Hey everyone!
    I really wanted to send you some final good luck wishes before you head off to India. You really have no idea how proud I am of all you for making the decision to travel halfway around the world for such a noble cause. You will not regret this decision in the least.
    I can honestly tell you that this country has changed my life. I am here studying now because I looked for the first opportunity to come back and, luckily, Clemson has the perfect program for me. I am sure that each of you will experience something quite amazing, breathtaking, and life changing in just the one month that you are going to be here.
    My semester here in Delhi just ended, so I made a trip back to Bangalore last week in hopes of finding the small village of Kunna Malai once more. It took me seventeen hours of traveling but when I walked down the road to see the same houses I built less than a year ago and to hear everyone call me by my name as if I had never left was one of the most emotional moments in my life. You will be sure to experience something similar to this, so prepare yourselves!

    Speaking of preparation, I thought it would be nice if I left you with a few helpful tips before you head overseas.
    First, come here with an empty mind. I know you most likely have had to write a paper about what you expect, but I urge you to forget whatever you wrote. Get all of your expectations out of your mind and just be open-minded when you get on the plane to Bangalore. You will get the best possible experience if you just let things happen.
    Second, be prepared to wait! You will not believe how much patience it takes to come to this country. Everything moves so much slower than any of you have probably ever experienced. You will have long, bumpy bus rides that will try all of your patience, but I am sure that once you reach your destination that you will have found the wait well worthwhile.
    Since I have mentioned travel, I also want to tell you about how important it is to travel as much as possible in your free time. You will fall in love with your individual village and villagers, but you cannot come to this country and pass up all of the wonderful sights and incredible history it has to offer. See the palace at Mysore. Visit Mudamalai national park. Go to Kanyakumari and be on the southernmost tip of the subcontinent. Do not miss seeing the amazing temples in Madurai and Tanjore. Sleep overnight on a houseboat in the Keralan backwaters. You have so many options so please take advantage of all of them.
    When traveling, it may be easy to hire your private cab or Mahindra van, but traveling by rail and public bus is also quite an experience of its own. Be sure to do this at some point of your trip at least. Tamil Nadu has a superb bus system that can take you from any big city to another fairly simply. One route can even take me through my extremely remote village. The benefit of public buses is the cheap fare as compared to a private car, but the bus may take a little longer to get from place to place. However, I think it may be worth saving money to take a public route.
    If you decide to travel by night, you should have no problems, though I would recommend taking a train. Overnight sleeper class trains are comfortable, so it should not be a problem if you were to go with that travel option.
    Enough about traveling preparations; let me tell you a few things about getting prepared for village life and the work site.
    Pack lightly as you will not need many clothes in the village. I took four plain shirts and just wore one per week. If you wear a dirty shirt to work every day then you will actually fit in better with the villagers. For the guys: I got cheap basketball shorts at Wal-Mart and just let myself ruin them and then left them behind for the villagers. For the girls: get light capri pants and you will be more than comfortable while working.
    Also, be ready to face resistance to you working at the site. I had to take the saw from the carpenters on the first day and start working to show them my intentions, but they then saw me as an equal and I had plenty of long days with them. In addition, working is slow, so try to push the workers to get the work completed on time. Your purpose is to build houses and you cannot let that goal ever leave your minds.
    I think the last thing I can give you advice on is regarding your group dynamic. The best thing you can do is speak French. It may sound crazy to you now and I am sure that it is difficult, but these people will be your friends for life and if you can communicate openly with them in their language, no matter how minimal the vocabulary will be, you will be so much better off. They will appreciate it immensely if you just try to become one rather than stick out.
    However, no one expects you to be fluent so make sure you get things translated if you are lost. It will be an emotional trip and emotional times lead to speaking in one’s mother tongue so you will miss things unless you ask. Your opinion on where you go and what you do in the village is just important as the others so have your voice heard.
    Lastly, have fun! I know it is cliché, but it is the truth. You are going to be somewhere that is a complete 180-degree turn from “normal”, so your only option is to really just make the best of it at all times, which is easy to do. Eat the food, speak the language, wear the clothes, and embrace the culture you will find here as much and as quickly as possible.
    You will look back on your adventure decades from now and tell your children about how much it meant to you, so go into this journey with the open eyes, minds, and hearts necessary to enjoy every second you spend here.
    There is a beauty in India that one can only see if he has the right mindset and right vision.

Best of luck!
Jake