With the Grace of the Lord, under the protection of the Holy Family, we are proceeding everyday life. This is an important month for us because the promise of the House being ready is getting near, we celebrate important feasts such as our Province Feast, the Brothers’ Golden Jubilees and in a special way the 67th Independence Day of our Nation. This is a month of feasts and celebrations.
As we are in the monsoon season, in every aspect works are going slow and weak, the mornings are darker than before, and we could hardly see the priests celebrating Eucharist in a dark place with candles in the Church. Thus it started the first day of this month with a drunker that disturbed while we were doing our meditation, early in the morning he greeted us with a loud “Good evening” as well singing in high voice. That same evening we had community meeting on Personal and Community prayer.
The first weak is fully dedicated for plantation of paddy (‘Ropa ropne’), both schools, High and Middle Schools, were taken for plantation. For the Independence Day, this Parish of Kurdeg conducts every year sports for the youngsters of the villages. This Sunday some of our Brothers went to Simdega to collect the CD sent by Eluru Brothers for the scholarship, but it was not possible to get, and just we bought gifts for the Fathers because it was the feast of St John Mary Vianney, here is a custom to present gifts.
We celebrated the feast of St John Mary Vianney on 5th of this month; we too gave a small gift as other religious as well as lay people. This day was holyday for the school just after the mass all the students were sent home. These days, the Brothers have to work a lot in the schools, teaching for the exams which will be held at the end of this month besides plantation, sports and parade for the Independence Day.
This time more than the High School, the Middle School worked in the paddy land, our Brothers also learnt how to plant paddy; it has been a great experience to know the work and the culture of these people here. Though it is raining everyone takes their own umbrella and plant in paddy land with it. Few days it had been nonstop rain at night with heavy sounds of thunder and lightning we could not sleep at nights.
On the day of Ramadan feast of Islam, our community went for fishing in an open well that belongs to Fathers with our hooks, from 08:00 am to 11:30 am; we got two tiny fish nothing else. We went to Simdega for getting the CD from the Bishop house as we got we also met some Religious Sisters of the Perpetual Help. We bought things for our dining hall; we ran out of money so we had debit in the shop. To come back to our house we tightened our belts.
All the schools were very conscious in practicing parade in the schools ground, the funniest thing is the marching of KG students, they were the heroes of parade. Though they distract the whole people everyone enjoys because they do their best in it. In a moment we could not get some money in the Bank, but always there are some people to help us by God’s grace. There has been little understanding of tradition of this place by the Community; our Brothers were the referees of football matches. It is scheduled like this: for the boys Hockey and for the girls Football. There were good numbers of villages that played in the Parish. Our Community was supporting the village of Hatta (a Parish Street). On 13th we went to Kunkuri, in another state, to buy things for our little chapel in a shop near Maha Grija Cathedral.
It was 14th we were invited by a friend driver who at our peck and call to play for our Parish in Kurdeg with other teams. It was semifinal; two of our Brothers played and won semifinal football match. August 15th is a special day in India we celebrated the 67th Independence Day, it is our Province Feast day of Our Lady of the Assumption. Mass was little later, many brought a cross for the blessing which will be placed in their own paddy land. Soon after the Mass, hosting the flag and March Parade were held. The final matches were conducted on this day; as we support Hatta, they won the football match; the prize of the match was a goat. It was our chance to play football final match at evening for Parish in Kurdeg. We all played except a Brother who was encouraging as in the ground with Fathers, teachers, students and huge number of people. We got the runner cups and medals. The thing is our team got more cups than the winners.
The prize we got is the appreciation of the people; many came to know more about the Holy Family Brothers in Khalijor, than the cups we obtained. That was a happy day with heavy body pains, we applied medicine and slept though some could not do so. We continued our prayer with a dog in the morning and flies, mosquitoes at evening. Next day of Independence bandh in Chhattisgarh for the death of a ‘prince’; many did not come to School. It is not possible to get anything or everything in Kurdeg so always needed to go to capital of District or another city to buy things for the house.
On 18th we bought things for the kitchen in Simdega and paid our debts, for dining table and kitchen tables we needed to go to another place. It was long process for us to get a gas cylinder for cooking, by all means we progressed. Several days Brothers have to go to Simdega for getting certain documents and even verifying them with an Advocate.
Brothers have to even leave some hours of the class to finish the matters of house quickly. As it was raining, painting works delayed. It was necessity to get diesel for our house; Brothers went in a vehicle without license. On 21st of this month Exams started in High school, Brothers were little busy in it. We had to do many things as soon as possible before Bro. Superior leaves Community. Brother went to Simdega with Parish Priest to invite Bishop for the blessing of the house. On 25th all we went to Simdega to buy vegies and edibles for cooking with Sisters who helped us in purchasing. On 27th the day after the Birthday of Bro. Abhay, was the blessing of the house. Bishop came in time for the mass, students of the schools, staffs and people were also in the blessing of house. It is a custom here for any or every celebration all have to be invited, invitations are to be respected.
By the grace of the Lord and the help of people, blessings were over that afternoon; some Brothers went to get kitchen tables and dining table for our House to Tapkara, but we could not get. Fathers and Sisters from various places came for the blessing of the house. Hostels boys were helping in transporting things from our class dormitory to our new house.
On 28th is holyday, we shifted our beds to our house with the aid of hostel boys. Bro. Superior is preparing to leave. All of us we went to Raurkela to drop him. We had supper there near the station. We came back to Kurdeg and slept for the first time in our new house.
[ we = community] [went = hiring vehicle]
Bros. Raja & Selvan
