Wunacome!

Big hello to my beautiful friends (and also to the not so beautiful – of which you are few!)

Sorry it’s taken me so long to write, but my assumptions that my work place would have internet access were wrong. Instead we have to drive 15 minutes into the town, and hope that the power supply is on (and doesn’t cut out) before I can use their painfully slow internet.

So things with me here have been up and down. I have good days and days when I question what I’m doing here and whether I made the right decision in coming. I have been here for just over a week, staying in the head office campus of Community Action for Rural Development (CARD). For those of you that don’t know I am working as a Programme Officer for this Indian based Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO)/charity, I’m working in tsunami affected village rehabilitation. I am the only westerner here, and I think I’m the only westerner in the whole region! The head office is in a place called Pudukkottai, the staff here work with about 300 villages in a 50km radius organising self-help groups to encourage women to generate income and to give education about sanitation and the importance of savings etc.

Since the tsunami CARD have opened a branch office in Chidambaram, a town about 15km from the coast in S.E. India, in the state of Tamilnadu. I thought that the tsunami unit would be already pretty busy, but this is not the case. The head office is a 5 hour drive away from Chidambaram and tomorrow I leave here to stay permanently there, only returning to the head office once or twice a month. At Chidambaram they’ve hired a 3 bed ground floor flat, the living room acts as an office. I’ll be staying there with 2 girls and one man from the organisation, one of them was only employed last week and has no experience of this kind of work. None of my Chidambaram colleagues speak much English so I have asked for a translator as otherwise I will be of absolutely no use. It was actually something only arranged today when I got upset thinking I made a bad choice in coming as I am not able to speak to the villagers or staff. It had previously been a big concern that I am useless to the organisation and am wasting my time as I am not able to join in with planning projects and talking to the villagers about their needs, hopefully it will be ok when they find someone who can be a worker and translator for the organisation.

I have started to learn Tamil, but it is an incredibly hard language. They have 247 letters in the alphabet! I’m crap at languages at the best of times, so far learning Tamil has been pretty slow for me, but I’ll preserve with it!

So I’ve been to Chidambaram already with the MD’s wife, who’s the Programme Director, and a few other members of staff. We are to work with 13 affected villages which combined have a population of about 8500. We went last week for a couple of days and went to about 7 villages. They have been relocated into temporary shelters, away from the coast, provided to them by the Indian Government or other NGOs. They stay together as villages in rows of hut houses made either from corrugated metal, sheets of tar or woven palm leaves. The majority of the villagers were once fishermen but now their boats are broken, they have no nets and they’re too afraid to go back in the water. The main work that we are hoping to do with them is to train the men in the skill of boat manufacturing and plant acres of different types of trees along the coast line to act as a buffers should another tsunami strike. They plan to plant about 136,000 trees, it’s a pretty good defense system, so long as another tsunami doesn’t come in the next few years! Actually you’re not allowed to live within 1km of the coast, but the people here certainly don’t want to anyway. They don’t even like being there anymore, seeing and being reminded every waking hour of the tragedy that struck their village.

We visited the relocated villagers in the temporary places to tell them that we’ll be working with them to get their lives back on track. Since the tsunami they have been idle, unable to work. The government has given each family Rs.5000 which is the equivalent to £62.50 (US$90), and some rice and lentils. The government is also planning on building new permanent houses for those who lost theirs. Many families have been left homeless and without any possessions as their houses were made from woven palm leaves, which stood no chance against the waves. All that remains of them now are piles of broken leaf sheets and branches mixed with small bits of rubbish and small cloth items. It’s hard to imagine the devastated places I’ve visited as busy trading places when they lie so barren and empty of people. I’ve taken photos but think the internet connection is too slow to be able to attach them. I’ll try from Chidambaram, maybe I can find a faster internet café.

The response of the affected villagers is quite different, some even don’t want to accept second hand sari’s, despite the fact they only have one or two, when most Indians own 50. Some have been very demanding and expect a lot, like a new house, a new boat and net and all new possessions. Well unfortunately that’s just not possible. CARD tries to help people help themselves. For example one of the things they are most involved with is micro credit. It’s basically a small loan to people who can’t get one from the bank. They lend small amounts to groups to start enterprises. This is what we’ll be doing with the tsunami villagers, as they can’t fish now, so they need to do something else, like petty sales or animal rearing.

Rehabilitation projects are slow though. We are only now writing project proposals and submitting them to organisations for funding. It’ll take a month before the money actually comes in, then a couple of weeks preparation. And the guys who are learning boat manufacturing will have to train for 4 months before they will have a useable finished project, and that’s just the first batch of trainees. Most projects have a 2-year time frame on them. Nothing happens at much speed here.

For those of you who donated money, a big thanks. It has not yet been decided exactly what the money will be spent on, but I’m pretty sure it’ll be used for the smaller projects we hope to run, like buying books, stationary and uniforms for children who cannot go to school as they are not able to buy the needed provisions. It will also be spent on hygiene and sanitation education. I’m actually a little surprised at their lack of awareness of the importance of washing hands or food, or that if you leave a fish out in the sun on the sand, it really shouldn’t be eaten 3 days later, especially when the sand hasn’t even been washed off or the maggots removed! Also they don’t use toilets as they don’t feel the need, doing it out in the open for them is better as there is nothing to clean and it doesn’t smell, they don’t consider the environmental or hygienic impacts of this. Even thou in some of the temporary shelters toilets have also been constructed, still more than one month on, they have not been used. We need to educate them into the correct ways to use them and the importance of doing so. Health education will also be taught, as diarrhoea is common, so usually they take their kids and sick to the temples and pay large sums of money for prayers to be said to get the demons out. We’ll try to educate about the importance of not drinking dirty water, hygiene and when it’s necessary to go to the doctor, and remove the stigma from doing this. Other things your money is being spent on is funding so people can learn new skills like basket weaving. Discussions are also going to be held about managing your accounts and you money. Nets too need to be bought as they people aren’t interested in weaving them themselves as it takes too long. They’re pretty costly as they are so huge, and different types are needed for the catch of different fish.

I am involved also in finding out information about fish processing. That is what to do with the fish after catch in order to preserve it. Such as drying, smoking etc. Also about fish hygiene, how so stop it from spoiling so quickly. Unfortunately because it’s so hot, they don’t have ice and there are no fridges / freezers or vans with fridges, things spoil pretty quickly. Before the tsunami they would sell fresh fish, often fish that is rotten, with fish processing it gives a much needed added value.

A point about the weather, it’s 35+ and bright and sunny everyday. I have a few vest tops but am not allowed to wear them. I’ve managed a few hours of topless sunbathing on the roof of my room, but you can only stay out for a couple of hours before you melt! We’re on the lead up to summer now, it’ll get much hotter and much more humid, and there’ll be loads more mosquitoes. Already I have about 30 bites on my body! India is ultra conservative and shoulders, midriffs, chest and legs must be covered. There is a huge segregation between men and women, even between men and women of the same organisation. They keep their distances from each other and I have been asked to do the same. It is extremely hard to be smothered and protected in the way that I am. I am not even allowed to go to the shop at the end of the road by myself, or walk round town alone. I am also not allowed to speak to men who don’t work for the organisation, and only about work matters to those who do!! It is seen as highly immoral for mixing with those of the opposite sex. Indians care too much about what other people think. Also they’re pretty sheltered and still unmarried girls of 28 can’t even say the work sex without sniggering. I don’t know how long I can go without male company, but I don’t wish to offend my employers. There’s a very caring family feel to the organisation. There’s only a handful of men, and loads of girls in their 20s and then the MD and his wife who are mid 40s.

There isn’t much for entertainment here, the girls here seem content with watching Indian love songs taken from films on the TV. There are some ultra cheesy dance moves and very dodgy haircuts. The big hair, moustache look is very much favoured! I spend a lot of time reading, as there isn’t so much else to do for entertainment. Only one of the girls in the organisation speaks good English. The others know a few words, but their written English is better than spoken as they use it at university. I heard that the level of English in the south is better than in the north, as most Indians (from all states bar Tamilnadu) speak Hindi, either as a first or second language, but in Tamilnadu they speak Tamil first and English second. But judging them on the standards of the northern Indians, their English isn’t great. It’s comparable to my German, in the way that it’s a language I learnt for 5 years, and had a 2 year refresher course at uni, but still can’t get very far past asking for directions to the station.

I go to bed here at between 9:30pm and 11:00pm. 9:30pm is considered to be pretty late, if the girls are in my room and we’re talking when it reaches 9:30pm, they always remark on how late it is, then they leave! I can’t believe 11pm seems late to me now! If I had more to do then I’d be staying up later, but then I have to wake up at 8am to start work for 8:30am. These hours of sleep and awake are pretty new to me, but it fits with my new lifestyle. At least I’m not expected to adopt the local waking time of 5:30am!


So I hope that you’ll write back to me, even if life seems boring and mundane. I have limited communication here and a very different sense of humour to my new friends. So please I need your stories, you guys keep me going when things seem tough. For the first time in my life I’ve experienced homesickness. Not home as in my parents home, more like old lifestyle, England, friend sickness. 2 years ago I didn’t think it was possible to miss England but I had a pretty good time between coming back from my last trip and going away on this one there’s actually many people and things I miss.

So I’ll stop now, and let you get back to work, or the TV or whatever you were doing. I’ll write again when I can.


I miss you all, and really mean it. Oh, sorry, I am going but I have to just tell you one more thing. The food here is nice for the first 2 days, but when it’s exactly the same everyday it loses it’s appeal. Also you have the same meal for breakfast and dinner, lunch is the main meal. Breakfast and dinner is some kind of bread / flour based thing dipped in a watery spicy curry sauce. Lunch is a mountain of rice with a watery curry sauce and some cold vegetables chopped very small. We eat with our right hand and often off palm leaves. I asked if they mind eating pretty much the same thing day in and day out, and they don’t mind, they like it, but I guess it’s all about what you’re used to. By the way if anyone is tempted to send me light weight food parcels, packets of sauces (the add water/milk kind), pasta, noodles, chocolate, sweets, etc you couldn’t underestimate just how much it would be appreciated!!

With much love
Ruth or Roose as I am known here!