South Asia—what an amazing place! Where to begin?

I am here teaching music to students at a Christian school. Besides teaching, I am taking lessons while I am here. I was given the choice to take singing, dance or instrumental. I thought since I would be singing all day at the school, I should do something different. So I chose to dance.

I have had the greatest privilege of getting to better understand the Hindu culture first hand through a classical dance called Bharatanatyam. This is nothing like American dancing. I used to dance in the States, so I thought, “Okay, this wont be so bad, right?” Wrong! It is extremely challenging. But what they do is remarkable.

This is a unique way of story telling. The Hindu culture has a lot of stories about all their gods, so they dance to it. In this particular form of dance, they have a live singer, a few typical Indian instruments, and a dancer in the middle. She will act out the story as it is being told to the audience. I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I started! But once I figured out what it really is that they do, I was so excited because I could tell a story about Jesus in a way that all these Hindus would love and understand!

What I do is tell my teacher a story from the Bible, then we find traditional music that will go along with the story. She plays it and teaches me a dance from the steps that I have previously learned. I am excited to learn my first story here soon. At the end of my term here, I will have a “show” and have lots of my dance teacher’s friends and students come watch me do this dance. All of them will get to hear a story about Jesus.

This has been a life-changing experience—and one amazing work out. I hope that other believers will join with me and dance to share the Gospel with these people!

*Written by a Hands-On student serving in South Asia for the 2009 fall semester.