Koseli

Wednesday, 16 February 2011

Chandra

Krishna - starting the program

Chandra in blue shirt

It was a cheerful sunny morning filled with happiness. Koseli looked like a bride all decorated for the first time. The children were busy giving final touches to their dances and speeches. At 11.40 am ten minutes behind schedule, we lit the lamp in front of Goddess Saraswati, the Goddess of knowledge and inaugurated the program.

All festivals at Koseli are celebrated with a short program entirely prepared by the children. These programs are our efforts to infuse confidence in the children. They are great performers even without any formal guidance. All they need is a little exposure and encouragement. That is where the school steps in.

Grade 2 - Performing

Rajesh and his troupe’s performance on Michael Jackson’s “Dangerous” just blew us away. The little ones stole our hearts with their nursery rhymes. Raj Lama spoke on the recent student council elections and how it is grooming them for the future. It was nice to hear Pinky Rai speak on Koseli and what it meant to her. However, the surprise package of the day was Chandra. We did know that Chandra was a great singer but the fact he was a great dancer too, came as a pleasant surprise to us.

Chandra is 14 years old. He was abandoned by his parents in his infancy for reasons unknown to him. He has been supporting himself from a very early age. He started weaving carpets and continued till he was asked to leave their lodging facility at the age of 8 (it was assumed that he was old enough to take care of himself). Since then, he has worked in various hotels and guesthouses where he was provided accommodation in exchange for cleaning dishes. Obviously, over his childhood, while he was struggling to survive, he hardly had any time to think about studying. And in last 10 months we too have realized that Chandra’s education has to start from scratch. We have also realized one more thing that his strength lies in performing arts.

As I write this blog, I am very happy to mention that Chandra has been admitted to a music school and he has started his formal training in singing and playing guitar. We wish him all the very best and hope he will fulfill his dream of being a professional singer when he grows up. We are also working on helping Chandra find a place to live where he can spend the rest of his time focusing on developing his reading and writing skills.

Grade 6 - performing

In Nepal it is a common sight to see children working in hotels in exchange for food and accommodation. There are many children working just to stay alive. Chandra’s transformation is a big stride for us because we are trying to bring about a change in at least one of these lives.
We are so happy that his life is changing and he is now busy chasing his dreams rather than cleaning dishes for food and clothes.

Coming back to Saraswati Puja celebrations, as always, we ended on a very high note. We thank all the guests who came to encourage the young performers.

Saturday, 29 January 2011

Srijana & Rajesh

Newly Elected Office Bearers

We decided in the second week of january, that the time was right to conduct elections in the school. Koseli’s senior children had started exhibiting a sense of respnsibility and a keen interest in the activities of the school.

Audience listening intently to the campaigners

In the past few months, the school has evolved quite a bit and my role in managing day to day activities has gone down considerably. From day one we have been trying to establish systems which took almost 8-9 months to show some significant results. The "Teachers Council" manages almost all the key affairs of the school.
The working team gradually grew in size & responsibilities and now with the inclusion of children we suddenly felt rich in the number of working hands we had. All important issues were now discussed among the teachers and the senior students, opinions were sought and only then decisions were taken. It has been a wonderful learning experience for all of us so far.

The nominations were filed on 14th Jan. During the campaigning week the students brought up four important issues:

• discipline and cleanliness in the premises

• english speaking environment in the school

• importance of education and

• encouraging their friends to come to school every day.

They gave speeches in the assembly everyday outlining the issues they felt were most important to them. We also had an opinion poll and the results were very close to the final results.

A student Voting

The voting went on smoothly with a 100% turnout of voters. I can very confidently say that it was one of the most fair election conducted in the world. Srijana & Rajesh were elected as headgirl & headboy and Manju & Paras as their deputies respectively. Our best wishes are with these children. They are already showing keen interest in their work.

Creative English volunteer, Ritu More

Celebrating victory with sweets

It is a great achievement for all of us in our small own way that we have been able to sow the seeds of democratic values in Koseli, while democracy is still waiting at the entrance gate of our country._________________________________________________________________________________________________

Srijana is 14 years old and studies in class six. She stays in the Sukhumwasi slum. Her father works as labourer at the airport. Including her, there are 5 members in the family. Her brother, Suresh also a student in Koseli is fighting with blood cancer. She loves to dance. She wants to be an airhostess when she grows up as she is always intrigued by the flying planes. She thinks the best thing about Koseli is the teachers. She also likes the education and environment of the school. As the Head Girl she would like to bring more discipline in the school.

Rajesh is also 14 years old and a student of class six. His father is a mason and mother works as a daily wage labourer on construction sites. He has a younger sister, who, his mother leaves at a foster care centre run by an NGO when she goes out to work. Rajesh wants to be a famous man when he grows up, though he is not clear about his chosen field but he thinks it has to be related to academics. His biggest wish is to remain happy in all circumstances. He was pulled out of a regular school due to poverty, then for a couple of years he went to a school which he didn’t like much. What he loves most about Koseli is that there are enough books and stationery for all the children which they constantly fell short of in his previous school. The teachers are helpful and all their needs are taken care of. As the Head Boy he would like to improve the english speaking environment of the school.

We wish our new team all the very best in their endeavours!

Saturday, 15 January 2011

Elisa-Elija

Elisa

It was a beautiful sunny December morning, when I had my first heart to heart chat with Devi, Namuna, Elisa, Elija, Akash, Kumar, Sameer, and others. This was my first interaction with the beggar kids from the Pashupati Temple area and I realized that each of them had an identity and a distinct personality. Their lives and their stories shocked me and I was convinced that Bollywood films were not just imaginary concepts but based on real lives. For all these children ranging between 4 to 14 begging, beating, stealing and drug addiction were ways of survival. "Survival of the fittest" is still very much a valid concept in their lives.

And I don’t blame the kids, they sleep under the open sky when the temperature is hovering around zero degrees. They go hungry for 15-18 hours at a stretch if they miss the food being distributed by Annapurna Bhandar.

The income from begging is mostly enough to buy some glue, which acts as cure for all other issues. Elisa says, “when we sniff glue, we see stars dancing in front of our eyes, we feel happy and gradually we forget that we have not eaten or we have to sleep right here next to taps in the drinking water area.”

Elisa is 8yrs old, lives on the pavements along with her other siblings and begs for a living. She also collects some left over coins from the funeral pyres after the last rites are performed as per the hindu rituals. If lucky she even finds a piece of gold, which she sells to other petty thieves or drug peddlers.

But what really sets Elisa apart from other kids in the begging community is that she is convinced that if she goes to school her life can change dramatically.

We opened our hearts to Elisa and her friends and welcomed them to Koseli. Every morning Krishna (our teacher) would go to Pashupati Temple area in search for our 10 chosen kids and bring them to school. It obviously wasn’t easy for him. Elisa played the role of the lead spotter in Krishna’s search.

Initially the routine of the kids was kind of weird. They would come to the school eat, sleep, bathe and then again eat and sleep. It was heart wrenching to see how their lives revolved around food and now that they had access to 3 full meals a day, they wanted to make up for all the past years. On a yet another lazy sunny morning, they even shared my lunch after finishing theirs. For me, it was the best meal of my life.

Gradually things changed and they started showing interest in studies and soon, as per their grasping levels they were assigned classes. Now they follow the same routine as other kids at Koseli.

Elisa along with her three more friends has not only been coming to school regularly but has also given up sniffing glue. She is a very cheerful and bubbly child and looks very different from the girl with matted hair and ragged clothes we first met. Our best wishes are with her and her friends.

However we have not been so lucky with Devi, Namuna and others. They were deep into addiction and no amount of luring them to basic comforts of life, Koseli could not hold them. These kids now just vanish into the thin air when Krishna does his daily rounds in Temple area.

Nevertheless, we are very happy because even if it is four lives that we have been able to transform, we feel it was worth all the effort. After all it is human life we are talking about. We are on our way to successfully integrating Elisa and her three friends in the Koseli family. As of now we are operating full capacity and don’t know what to do about the 40 kids on the wait list.

Elija, when she came

(L-R) Akash, Kumar and Elija (now)

Monday, 13 December 2010

Upendra

Upendra cooks for his two younger brothers, feeds them and walks 2 kms to“Koseli” from the Jadibuti slum. He is 12 yrs old and his brother, Chandeshwor 10 yrs.

Now, there is a little confusion here. Chandeshwor says he has attended two “Gadimai Melas” (religious fair held in their village every five years) and assumes that he must have been at least two years old to remember the first one which means he is 12yrs now and since Upendra is 2 years older he is 14yrs. Every time this conversation comes up, Upendra only smiles mysteriously which leaves us all guessing. However, looking at their height and growth patterns we have decided that Upendra should be 12yrs and Chandeshwor, 10yrs. The matter is more or less settled temporarily.

What sets these three brothers apart from the rest of the kids at Koseli is that they are the poorest among the slum kids. In the 21st century, they live a life without a toilet. Like most of our findings at Koseli, we discovered this one too during the medical screenings. These kids were suffering from scabies. Scabies is a contagious skin disease marked by itching and rashes, caused by itch mite. If Chandehswor would recover, Upendra would have it and the cycle was continuous. The repetitive nature of the cycle made us look into the causes of the disease and we found out that their toilet routine was probably the most unhygienic aspect of their lives which was also the source of the disease. The other families in the slums have a make shift toilet which is quite bad but then it is better than having none at all. We cannot help these kids in that aspect but we have talked to them about the importance of hygiene and the instances of recurrence of disease have gone down relatively.

Upendra, to his credit also has the gambling streak.

The 24 hour informal channel of information is probably the most effective mechanisms we have established at Koseli so far. Since we talk a lot about NOT gambling at school, the children are beginning to understand that MAY BE its not a good thing and they should come and report if they spot their friends engaged in the game.

Soon through our network, we heard that Upendra had missed school to stay back and gamble. And since he didn’t have any money to gamble he became the dealer and actually ended up with some money in his kitty at the end of the day. I wondered if I should have been happy or sad at the news.

This was the BIG NEWS of the day. So, when he came to the school the following day, all the other kids waited for him to get a big scolding. I was obviously very angry but in the last few months I have also realized that these kids don’t deserve to be scolded under any circumstances. I just talked to him at length. Sometimes, I wonder if they even understand a word of what I am saying as they look at me blankly with a smile leaking from the side of their lips all the time. Nevertheless, Upendra promised that he wouldn’t gamble again. I guess he also knew if gambled again then the information would reach school at the speed of light.

The parents of these boys are very poor and live in the village. They have left them in the city to fend for themselves. Once or twice in a year the father takes them to the village. Recently they went to the village for a festival and turned up only three weeks later. When we talked to them, they told us they had a very good time in the village playing on the muddy village roads and fishing in the pond. Obviously, they did not attend any school during that period. While they love Koseli, they didn’t miss it during their stay in the village. They loved their carefree lives.

I wish they had just stayed back in the village and attended school there. The story would have ended, but then as expected one fine day their father dumped them back in Kathmandu and the little kids are once again lost in the lanes of the slums and struggling for survival.

“Upendra will be twice the age of normal Grade one child when he reaches there next year, provided he continues to come to school regularly this year”.

Monday, 29 November 2010

Renuka

Renuka is a 8 year old gentle child. She is an absolute pleasure to watch. She loves skipping ropes and makes sure that nobody is hurt while she is playing. She, (along with 3 other little girls), lives with her didi. All these five girls living in a small room are bonded by humanity even though only two of them are sisters.

Like most of the other children at Koseli, Renuka was also a happy child and never complained of any physical pain. Then, during the monthly medical screenings we realized that she bleeds. It was quite a shock for us as Renuka was too young to be menstruating. After a round of questions and answers we realized that there was blood in her stool. And it had been there for so many days, months, years..she didn’t know..

Its amazing how most children at Koseli have no proper sense of timeline. They relate to time through events. Usually there are long mental gaps between two events. No event is significant enough to remember at length. As young children, they keep moving from one place to another depending on their circumstances. Most of them don’t live in a place for more than 2-3 months. In addition to this, there is also the movement between the village and town. The days are filled with trivia, so to remember the details is actually too much of a pressure on their little minds. Thus, the stories they construct and relate are very vague and open ended.

So, Renuka too on her part was also not able to tell much. She able to tell when she spotted blood in her stool for the first time or if she had experienced any kind of pain in the past. Physical pain is a part of their lives and they don’t know what life is without it, so it generally goes unaccounted.

The stool test report confirmed that she had an ulcer in her intestine. The ulcer had become so big that it had started to bleed. The intestine was on the verge of rupture and here we had this girl still skipping her rope, not complaining of any pain and attending school regularly. In situations like these, I am at a total loss of words and feelings. It is beyond normal human capacity to react.

Fortunately, Renuka was diagnosed before it was too late. She underwent medication and has recovered fully.

I request everyone who is reading this to take a moment and think about the whole situation. I wonder if any of you would react differently, if life ever brought you face to face with a little child like Renuka.