Travel Blog: India, Day 8 - The kids at the riverbank.
While at my host's cheerful home village, an oasis in the middle of abject and depressed poverty state in India, we met a group of children doing laundry in the nearby river. Let me see...
A gaggle of village kids. India. A river. An open field of epic proportions.
Why, yes, a photo op was in order.
Every time I visit India, I am always amazed and overjoyed by the people's capacity for kindness, unhindered friendliness and hospitality, and their sheer willingness to participate. Shy though they were, this group of children stayed true to Indian hospitality by eagerly smiling and waving at the camera when I started clicking the shutter. They giggled and laughed elatedely when I turned the SLR around showed them their photos in the camera's monitor. I took dozens of photos of the little guys. I don't know what these children's lives are like on a normal day, but in that environment, with those kinds of smiles, they made this scene look absolutely idyllic.
Warrior Dash and the joy of common purpose.
In retrospect, I regret having spent so much of my life in solitary pursuits. It's simply my personality that I do my best work and think most clearly when I work alone, but I regret having allowed the desire to "work better" to infiltrate everything that I do. I don't believe in doing anything halfway, so it just never made sense to allow myself to be hindered or distracted. I love to meet with people for lunch, coffees or dinner, just to pass the time and enjoy simple conversations, but environments where my work is dependent on another person's involvement have always been frustrating to me. As such, I've always been one to drive alone, work alone, and often play alone. It's not good to spend so much time inside your own head. Over the past few years, I've been reminded of how wonderful it can be to spend time with people for a common purpose. India, certainly has given me multiple experiences of pure, unadulterated joy at what I have seen and assisted in accomplishing when working with a group of people for a common purpose. I also experienced it more recently in my excursion with my friend Jeff to Warrior Dash.
Warrior Dash is a 5K obstacle course. It has whetted my appetite for bigger things...like Tough Mudder. I can't wait.