The faces of the Scholarship program

Richa (right) and friend striking a pose for the camera

As my internship is drawing to a close this month I find myself reminiscing about my work over the last six months. It is amazing how quickly time has gone by and how much work I still want to do but have very little time to do it in. One of my biggest projects during this internship has been developing a database of WLC’s scholarship program that helps poor children attend good schools. Over the last six months I have been visiting each and every one of these students in their homes to interview, photograph and collect information to build an accurate database. Part of my job is to literally take these names and faces and turn them into numbers so that the information can be more effectively managed. The more fun part of course is meeting incredible people hearing their stories.

It has been an interesting journey visiting 145 homes and drinking that many cups of chai and eating twice as many Parle-G biscuits (staple snack of India) offered by the hospitable parents of these children (it is customary in India to offer visitors something to eat and drink, no matter how poor the home is and it is extremely rude not to accept the offering even if you have been to five other homes that day and already drank 5 cups of chai and ate 10 biscuits). The families and homes come in every size and variation ranging from cement homes with television sets to plastic covers stretched over poles on the ghat. Each of these families has a unique story and I have been humbled beyond measure hearing each and every one of them.

Sonu selling candles and flowers in the evening

Two scholarship children who have a very special place in my heart (only because I see them all the time around Assi Ghat) are Richa Gaur and Sonu Sahani. Both are approximately between the ages of 10-12 (it’s hard to say how old children are because parents rarely keep track and documentation of births is spotty). These children live very close to the Ganga Mahal and it’s hard to go a day without seeing one or both of them going about their lives. Our initial meeting involved both of them trying to hustle me with sales for candles. Many of the children living on the ghats sell candles to tourists, who then light and float the candles into the Ganga for good luck. Both of these kids are up early in the morning selling their candles, getting ready for school coming home, attending their tutorial sessions, doing their homework and then selling their candles again in the evening. At first it was difficult for me to digest the idea of children working for their family’s livelihood. But after being here for six months I have learned that my concept of what is right and wrong is often relative and context dependent.

Over the last six months my relationship with the Sonu and Richa has gone from “didi candle?” to a polite “didi namaste” (didi=sister), thanks to the currency of working for WLC. Richa literally lives right beneath our balcony. Her father runs a tea stall on Assi Ghat and the whole family lives and works under a makeshift home composed of four poles and a plastic cover built adjacent to the Ganga Mahal building. It is hard to imagine living like this, completely exposed to the elements with no privacy, but this is their reality. Despite their living conditions, the family lives with great dignity, keeping their little space as clean as a whistle and religiously sweeping their section of the ghat every morning.

Sometimes when I wake up in the morning to watch the sun come up from the balcony I often see Richa combing her hair and getting ready for school. You could never tell that she lives under a shack by the river if you saw her in her school uniform. The uniform is treated with the greatest respect, always kept tidy and pressed. For me, the uniform is a symbol of hope that one day she and her family won’t have to live under a shack.

Meeraji

For a Westerner, living in India for six months can prove to be challenging in many ways. There are many social, cultural, personal and gastrointestinal difficulties that one encounters on a daily basis. Being away from family and friends and your home is more difficult on some days than others and it helps to be surrounded by a good circle of people to get you through the more difficult days. One such person who has been an important part of bringing a smile to my face everyday is Meeraji. Meeraji has been with WLC for many years. She is a co-worker who is responsible for the daily running of the Ganga Mahal, the building that the WLC operates out of in India and the place where the Canadian interns live. She keeps the place spick and span and running smoothly. She also happens to live right next door so she is the one we run to if there is ever a problem.

To many of the staff Meeraji is also a strong maternal figure. She is always called on to hand out the sweets to children at special events and I have often observed staff members heading into the kitchen to have their daily chat with Meeraji (she is apparently a great story teller). Over the last six months she has become my surrogate mother too. Each morning I wait to hear the soft tread of her feet as she brings in our morning chai (on a silver platter if you can believe) and as 12:30 comes around I am thinking about what she is cooking up for lunch. My excitement for dinner is of climatic proportions that I really can’t get into it in this one blog. No matter what she makes, it’s always delicious. One staff member commented that the food tastes so good because “she cooks it with love”. Well, whatever she is putting in the food she has successfully got me eating and enjoying a strict vegetarian diet, including dal (something I usually despise), everyday.

It’s hard not to fall in love with Meeraji; her soft gentle nature has a soothing influence on the most difficult situations. She is often the one that is putting our minds at ease during the various mini crises that have taken place, including frequently reoccurring gastrointestinal issues, colds, water shortages, power outages, strangers showing up at our door and for me personally swarms of locusts and various other seasonal insects. And despite the obvious language barrier she always manages to make me feel better. These last six months just could not have been as comfortable and enjoyable without her.

Not Your Ordinary Set of Wheels...

Meet World Literacy of Canada's Rotary Mobile Library!

In partnership with Rotary International, WLC's mobile library is just what it sounds like. Yep, a library on wheels. We're talking 4 wheels and hundreds of books, rolling in and around Varanasi, 5 days a week. Running since August of '08, the mobile library is a popular new addition to WLC's programming, and it's not hard to see why. As a natural extension of WLC's library services, the mobile library is a straight forward outreach program that services all people interested in books, no matter their age, sex, caste, or religion.

Manned by the ever amiable Uttam - driver, librarian, and community networker - the mobile library has become a fixture on the dusty roads around Banaras. Easily out-flanking all other versions of traffic in Varanasi (auto/cycle rickshaw, bicycle, motorbike, goat, cow, and anything else with legs or wheels) the van is imposing and instantly recognizable. As for me, well, I'm the "white foreigner-girl" who gets to go with Uttam from time to time, and it's so far been one of the most interesting aspects of my job.

After pulling onto a dusty village road and parking the van, it's usually only a matter of seconds before someone is asking Uttam for a book, or showing him a drawing they've drawn for him since his last weekly visit. I help out by hopping into the back of the van - the library - to tidy the bookshelves and choose which books to display. I like sitting there, on my spare tire-turned-stool, not only because it shelters me from the hot sun, but because it gives me a great view of the mobile library in action. From that vantage point I get the pleasure of seeing all kinds of faces considering our books on display. From serious looking men searching for a book on a specific topic, to tiny hands trying their hardest to pull a pair of curious eyes up to the counter - all are interested, and none go away empty-handed.

Uttam has developed great relationships with the kids in our field areas by encouraging them to read, to draw, and to play with educational toys. In fact, no field visit is complete without handing out sheets of paper and supplies to these budding artists. Sometimes we hold drawing competitions on site, and sometimes they work on their creations all week until our next visit. Although I like the drawing competitions, I have a soft spot for the drawings done at home. Perhaps it's because I loved to while away hours and hours drawing as a child, and I was never without a rainbow of colours and stacks of paper to do just that. I realize now that I was a lucky kid, not just for the food, shelter, education, and love (although that's alot), but also for the privilege of losing myself in my imagination, and for having so many tools to do that. Whenever Uttam enthusiastically unrolls a new creation and I see that proud smile light up the artist's face, I like to imagine that little person when she created it. Sprawled out on the ground and eyes focused on her blank canvas, her mind might have been freed from her everyday thoughts. Maybe she was captured by the floating images of her mind, at least for a little while. Some might say it's unrealistic, and others might think it trite, but it's something that I hold dear as a special privilege of childhood.

Capturing children's imagination is something that the mobile library does by offering a simple yet invaluable opportunity: a space and the materials to read, to be creative, and to play. But by equally feeding the curiosity of young adults and serving the elderly's need for stimulating diversion, the mobile library is a not only a van full of books, it's an open space that belongs to any person who's interested in learning. To me, the mobile library is a wonderful example of just how effective a development initiative can be when it sticks to the basics: Identify the need, provide the people a reliable opportunity to fill that gap, and let the community do the rest. After many years of studying development and noting how easy it is to stray from this simple formula, I know that I am privileged to witness it, and proud to be a part of it.