a war within myself

these are some of my hostel girls: Eva (from Germany) and Karin (from Italy) This is visiting Shivas Temple

Me and the cleaning girl from my hostel: shes from Calcutta and considered to be in a very low caste, shes 15, works as a maid at the hostel working about 7-12 hours a day and MAYBE (if shes lucky) earning 1,000 ruppees a month (eqv. to $20) She doesnt know any english, but we manage with hand gestures and such. I usually give her about half of all my meals because the school provides me with too much food, and I cant justify overeating when there are so many hungry people around. So I eat til Im full and give her the rest.

Veiw from my roof, I go up there for drying my laundry, doing reading, or journaling, or school work. Sorry that you all have snow and Im enjoying this gorgeous weather!

COW in the middle of traffic

child sitting by side of the road

So yesterday and today were both kind of bummers....we went and toured two NGOS (Visthar-which takes care of Devdasi's Children--Devdasi are equivilant to prostitutes; the girl children usually have no other choice but to follow suit of their mothers career) and we also visited Precious Childrens Home, which is a home for prisoners children to stop the cycle of crime within families. Both places were not interested in having volunteers--which is ok because I didn't feel moved at either place. So when I came home I took initiative and spent the entire night researching local NGOs and such. I found a few and today I went a visited one that is not even a kilometer from the hostel (about a 5 minute walk) it was called CRY (childrens rights and you) and is an organization working for child laborers and against abuse and so forth. They are seeking volunteers, but for longer than 4 months. So needless to say its been kind of a bummer. But Dr. Rao is taking me tmrw to go and visit Dream A Dream Foundation which is for children from broken homes (usually an alcoholic father, and a double&triple job working mother) It looks really legit and def. a place where they are seeking volunteers. Dr. Rao himself has setup a program to teach children fundamental computer skills (such as turning it on, researching on the web, and typing) For more info you can check it out at www.dreamadream.org and heres the volunteer site (which sounds very appealing to me!) http://www.dreamadream.org/dreams/avs/home/volunteers/;jsessionid=D801304B819A46D769D6363FCB23747A

Anyways last night I went to MG road (a shopping road) and I was passing by a resteruant when a lady sitting on the ground holding the tiniest, most mal-nourished baby I think I may have ever seen (in Haiti I was only exposed to malnourished children who were at the time begining the process of become nourished) This lady was holding out her hand begging for money. Several children with what appeared to be tear-stained cheeks (vasaline) also approached me on the street, and when I was in the rickshaw approached the rickshaw--all begging for money. All I had on me was the money to get home, and a credit card. I had to turn my head and ignore these children. This is not only a daily thing, it is an hourly thing. Once I returned home the image of that malnourished baby and that woman kept haunting me. I started asking myself "has my heart calloused?" "have I turned cold towards humanity?" And so begins the war within me....one that I have had everyday since being here. The war between rationality and compassion. In reality the stats state that around 40,000 children (not including women and men) work for an underground, highly organized Indian mafia. This mafia not only kidnaps children, but also (as Slumdog Millionaire accuratly portrays) either cuts off limbs, or maimes these children. This mafia starves babies for days at a time to invoke more compassion, and then drugs babies and children to keep them hooked on street life. Most beggars who work for the mafia don't even get to keep enough money to eat from. So do I support this ever-growing mafia knowing that my few dollars only go towards enabling more inhumane acts of the mafia, or do I turn my head and silently die on the inside? Do I pretend not to see all the suffering and pain going on around me? The best way to describe it is a feeling of helplessness. I cannot help these people.....without helping the mafia. And so reflecting on this internal war I had a vision...a dream. This vision was to become equipped with sevearl containers of food and just go around feeding these beggars. I know in all actuality this is not something I could do by myself. Seeing as I do not know the language I would for sure get stampeded by beggars. But if I ever did move to India for a longer period I could see myself starting an NGO to feed and rescue beggar children, babies, women, and men. Its just so frustrating how the caste system works...even if I did 'rescue' these people, there would be no acceptance into society--no way to find a job or support themselves. They will forever be stigmatized by their caste, discriminated against with no way to find jobs, housing, and the fundamentals to life. To me it all just seems like one large hopeless cycle, and I find it SO very frustrating.

So tonight, determined to not bypass suffering people without more than a glance, I brought out a package of lollipops. I went to a less popularized shopping street, and was approached by 4 beggars....all of whom I gave a lollipop. Although I could not really help them I could at least treat them like humans. Looking them in the eye, smiling, extended a small token of love. If nothing more, I beleive just the fact that I treated these people as human, is as much as I am empowered to do at this moment in my life. I find this frustrating because I cannot do more, but comforting that I don't have to deny their humanity.

To go along with this post I will also post an article on begging here in India. Thereyou can read facts behind the emotion I feel.

By the way tmrw for my birthday I am going to go and do some NGO touring, go to MG road for a little shopping, dinner with Mrs. Kutty (and Andrew if hes feeling better--hes sick today) and then to Shiros with my friends--Ive invited both my Indian group, and my hostel girls so we'll see who shows up and how that all goes! I'll be out late tmrw night (and prob exhausted after I get back) so I'll update as soon as I can!

I love and miss you all! Thank you for your prayers--please pray for my service work, Im anxious to start and I feel like a lot of doors have been shut!

With love,

Rebecca Ann