Bringing Love to the "Snake Eaters"
About a year ago, while travelling in jungle/scrub areas outside of Bangalore, Asha and Raju stumbled upon a group of about 50 people who are known colloquially as the "snake eaters". These people are unusual even for a country as diverse as India. They were still living essentially as hunter-gatherers off an area of land that most people will not go into because they are snake infested. In fact, Asha and Raju say that they must work to overcome their own fear of snakes in order to visit and minister to these people. The people themselves view snakes as a source of food and carry a traditional antidote to snake bites with them at all times. Of course, snake bites aren't the only thing that can kill a person living off the land. As is common among people living in such underdeveloped conditions, many children will die before their 5th birthday and hunger is a constant threat. Particularly in bad weather, sicknesses that are easily treated can be deadly or disabling.
When Raju went to visit them, he discovered that they had a small settlement of shelters made from whatever cast off material they could find. But he also discovered that most members of the group did not not have or wear clothing. He also learned that they do not grow food and did not participate in any economic activity. However, what was most unusual about this group of people is that they held no religious beliefs and don't bury or burn their dead, but just leave bodies in a wooded area to decompose. Religious belief and some sort of ritualistic disposal of dead bodies have been nearly universal among humans going back many thousands of years. There are only a very small handful of tribes or groups who are known to exist without these practices.
Asha began bringing clothing and showing the people how to dress themselves. In addition to providing some protection, being dressed opens up the possibility of engaging with others outside of their own group in order to trade. People who are not clothed, as you can imagine, are generally not welcome in marketplaces. In order to help them get started engaging in economic activity, Raju brought them some colored balloons, showed them how to inflate them and encouraged them to sell them. Since then, they have taken up the habit of travelling to local marketplaces each day to sell their balloons in order to buy food. Of course, there is only so much demand for balloons and hunger remains a real problem, but it has improved their living conditions all the same.
Raju of course wanted to share the teachings of Jesus with them, but there's a proper order to things and before they would listen to what he had to say, they insisted on feeding him. Now, these people are known as snake eaters, but in truth they will eat almost anything they can catch - frogs, rats, dogs, lizards, insects, cats. So Raju was a bit nervous about what they would serve him but it was his lucky day as frog was on the menu. And frog, as the French have known for some time, is quite delicious.
So now Asha and Raju visit this community when they are able and are teaching them how to follow Jesus' teachings. Typically between 20-30 people usually show up for their lessons. These pictures are from a recent trip which they made where the lesson for the day was 1 Corinthians 13, the famous love passage.
Asha and Raju have asked us to pray for these people as the circumstances they are living under are extremely difficult. At the moment many of them are suffering through the rainy season without blankets. Raju is asking anyone who is able to make a donation to help him purchase blankets for this community. Please consider making a donation to Comfort India Trust today - a little goes a long way and it's support from people like you that makes this work possible.
