Gift of Love and Palau Ubin

(From Mary Bohan)

"Peace begins with a smile" - Mother Theresa

Every day on my way to and from work at the fifth floor lab of the Brenner Center, I read this quote on a small poster in the elevator. It wakes me up me as I walk in early in the morning and relaxes me after a stressful day at work. But, surprisingly, it also led me on a trip to Calcutta, India.

Upon coming to Singapore, I had booked my flight home three weeks after my work was done, planning to travel and explore the area before returning to America. Speaking with one of the girls on my hall, a native of Calcutta, or Kolkata as it is now called, I learned how easy it is to fly to India from Singapore, and she encouraged me to plan a trip to India. But one day, on the way to work, I saw the poster in the elevator in a completely different light, and everything clicked. I immediatly emailed my parents, hoping to convince them to let me go to Calcutta to volunteer. Having grown up in a Catholic family and attending the Convent of the Sacred Heart for 13 years, I had always thought it would be amazing to work for the Missionaries of Charity, the organization by Mother Theresa. It would tie in perfectly with the work that I was doing in Singapore, bringing a more personal and real life experience to the medical research that I was doing in the lab. This was my chance.

At first my family was skeptical, as I would be traveling alone as a young American girl to the chaotic country of India. But the more they heard about it, the more they liked the idea. A few weeks later, I now have a flight, a visa, six shots in my arm, and I'm just as excited as I am terrified. Before I left Singapore, my parents insisted that I meet with Sister Luke, the colleague of a friend of my parents who is a member of the order, and was a personal friend of Mother Theresa's in Calcutta, who is now working in Singapore.

On Saturday afternoon, I headed off to the church associated with the order, for a service called a Novena that is held hourly from 1 until 7 weekly. It was an amazing experience, an open air church with a thousand people coming each hour to participate in the service. There were people of every race and ethnicity, some whom were wearing traditional Indian clothing, others in Chinese dress, and I was the only American or European individual. After the service was over, I asked the receptionist for Sister Luke, but she responded with a blank stare, and after we searched the directory for a few minutes, I learned there was a convent down the road where she might be.

I started walking, and two hours and a two liter bottle of water later, I came across a small faded sign that read "Gift of Love, Missionaries of Charity." I walked past the empty security booth of the gated compound, and came across three buildings, a home for the blind, a health center, and the "Gift of Love." I was surprised to be greeted by a middle aged overweight Asian man wearing only a towel, who confirmed that this was in fact the home of the Missionaries of Charity, but that Sister Luke was in Cambodia for the month. He brought me to another nun to speak to, a Filipino woman who knew both Sister Luke and our family friend very well, and was very excited about my trip to Calcutta. I later learned that the Gift of Love is a center for individuals who had been neglected by their children and had no where else to go. The center is staffed by volunteers, who take the residents to services of their respective religions, and cook, clean, and bathe them while the nuns visit others in their homes and the hospital. The home had a wonderful sense of calm about it, everything seemed very peaceful despite the apparant illness and poverty of the residents. My visit to the Gift of Love made me even more excited for India, I can't wait to go!

On Sunday, Tammy and I were a bit adventurous and ventured out to Palau Ubin, a remote island ten minutes off the shore of Singapore. We took a bumboat ferry across the water, and upon reaching the other side it seemed like we had gone back forty years in time. There are very few cars on the island, the principle mode of transportation is by bicycle. We set off to explore the island, and ended up biking for nearly three hours straight, on roads, sandy paths, and dirt roads. The island had many coconut and rubber plantations, mangrove swamps, and enormous granite quarries. Unlike mainland Singapore, in which nearly all agriculture and manufacturing is exported to Malaysia, this island was very rustic and natural. But Tammy and I were surprised to find that one of the isolated beaches was covered with litter above the water line, a strange sight given the fact that we have probably seen a grand total of three pieces of litter since arriving, given the severe fines for breaking the law. Somehow every piece of litter in Singapore had managed to wash up on this beach. We continued to bike around until we the sound of thunder and the threat of rain led us to head for the mainland. We were completely exhausted, and couldn't even speak a word the entire trip home. We definitely got our exercise for the week!