"The Kahani people don't know this story." (Journal Entry)

Today’s session went well. It was just Robin, Anne and me. We started off with Anne retelling the story. She remembered the story and told it in Kahani really well (From what we could tell)! We praised her and then listened to Gen 1 in Hindi and Kahani. We talked about the story and asked her questions to get some cultural information.

What do you like in the story?
She hesitated at first, so we told her what we liked. I said I like that he made animals. Robin said she like how He made it “systematically.”
She then said she liked how he made the stars in the sky and the trees and plants.

What do you think Kahani people would like in the story?
The stars and the trees and plants.

What do Kahani people think about how the world was made?
I don’t know…God made it…I don’t know…

What do you think/what would Kahani people think about the part that God made people like himself? (For this, I had no idea how to say it, so I showed her the kumaoni scripture portion and asked her what people would think about that…)
They would think it was good. –She gave more answer, but we couldn’t understand, so we recorded it- will get it back-translated at some point.

What do you think/what would Kahani people think about God blessing people?
They think it’s good.

Does it happen here?
Yes…if you do your prayers and good work, then God will bless you. If you don’t do your prayers, then he won’t.

What do you think people will think about the story, since Adam and Eve (in this story) didn’t really do any prayers or work, but still God blessed them?
It’s okay…if God doesn’t bless someone then they will think that there isn’t a god, or that he isn’t here. So he should bless them. Again, she said more, but we had to record it, I couldn’t figure it out.
(picture - Hanging out with Aunty and Uncle)
What do you think about God making the earth in 6 days…is that important, or could you just say, “When God made the world, he made tress, animals, light, etc…”- is it necessary to say what happened on each day?
Yes, it is important…and then on the 7th day he rested. People don’t know why they have holiday on the 7th day- on Sunday. They will hear this and know why…

We discussed this for a while- trying to get her to think more along the liens of “summarizing” rather than mimicking the recording- as I think that is what is happening. She finally did say, “Either way is fine- to say each day, or tell all what he made, but that he rested at the end is important.”

We listened to the recording in Kahani and Hindi once more- and told her we would do the story tomorrow. We ended with her telling a childhood memory. She did a good job.

It was a good session. We go back tomorrow. I think the plan is to have her tell the story/what she can remember of Gen. 1- and then talk about putting the two stories together…PLUS adding the spirit world part. We got Pastor Moses to translate what we had written into Hindi and then we’ll have her translate it into Kahani. It is NOT how a story should be crated- going from English to Hindi to Kahani. But we don’t have the scriptures available for all the anchors for the spirit world story. And, it would probably be really confusing to Anne to hear all these references and then to be asked to make a little story about it- it was hard enough for us in English! We will come back to it- we’re just getting it done for now…That is what Jimmy and Jeff did too…so…guess it’s okay!! Haha..

So this afternoon or sometime today we still need to, get back-translation of Anita’s retelling of Gen. 2. That will involved either waiting until Precious is home from school and hopefully she would have some time…(Precious is the girl behind us who speaks English and Kahani). Or there is the retired principal who I met on the road one day who offered help who could do it. Or we could call one guy we met who works in a school and either he could do it (For now) or perhaps he could suggest one of his students. The issue right now is that all students are really busy with papers and exams. We may not have much luck with them right now.

---------Later--------

So you would have though most of our work was done for the day…but no, not quite yet.
I called the principal, he said he was busy, maybe we could come on Friday. He actually asked if we could come at 9am, but we told him we had other meetings then. About an hour later, he and his wife showed up at our house! We discussed the back-translation stuff with him and he back-translated our story!!!! We didn’t really tell him what we were doing, rather just that we needed a story translated from Kahani into English. After hearing the story the first time he said, “This is a story from Christian mythology…but she didn’t tell the whole story, there is more to it…” He then told us the story again and started telling us about the Fall too, and Paradise Lost!

Afterwards he asked, “Why do you want this?- This is not a Kahani story, this is an English story…The Kahani people don’t know this story…this is just an English story translated into Kahani…” It was really interesting to hear his point of view on the story- I wanted to say, “Right!!! They don’t know this story, that’s why we’re getting it into their language! Cool huh?”

Anyway, in the back-translation, it came out that Eve made Adam her slave and Adam forgot about his parents and left them and lived with Eve. They lived in nakedness and didn’t mind about it because they had pure thoughts….So- that’s one thing we have to fix in the next retelling!!! He said a few times that Eve was beautiful- I’m not sure if that’s in there, or not…but we may check that too.

I’m also a little concerned that the story was more memorized than a summary or a story form…but that may take time to happen…

We also asked the shopkeepers upstairs if they knew where we could park our bike if we get one. They were so helpful and nice and said they would help us. They said, “during the day, it’s fine- we are here, we’ll watch it for you…during the night, you can keep it in our shop…” We still have to “arrange” it with them for sure tomorrow- but in general, it’s such a sense of community here, I’m not concerned about it at all- I trust them to take care of us and the bike…and do whatever they can to help us.