Raxaul Made Into the National Press...Hmm...Is that good?

The December 2009 issue of The Week in India named Baba Christudas as "Man of the Year." He is a Catholic priest that has spent his life working amongst the lepers of Bihar at a little leprosy hospital a few minutes walk from Duncan Hospital. The hospital pictured to the left is called "Little Flower" and is actually an impressive success at drastically changing the disease outcome and powerfully effecting the lives of people with a highly stigmatized disease.

The interesting thing regarding to this post is the introduction to the article. As authors of The Week rode into town they apparently must have jotted down their first impressions: 

"Bihar is like someone curled up and died. I was told before leaving. But a carcass implies an end. Bihar, to unsuspecting eyes is like a curled-up animal, on its las legs, marked with wounds that seem to fester and pulse with a life of their own. The landscape is dry and arid, tracts of land stretching out on both sides with a few spurts of green in between. It is a land in search of some beauty and some manna.

Raxaul announces itself much before it becomes visible. The narrow one-way street is choked with garbage and lines of trucks wait for clearance to cross the border Children defecate next to vendors selling freshly slaughtered chicken and hawkers selling fried food. Though Raxaul defies words, I realize why there are the most leper colonies in Bihar."

Just thought you might love knowing a bit about what the rest of India thinks of where I am staying.