Trials and tribulations

Hey guys, thank for being with me and sharing my Indian experience. For those of you who have been waiting for this to arrive, apologies in the delay, but I have had lots going on, and was putting off writing this as I knew it was going to be long, but the longer I put it off, the more I had to write about so as you know from my past blogs, I tend to write a lot, and I have a feeling this may be the longest one yet!! So this is a warning, before I go any further, cut and paste this and print it out. Read it when you got time, like on a bus, in the queue at Argos, sitting on the loo, or trying to fall asleep. I give you a big hug and thank you for showing some interest in little old me (although I don’t know who actually is reading this!!), and hope that you too are hunky dory.

So…My past couple of months have been pretty filled as I have been trying to decide exactly what I want to be doing in India and where I want to be. If you are keeping up with me here you will know that I have had many frustrations working with organizations engaged in tsunami work and have been looking for my options as to where I should possibly move on to. I decided to check out an organization in Goa, as I figured it’d be pretty cool living close to the beach, where the people are more liberal and where there is a flow of tourists most of the year. So some time in October after establishing contact with an organisation thereI was invited to attend a 3 day conference in Cochin (south west India) organized by The Peaceful Society, from Goa, to learn about the organisation as well as the state of the rivers in India and the effect river pollution is having on the populations which depend on it and the environmental consequences of factory effluence, sewage and domestic waste.

It took me about 14 hours to travel by auto rickshaw (tuk tuk), bus and train over to the other side of India to the west coast to Cochin in Kerela. I was impressed by the conference, by the attendance and the distance other organisations had travelled to attend. The meeting was held for NGOs working in other states, for them to share their experience and for a consensus to be drawn up as to what action should be taken. Guest speakers were invited, which included highly respected environmentalists, ecologists as well as social activists. There were organisations from 7 different states, who bought with them water from their local rivers for a symbolic mixing into the sea at Cochin. The furthest had come 60 hours by train from the northern state of Bihar! I was asked to be part of the reporting team, so had to attend every part of the 3 day meeting and write up the notes (think it ran into some 20 typed pages by the end!). It was pretty interesting though, I learnt about river pollution in India (in general and in the different states) and I also learnt about the importance of rivers to life and about the Indian government’s crazy scheme intended to provide more water for dryer states by way of joining all India’s rivers, diverting their courses and disturbing their flow. I had a feeling it may be this way, but it was confirmed that if you want to do something illegal, such as dumping factory effluents into the river, you can do so for a cheaper cost than it would be to treat it, simply by paying off the authorities so they turn a blind eye. It’s such a shame, I’ve seen the condition of some of the rivers in India, they are stagnant and black and you can usually smell them before you can see them. I thought there’s be no hope for rivers like this, but I am assured, with enough resources, it s possible to bring the life back to this kind of heavily polluted river. Unfortunately no NGO has the funds to do the necessary work, and the government here doesn’t seem to care about what’s really important, so despite the 50 or so NGOs in attendance, swearing that they will lobby the government and run schemes locally to clean the rivers and challenge the corporations, I doubt much will actually be done.

The meeting was held in a conference hall on campus of a catholic centre, which came complete with a church, few fathers, nuns and religious fanatics. It was a nice setting though but a little strange for me to see so many religious people wandering around in religious attire. There’s actually a very large Christian population in Cochin, due largely to the influence of the Dutch who were here in the early days. In Cochin I only really had one day spare where I could be a tourist, so I went to the places of interest to tourists, Fort Cochin to see some historic places and also the local fishing technique. For centuries, since the Chinese were in the area, don’t know exactly when, but hundreds of years ago they constructed big wooden constructions on the edge of the river with a fishing net suspended under the water. When the fishermen feel the time to be right they pull on ropes and the massive net lifts out for them to inspect their catch. It didn’t seem like a very efficient way of catching fish as when they pulled them out there were just a few small odd fish. But someone from somewhere was having more luck as also at that place there were places selling fresh sea food, which you purchase from the market then take to one of the many cooking places for it to be cooked up into a chap and delicious meal.

I went alone to Cochin, but for me being alone doesn’t usually last long. Almost as soon as I arrived to Fort Cochin a young local guy latched onto me, and we spent the day together, until I had to tell him to leave me alone after finding out he was only talking to me for one reason. He suggested that we get a room together, and when I expressed my shock and unwillingness about it, he offered to pay the Rs 200 for the room! Local guys just don’t get it, and I have got so bored of many of the men here being the same! It’s become such an old broken record, but now I’m prepared for it, I learn something from each time and won’t give the chance for anything to be recommended again. It’s a shame as I’ll talk to anyone, but it always is the case that I do, then the guy that I’m with winds up wanting more.

I saw something in Cochin which had a big impact on me, due largely to the fact that I and no one else did anything about it. As I was walking one day I saw an old homeless guy with big open wounds on his body and flies nestled in them and totally buzzing round him, the guy was barely alive, but was already starting to decompose on the street where he sat, and I, like everyone else walked past him on the street. That guy upset me much more than seeing people with deformed bodies and children begging. He looked like a sweet old man, but was ignored by everybody and was decomposing whilst still being alive! I would have tried to help him, like get him to a hospital or something, but I saw him on the day I was leaving, and wasn’t sure if I had the time to take him somewhere and also make my train. When I got back to the campus I hung around outside and said if he should be helped one of the nuns or fathers would come out and I would tell them and leave them with sufficient money to get him fixed up. Unfortunately no one came, and I had to go. These situations in India are so sad. Many people requiring state or civil help never receive it. You see many people with mental problems talking to their imaginary friends and people looking on, as if they too do not exist.

Anyway, after the 3 day meeting was over I travelled with the Peaceful Society to Goa. The train took 15 hours. We had to provide our own entertainment on the train, in the Indian way, which is by singing. So on the train with men in their 30s and 40s I had to sing western songs whilst they sang with me if they knew the songs, or they would sing Hindi songs. It was embarrassing at first, but then it seemed they didn’t mind that I only knew a few lines of a song and probably sang out of tune! The train ride was pretty uneventful but at night I started to try and make some bikini tops from scraps of material I pilfered from a tailor shop where I went to get my newly made jeans altered. When we arrived at Goa we rented a rickshaw to take us and all our luggage to the Peaceful Society campus. The campus was really nice, a few buildings in a woodland setting, but by this time I had already decided that I can’t work for them, due to the nature of their work. They don’t run projects as such, but do more empowerment training and organizational stuff. Things that really are too high level for me. So I stayed with them in their beautiful campus for a few days and typed up the report for them. I then headed to the beach where I planned to stay for a few days before heading back home.

I actually ended up staying on the beach for almost 2 weeks. I first headed to a beach called Vagator as I heard that Anjuna, the main beach for backpackers didn’t have much accommodation, but when I arrived to Vagator the place was empty of foreigners and the beach was full of Indian day trippers just standing fully clothed on the beach, or maybe up to their knees deep in the water, still fully dressed. I left Vagator about 30 minutes after arriving and headed to Anjuna. I was walking round by myself checking the place out telling myself that I had to go and make some friends, or else I’d be staying in Goa alone. It’d been ages since I had to introduce myself to strangers and to see if we could hang out, but it turned out better than alright after I got the courage to sit and talk with a stranger guy. The guy I first met was called Chris, I can’t really say where Chris is from as he’s half German and half French, he grew up in France, but studied in England from 15 to 21, has lived in about 3 different countries since then and is now living in Holland. He was also travelling alone, after doing the past 18 months on a bicycle from France to India, via the Middle East, promoting the use of the bicycle for some UN department. That night Chris introduced me to a guy he met a few days back called Brad, from Australia. The 3 of us ended up talking late into the night and were the last to leave at about 3am, when all lights were off and there wasn’t another soul about. Anjuna beach is really nice, I thought I was going to be there in peak season, and that the place would be packed, but it turns out I was there just before peak season and it was pretty empty. People have an image of Goa that it doesn’t really live up to. Perhaps it does over Christmas and New Year, and perhaps it was like that a few years ago, but for now it was quiet and pretty mellow. There is only a handful of restaurant / bars on the beach and there’s a loud music ban after 10pm so most places start to wind down pretty quickly after that. Our little group was always the last to leave a place, way after everyone else had left and the lights were turned out.

In Goa I had an interview with a Christian organisation called Caritas. They never got back to me though, I think they were concerned about what I could offer, seeing as I don’t speak any of the local languages spoken in Goa.

For the first few days I spent my time in the water, on the beach, eating, drinking and talking. After a few days I met another guy called Emanuel, from Sweden and some San Franciscans - Ben and Nate. I was so grateful for meeting these guys. We spent all day and night together and got on so well, it was as if we had known each other for years, rather than just a few days. With my newly formed posse we hired scooters and did a few days riding around Goa. Goa’s a really beautiful state, and nothing like the rest of India. You could actually forget you were in India being in Goa and I took the opportunity to totally forget about all I’m doing here and really chilled and got into it. We rode through beautiful country side, past rivers and agricultural land and checked out other beaches. Our nights were spent drinking cheap alcohol at the bars and on the few occasions where they had parties, we partied to Goa trance. Unfortunately Goa is known for its trance music and the restaurant and bar owners think this is what we want to hear. It gets repetitive during the same night you first hear it, and trying to dance to it during the day tie and early night parties was a challenge to maintain. It always felt strange in Goa as the image people have of the place is a constant party place, but actually it’s much more chilled and relaxed. I had such a good time, I extended my ticket twice, and when it came to leaving and saying goodbye to my new found friends I found it so emotional. I think that it was due to the fact that I knew I was going to be coming back to Tamil Nadu, a place of frustration and not much going on, with the only person there I can really talk to being Terry. Also I was really sad as the guys I were hanging out with would have been people I would be friends with and possibly date back home, and I didn’t know when it would be that I’d see these people again. Anyway, after crying my goodbyes and swearing we’d see each other again (which is more unlikely than likely) I started my long trip back home.

First I had to take a bus to Bangalore, 15 hours, and then wait a full day before being able to take another bus to close to where I live, another 12 hours. The first bus I took I had to share a single bed with a very large young Indian lady. The bus I had booked a seat on never turned up, so I was put on the sleeper bus, where you share 2 to a bed. It’s better in this situation being a woman rather than a man, I heard from some male friends the horror of having to share a single bed with a local guy who has no respect for space or the fact that you may not actually want his head on your shoulder! I was still pretty upset during the journey. It didn’t help that I had to spend a say in the city before I could leave. It was such a contrast to scenic and peaceful Goa, I missed by friends and didn’t really want to be going back, so I engaged in a bit of retail therapy. I didn’t have much to do in the 12 hours I had to spend in Bangalore, so I hung out in the book shop and ended p buying myself 14 new books, peanut butter, wholemeal bread and a whole load of other things I wouldn’t be seeing for some time.

When I arrived back to my house I was only to be there for 3 days before I left to another town, Tirchy (full name Tiruchirappalli), to attend a training meeting given by a guy from the Grameen bank. These 3 days were not good though. When I got back to the house the instant stench of damp coming from my house was immense. The walls in my bedroom had water droplets on them where the bricks had absorbed as much water as they could, and now the water was coming in. Clothes smelt putrid and to top it all off termites had moved in. On my shelving behind bags and on the door frame of my room termites and ants had begun to get settled. It’s the last thing you want to deal with when getting back and feeling down, but deal with it I had to. Cleaning out the houses these pests had laboriously worked on was disgusting. As I demolished their houses the hordes came out and spread about the room quickly. Fortunately India houses are tiled, so with a lot of water I was able to wash them away, but they had nestled in my stuff and so I had to clean everything. Oh, and I forgot to say we were robbed whilst Terry and I were out the house. It isn’t the first time it’d happened, and we know it’s some of the neighbour boys, maybe the teenagers, they didn’t take much, we had much more valuable things in the house they could have taken, such as the laptops and cameras, but it’s just annoying and sad, as most things we have are essential things, and besides, both Terry and I have been working for these Indians without receiving a single rupee for coming up to 10 months. We got robbed before whilst Terry and I were actually in the house, we now shut our windows as sticky fingers come through the bars and take whatever they can. Food has also been stolen – I’ve lost noodles, cornflakes and pasta!!

Before leaving for Goa I had started to organise some projects with HRFDL in coordination with a local university – one was a crab cultivation project and the other health and well-being training. These projects however were dropped whilst I was away as Tamil Nadu received massive amount of rain (it being rainy season now) and many of our villages were flooded, and the inhabitants forced to evacuate their houses and live in the local school. Well, about 4 villages were evacuated to schools, and the other villages I visited to make an assessment weren’t actually flooded into their houses, it was flooded around, but there was some slight exaggeration on the side of the villagers. However, despite the exaggerations it seemed absurd to me that preparations for the rain were not made. It is known that Tamil Nadu’s rainy season is the end of October until late December, where monsoons and torrential downpour cause havoc. The people living in our flooded villages suffer as they are agricultural farmers or construction workers, and since tsunami many still haven’t been able to find work, and now that the land is under water they still are unable to work or provide for their needs. And you know what’s really messed up is that one of the villages that had to evacuate to the school is a village that HRFDL built for tsunami victims after their original houses got washed away. They knew that the land they built the houses on would flood, but they believed that they would have built permanent housing for them to move into way before the rains came. Well the rains have come, and we still haven’t even been able to source enough money for buying the land, let alone start constructing new brick houses! So as the staff members at HRFDL are pretty incompetent and uncommitted, and it is impossible for any of them to focus on more than one thing at a time, or do any more than the minimum amount of work required (despite the population being extremely poor and suffering 2 natural disasters in less than a year!) I have decided that history will not change (in this case anyway) so have now given up trying with these guys.

So for the 3 days I was home I slumped into a depression. I was upset at having great friends for a short time, and then loosing them all, not knowing when I would next have fun or have anything closely resembling a social life. I was depressed for having a great time, and that being gone. But mostly I was depressed as I pondered what exactly I came to India to do, and what I have actually managed to accomplish since arriving. So many people back home think how altruistic it has been me coming here, but if the reality of my time here was really known the formed opinions of folks back home would surely change. To be honest I have actually achieved very little being here and much of what I have spent my time on for work has been wasted or not utilised. I felt my time here was pointless since arrival, but was (and still am) unsure as to what to do next. I have learnt much more by seeing how not to do something, by seeing how disorganisation and a lack of direction really halts necessary work from getting done. I have taught myself more from my own inquisitions than have learnt from my “experienced” partners, and have realised that life for India’s poor will not be changing any time soon when 80% of the NGOs are useless beyond (my preconceived) belief and the government fails so badly in all that it is supposed to do. India is a funny place, there is much to love about it, as well as much to hate about it, and when feeling down you pick up on the negative, irritating things and get so wound up you start looking for the fastest way out. I felt like I didn’t want to be in India anymore, but also at the same time didn’t know where I did want to be, well there are plenty of places I would like to be, but don’t have the money to change country and work somewhere else as the flight ticket alone would take up a considerable chunk of my savings! For 3 days I sat in my hammock, trying to read the new books I had bought, but my mind wasn’t able to focus and I would start crying at the many differnet thoughts buzzing around my head. I have never been as depressed as I was during those 3 days being back.

But there was no time for depression any more as just over 2 weeks ago I went to Trichy to learn more about micro-finance by a man from the leading micro-finance institution. For those of you who don’t know micro-finance is something undertaken by many NGOs, it started in Bangladesh with Grameen bank, but is now a practice many countries around the world. It’s basically small loans issued to groups of people so that they can start a small enterprise. It is given to the poorest of the poor who are unable to go to a normal commercial bank for a loan. There is no collateral needed and interest rates are as low as they can be. There is a lot of supervision with the loan, and it is given mostly to women (about 95%). It has differing rates of success, due largely to the organisation which implements the programme. Most organisations don’t manage it too well and give money for an enterprise to begin without helping the beneficiaries with training or marketing. A lot of the time the people embark on an enterprise the market has no interest in, or they don’t give sufficient training to the people, so they don’t know how to make savings or repay their loan. The people who receive the loans are not accustomed to having money, so sometimes the money is spent on other things, or savings are not made as they are accustomed to spending their money as it comes in. There are no serious consequences for non-repayment of the loan, as it is a social bank, or social organisation that does the lending. Micro-finance however does have big potential help people change their own situation for a sustainable future. Grameen is now actually sustainable, and from the interest they charge the beneficiaries they are able to issue new loans and reach more people, some 5.3 million people have Grameen loans in Bangladesh. The meeting was arranged for Kalaislevan’s organisation as one of his funders knows Nazrul, the guy who came to give the training. As you would usually have to go to Bangladesh for training, he thought that he would invite all grass root and struggling NGOs to also attend the training, so they can learn the best practices.

When I arrived at Trichy I stayed in the family house of Kalaiselvan. I had worked with him and his organisation Awakes in the past. When I arrived to his house a woman from London, Lesley was already there. I recruited Lesley to come and work in India. I have been asked by a few organisations if I can get them foreign volunteers, and Lesley replied to my internet message. We’d been in contact for months before she arrived, and we got on instantly, despite the fact that she is nearly 20 years my senior. It was really nice having someone to talk to again, someone you can actually engage in conversation with, rather than just having someone to talk at you(like Terry!!)., rather than with you. After a few days I spoke with Emanuel (the Swede from Goa) on the phone. Emanuel is an amateur documentary maker, and we’d discussed the possibility of him coming down to my area and making a documentary about tsunami. Anyway, Emanuel arrived after a few days and Lesley, Emanuel and I moved into a hotel and out of the family home. Terry was at the training too, and so was a friend of his, Liza, from the USA. So it was cool. It helped me take my mind off all the thoughts and questions going on in my head I had no answers for, and we tried to have as much fun in Trichy as is allowed by a city with not so much happening. Terry and Liza left soon after the training though as Liza was only in India for 8 days. Mine and Emanuel’s sleep pattern seemed to match, we would get up at about mid day after going to sleep between 2:30am and 5:15am! Unfortunately I still had to see Kalaiselvan on a regular basis, but fortunately not as regularly as Lesley did who would have to get up much earlier than I did as she promised to be at the office for a 10am start. Working with Kalaiselvan is frustrating beyond words and I felt guilty for bringing Lesley to work here, but she would have come to India anyway, and this is her 6th time here and already has quite an understanding on Indians and the way they work! Kalaisevan is the director of his small organisation, and he’s one of the most unfocused people I have ever had the misfortune of having to work with. I did work with him however, as he works for good causes, but it frustrates me as he keeps the organisation from achieving what it has set out to do, which in the end makes the villagers he represents suffer. He is trying to work with bonded labourers and their families, but he has very little by way of funding. He will actually do what ever he thinks he can get money for. One of the things in the past he has asked me to do is grant seeking. I know how to get money for organisations, but in order to do so you have to write such a comprehensive project concept paper for submission, Kalaiselvan denies that so much information or correct formatting is necessary, and insists on writing a one page letter. Guys like him will never get much money, especially when they don’t have a website, and won’t ever get one done. He wastes my time (and money, as he doesn’t pay for any of my expenses), and then denies it later when I have a go at him. I have tried to do a website for him, but he never read the text I wrote for the different pages. He asked me to design a leaflet for Awakes, which since I completed it have seen or heard nothing of. I have written 3 or 4 project concept papers, using information from dialogue, which he is then never happy with, and says the concept is wrong, despite the fact I have pretty much written word for word what he says as he takes 4 hours to explain something that could have been done in 30 minutes. Nothing I have done for that guy has he ever used, but still he is full of compliments and asking me to do more work for him! This month has been the month of decisions. No more will I waste my time with organisations like HRFDL and Awakes!!!

I’ll quickly tell the story of these quarry people and their families he is working for. I will do more research on them as I will help Emanuel make a documentary on their lives. The workers are people from other places in TN who are affected by droughts and a lack of work, so they come to Trichy to work in one of the many the quarry fields. Upon arrival they were paid an advanced salary, which most families managed to spend completely in a few weeks. The work they are engaged in is highly hazardous and labour intensive. Some members are engaged in blowing up mountains with dynamite, others are involved in shovelling mountain bits into the back of trucks and some are engaged in breaking up large chunks of stone with hammers. The workers are paid depending on their production, and because the have already been given their pay at the beginning of their contract they earn next to nothing daily, but still have things to pay for, so take out additional loans with interest rates as high as 40%, and are usually unable to pay off the monthly interest, let alone the original borrowed amount. Because these people are paid depending on their out put work becomes a family affair. Most children of these families have never been to school, and work along side their parents. The work is tough and the hours long, and because they are paid a pittance, and are in debt to their employer and/or money lender they cannot leave, and so are bonded. Awakes has opened up a school, where 50 of the 300 working children now go to. It is hoped that more children will be able to go, but they only have the funds for 50 so far. There are many ways that the school can improve, and I have written a report as to how this can be, but have not yet been able to get funding for it, as many of the things I write for Kalaiselvan go unread or unused. Social problems amongst this community are pretty high, domestic abuse is common, as is sexual abuse, forced prostitution and alcoholism. Kids from this community are not able to go to a regular school as they are undisciplined at home and won’t be able to learn in the usual manor. Health problems are common, as is an early death from years of strenuous work, abuse, drinking daily and very low morale.


I only got back from Trichy yesterday, after ending up staying there for 2 weeks. Since deciding that I am no longer going to waste my time with organisation which make no progress I decided that I want to manage a couple of my own projects myself. I would like to do all the initial work of planning and conception, and then join with a local organisation to help with implementation. I will then give training on monitoring and evaluation and plans of action, but then the goal would be to leave the project in the hands of a capable organisation. There is a female prison in Trichy and I would like to be able to do something for the female inmates, as I am pretty sure that most of the women in there are not real criminals, but situation criminals. I don’t know for sure yet, but I have a strong hunch that the majority of the crimes committed by these women will be crimes against their husbands or their husband’s family. As you know most women here have to have arranged marriages, where they basically become slaves to their husband and their husband’s family. They get treated badly and inhumanely and domestic abuse is seen as a necessary way to discipline, even when the offence may have been as small as not getting dinner ready on time, not cooking the right thing, or not being able to get the stain out of the husband’s shirt. I find it hardly surprising that many women take revenge on their husband, and I think these are really strong women, who are most likely sweet and lovely usually, but driven to do a criminal act from years of torture and abuse. I sympathize with them a great deal, as every day in India as I look around and meet people, I am thankful I am not an Indian woman, especially an Indian woman married to a man (and his family) which I loath. I haven’t seen it yet, but I know the prison will be horrible, without adequate sanitation and hygiene, they’ll be further abuse in prison, and most will have little chance of getting out as a fair trial in India is something so rare (court cases can be rigged, witnesses, police and judges bribed, if you don’t have the money there’s no way you’re going to win). I want to do a project to support these women and any dependants they leave on the outside. So I had a meeting with an organisation in Trichy TMSSS to see if they knew of any organisation working in this area. They themselves actually do some work with released women, but it seems not much s going on. I was also going to start planning a micro-finance project for the homeless and beggar people of the town, as there are many and no NGO is doing any more to help them than giving out occasional food parcels (which reinforces dependency) when they have the funds.

But as the days started to go over, and I started to draft a letter to TMSSS to tell them what I can do, what I want their input to be etc, I started to realise that nothing is actually holding me to Tamil Nadu, except my house, which I have £600 tied up in, and won’t be able to get back until the end of my contract which will be at the end of May. So I started to think about where else to go, and was again temped by the north, to places where the locals are mostly tribals, or Indians only due to the way the British mapped out the country when we left. So I kind decided that I will stay in my house until about the 20th December and read read read loads about micro-finance and plan a programme that can be used in any city to target the homeless and beggar population. I then will go to Goa for Christmas, my birthday and New Year, and will return to help Emanuel make a film on tsunami and then on the Trichy quarry field bonded labourers in the New Year. I will then decide where I go to next, but as of yet don’t have any solid plan. I may do the female prison project, or I may just plan it, and leave it to TMSSS to fully implement, and maybe remotely advice and help on. Even though TMSSS is a big organisation, the director still had a rather glazed look in his eye during our meeting, a sense of unprofessionalism (as judged by a westerner, not an Indian) and not many ideas about how to make his organisation any different from any other doing marginal work. I ust don’t know that I want to commit to another organisation that in the end may just end up wasting my time again. Besides, I really don’t think I want to live in Tirchy, there isn’t a great deal there.

So that’s me, and you’ve caught up with what’s going on with me right now. I do apologise for going on for 9 pages (in MS Word). I know this is the longest yet and thank you for all of you who have managed to get this far. I decided not to send this as an e-mail anymore, as I don’t want to burden people with my long winded ramblings (of mostly complaints), but if you would prefer that then let me know. I ask again as some of you who said they would the first time I asked may have changed your mind, especially when you know just how long I can go on for!!

So I guess for those of you who have got this far you have taken a realinterest in what’s going on here. I really do apologise that it’s so long, and mostly winging, but working in a place like India is as I hope you have come to realise often lonely, fustrating, repetitive, hot, wet, boring, annoying and enjoyable! I am generally doing ok and am trying to hang onto my sanity, which often dangles by a fraying thread, but I am looking forwards to Christmas and a break back to Goa (but still have enough stored up trance that it will be some years before I will really be happy to hear too much of it again!). As of tomorrow I will be living alone again as Terry starts his trip to Nepal, leaving me by myself, alone in the house with only the rain, neighbours, TV, internet, books and street dogs to keep me company. I would love it of those of you who have got this far would e-mail me. I feel really selfish to go on about myself for what is now 10 pages, and not know anything about your trials and tribulations. They may not seem to you as dramatic or serious as what you perceive e to be going through, but I would still like to know. In a place of few friends virtual contact is so necessary, so even f you write to tell me you cat got sick and you had to take it to the vet, or you got a flat tyre from driving home one night, I would still love to hear about it, honestly!!

So that’s me, and I think I have gone on enough. I hope that you are all well, not letting the weather get you down or the run up to Christmas make you wish that it didn’t exist (in it’s commercial form anyway). I feel sorry for those of you in the UK who are scrapping ice of car windows each morning, but don’t worry, I really don’t have much to rub it in with - my clothes won’t dry, the roads are mud pools, mosquitoes and frogs rule and the power and phone lines keep cutting out!

Big love to you all. I still feel close even though my world is very different and I am very far away. Take care and have fun, be happy for the things in which you find enjoyment and go searching for the things which make you happy.
Signing off until next time
Ruth xxx

My day today (30th Nov)…
HRFDL are presently involved in flood relief. We’re in rainy season, as I think I said before, and today I went on a field visit to flood affected villages. The situation for the Dalit people in these coastal villages is worse now than it was for tsunami. Dalits, as they are amongst the poorest of the poor, occupy low lying lands, and this rainy season has been the wettest season in 40 years. Heavy and continual rainfall have caused rivers to burst their banks and flood nearby villages. The villages I visited today are in a pretty bad way, as you can see from the photos. Many of the houses had mud walls, and a roof made from woven coconut palm leaves supported on bamboo sticks. As the river burst it’s bank (at 7pm last Friday) the water in the villages rose to over a metre in just half an hour. The walls gave way and water flowed through the houses washing away all possessions. These are houses without shelving, as they are basic 4 wall huts, and most household possessions were stored at ground level. For many of the houses too the ground that the bamboo sticks were stuck into was so submerged that the mud holding them in place also washed away and the roof collapsed on top of the houses. People have lost all their possessions and food. They have also been without work as they are farmers and the land they work on is sitting under water (this has at least washed any remaining salt on the land from tsunami, but the stagnant water has killed a lot of crops). The government, as always has been slow to respond, and have done nothing so far. In one village the people told me they haven’t eaten for 3 days, in another I was told all they have had to eat in the past 5 days is mouldy rice with lemon. School books have been damaged or washed away, and a guy called Suresh who I was talking to is 6 months away from completing his Masters of IT, but has lost all his text books and notes from his previous year and half.
There’s not a lot of money floating around for flood relief, some NGOs have been able to give food, sleeping maps and cooking stoves, but for most people they are having to sleep outside, directly on the ground next to their flattened house, wearing the only piece of clothing they own, with nothing to cook, and nothing to cook it with even if they did have, and pools of standing water just waiting for an epidemic to cause more havoc. There have been quite a few deaths in the area, most have been transport accidents as buses over full of people got swept away, but there have been a few cases of people not able to get out of their house quick enough and got crushed by their roof falling on top of them. I have given some money that I had left over from the money I collected for tsunami, but it doesn’t really go very far when we have 30 villages averaging about 100 people in each village, who 50% of inhabitants lost absolutely everything. Another thing is there isn’t much sense of community cohesion, even in times of disaster. I am trying to think of ways that the community can be helped in the least costing way. The idea I had would that they would try and work on their own houses, recycling the materials which can be used again and helping out their neighbours who in turn would help them. But it seems they don’t really want to do this. The actually laughed at my idea of compressing the mud on their floor and laying old thatch on top, just as a temporary measure until they can afford to rebuild their house in a proper way. There is a bit of a dependency culture here, and when you have no one to depend on, it really isn’t good. There just isn’t enough money to help these people, we can’t even give them a make-shift tent to sleep in, or a decent meal. Well, as things develop with this I’ll keep you posted on the latest, but we are trying to get more funds, but even if we are successful this will take time, and time is something the people don’t have. I was told by one old lady that the flood didn’t kill her, but now the starvation which is following will most likely do so. It’s a really pathetic situation, and there is likely to not be much help, as floods happen all across India (and Bangladesh in particular) during rainy season. The local unaffected people simply aren’t concerned. I was asking if we could do a house to house collection of unaffected people to try and get together household items and clothes for distribution, but I was discouraged to do this as it would be seen as begging!! I don’t know how long the rain will go on for, rainy season isn’t over until the end of January, and we may not even have had the worst of it yet!