A Hidden Gem

Ben Lerner

Saraswatipur was the first day in 5 or so days that I haven’t been completely sick. Although I hadn’t had any food in my body for around 36 hours by the end of the day, I didn’t want that to hinder my experience in this hidden gem of a village.

I say hidden gem in the highest sense of the phrase, the village is surrounded by dense jungle on 3 sides, and a river on the other side. The drive to the village was quite rough, regularly driving through rivers and beds of rock. One thing in particular that hit me about the drive was the fact that our driver had to turn off our music so we wouldn’t attract elephants. As a 16 year old from New Zealand, who had never seen an elephant outside of a zoo before, the notion that we’d be driving through the Indian jungle with wild and possibly aggressive elephants was quite a foreign thought, and definitely led me to question how I even got in that situation.

Our welcome into the village was one of the most humbling experiences I have had. Children from the village lined the road outside the church we were staying in, singing songs and dancing. We then were welcomed with smoke, flowers, and orange lines on our foreheads. Although I still have no idea what any of this meant, I still felt the significance of it with the kids of the village staring intensely at us while the welcome was performed. We then looked around the village and most of us played rugby, however Cam and I weren’t feeling healthy enough to be running around. But this didn’t end up being so bad, as we got to have an intense dance off with some of the younger members of the community present. With most of these kids not speaking much English, the smiles and laughs that we all shared really showed me how much we can say without saying anything aloud.

The people of Saraswatipur were happy, warm and welcoming and I felt extremely privileged to be welcomed into their village for the less than 24 hours which we were there for.