A new beginning

I have no idea what time it is. My watch says it’s 3:45 am, but it’s daylight outside the nearest window and, regardless, it’s not clear what time zone I am presenting zipping over or through (do time zones exist in the sky?). I’m in limbo—an exciting limbo on my way to a new life. A new life living in India and working at People’s Watch, an NGO in Madurai working on a variety of human rights issues.

I’ve wanted to come to India for over a decade now. Ever since I started Kundalini Yoga and my teacher shared stories of his youth. It’s exciting to be on my way. I’ve read so much and heard so much and dreamt about this country, it’s a bit surreal to by flying there now.

I’m not sure what my time in India will bring. I’m not sure what things I’ll learn, what skills will prove to be useful, what experiences will end up being the most interesting or the most meaningful or the most humbling. I have few expectations but many hopes.

I hope to learn about human rights. I read about human rights in school and witnessed human rights violations in Africa, but I want now to participate and advocate. I want to enter the fight. So I hope to learn in India practical strategies to protect people’s most basic rights. I hope to learn what techniques are available to empower the oppressed and to hold abusers accountable. I hope to be inspired by the men and women fighting the good fight, day after day, in the face of pain, suffering, and heartbreak.

I hope to finally decide that going to law school was a good idea. I went to law school skeptically, knowing that I would not be happy following a typical lawyer’s career. I went hoping and trusting that I would find legal work that excited me, that inspired me, that spoke to the deepest parts of me. I hope to find in India proof that this is possible.

I hope to connect with the place where yoga and meditation—two practices very dear to my heart—originated.

I hope to have my worldview challenged and enriched. I hope to make friends who can share a new culture with me. I hope to share the best parts of American culture as well.

Most importantly, I hope to watch an absurd number of Bollywood movies.
Three hour romantic comedies with dancing? Brilliant.

That’s it for now. Stay tuned.

Author

briantronic

For as long he can remember, Brian has wanted to make the world a better place. This led him to become a Math teacher, a yoga teacher, and a Peace Corps Volunteer. While teaching Math and Physics at a small village high school in rural Kenya, he picked up Swahili, started a chess club, and discovered his true passionÛÓhuman rights and international development. Upon returning to the U.S., Brian pursued a law degree and spent three years studying international law and human rights. Having seen the power of education to transform lives, he also raised money to send his former Kenyan students to college. Since graduating from Penn Law School in 2010, Brian has been clerking in the Superior Court of Vermont, researching legal issues for judges in the Criminal, Civil, and Family Courts. He is excited to work in the field of human rights in India, a country that has long fascinated him.

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