So it’s been a couple of days since we updated our blog but we’re just so busy being overblown with impressions, activities, ideas and pecurities that we simply couldn’t find the time to get to a post done. Even now it is an in-between because we’re dead-tired from a long and amazing day here in India. Right now Koen is laying beside me fast asleep so I’ll make it a short one.
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Here is a video with the childeren we took care of.
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Our house is on the first floor, above an Indian family.
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We live in a very nice typical Indian street next to a very (very) busy road. The street still has traditional huts in it where people actually still live in, just like 50 and more years ago. Left to the hut live Senthil, Karin, Anantha (the Amaidi family who helps us) and above their place live more volunteers who we partied with yesterday.
The view from our rooftop when looking towards the ocean. The beach is where you see the palms.
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We’re neighbours with a hindu temple, awesome!
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A panorama of our street.
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On the motorcycle is Senthil, our great help since we got here who lives next door. And below you see Senthil with his wife Karin in their office.
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Since our last post so many things have happened to us that I could write a 15 page article about it. As we said in our last post we were going to visit an orphanage. Well, plans changed and this week we went to the ‘gypsy’ community instead. Next up is the Anbalayam orphanage though. The gypsies are amazing. I can’t explain the shock that went through me when I first saw how they live there. They live along an abandoned airport and a big field full of garbage dump. They’re totally excluded from normal society and appearantly it was organised that way. See, the government actually does not want them near the city area because they are members of the lowest cast! Yep, India is still pretty traditional and old fashioned and they still live by the casting system. So the government, those good sameritans, gave them jobs and housing, which actually means they get to live in huts and tiny houses and work on the dump collecting materials like copper to sell. Now, this situation sounds pretty strange. But even stranger is that the gypsie people seem to like it that way. They live near the garbage and kind of treasure their way of life. Bathing is a word they never heard of, they proudly tell us their last time of washing themselves which can be weeks or months or more. Flies all over the place and the smell is unbearable.
But they’re absolutely fine with it, it’s their way of culture. But their kids are suffering from it. Not seldom you see little kids eating sticky stuff covered with insects and with dirty skins and wounds. The gypsie life is obviously not for little kids and that’s why there is Samugam Trust, the centre we worked at this week. They ask permission from the parents to take them to a care centre where they’ll get washed and sleep and play. They can live there 24/7 if they want and their parents allow it. It’s been a very interesting week and we learned a lot about kids with difficult pasts and about the Indian culture.
Photo’s of the gypsys will follow soon…!
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Here’s us at the center with our kids and caretaker Swathi. The kids from left to right are Tamil (the smartest and brightest…she’s so sweet we would love to take her home but yeah..) Dinesh, Aurupondi, Lakhsman (who’s really into Koen) and Vinoth (who’s really into Steffie).
We also visited a ‘home’ for Leprosity patients. It’s basically an abandoned hospital where elderly people with lepra have been ‘dumped’ by their families. They are rejected by society and nobody visits them accept for 2 caretakers, sent daily by our project, Samugam. When we visited them with our new Denish friends, some of them cried because the elderly people are so lonely and nobody ever visits them except us. Some of them can’t go outside since the entrance is locked by palmtrees which were ripped out of the ground because of the cyclone that hit earlier in Januari. They are trapped. One man has been sitting in the same spot over there for over 7 years!! We are going back there on friday to do a special project…you’ll see!
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Inside the leprosity home and Steffie doing the hair of one of the patients. The woman on the right needed eye surgery, which we paid for directly. It was only about 8 euros.
Besides being flabbergasted about Indians and their habits we also made friends here. There are quite many other volunteers here (most from Denmark) and also a few Dutch. So it’s really cosy and yesterday we went to dinner together which was really nice. We also nearly lost our lifes by driving back in rikshaws, who were racing to be the first arriving. Now, the Indian traffic is really something special, not a second goes by where you didn’t almost crash into something/someone. We were winning with our very skilled and risky driver but then we ran out of gas.
We took a picture with our roomy, Maya, just before the driver filled up the tank again. The race was extremely frightening but totally worth it.
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Today I’m meeting with my new friend Swathi and I’m gonna take her for a treat because she has already treated me so much even though she doesn’t earn shit. Jobs here are so poorly payed it’s really sad. Koen and I feel like rich bastards here. People look at us like we’re millionaires..
Here are some more pics..we have a lot more to show but we’re calling it a day! Goodnight!
Question of today, which we want YOU to answer: We have had many guys come up to us and ask to go on a picture with us. They ask this all the time. They don't even prefer to go on the picture with Steffie (who is blond and a girl!) but sometimes even only want Koen. What do you think, would you enjoy this type of behaviour, and why do you think they want to go on the pictures with us so often?
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