About Poisonwood - Desidiary

For 2 years now, I've sat on the sidelines envying the bloggers that share, document and sometimes entertain with their uninhibited expression of feelings and opinions. Today, thanks to the unrelenting persuasive efforts of a niece with an indomitable spirit , I join their ranks with my first post.

So lets start with the name of this blog - Poisonwood - Desidiary. Why such a complicated name ? Because - all the cute names I could think of are taken. Seriously though -

I learnt about Poisonwood from Barbara Kingsolver's novel "The Poisonwood Bible" - a very unappealing title - until I needed to read it to impress someone.

The lesson of the poisonwood is one of the most relevant and powerful lessons I took away from the book : It does not matter how successful and smart you think you are. It is presumptous, indeed perilous, to believe that you can affect the lives of people that seem less successful and smart than you, until you have achieved success by the the rules of the environment they live in. And oh by the way - they may actually be far more successful than you first thought, perhaps more so than you.

Desidiary : Perhaps it is my age, or the place I am at in life... or it is just the incredible experience that is India - but every single day here is remarkable - every single day my life is enriched by a experience, nuance, subtlety that takes my breath away.

And so welcome to this - my diary of my experience in my desh -to which I thought I had returned to teach the local people a thing or two.......and 18 months later I find that the balance of trade is still very much in my favor.