Feeling altogether more chirpy now after a weekend off from the bickerings and jealousies and 'you come my house, eat, eat' which together with the hot and sticky had made some of us at least a bit frazzled. On Saturday we had lunch at RUHSA with Dr Rita who had also invited Sekar and Joseph, and all of us cycled safely through the insanity that is the main road of KVK. An auto rickshaw failed to send me to discover my karma and next reincarnation by just a whisker, which did have Marilyn and Andy, cycling behind me, somewhat wobbly and weak at the knees for a few moments. Marilyn kept shouting a running commentary like BIG BUS COMING from then on, just in case I failed to see the loud and blaring coming towards me often on my side of the road. Not that I want to worry any members of family, nearest and dearest, reading this blog...
Dr Rita again proved a good listener and an extremely warm and friendly person. The canteen is now staffed by a self help group and - wonder of wonder- the food is really good and appears to no longer feature small crunchy creatures as a free extra. The only dodgy moment came when we were explaining to the Doc about the origins of the One Candle Fund, which faithful friends will know were in a distressing moment too far, when Pam became overwhelmed by the sad tales of children having to leave school early because of dire family tragedy. It was set up to run as simply as possible, with children suggested by the then RCO Govindaraj, vetted and agreed by Mr Immanuel, and then cheque paid out direct to the child, by Pam. There were only around 9 children originally but now there are nearly 100, 30 plus of them funded by BTC. Sekar told Dr Rita that the original plan had been that those children who performed best at school in exams would benefit. Since this absolutely was not the case both Pam and I immediately intervened to correct this, but Sekar was having none of it, and kept insisting he was right to Dr Rita. He only stopped repeating this when she said that would have been a bad idea since the poorest families will rarely produce the best students, for obvious reasons. I think more and more that Sekar is not a happy man. I was about to write something here about the challenges of working, as Sekar has, under the leadership they have all endured, but then thought better of it, given a blog is a public document....
In the afternoon we accomplished two major triumphs, the first being airline tickets online to Goa, for next Monday. Thanks and praise for perseverance under extreme provocation, to Marilyn and Andy. The second triumph was a board/bored meeting of the team- Andy Pam Brian and me, with mild heckling from Marilyn, to discuss The Way Forward. Pam had done serious money sums, and we now needed to decide whether we would go ahead with a very bare-bones, reduced to the simplest form, version of the day care for the elderly. Thanks to the HLF group from Seetaramanpet, we had some much more realistic figures for daily expenditure. We are already committed to the school and to the One Candle fund, and clearly they must be sustained. We decided that we would go ahead with the elderly, for just 10 people, and that we will have to start thinking about younger people who might succeed us in years to come, given that we are already in the ranks of the aged ourselves! Offspring and blog followers, you have been warned!
Sunday having dawned bright and clear (!) we were on for our trip to the Golden Temple in Vellore. This is a recent miracle- these happen more in India I've noticed, than in Hounoux or Brighton. An ordinary chap, poorish family, had a vision that he would build a temple made of real and pure gold, and lo! - opened four years ago, there it is. No one is sure how he raised the money, but it now attracts huge numbers of visitors and lots of VIPs from all over India. Our party of 10, Selvi, her mum, Vejaya ( who is intent on becoming Andy's second wife), we five, and the driver, squeezed into the Tata Sumo. Love that name, it being a 'big size one'! The driver, Siva, is not insane, a huge plus.
The temple did not disappoint, it really is astonishing. Our own children will be amused to imagine their father sporting first a red spot splodged on his forehead, then a white one on top, as we all walked through the walkways, beautifully clean and cool, winding our way with thousands of others, dressed predominantly in shades of red and orange. The gardens are glorious- grass everywhere and flowering shrubs, and even a waterfall. As you walk you pass large posters featuring the face of the man whose vision this was, whom they call ' Amma' - mother, as an honorific, despite him being the wrong gender. The posters offer words of wisdom, and begin with a justification for building a golden temple, instead of helping the poor and providing a hospital. People, he declares, will come to the temple and reflect there, be spiritually awakened, and then go away and set up hospitals and do service to the poor. Much for us to think on, as onlookers to this culture. Our Indian friends all performed the acts of devotion whenever we passed a shrine to a god, and again we saw how their religion is sewn firmly into the fabric of their everyday existence. Selvi did do a lot of muttering 'What is this? Is it a temple or is it for tourists?' etc etc, with some nose-wrinkling. It is beautiful, whatever. Andy occupied himself with working out, with Selvi's help, what the cost of the one and a half tons of gold would be. He's re-doing the sums as I write...He says about 40 million pounds. And he's muttering, 'What an absolute waste of gold...'
Late at night on our return, after a really good meal in the Punjabi restaurant opposite CMC hospital, featuring naan bread with serious quantities of garlic, I wrote this poem.
Dr Rita again proved a good listener and an extremely warm and friendly person. The canteen is now staffed by a self help group and - wonder of wonder- the food is really good and appears to no longer feature small crunchy creatures as a free extra. The only dodgy moment came when we were explaining to the Doc about the origins of the One Candle Fund, which faithful friends will know were in a distressing moment too far, when Pam became overwhelmed by the sad tales of children having to leave school early because of dire family tragedy. It was set up to run as simply as possible, with children suggested by the then RCO Govindaraj, vetted and agreed by Mr Immanuel, and then cheque paid out direct to the child, by Pam. There were only around 9 children originally but now there are nearly 100, 30 plus of them funded by BTC. Sekar told Dr Rita that the original plan had been that those children who performed best at school in exams would benefit. Since this absolutely was not the case both Pam and I immediately intervened to correct this, but Sekar was having none of it, and kept insisting he was right to Dr Rita. He only stopped repeating this when she said that would have been a bad idea since the poorest families will rarely produce the best students, for obvious reasons. I think more and more that Sekar is not a happy man. I was about to write something here about the challenges of working, as Sekar has, under the leadership they have all endured, but then thought better of it, given a blog is a public document....
In the afternoon we accomplished two major triumphs, the first being airline tickets online to Goa, for next Monday. Thanks and praise for perseverance under extreme provocation, to Marilyn and Andy. The second triumph was a board/bored meeting of the team- Andy Pam Brian and me, with mild heckling from Marilyn, to discuss The Way Forward. Pam had done serious money sums, and we now needed to decide whether we would go ahead with a very bare-bones, reduced to the simplest form, version of the day care for the elderly. Thanks to the HLF group from Seetaramanpet, we had some much more realistic figures for daily expenditure. We are already committed to the school and to the One Candle fund, and clearly they must be sustained. We decided that we would go ahead with the elderly, for just 10 people, and that we will have to start thinking about younger people who might succeed us in years to come, given that we are already in the ranks of the aged ourselves! Offspring and blog followers, you have been warned!
Sunday having dawned bright and clear (!) we were on for our trip to the Golden Temple in Vellore. This is a recent miracle- these happen more in India I've noticed, than in Hounoux or Brighton. An ordinary chap, poorish family, had a vision that he would build a temple made of real and pure gold, and lo! - opened four years ago, there it is. No one is sure how he raised the money, but it now attracts huge numbers of visitors and lots of VIPs from all over India. Our party of 10, Selvi, her mum, Vejaya ( who is intent on becoming Andy's second wife), we five, and the driver, squeezed into the Tata Sumo. Love that name, it being a 'big size one'! The driver, Siva, is not insane, a huge plus.
The temple did not disappoint, it really is astonishing. Our own children will be amused to imagine their father sporting first a red spot splodged on his forehead, then a white one on top, as we all walked through the walkways, beautifully clean and cool, winding our way with thousands of others, dressed predominantly in shades of red and orange. The gardens are glorious- grass everywhere and flowering shrubs, and even a waterfall. As you walk you pass large posters featuring the face of the man whose vision this was, whom they call ' Amma' - mother, as an honorific, despite him being the wrong gender. The posters offer words of wisdom, and begin with a justification for building a golden temple, instead of helping the poor and providing a hospital. People, he declares, will come to the temple and reflect there, be spiritually awakened, and then go away and set up hospitals and do service to the poor. Much for us to think on, as onlookers to this culture. Our Indian friends all performed the acts of devotion whenever we passed a shrine to a god, and again we saw how their religion is sewn firmly into the fabric of their everyday existence. Selvi did do a lot of muttering 'What is this? Is it a temple or is it for tourists?' etc etc, with some nose-wrinkling. It is beautiful, whatever. Andy occupied himself with working out, with Selvi's help, what the cost of the one and a half tons of gold would be. He's re-doing the sums as I write...He says about 40 million pounds. And he's muttering, 'What an absolute waste of gold...'
Late at night on our return, after a really good meal in the Punjabi restaurant opposite CMC hospital, featuring naan bread with serious quantities of garlic, I wrote this poem.
In hope of better karma
In the midst of the squalor
The stench, all human life
Teeming in millions, poverty
Beyond belief a mere existence eked
No hope, save, with luck, the next time round
Reincarnated more fortunately, an upgrade
Not bottom of the heap, dung heap
Flies, barrel scraped
A country which spreads no safety net
To catch its poor or sick, its
Elderly, or sad or mad
See here a miracle has bloomed
Green landscaped lawns
Shaded walkways, quiet order
And central, rising, glinting in the glare
Merciless, a Golden Temple
A wonder Bollywood or Disney might have dreamt
But this the vision of a local boy
So all the more miraculous
Astonishing
The masses come to marvel
And to pray, to walk in circles, chanting
And in hope the gods will then be good
Will ease their pain,
Or send the rains, a baby
Long desired, or marriage partner
Kindness, some better karma
B Sc for student son
Or doctorate for daughter
A way to climb beyond the filth
The struggle and the gutter
Where politicians lie and cheat
Corruption fetid in the air
No wonder then the people come
To marvel at the yellow gold
Whilst calculating weight and price
To bow their head before the god
And walk in circles, chanting
In hope of better karma
Some times we ignore the promotion freebies that come with the motor oil that we buy.. Recently i bought a Castrol promotion pack for car but wasn't informed by the dealer that the scratch card offer to enter the lucky draw to go to South Africa World cup games and the dealer has assured gifts that we can collect at the time of purchase. Make sure you ask your service dealers for the contest details if you buy one in the near future and collect your assured gift :)
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