A Portrait Of India: Day 3

Posted on behalf of Jim Cook, President of Children International.

We’ve been working in and around Calcutta for over 25 years now. I’ve traveled here often and thoroughly enjoy the city that is like no other place I’ve ever been.

On my first visit here about 20 years ago, I thought I had entered a different dimension. I couldn’t believe my eyes, ears or nose. I couldn’t leave soon enough and wasn’t eager to return.

But now I look forward to visiting “Cal.” It’s quaint, it’s crazy, it’s colorful, it’s grim, it’s vibrant…it’s Calcutta. Or, as it has been renamed, Kolkata.

Whatever you call it, it’s unique. Get here if you can. But be open to witness life in a way you’ve likely never experienced it before.

It has taught me a lot about change and how I approach it. During that first visit, I couldn’t have imagined I would ever find the city charming. But now I do. Change. Embracing change. I do now, much better than I did before and my Calcutta experience has a lot to do with that.

I visited the United States Consul General, Henry Jardine, here today. I try to visit our Embassy or Consul representatives in every country, just to touch base and inform them of our activities.

I especially like Consul General Jardine, whom I’ve visited once before.

He very much supports the efforts of charitable organizations like Children International and has been most helpful in making sure the Consulate is represented at special events we have in Calcutta and with helping sponsored youth secure visas for attending our Children International youth conferences in the U.S.

He indicated he’ll soon be ending his stay in Calcutta and will be moving on with his family, as is the way with the U.S. Department of State. But ever since my good friend, Richard Bank, formerly of the State Department and now in practice in D.C., urged us to establish relationships with our Embassy personnel, it’s been interesting to see how acquaintances like Consul General Jardine tend to show up in other locations where we conduct sponsorship activities.


Reminds me how connected all of us are. And how much we rely upon each other to make the world work. To make it a better place for as many people as we possibly can. I hope you’ll join me.

For more photos and to read his journal entries, visit Jim's Journal: At the Heart of Calcutta.

A Picture Of India: Day 2

Posted on behalf of Jim Cook, President of Children International.

As I look over my notes, I recall with sadness the mother who was holding a child obviously very young and very malnourished...or worse.


I really didn’t need my notes to recall this situation. It’s hard to put it out of my mind.

I entered what she called a home. It was a tiny, dark place with plastic sheets for walls and not much more for a roof. Grim. On a small mat in the center of this “room” was another child…impossibly small, especially considering the one she was holding.

I turned to the field worker with me who was familiar with the mother and she informed me the mom had been told to take the baby to the doctor earlier in the month. When we asked what the doctor said, her unintelligible, illogical answer masked the real story…and at the same time revealed it. She really didn’t believe in, or understand, or could afford it if she did, modern medicine. And she had taken the child to what is referred to, appropriately, as a “quack.”

We made a note to follow up very soon with a more “hands on” intervention. It’s a matter of life and death. Literally.

This sad tale illustrates something that is a frustration yet underscores the value of child sponsorship...that mother is doing the best she knows how to do. She needs to learn how to care for her child. She has never had the luxury of education about how.

Over the years, through our sustained presence, I’ve seen sponsorship change the way individuals in entire communities approach the their own health care and that of their families.

I look forward to seeing that happen here…and the sooner the better! I will be anxiously following this child’s situation. And I’ll keep you posted. But we may have not gotten to her in time, and I’m not sure there will be a happy ending.

As bad as it sounds, it actually gets worse. The father is a rickshaw puller…or more accurately, a rickshaw driver as he uses a bicycle rickshaw. Unfortunately he was pedaling his rickshaw in a part of the city that had banned rickshaws and was summarily arrested and jailed. This clear and present “threat to society” was in jail awaiting his fate while his wife and family slowly starved.

This family was also a product of the relocation group I mentioned yesterday. The lack of wisdom and basic human compassion of both the relocation and the jailing of this “lawbreaker” is appalling. Pedaling a rickshaw. Trying to earn a living in a manner that is so hard its incomprehensible to me. Yet he’s jailed for it!

Oh, and one more thing. The woman and her jailed husband are behind on their $10 per month rent and are being threatened by the “landlord” with eviction.

So, the next time you’re thinking you’re having a bad day, consider this poor woman’s plight...a child in her arms on the brink of death, a toddler badly underweight with not a lot of hope for good nutrition, a husband in jail and a landlord trying to throw you out of what is generously described as a hovel.

We’ll do what we can for this family. I will. But we haven’t yet raised a dime that would enable us to help. Their case underscores the need for a vibrant sponsorship effort in this area. Join me in helping if you can. Call a friend. Let’s make a difference.

Update from the field...In a recent email sent to me from Neeta Goel, who is helping keep an eye on this family, she reported that our staff on the ground has been assisting them with food and medical assistance. Here are some excerpts the note she just sent to me: We began giving the mother and child some small quantities of food each day – milk, bananas, bread etc, and monitored her daily to make sure that the mother was actually eating the food, since she wouldn’t be able to nurse the baby otherwise. We monitored quantities too, knowing she would share the food with all her other kids, who were hungry too. There are no doctors in Bawana, except for homeopathic ones, and although we took the baby to these ones too, they refused to treat the child since they thought he was too sick. We then took the child to a hospital that is about six miles away from Bawana. The pediatrician confirmed that the child was severely malnourished and gave some medications that would help him put on weight. Although he still looks skinny to me, Shweta (a qualified nutritionist) confirms he is gaining weight slowly. The biggest change I saw was that he was smiling, and not screaming non-stop as I had seen him do previously. Anyway, that’s the progress within the last 2 weeks. We just completed the baseline survey and the medical exams today for all kids. Once we encode all the data, we will be able to share those reports with you too.

Tomorrow on the blog, Jim shares more thoughts from his recent trip to India. For more photos and to read his journal entries, visit Jim's Journal: At the Heart of Calcutta.

Of Weddings and Presidents

Posted on behalf of Nivedita Moitra, communications coordinator for Children International in India.

Spring is in the air in Kolkata and it is the wedding season. Houses are being spruced up and often the sound of the 'Shehenai' (a double reed wind instrument) carries in the evening breeze signifying that a wedding is taking place somewhere. One morning recently, I was standing outside one of our community centers, which was receiving a spring-cleaning, when a passer-by remarked, "is there going to be a wedding in this house too?" And it struck me that the excitement that was being generated inside the center was because a visit from Jim Cook is no less festive for our agency than a wedding would be for one of the families who live here.

All of us, the sponsored children, the families and the staff looked forward to welcoming Jim amidst us, but not without a touch of trepidation. It is not an everyday happening that the president of Children International comes to spend some time with us, and we wanted everything to be a pleasant experience for him; we wanted him to go home with pleasant memories. The tension was palpable but so was the excitement as everyone prepared to play his/her part in making Jim’s visit a memorable one.

I hope we succeeded.

Beginning tomorrow, join us as Jim recounts his recent trip to India.

Straight from the Heart

Posted on behalf of Nivedita Moitra, Communication Coordinator for Children International in Calcutta, India.

A visit to the communities is always exciting, though for this visit I was a little uneasy. I was going to visit a sponsored father in one of our rural communities who had a heart surgery. On that hot and balmy August afternoon, while walking to their house through a sleepy village, a number of doubts assailed me – would the father be willing to talk? Would he be upset about his medical condition, or would he be offended that I wanted to talk about a matter that was not particularly pleasant?

I was surprised on all accounts. When I met Prasanta, the first thing that struck me was his optimism and positive attitude. He is a warm person who talked to me at length about the major heart surgery he underwent with support from Children International. His gratitude toward CI was palpable and it left me feeling proud to be in an organization that meets the different needs of the sponsored families.

Prasanta is a vendor who sells tasty snacks in his food cart outside schools in his community. He pushes his cart from school to school hawking his wares. The first hint of trouble came to him in twinges of pain and shortness of breath. Soon pushing the food cart became an uphill task and the family income plummeted, as he was the sole breadwinner supporting his wife, son and twin daughters. The future looked bleak for the two daughters who were not in the program. The specter of debt and sliding further into poverty loomed on the horizon.

Two months down the line, this scene has changed dramatically. A smiling Prasanta (Soumik’s father) greeted us with wide smiles and told us that he is back on the job that sustains his family after a heart surgery that required VSD closure and Aortic Valve replacement. To quote him, “Life had handed me a raw deal…but I am so fortunate that my son is in a programme that supports not only my son’s need but shares and meets the concerns and needs of the family too. Had it not been for Children International, it would have been impossible for me to undergo this treatment – and as for my family God knows what would have happened to them, especially my daughters.

“To load my van with food used to be a daily struggle that I had come to dread, not to mention the pushing of the cart, but I knew I had no options if I wanted to feed my family. Life for me had become one long tunnel of pain and despair till we got the great news that Children International would be meeting my medical expenses. Then on, I did everything in my power to ensure that I followed all the medical advice to the letter, because I had to become well for my family,” affirmed Prasanta.

When I complimented him on his positive attitude and told him that he was quite a hero in my eyes, Prasanta quietly corrected me and said, “I am not the hero; for me the real hero is my son’s sponsor, without whom Children International would not be in our lives and I would not probably be alive today”.

After sharing with Prasanta his joy and gratitude towards Children International for putting him back on his feet and as I walked back to the main road where transport was waiting to take me back to the city lights, I wondered at the power of sponsorship that is keeping the hopes and aspirations of many families like Prasanta’s in different countries alive and burning bright.

Behind the Scenes: Meet Neenee Moitra

Posted on behalf of Kevin Fleming

Hundreds of thousands of people around the world are impacted by sponsorship. In order to discover how sponsorship impacts these people and their communities, Children International depends on dedicated communications professionals.

Our communications coordinators are located in all 11 countries where we work. They are our eyes, ears, noses and hands in the field. They peek under the rug of the earth to deliver to you compelling and touching stories, the small miracles that sponsorship makes possible.

These communications coordinators wear many hats. At once they are beat reporters, photographers, documentarians, videographers, a smile of encouragement and a shoulder to cry on. Without them our work at Children International headquarters would be far more difficult!

Whenever you read a Journeys article, watch a web video and even read blog posts it’s likely that what you are reading was supported by a communications coordinator.


Nivedita (Neenee) Moitra is our “go-to gal” in Calcutta, India, where she has covered sponsorship for several years. She is a superb photographer who captures a unique view of life in the rural Indian villages where many of our sponsored children live.

Check out her "Snapshot in Time" slideshow on our website, www.children.org. She has provided an audio commentary of the beautiful photos that are presented. The slideshow will be available on Tuesday, February 19.

Meet Angkan...

What would you like to be when you grow-up?

"I would like to be an artist when I grow up because I enjoy drawing and putting human emotions and forms to paper." – Angkan, age 11, from Sahay

Meet Sabana, From India

"I would like to tell my sponsor that I am very lucky to have a friend like you!"


Photos by Niveditra Moitra, the communications coordinator for our agency in Calcutta, India.

One Down, Seven to Go!

Mithu Dinda peers through a massive crack in the wall of her flood-damaged home in India.

BREAKING NEWS…

Thanks to the generosity of our blog readers, in just two days we have received enough donations to cover the repairs to the first of the eight homes that were critically damaged by flooding in India!

As you may recall from my first blog from a couple of days ago, the government in the state of West Bengal, India, has stated that around 400,000 people have been affected by the flooding, and that some 40,000 homes have been either damaged or destroyed. I also mentioned that it is very difficult to obtain land to build new houses, so the most viable option is to repair and rebuild the homes using much more durable materials.

Our goal is $4800, which will allow us to repair the eight homes identified to us by our agency staff as being in the most critical need of repairs. The individual cost breakdown is $500-600 per home. And in the past couple of days, our readers have already contributed $550!

So we’re off to a great start. I realize that our blog readers make up a limited – but growing – group, so I’d like to ask you to help in a couple of ways:

1. If you haven’t already contributed toward helping put a roof back over the heads of these families, please consider doing so. You may give any way you prefer: by phone at 1(800) 888-3089, by check (mail to Children International, PO Box 219055, Kansas City, MO 64121) or via our website, www.children.org.

Regardless of which method you choose, it is very important that you email us at blog@children.org to let us know the amount of your donation and that it is intended for the India flooding victims. Be sure to include your account number.

2. How about helping us spread the word? Use the little envelope icon at the bottom of this post (and of the original posts from a couple of days ago) to forward it to your friends and family. Let them know you’re participating in helping repair these families’ homes. Perhaps they’d like to help as well!

You don’t have to do it alone…helping these families in India would make a great project for a class, a group of coworkers or a church group.

Thanks a MILLION for your help! I’ll keep you updated as more donations come in and work begins on the repairs.

More Help Needed in India

The very first thing I want to say is “thanks.”

I wrote yesterday about the victims of the flooding in India in hopes that we’d be able to raise some funds to help them, and you didn’t disappoint me. Some of you responded right away – and we appreciate that!

Today I received a report that damages are more extensive than we first thought. In addition to the two families I wrote about yesterday, at least 6 more children and their families have been severely affected.

So our goal just jumped from $1200 to $4800 ($600 per home x 8 families).

Besides asking our blog readers to help, we’ve also kicked off an initiative here in the office. Our Children International employees are raising money in different ways – some of them quite creative! (Stay tuned…we might be sharing more about this on the blog.)

Wouldn’t it be exciting to put these families into safe, dry houses without lengthy delays? Of course, we as an organization are committed to their wellbeing, so we will make sure they’re taken care of. But I know our sponsors want every possible ounce of our regular sponsorship donations to go to the programs that are so desperately needed to make children’s lives better. So if we can raise these funds as a separate project, much good will have been done.

If you’d like to donate, please email us at blog@children.org. You may donate any way you’d like, but it’s VERY important you specify that your donation is to help the needy families in India that you read about in the blog. So if you donate through the Children International website, it’s still important that you email us at blog@children.org and let us know that you gave, and how much. If you send a check, be sure to include “For Needy Families in India – Blog” on the memo line.

The report I received is so recent that I don’t yet have photos of the specific homes that were affected, but below are some general photos of the flooding.

We’ll keep you posted as to how much we’ve raised as the donations come in.

Thanks again!

Photos by Nivedita Moitra, from our agency in Calcutta, India.
Note: Click on each picture for a larger image.

Families in India Need Your Help Now

No country is guaranteed safety when nature’s fury strikes, be it through volcanoes, hurricanes, typhoons, tornados or earthquakes. So loss of property and even life is a sad – and often recurring – reality in many countries. It hurts worst of all when natural disasters strike developing countries whose people are already struggling to survive.

Many of our readers have been among the first to volunteer to help when we’ve reported on critical situations. That’s why I’m sharing information about a very urgent need.

Recent heavy rains in the area of Calcutta, India, have wrought their yearly havoc. According to government estimates, around 400,000 people in the state of West Bengal have been affected, with some 40,000 homes damaged or destroyed. Predictably, some of those affected are sponsored children and their families.

Many poor families live in homes made of nothing but mud and bamboo, so when heavy rains come the structures are simply unable to hold up. Because of the difficulties surrounding obtaining title to land, Children International’s policy in the region is to help families repair their homes with better materials so they will be more durable in the face of the constant reality of the area’s heavy tropical rains.

Although a number of sponsored families’ homes have been damaged to varying degrees, the local staff has presented us two cases they feel are most critical. These involve damages to the homes of sponsored youths Rakhi Maishal (left) and Kunal Moisal (right).

The bad news is that the families of these sponsored young people are desperately poor and are unable to afford the needed repairs to their homes. The good news is that we can help.


The amount needed per family is relatively small, but it’s beyond the scope of what regular sponsorship contributions can cover. We are committed to helping these families, but any additional assistance we might receive would be greatly appreciated. At a mere $600 per family, I don’t think it will be hard to make a difference.


Will you help us put these two families under a safe, dry roof? If you’d like to contribute part or all of the $600 needed for each family, please contact us at blog@children.org. We’ll put you in touch with our Sponsor Services staff, and they’ll help you complete your donation quickly and easily.

If you can lend a hand, thanks in advance for your help. Otherwise, simply keep these families in your thoughts and rest assured we’ll do everything we can to get them back on their feet again.

Masterpieces

Information and photos provided by Nivedita Moitra from our Calcutta agency.

Our Calcutta agency recently held the 11th Annual Art Contest/Exhibition. Madhoboni Chatterjee, a famous danseuse, as well as a well-known painter and sculptor, inaugurated the art exhibition. In her inaugural speech, she said that she was overwhelmed by the beauty expressed in the paintings and hoped that the children who have drawn these lovely pictures would also work toward making the world a place as nice as their paintings.