ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, May 23, 1996 TAG: 9605230102
SECTION: NEIGHBORS PAGE: E-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: FRANCES STEBBINS STAFF WRITER
When Evelyn and Stanford Byrd think of their two weeks in India on a United Methodist mission trip earlier this year, he remembers "the people, the overwhelming numbers of them," and she remembers "the smells."
With a land area one-third the size of the United States but with nearly a billion people to feed, house and clothe, India's democratic government copes only in the most basic ways, they said.
The Byrds are members of Greene Memorial Church and seasoned Habitat for Humanity volunteers in concentrated projects in the Northern United States. They went to India as part of a Volunteers in Mission project of the Virginia Conference.
VIM, whose directors in the Southeast are former Bedford residents Walter and Betty Whitehurst, sets up work teams of United Methodist adults to give practical help regionally, nationally or internationally to those with special needs.
The Byrds were the only members from the Roanoke Valley of a 35-person team. Last year about 6,500 Southeastern Methodists took part in VIM trips.
India's huge population grows exponentially, Stan Byrd said, and there appears to be little interest in or availability of birth control. Life is relatively short. It hasn't changed a lot from the 17th-century days when a ruler built the gorgeous Taj Mahal shrine in memory of his wife, who had died at 37 after the birth of her 14th child. Without hesitation, Stan Byrd called the building "the most beautiful I've ever seen."
As for the smells, Evelyn Byrd said they come from food and flowers, fresh and rotting vegetables in the streets. The 90-degree early spring heat in Bombay doesn't help.
People live on the city streets under tarpaulins. People lie on the streets, and some were so frail, said Evelyn Byrd, "that you wondered if they were dead or alive."
Those who have "good" shelter, like the Indian pastor who was the group's host in Bombay, live in two-room apartments, often with no kitchen. They drank only bottled water, and washed their hands with a dribble from a dipper.
Among the Byrds' memories is one of the white-painted warehouses in Bombay where a colleague of Mother Teresa introduced their party to some of the dying being cared for there. Among the needy was a half-dead infant abandoned near a railroad track. An American doctor, who was nearing the end of a month's stay, had taught some of the women with AIDS to embroider to help them pass the time.
The Virginia Methodist party's destination was a church center in the North India community of Dehra Dun. There they prepared and cultivated a garden whose produce would help feed those nearby. With its warm climate, India has two growing seasons.
In the diet eggs are plentiful and chickens numerous. Cows, which Hindus regard as sacred, are a part of the sights and sounds, along with howling dogs and monkeys. There isn't a lot of control of anything, Stan Byrd remarked with a smile.
A touch of Tibet also marked the Byrds' visit because refugees from problems in their own country have moved across the Himalayan border to the Indian foothills, which have an elevation of 7,000 feet.
Handmade rugs are one means of support, and Evelyn Byrd, who said she "doesn't need to collect any more things," couldn't resist some small ones.
Though Christianity is well-established in India, it is practiced by only 3 percent of the population. That, however, amounts to about 35 million people. The Methodist Church sent its first missionaries to British India 150 years ago. The Virginia church group visited both denominational centers and those of the ecumenical Church of North India.
Evelyn Byrd is glad she took a coat and sweaters, for despite the heat in Bombay the mountain town grew freezing cold at night. She wondered how many people survive in the open.
At the end of a hard life, relatives send loved ones' ashes to their ancestors in small flowered boats on the sacred Ganges River.
LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ROGER HART Staff Evelyn and Stan Byrd spent two weeksby CNBon a Methodist Volunteer in Mission trip to India. Among their stops
was a visit to one of Mother Teresa's clinics in Bombay.