puan

Puan is the name for the traditional Mizo skirt.  It's just about 2 yards of woven fabric, worn wrapped around the waist with the end discreetly tucked in.  Several times I have been asked if I want to wear one and I decline.  What a disaster if I stand up and the skirt falls down!  Some of the women do wear belts around the waist to avert this possibility.

The other day was a national holiday, a secular day not celebrated by the College; nonetheless, many turned out in their finest.  The men have a traditional shirt which you can't see in this photo.  The plaid looks like this:

 The traditional colors for the women look like this:

 But you see every style and color in the stores:

 As far as I know, they are still hand woven.

Zira (husband) and Rami (wife) spent six years in Berkeley while Zira was getting his PhD.  They speak as good an English as is to be heard in these parts; their two young daughters are quite fluent.  Rami's parents live in the city but bought a plot of land in the country and the family is developing a farm so as to be more self-sufficient.  The two of them spend a lot of time out there, working the land and caring for the crops.

We went out to visit and Rami parked the car on the main road.  We had to walk down some very narrow paths on the edge of the hill.  One man coming up the hill gave me his bamboo walking stick, for which I was quite grateful.  Several times I had to hold Rami's hand taking steep downward steps.  I joked with her saying that I believe that the people are part mountain goat.

On the property, her parents have built one medium size hut, with a small kitchen and bedroom.  However, there is also a back room with three full-size puan looms.

The young lady who was working had a graph for the design, just as we would use for cross-stitch embroidery, or as I have seen used by Persian rug makers.  She told us it takes about one day to weave one skirt.

Down the hill was another building and I could hear more looms at work.  Rami's father, who introduced himself to me by saying, "I am 76 years old", was a high school teacher and speaks some English.  He told me there were 17 workers in the other building.  He started the business when he retired from teaching.

Rami asked me if I wanted to go back up the hill in the car with her parents' driver.  She told me he was an excellent driver, which they all seem to be, by necessity.  I told her that it is much easier for me to walk up than down, but she insisted.  So I got in the car and I found out the reason that she doesn't drive down to the property.  The road is still being built.  As we came around one curve, here was a big pile of rocks and the men hammering them into smaller pieces with which to pave the road.  Yes, breaking rocks in the hot sun is a reality here.

So the men began to throw the largest rocks to one side and eventually we drove past, two wheels on the dirt, and two wheels bouncing around on the pile of rocks.  I know we bottomed out 2 or 3 times.  I don't know what they make the cars out of here.  And when I finally got out at the market in Durtlang, I saw that the back tires were close to bald.

Yes, said Rami, I wanted you to have the experience.  And quite an experience it was.

Social works

"If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year.
Do you suppose," the Walrus said,
"That they could get it clear?"
"I doubt it," said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear. --Lewis Carroll

Every Thursday all the students participate in social works, which consists of cleaning up the campus grounds.  Christmas decorations were still up when I arrived and so they have come down.  A fire break is to be dug to prevent the fires which come between winter and the rainy season.  If there is no break, the fires can run up the hillside onto the campus, into people’s gardens.  The students pick up trash (of which there is barely any; there are little garbage cans everywhere which say “keep ATC clean”) and sweep the streets with what passes for brooms here. They go into the wooded areas and clear away the brush.  I have seen them with wagons full of large, sawed pieces of log.  All the classrooms and faculty offices are swept and cleaned.

It's a very nice idea.  Not only do the students become responsible for their environment, they get some guaranteed time outdoors and time away from study.  They also have the opportunity to bond in different groups beside their class groups.  Students at the Bachelors level take all their classes with their grade level and are together in the same room all day long.

One of the main tasks is keeping the leaves off the streets.  For this task they use brooms like the one I use in my house, i.e., short.  Most of the people here are shorter than in the U.S., but there are a few fellows who are 6 feet tall.  Remember, the broom is 3 feet tall.  They clean the leaves out of graveled areas as well as the paved areas, but those brooms are just the stems of the grass, without the fluffy end.  And the leaves are endless, as the road is lined with many trees which are consistently shedding.  There are also other campus workers who remove leaves at other times during the week.

Being a good and moral citizen is emphasized as part of the degree program.  The other morning, as part of announcements, everyone was reminded to shut off the lights to their classrooms when leaving for lunch.  On Sunday evening, everyone was reminded to attend all the services in the chapel and on Monday morning, there was a surprise attendance call.  The masters students tend to be the most lax in attendance.  I don't know if there is any penalty for absence, aside from the shame of being outed as a bad citizen in front of the entire College. 

Lost tribes look for me

I have been assigned to teach informal English classes once a week. Almost all the students signed up initially, but only half of them showed up for the first classes at the beginning of the month.  Fewer and fewer have come each time, principally because they are simply overloaded by their coursework.  At first I was covering the most common mistakes in verb usage.  They tend to use 'use to' for the simple present, e.g., I am use to eat rice for breakfast every day.  I spent a lot of time on the differences between 'I used to' and 'I am used to' and have come to the renewed conclusion that English is just a horrible language.  We have also worked on pronunciation: they have several 'ch', 'ts', and 'sh' sounds, some of which I cannot hear the difference between, but they seem to have no pure 's' sound.  They can faithfully recite "She sells seashells by the seashore", but they fail to use their ability on a daily basis.
The students also have questions about life in the U.S. and life in the world outside India.  Sometimes I just talk to them and we come across idioms and vocabulary that they are not familiar with.  At those times, we discuss those things in particular.
The other day I was teaching and someone came to the door.  I didn't recognize the man, but I am not yet acquainted with all the students by sight and I assumed he wanted to attend the class.  I invited him into the room, but he stood in the doorway and began to explain his mission. He had heard from some friends that someone had come to ATC to teach 'ivrit'.  Yes, I replied, that is me.  He began to stumble over his words even more, mentioning the connection in Israel.  I explained to him that I was teaching class and if he would give me his phone number, I would call him later.  He seemed reticent so I told him he could wait if he liked and I would be done in 40 minutes.  He agreed to wait.
I returned my attention to the class and the students decided that I must be famous.  If you know me at all, then you know that I am quite famous but not quite so famous that a completely unknown person would show up at my classroom at the end of the earth looking for me.
After I was finished teaching, Adam and I had a very nice conversation.  He started to talk about lost tribes and I assumed he meant the Bnei Menashe.  No, he said, he did not join their group because he doesn't want to lose Yeshua.  He described himself as belonging to Messianic Judaism.  Yes, even here, people are returning to the roots of the faith and still believing in Yeshua.
Adam came back to my apartment and we talked for a good hour.  He said he has about six people who are interested in learning Hebrew but, again, transportation is a problem.  I told them they were welcome to come to my apartment which can easily seat a dozen, or if someone were willing to come and get me, or arrange for a taxi, I could meet them anywhere in the city.  When I gave him the learning Hebrew DVD's, he almost cried.  He said whenever he gets a gift, he becomes very emotional.  He told me that he had been in Messianic Judaism for about one and a half years.
He also told me that he was sure that others in the group would want to meet me and that he would call me to make arrangements, but in fact, I hadn't heard from him for a week.  Yesterday, I had a new dilemma in that the College wants to sponsor a Passover seder demonstration with some minimal participation, but there is nothing in the native culture here that resembles horseradish.  So I called Adam to see what they use here, but he was so busy apologizing for the fact that none of the people wanted to participate in the Hebrew classes, that I never got to ask him.  He told me that he was leaving shortly, that he had to be some place in a hurry, and that he would call me back, but I haven't heard from him.  I imagine that he is embarrassed about the situation.  I am sorry that I might not get to talk to some of the group, about 70 people who meet every other week, to encourage them, but I do not want to embarrass him anymore.  I will leave the ball in his court.  Please pray that Adam would not worry about the others and would come and speak with me again.

I look for lost tribes

If you haven't heard about the people from this region who lately have been claiming to be of the lost tribes, I recommend Simcha Jacobovici's Quest for the Lost Tribes by A&E.  It seems to be available on youtube here: https://youtu.be/PhB16xVTlbQ or you can get it on amazon.  While I don't agree with everything he presents, I believe the piece on Manipur is accurate.  There was an additional group making aliyah this week: http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/detailsnew.asp?id=feb1817/oth050
They also have a website http://www.bneimenashe.com/index.html which appears to be maintained by one Stephen Epstein (about whom I know nothing).
Through a contact in Israel, I was able to get in touch with someone from the local Bnei Menashe community.  She came to visit me in my apartment on Shabbat last week.  Although she has a car and driver (as some older people do here), she took a taxi because it was Shabbat.  I gather she wanted to give the driver the day off.
She told me many stories, about half of which I understood.  There are many dreams and visions associated with the process of moving the people to full-fledged Judaism from Christianity.  In the 50's, there was a tribal leader in Manipur, the next state over, who had a vision that the people were of the lost tribes.   Someone had a vision for the state of Mizoram, and a man who later took the name Gideon Ray began preaching Judaism here.  Although they were Christians, they gradually migrated toward Judaism and when Rabbi Avichayil found them in the 1980's or 90's, he affirmed their identity and many of them began to officially convert and make aliyah. 
My guest told me of one pastor who had a vision of a large stone coming toward Mizoram shouting "Maher maher shabbat leil".  She said the pastor knew no Hebrew.  I asked her if she knew what it meant and she suggested that I could tell her.  She said at that time, people began to question that pastor about whether the vision was talking about the Jewish sabbath, but in the end he denied it.  She said he was jealous for his Presbyterian salary and retirement. It is told that he died an agonizing death.
The lost tribes people always tend to tell the story of how they had leather scrolls, but the dog ate them.  It seems like the dog might have been some ancient Chinese emperor, but they take the reference to dogs in the New Testament to mean that gentiles either burned or otherwise destroyed their scrolls.
My guest's father was a Seventh Day Adventist pastor, but her parents were divorced and she grew up with her mother.  However, she was already acclimated to the sabbath at the time that she became convinced that Judaism was the way.  She has been practicing since 1980, having become persuaded in her mind from the preaching.
There are some 30 people in her group, but just like everywhere else in the world, the community is divided into two groups: Avichayil's group Amishav and Michael Freund's group Shavei Israel.  They are divided not only here in Mizoram but also in Israel.  Since Avichayil passed away, Freund's group is growing stronger and more people are joining.
My guest had a lot of 'interesting' ideas about the New Testament: that it was written about a thousand years ago to force people to adopt Roman customs.  I politely disagreed and told her it was a very Jewish book.  I told her she needed to have another look at it since it has undoubtedly been a long time since she read it.  She also does not understand why, if Jesus is the son of Abraham, the church does not worship on Sabbath.  Good question, indeed.  She says that if the church says that Yeshua is the son of the Holy Spirit, then it's fine for them to worship on Sunday, but if not, they should worship on Saturday.
We talked for a long time about many things, including what I am doing here.  She did agree that it was a good thing for the church to understand Old Testament faith and practice.  I would say that we had a moderate amount of communication difficulties, but we left the apartment arm in arm and immediately ran into some young people who already had taxis ordered that would carry her down the hill to the nearest town where should could catch a cab back to her house.

I have my say - Part 2

Sunday nights at chapel is a much bigger deal than morning devotions.  During the week, the students are permitted to lead the service, but Sunday evenings are reserved for faculty and persons of consequence in the broader community.  The service alternates weeks in Mizo and English.

On the Wednesday after I led the devotions, there was a(nother) short impromptu faculty meeting after the morning service and they asked me to lead the service that coming Sunday evening.  I was a bit shocked.  I asked if there was any special theme and they said, no, I could speak as I liked.  I determined to give my testimony and whatever else came along after that.  For one thing, there are no native Jews here, only ones converted by rabbis who agree that the Mizo are lost tribes.  Afterwards it occurred to me that these people have probably never heard the testimony of someone who became a believer later in life after having been out 'in the world'.  These people are all born into active Christian families.

On Sunday evenings they also have a chairperson who leads the service and the speaker only gives the sermon.  At first, the chairperson asked me if I could say the blessing over the tithe and offering, which I agreed to.  Then I asked him if I could do the benediction and he said that was customary for the speaker.  When the time for blessing the offerings came though, he called on someone else.

At the appropriate time I said my piece, again from the lectern.  I spoke a bit too quickly, for which I was chided afterwards.  Truth to tell, I had woken up with a seriously runny nose that morning and determined by late afternoon that a decongestant was in order.  It helped my nose, but it also made my mouth really dry.  And I do get excited when I am talking about all the things that I see YH doing in the earth.  In the end, I talked about this time of mutual investigation of 'Jewish' things in the Biblical studies seminar (which, after the first session, has been postponed a number of times) and how the beauty of what YH speaks of and prescribes for us in His word feeds our souls and spirits.

I was really looking forward to doing the benediction because it had been so well received on Monday morning, but, alas, when the time came, the chairperson called on the Principal to deliver it.  As we exited the chapel, he told me he did that for security reasons.  I began to imagine that if I had delivered the benediction, someone might have shot me, which is completely out of the range of possibility here.  He went on to say that it had to do with my visa.  Somehow it has come into someone's mind that I do not ascend to the upper pulpit because preaching is against my tourist visa, as if some stranger in the chapel that night might have ratted me out.  I know exactly where this is coming from: someone has manufactured the idea that they are covering my backside politically when they are really covering their own backside religiously, that I could not possibly have another reason for not ascending to the pulpit, i.e., not keeping their religious tradition, outside of putting my visa in jeopardy. I think that some people do not think it is okay for me to do what is comfortable for me to do, but instead think they might look bad if I do not follow the traditions of their church.  In general, the Mizo people appear to be very non-condemning and I think this is an unusual situation, but indeed I am an unusual person, especially here.

I have my say - Part 1

Back in January, I was scheduled to do the morning devotions which are held Monday through Friday at 8:30 a.m., beginning of the school day.  All the themes and scriptures are determined by the College chaplain in advance.  First they gave me one date, then another date, and I had my opportunity on Monday last week.  They gave me the last 3 verses of Genesis with the theme for the month of February being "faith".  The subtheme for the week was 'faith and works', but I just sort of ignored the works part.  I also had to choose the hymns for the day.  I have heard them sing On Christ the Solid Rock I Stand, so I chose that to open the service.  I asked them if they knew All the Way My Savior Leads Me, and a few of the students opened the hymn book and began to work their way through it following the solfeggio.  They said they didn't really know it (actually I don't know the original melody either, just the Rich Mullins melody), but they would learn it as they went.  The Mizo people are very gifted musically.  Everyone plays an instrument and they all love to sing.

The pulpit is about like this.  I don't really want to take a picture inside the chapel here.  They are very reverent about it.  When people first enter and sit down, they close their eyes and are very still for some minutes.  When a 'special number' is part of the service, applause is forbidden.  The chapel here at the College is less ornate than the one in this photo, but this is the general relative height of the pulpit.

 I admit that I was quite nervous.  For one thing, they have a platform where the faculty sit on either side, a large desk in the middle for the 'chairperson' of the service, a lectern on the right and left of the desk for readers (segregated male and female).  And then there is this very high pulpit another half a flight of stairs above the platform that the preachers generally step up to.  I told them from the beginning that I would not be going up there, because it was not 'my tradition'.  This is a phrase they understand, even though they were in disagreement with me.  However, it is the general attitude here that people should be comfortable with what they are doing.  So I preached from the 'female' lectern.  The true reason I don't want to go up there is because I just don't think Yeshua would have walked up there.

I think I wrote my whole sermon the day it was assigned to me, but over the weeks until the day, I added to and refined it.  I wrote it out entirely and practiced it to myself, because the speaker is limited to 10 minutes.  I talked about how the lives of Joseph and Yeshua are parallel, how Joseph's Hebrew and Egyptian names figure into that, how the word for 'embalm' is related in Hebrew to the word for 'wheat', how Joseph had the faith to know that his descendants would leave Egypt some 200 years after his death.  I continually came back to the idea of resurrection and quoted the scriptures that assure us as believers.  I honestly don't know if anyone followed much of what I said.  They do not usually quote many scriptures from all over the Bible, but you know that I did.

I asked my Hebrew students the next day what they had understood, and they mumbled a few words about Joseph and faith.  It should also be noted that not many of the faculty were in attendance because there had a been a conference over the weekend and they hadn't returned yet.

I had also asked the chaplain if it would be okay if I said the benediction and could I say the Aaronic benediction.  Yes, he said, they are interested in all kinds of new things.

And that was how Monday went last week.  I managed to do everything in order, say my speech, although probably a bit too quickly.  Everyone really liked the benediction.

Banana miracles

Many of you have already heard the story of the bananas that occurred while I was here for my survey week in November.  The administration was very concerned about how I would get rice for breakfast and I told them I don't eat breakfast.  I guess they were fairly well horrified.  I told them I would have a banana for breakfast.  This apparently is unheard of.  My entire stay was for 6 days and they brought me 30, yes, I counted 30, bananas.  The miracle was that they only generated one fruit fly.

Seriously, there is something quite different about the produce here.  It seems to last for a much longer time than in the US.  As far as I can tell, the produce is fairly organic.  Almost everyone here on campus has a garden and they don't use any chemicals.  The bananas just grow naturally.  People harvest them and bring them to market.  You can see papaya trees around campus as well.

And you can buy two weeks worth of bananas and by the end of two weeks, the last one might have a small brown spot on it.  The bananas are smaller, maybe 4", and very sweet.  I have bought one cabbage and had it in the fridge for 2 weeks and it still appeared and tasted quite fresh.

I think the big food corporations have sold the American public a line.  I suppose if our produce were raised to ripen naturally and not shipped cross country, we also might have longer lasting fruits and vegetables.