NEW DELHI - Mother Teresa (86), left yesterday for the Vatican, Poland and the United States on her first overseas trip after recovering from a near-fatal heart ailment, writes Rahul Bedi.
She is accompanied by Sister Nirmala, who succeeded her two months ago as head of the Missionaries of Charity which Mother Teresa founded in Calcutta in 1950. Mother Teresa's aides said in Rome she would meet the Pope and open a rehabilitation centre for prostitutes.
"Health permitting" she plans to visit her missions in New York and Washington after Poland. She is accompanied by Dr Patricia Aubanel, the American cardiac surgeon who has treated her for several years.