at drums, it is clearly a drumline. They wore white tanks, white wrap pants, maroon strip of cloth around their waist, and an orange strip around their heads. They danced while beating flat drums that they strapped to one arm and cradled. One beat what looked like a bass drum, and another shook maracas. Then the cows and peacock arrived. Grown men in 2 elaborate cow costumes and one peacock shook their rear ends and flapped their wings. The entire thing was a lot of fun, especially when we joined in the dance. This folk dance has come to be used most often for funerals, but that is not their sole use.

Next we saw classical music and temple dance. Men and women played on a very large string instrument, a violin, and a couple drums. At one point, a woman sang. We also watched as a woman and two girl students did the temple dance. The girls were 8 and 10 or 11. They were dressed in very ornate and brightly colored outfits with jewelry even hanging below their noses. The teacher explained that the dances are used for worship, soothing, excitement, cooling, and even putting a child to bed. Every part of the dancer is part of the dance. The hands, arms, body position, facial expression, and even direction of the eyes are choreographed. These intricate, flowing, and beautiful dances could tell a story and left us in awe.

Yesterday evening at 9:45, we arrived at church. I still have absolutely no idea why we arrived then, because the New Year’s Eve service did not begin until 11:30. The service was entirely in Tamil, but it followed the basic familiar pattern. There were responsive readings, prayer, songs, sermon, baptism, and communion. Many of the songs were familiar tunes. Perhaps half of the hymns we recognized the tune and the other half were written locally. In another nod to the familiar, we were old later that the sermon was written to ask people to give money, though the theology was very prosperity gospel.

There were a few slight differences that I am SURE no American would mind. The length, for instance was jus a little long with the 3 HOUR SERVICE and 1 ½ HOUR SERMON. About the time there were 5 children screaming under the age of 3, I thought the sermon could do well to wrap up. Not to mention the two offerings and the split with men on the left side of the aisle and women on the right.

When it came time for communion, I was excited to be receiving it in India. To receive the elements, the men all go, followed by the women. They kneel at the rail and receive a wafer and a small cup of sickly sweet berry juice. We on the women’s side watched the men to see if we would be allowed to go forward (because of the possibility of unsafe water). The men in our group stood to go forward with the men of the church then ended up sitting back down because of a miscommunication. At that point I became very disappointed that we would be excluded because of bacteria. At the church women finished receiving the elements, our men stood back up and went forward. I was with a great sense of relief and joy that I went forward with the other women of the group to receive the elements. A comment made later by a member of the group was about a sermon they once heard. We can be afraid of the bacteria, perhaps, but these elements are blessed and at some point we must have faith. You know, here we must have faith in the physical safety of the elements, but isn’t communion a great act of faith anyway?

After the service, at about 2:30, our group was led outside where we were formally welcomed into the church. People took pictures of their children standing with us westerners. Music was played on a drum and a double-reed instrument that looked like a 3 foot oboe with holes instead of keys. We were led back inside the church and made to sit in the new rows facing the congregation. We were welcomed by name in the traditional Indian manner with very heavy necklaces made of flowers. At the end, we were each given small limes that we then handed to the pastor as we wished him a Happy New Year. It is a tradition at the New Year to greet a person in authority, like a pastor, with a lime. That pastor must have had close to 200 limes by 3:00 AM. What on earth do you do with all those limes? We should adopt this practice in the US except substitute chocolate ☺ (NOTE: We were told the next day that we were treated as a part of the church with the lime thing. If we were simply honored guests, we might have been given the limes. Instead we were given them to give to the pastor along with the congregation.)

We get back to TTS at 4 AM and had to be a breakfast by 9 to get on the bus to head into the mountains. Hopefully a few things will happen in the mountains at the fancy hotel…some rest, different food, and a hot shower.