April 27, 2008

RISE UP

We have arrived back to simmering Delhi. On our way we stopped by the new age Hindu pilgrimage center of Rishikesh and the refreshing hill town of Musooie. We rode a very civilized AC night train, and the usual selection of filthy buses and crazy tuk-tuks. Arriving in Delhi we were met full on by the unpleasant touts, scammers and con men who greet every foreigner at the bus and train stations. But now we could ignore the fake ticket offices, the bogus hotels, the rip off travel agents, the over priced taxis, and instead proceed confidently telling them to buzz off, bite me, and get the hell out of the way. And of course we made bee line to a real cafe for a real latte.

Sizing up our experiences in Bodhgaya and Bakrour village we composed a letter to the board of the school and orphanage summarized as follows.

First we want to emphasize the school should be providing quality education to the children. Some ways we proposed to do this was to: limit class size; train our teachers; motivate, promote and retain quality teachers by offering better salary; improve the quality of the school & orphanage environment by adding the second story and improving the water and electrical situation. We also want to develop a plan for supporting the orphans.

To these ends we hired a local English teacher to teach English to our teachers 2 days a week. We provided education books and CD’s. We asked the board to come up with a proposal for teacher skill building seminars. Admission to the school was closed, children were turned away from attending the school. This was not easy for the staff to do.

We had discussions about at what age or grade level the orphans should be allowed to stay or move on to make room for new orphans. The board wanted to add more orphans, but Sheri and I thought that we should be focusing on quality of care for a limited number of orphans. Sheri and I are supporting the education of two of the orphans in private school.

All of the above costs money. Realistically we need $1000 per month to keep the school (250 students) and orphanage (9 children) operating. To add the second story we need at least $15,000. Once the second story in complete, most likely we’ll need more staff. Also prices of everything in India are rising fast. There are experiencing an inflationary period (7 to 8 percent per year). So in reality we will need something like $1500 per month in the near future. We are proposing individual sponsorship for each orphan so they came be as prepared as possible for the future ($300 per year for education, and some other amount for their care).

It is a very strange feeling trying to plan for the future and create a realistic budget for these children. A few hundred dollars more or less means that a child could be denied decent food and clothes or 10 children won’t be able to go to school or maybe they will. Our teachers are only making about $30 to 40 dollars per month. They should be paid a lot more. They are barely making it. All this requires a close examination of ones ethics and principles and sometimes the picture isn’t so easy to accept and everything isn’t so clean and nice. It is very tiring. But doing something is better than doing nothing. So everyone please RISEUP.