Second day at Rising Star
sorry about my last post. I couldn't edit it. I don't know what the problem was but I published it anyway. When I get back I will fix it.
On the last blog oil Robbins equals oil rubbings which are a comfort to leprocy patients
At this lepracy colony, there were only two women and two men. There used to be 30 people there. People moved away or died. There were single story cement row houses with electricity and open windows and doors. Extreme poverty. I asked how did they support themselves. There is a government welfare program that supplies the bare necessities for life. The people affected by lepracy are in the lowest respect of anyone and are shunned and treated poorly so they end up living in colonies. There are 800 colonies in India. The organization that we are here with, Rising Star Outreach helps in 60 colonies. They have medical care for each person in the village and heal leprocy with a combination of antibiotics to stop the cycle. There are no active cases in the colonies.
Then they follow up with needs of the villagers like gardens and beds and microgrants for businesses to stop the cycle of begging. They visit villages with volunteers to show care and love for the most outcast in society and the biggest thing they do is they educate the children of the colonies to break the cycle of poverty. The Rising Star Outreach is a boarding school for 320 children from the colonies. Their families can visit once a month. Hey can go home several times a year between terms. Some of the kids do not sleep there and are transported from home to school, but most are boarded, fed and cared for. Looking at the poverty in the colonies we have visited so far, this campus is a dreamland with food, shelter, education, security and activities.
The first colony that we visited had a man, Jayraj that is in his early 70's. his wife is also there. He is a very outgoing man and loves to visit and dance. He was super happy having nothing. You can be so happy with absolutely nothing, even less than those around you. We had a dance party with Indian music with him and that was really fun. All the volunteers danced in a circle with him. He was so joyful, the joy was infectious. I rubbed oil on a leprocy victim, an older man who could not walk because of feet deformities. He crawled around like a crab. I volunteered to give him an oil rub, rubbing oil on his legs from the knee down. He did not have much feeling there because of the leprocy nerve damage. We discussed this because I was a woman and usually only men do this to men, but I got permission and rubbed his super skinny calves and deformed feet. Camille painted Jaraj's wife's nails she wanted them the same color as Camille, purple. It is very hot and humid here in rural southern India. The temperature was in the mid 90's with oppressive humidity. We are all dripping with sweat. There was no air conditioning in this colony. Jaraj has so much fun dancing with us he said to Natalie that for a moment he forgot he had a disease.
After the visit to the colony, we came back to the school campus. There are rooms that the volunteers used to sleep at but two years ago the government rules changed and you can only stay on campus if you have a work visa, so volunteers can not stay on campus. We use these rooms as daybeds. The bathrooms have mostly Turkish standing toilets but one western toilet.
In the afternoon we got to know our sponsor child. Each child has four sponsors that pay for their education. It takes $1440 a year for all the costs of a child, so each sponsor pays $360 a year. My sponsor child is Pria who is 12. Her older brother and sister also go to the school also. She introduced me to her friends and said she liked math and science the best. The kids speak Tamul, as India incompasses many languages, but English is the business language ( they were an English colony) so the classes are taught in English. I was told to get something for her. I got cool socks and a pen with many ink colors. She told me she was happy to be here and she looked very happy.
After meeting our sponsor children, we played with the kindergarteners on the playground. We brought some duplo blocks and they all wanted to grab a piece and not play together. These are kids who have nothing are put into a very structured environment- up at 6 am to wash their clothes and study then off to breakfast ( rice and curry) and then to school. By the time recess comes in the mid afternoon they have a lot of steam to run off. There is a old swing set with cracked rubber seats and the kids wanted to be pushed. After pushing for a while, I got on an empty swing and started to show them how to pump so they could swing themselves. After a few pumps the rubber swing broke and I tumbled down getting a nice bloody gash in my hand. All the kids wanted to see my bloody hand. The teacher was really concerned. I waited until recess was over to go to the infirmary and get cleaned up and taped. The kids kept asking about my hand for the next few days and pointed to the broken swing.
There was a boy in the infirmary that was recovering from heart surgery- getting a hole in his heart repaired. They did it with a cathedar and he was on bed rest. At the infirmary, my hand was cleaned extra well and taped up. No bandaids here, just paper tape and a piece of gauze.
We also had a meeting with the medical doctor employed by rising Star and some of his staff. They told of why they chose working with leprocy patients and told us about leprocy. I found out that it is a bacteria and people with good immune systems are not affected but people in poverty without access to curing medicine
The first four days we are staying in an apartment 90 minutes away from campus. We are picked up by a van, with an Indian driver and assistant. There are also two Indian women who accompany us to the colonies. They are medically trained and in their early twenties. Natalie who picked us up goes everywhere with us too. We also have the director, Nancy and her husband Darryl who are here for a year. They are in their 70's and very active.
In our apartment We have a three bedroom three bath set up for nine people with a bunk bed and a single bed in each room. There are four volunteers this session, so Camille and I share a room and the other two volunteers have their own room.
The floors are marble and the furniture is basic. The door has a padlocked gate that we lock going out and we are locked in. It has four other locks including a keycard electronic lock. Because of the long commute we are not here long. We make our own breakfast which has been of scrambled eggs with green pepper and tomato and onion. The food is provided. There are house cleaners that wash our towels and clothes every day and clean up our breakfast dishes.they even seed pomegranates for us for breakfast every day. Spoiled!! The kitchen has a gas burners that you light each time and turn on the propane tank below. The tap water is unsanitary for drinking but fine for bathing and cleaning, so there is a water filter. We have western toilets.
On the last blog oil Robbins equals oil rubbings which are a comfort to leprocy patients
At this lepracy colony, there were only two women and two men. There used to be 30 people there. People moved away or died. There were single story cement row houses with electricity and open windows and doors. Extreme poverty. I asked how did they support themselves. There is a government welfare program that supplies the bare necessities for life. The people affected by lepracy are in the lowest respect of anyone and are shunned and treated poorly so they end up living in colonies. There are 800 colonies in India. The organization that we are here with, Rising Star Outreach helps in 60 colonies. They have medical care for each person in the village and heal leprocy with a combination of antibiotics to stop the cycle. There are no active cases in the colonies.
Then they follow up with needs of the villagers like gardens and beds and microgrants for businesses to stop the cycle of begging. They visit villages with volunteers to show care and love for the most outcast in society and the biggest thing they do is they educate the children of the colonies to break the cycle of poverty. The Rising Star Outreach is a boarding school for 320 children from the colonies. Their families can visit once a month. Hey can go home several times a year between terms. Some of the kids do not sleep there and are transported from home to school, but most are boarded, fed and cared for. Looking at the poverty in the colonies we have visited so far, this campus is a dreamland with food, shelter, education, security and activities.
The first colony that we visited had a man, Jayraj that is in his early 70's. his wife is also there. He is a very outgoing man and loves to visit and dance. He was super happy having nothing. You can be so happy with absolutely nothing, even less than those around you. We had a dance party with Indian music with him and that was really fun. All the volunteers danced in a circle with him. He was so joyful, the joy was infectious. I rubbed oil on a leprocy victim, an older man who could not walk because of feet deformities. He crawled around like a crab. I volunteered to give him an oil rub, rubbing oil on his legs from the knee down. He did not have much feeling there because of the leprocy nerve damage. We discussed this because I was a woman and usually only men do this to men, but I got permission and rubbed his super skinny calves and deformed feet. Camille painted Jaraj's wife's nails she wanted them the same color as Camille, purple. It is very hot and humid here in rural southern India. The temperature was in the mid 90's with oppressive humidity. We are all dripping with sweat. There was no air conditioning in this colony. Jaraj has so much fun dancing with us he said to Natalie that for a moment he forgot he had a disease.
After the visit to the colony, we came back to the school campus. There are rooms that the volunteers used to sleep at but two years ago the government rules changed and you can only stay on campus if you have a work visa, so volunteers can not stay on campus. We use these rooms as daybeds. The bathrooms have mostly Turkish standing toilets but one western toilet.
In the afternoon we got to know our sponsor child. Each child has four sponsors that pay for their education. It takes $1440 a year for all the costs of a child, so each sponsor pays $360 a year. My sponsor child is Pria who is 12. Her older brother and sister also go to the school also. She introduced me to her friends and said she liked math and science the best. The kids speak Tamul, as India incompasses many languages, but English is the business language ( they were an English colony) so the classes are taught in English. I was told to get something for her. I got cool socks and a pen with many ink colors. She told me she was happy to be here and she looked very happy.
After meeting our sponsor children, we played with the kindergarteners on the playground. We brought some duplo blocks and they all wanted to grab a piece and not play together. These are kids who have nothing are put into a very structured environment- up at 6 am to wash their clothes and study then off to breakfast ( rice and curry) and then to school. By the time recess comes in the mid afternoon they have a lot of steam to run off. There is a old swing set with cracked rubber seats and the kids wanted to be pushed. After pushing for a while, I got on an empty swing and started to show them how to pump so they could swing themselves. After a few pumps the rubber swing broke and I tumbled down getting a nice bloody gash in my hand. All the kids wanted to see my bloody hand. The teacher was really concerned. I waited until recess was over to go to the infirmary and get cleaned up and taped. The kids kept asking about my hand for the next few days and pointed to the broken swing.
There was a boy in the infirmary that was recovering from heart surgery- getting a hole in his heart repaired. They did it with a cathedar and he was on bed rest. At the infirmary, my hand was cleaned extra well and taped up. No bandaids here, just paper tape and a piece of gauze.
We also had a meeting with the medical doctor employed by rising Star and some of his staff. They told of why they chose working with leprocy patients and told us about leprocy. I found out that it is a bacteria and people with good immune systems are not affected but people in poverty without access to curing medicine
The first four days we are staying in an apartment 90 minutes away from campus. We are picked up by a van, with an Indian driver and assistant. There are also two Indian women who accompany us to the colonies. They are medically trained and in their early twenties. Natalie who picked us up goes everywhere with us too. We also have the director, Nancy and her husband Darryl who are here for a year. They are in their 70's and very active.
In our apartment We have a three bedroom three bath set up for nine people with a bunk bed and a single bed in each room. There are four volunteers this session, so Camille and I share a room and the other two volunteers have their own room.
The floors are marble and the furniture is basic. The door has a padlocked gate that we lock going out and we are locked in. It has four other locks including a keycard electronic lock. Because of the long commute we are not here long. We make our own breakfast which has been of scrambled eggs with green pepper and tomato and onion. The food is provided. There are house cleaners that wash our towels and clothes every day and clean up our breakfast dishes.they even seed pomegranates for us for breakfast every day. Spoiled!! The kitchen has a gas burners that you light each time and turn on the propane tank below. The tap water is unsanitary for drinking but fine for bathing and cleaning, so there is a water filter. We have western toilets.
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