A GUEST HOUSE - CULTIVATING GRATITUDE FOR LIFE’S CHALLENGES and JOYS by Tina Romenesko

A GUEST HOUSE - CULTIVATING GRATITUDE FOR LIFE’S CHALLENGES and JOYS 

by Tina Romenesko

Bacchan Devi - Matrichaya Group leader

During the afternoon, we headed to the Munda tribal village on the outskirts of Ranchi.  The projects in this village are overseen by Matrichaya graduate, Bacchan Devi.  Bacchan is a shining example of the ever widening circle of women.  When she heard about Matrichaya, she thought because she was uneducated, she wouldn’t qualify.  With Mama’s encouragement, Bacchan applied for the program, was accepted, and learned to sew, knit, and embroider.  Eventually she became a leader herself, and opened a successful sewing center in the village marketplace.  However, the men didn’t like that the women were meeting together in a public place - so she moved the group to her home and turned the upper level into the sewing cooperative.

The steep concrete staircase opens into a large common space where 25 women are waiting anxiously for us to arrive so they can show us their workbooks and passbooks.  Each woman has her own 3 ring binder with doll size versions of the kurtas, pants, dresses, and tops they will be sewing to sell in the village.  Each woman also has her own passbook - which allows them to buy supplies and even a sewing machine - on credit.  For each finished piece they receive 188 rupees, which is about $3.00.  The training is free and runs on ongoing grant support from DFW.  Originally, they were shooting for 20 trainees, but the demand was so great, they now have 40 women enrolled in the training.  Matrichaya believes the village can sustain even more seamstresses,

As Bacchan poses for a photo with her son and husband, Taryn asks him how her husband feels about his wife and the way she has helped her community.  In broken English, he replies, “ I support her, and she supports me!”  We all clap - but Archana tells us at dinner, that wasn’t always the story.  The empowerment of women is a breaking of tradition - a necessary change and also a challenging one.  Without the support of Matrichaya, Bacchan wouldn’t have had the courage to continue, and challenge traditional family structure.  Seeing the pride in her husband’s face now, empowers the whole community, that together they can all grow and prosper from these trainings.

Bacchan is also the medical liaison for the village and has created a health center and preschool in a very humble building on the other side of the village.  The women in these trainings are educated about vaccinations, basic hygiene, nutrition, and are instructed how to treat minor illnesses.  They also serve as birth attendants or doolas.  The children in the preschool receive one free meal daily of lentils and rice, that is government subsidized.  For some it is the only meal of the day.  The children are very shy and a few start to cry when they see us.  

Dining For Women has supported over 6500 trainees at Matrichaya since 2005, and the key are these self help groups that promote socio-economic change through education.  Archana calls it a “hand up”, not a hand-out.  Some of the other trainings include mushroom cultivation, jewelry making, and beauty school training.  From legal aid to health advocacy, the focus is on Health, Occupational Preparedness, and Education or H-O-P-E.  HOPE.  

Our last Matrichaya stop is quite a drive out of town to visit a bamboo artisan project training in a small village.  The women here are using rustic saws and awls to make wall hangings, baskets, and vases out of bamboo.  I crouch down on the ground and hold a thick stalk of bamboo for a woman that has been sawing since we arrived on a large, green bamboo stem.  As I hold it for her, we smile.  I talk to her kids in my funny language, with my blue eyes, and none of them cry this time - they smile, because their mom’s are smiling too.  I give the project manager 60 rupees for a bamboo vase that will sit proudly in my kitchen - a reminder of the hard work these women do and have done to improve their lives and the lives of their families.  

Bamboo artisans - hard at work.

Thursday is our last day in India.  We are back in Kolkata now, and have been invited over to Ayesha’s and Sadek’s for breakfast.  As we sit on the floor and share fresh fruit and pyes (a wonderful porridge of rice, milk, cashews, and sweet) , they show us their books of published poetry, written in Bengali and adorned with Sadek’s paintings.  We view the photos from the Santali village visit and are all struck in that moment by the uniqueness of each project we have visited.  What makes the difference is passion, and being able to channel that passion into progress - and get funding.  With Matrichaya, we see how a family matriarch has made a difference for children living in urban slums and tribal villages.  Her passion has inspired her daughters, and a whole community to expand the work she began after her husband's untimely death.  Ayesha and Sadek are shining examples of the disadvantaged working against tremendous odds to help the disadvantaged.  And Colleen and Anchal have extended the circle of support to corporate America, striking a design deal with Urban Outfitters, and offering commercial sex workers an alternative lifestyle with a viable market, to raise the status of their children and offer these young women hope and empowerment.  

************

Last night was my local DFW meeting.  I’d been up since 4:00 a.m., but knew I wanted to connect with these wonderful women while my India experience was raw and real.  As we shared food and wine, I shared the 3 projects I had visited as a representative of their group.  I told them how proud I am to be part of this organization and that their monthly participation really does make a difference for these women and families.  WIthout their donations, none of these projects would be possible.  I told them about the banners, the plaques announcing their gratitude, and how “Dining for Women”, with a cute Hindi accent, is now a part of these women’s vocabulary. Along with the word “Thank you”.  Tears in my eyes, I finally realize how to answer that crazy question I have already been asked a million times.  “ How was your trip to India?”  “It was life changing.  Just exactly what that means is still up in the air - and that’s the good news.  As we move into the holiday season, I hope it continues to give me perspective.  Here’s one point of view - one tidbit of wisdom -  from my good friend and Sufi mystic, Rumi.  The DFW trip to India was not an easy - but in many many ways yet to be fully understood and realized - it was an important one.  

Thank you and Namaste.

	THE GUEST HOUSE by Rumi This being human is a guest house.
	Every morning a new arrival.
	A joy, a depression, a meanness,
	some momentary awareness comes
	as an unexpected visitor.
	Welcome and entertain them all!
	Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
	who violently sweep your house
	empty of its furniture,
	still, treat each guest honorably.
	He may be clearing you out
	for some new delight.

`

CONSULT NOT YOUR FEARS, BUT YOUR HOPES AND DREAMS by Donna Shaver

Taryn and some of the girls from the Spoken English program.  

CONSULT NOT YOUR FEARS, BUT YOUR HOPES AND DREAMS by Donna Shaver

The day began with a visit to the Spoken English and Computer Literacy programs for girls. Each is a three-month program. These are introductory classes, and the current group of students has had only had one week of classes. All of the girls are from impoverished families. They must be at the tenth grade level before they can participate. One of the students gave a short introduction to the program in English. Her presentation was very well done. We were astonished to learn that she was a student in the current class!

The instructor went on to tell us that the first thing they work on in class is to remove any hesitation the students might feel in expressing themselves in English. The class is effectively a language immersion class. When the students come into the classroom, they are absolutely forbidden to communicate in any language other than English. A student will be suspended for violating that rule.

They start by learning, and quickly speaking, 35 sentences. There are tests in every class. Students are instructed to write down any new words they hear, find out later what they mean, and write a sentence with the word in context, which they record in a diary, effectively creating their own dictionary.

As luck would have it, we had our very own specialist in instructing immigrant children in English, Debbie Birgfeld from Washington, D.C.! Debbie and the instructor talked about the English language programs he was using. Debbie was familiar with the programs, and had suggestions for programs that worked well for her. They made arrangements to stay in touch and share information-- another important connection thanks to Dining for Women!

As our time was coming to an end, we were treated to a snack and some time to interact with the students. The girls crowded around, eager to speak to us in English after only a week of classes! We all happily stumbled along, thrilled to be engaged with each other in learning and understanding.

We are amazed at all that has been accomplished as a result of Chanchala’s initial vision of educating the poor children in her village. She exemplifies the very heart of Dining for Women.

"Consult not your fears but your hopes and dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what is still possible for you to do."
---Pope John XXIII

Tina and the Computer Literacy class - note the banner in the background!!!

SELF-EMPOWERMENT by Betsy Dunklin

Self-Empowerment by Betsy Dunklin (Boise Chapter)

“My mother believes in self-empowerment,” Archana stated with tears in her eyes as we stood on the rooftop patio of her family home in Ranchi. Archana, an ICU doctor in Buffalo, NY, had come with her husband and 10-year-old daughter to her family home to help her elderly mother, Chanchala, the founder of Matrichaya, prepare for our visit.

“When I was a child, my mother would bring poor children from the area to our home to teach them and would recruit me, my sisters and others to help her,” she continued in telling us the story of how her mother, a highly respected woman in the community, came to found the school that DFW has helped fund.  She had been a homemaker as the wife of a university professor, but after he died when she was in her forties, she knew she needed to push herself to create a new way of life.  So she ramped up her efforts to educate the desperately poor youngsters she knew could achieve as well as any, given the opportunity.  

She expanded the educational opportunities by compelling her friends to give their time and by organizing classes in nearby communities. When the need for more educators grew,  her teacher friends began to train those who had matriculated (completed 10th grade) to teach the young children.  These young “teachers” earned a small fee they could use to continue their own education. Archana and her two sisters, also with us today, began to financially support the program, and it continued to grow.

“The classes would meet in a field or a store-front or wherever a place could be found that day. When harvest-time came, classes had to wait.” Archana explained.  “My mother realized something needed to change.  She decided to turn our home into a school because she just needed a small part of it to live in.”

And that is how our group came to be standing on the roof of Archana’s ancestral home, a three-story concrete structure, modest by western standards, that is now the school Matrichaya. Behind the house was the small slum where some of the students lived. These were permanent structures, a few steps up from the tents and cardboard shacks we had seen in the big cities, dark, one-room houses with goats grazing in the dirt alleyways surrounding the units.

I never would have guessed that the beautiful shining faces of the school children who greeted us that morning were the children of the rag-pickers who lived in the slum.  When we left our hotel at 10 am that morning, the sun was shining, the air soft and warm. I saw palm trees, coleus and marigolds.  A few minutes later we arrived at Matrichaya, the family home and school.  We were greeted by two rows of the most lovely young women who looked like Greek goddesses in their white robes with a green border.  They were holding hands, swaying in a two-step dance and singing.  We were encouraged to join them as they gently swayed and pulled us through the compound walls into a patio filled with dozens of children in colorful outfit. We began to catch on to the dance step and fell into rhythm as we wove through the colorful patio and on to the front row of seats waiting for us.  Other guests were already seated behind us.

I was enchanted!

Today was awards day at the school.  For the next hour, one group after another performed.  Kindergartners in sweet costumes did hand gestures to Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.  Boy-and-girl pairs of older primary grade students in exquisite costumes performed folk dances.  The older girls’ routines were more Bollywood, some with a hint of Beyonce, and somewhat Westernized costumes.

One youngster, perhaps ten, did a ferocious comic parody of a Kashmir mountain man, full of hair-raising howls.  My favorite was a parade of couples demonstrating the dance and traditional costume of each state of this large and diverse nation.

I was struck by how proud they all were of their performances, deservedly so, and how respectful they were of each other.  Even the littlest children remained well behaved through the hour-long pageant.

Then it was time to present the awards.  An elderly gentleman in the front row presented the first awards to the top three students in each class.  Many of the students, as a sign of respect, bent to touch the tops of the feet of the gentleman, then their own forehead and chest after accepting their trophy.  Next, each of us was asked to hand out various awards -- best actor, best speech, best attendance, and so on.  The children came forward with such dignity and poise. School principals back home in the states would have been envious of such a courteous student body.

Once the ceremony was finished and the students dispersed, we toured the classrooms in the home. First, we visited a group of women who were learning needlework skills.  Some of them were the mothers of the children who had performed. Their male instructor was using an interesting manual technique for embroidery I had never seen, producing a beautiful design.  Samples of previous students’ work was hanging from the wall.  We were very impressed with the gorgeous designs and quality of the work. Archana explained that they also offered a fashion design class whose students incorporated the work created by the needlework students.  The finished products are sold at craft fairs and stores commission some items. These former rag pickers are now skilled artisans with a marketable trade.

Upstairs, we visited a beauty school class of young women who were learning how to “thread” eyebrows, a painless technique to shape brows that is becoming popular in the USA.  Debbie volunteered to have hers done and within a few minutes had perfectly arched eyebrows.

After a box lunch of locally made pastries, we piled into taxis to visit the Birla Institute of Technology where Usha, Archana’s sister, is a professor of chemistry, to meet the “women’s cell”, a group of female faculty and students who handle complaints of discrimination against women on campus.  The state mandates that each university have such a group. We had a lively exchange of ideas about how to address the problems of sexual harassment, violence against women, and pay inequity. The student body is 40% female and the women seemed to feel that they had an equal voice.  They were well informed about issues of discrimination and how to address them and were enthusiastic about Taryn’s suggestion that it is important to educate males about how certain behaviors can be offensive to women  as well as defend female victims.

These women, all future members of an elite professional class, exuded self-confidence. I thought they are an excellent example of self-empowerment. Equally so were the former rag-pickers, now transformed into skilled artisans and beauticians through their own initiative, and the young students who performed with such grace for us that morning. Chanchala’s efforts to empower herself after her husband’s untimely death have set the example and created the opportunity for so many others to improve their lives.

Again it struck me that it is the efforts of people like Chanchala and her family that are going to conquer the poverty that is rampant in India and unleash the great potential in these entrepreneurial people.

FRIENDSHIP, HOPE, DREAMS, and LAUGHTER by Tina Romenesko

Tribal school girls welcome dance.

Friendship, Hope, Dreams, and Laughter by TIna Romenesko

Day Two begins at a different Santali tribal school.  The children here include both boys and girls, ages 5-15, in red pants or skirts, and matching red gingham short sleeved blouses or shirts.  They are all adorable, and again we are honored with a marigold shower, and much hand shaking with bright hellos!  A girl could get spoiled!  The older children are going to play football (soccer) for us - boys against the girls.  We can’t help but cheer for the girl team, playing barefoot in SKIRTS!  They hold their own, but the boys win 1-0.  Ayesha asks the goal maker why he doesn’t help the girls more with their skills.  “Because then they would win!” , he replies.  Seems competition and kids are the same everywhere.

Debbie gets the little kids on the sidelines going, chanting “ Good Job!”  and doing the a.o.k hand gesture, or mudra.  Then she runs from one end of the line to the other, their voices rising and laughing, each child giving her a big HIGH FIVE!  She was an ESL teacher for 37 years and absolutely loves the kids and knows how to fire them up!  Susan has brought two huge packages of pens and Ayesha decides this is a good place to distribute them to the older students.  Martha has crayons for the younger ones, and all are pleased with the treasure, most proudly display in their shirt pocket.  I share two postcards with the older boys and tell them a little about Milwaukee and Wisconsin, and then give the postcards to their teacher to use as a learning tool.  Again, wise sharing is a must.  No favorites.  We don’t want to create imbalance when it isn’t necessary.  The next half hour is spent sharing names.  They all know I’m TINA, and laugh hysterically as I try desperately to pronounce theirs.  This is a game I end up playing a lot during the day.  They are so proud when they can spell their name, in English, which helps me enormously.  The kids are beautiful little souls and so curious about us.  

For the next two hours, we visit many of the kitchen gardens that were funded by the DFW grant in 2011.  These gardens are used to sustain individual families.  Each focuses on a particular crop.  This time of year, we see lots of squash, eggplant, cucumbers, lemons, mangoes, and a few vegetables we are unable to identify!  The next stop is visiting the project that Ayesha’s brother, Toyeb, has created.   His thriving agriculture cooperative serves as a model for the community.  The land is leased by the tribe and historically yielded about 10000 rupees per year ($150).  He has diversified now to include a pond that produces 4 kinds of fish, and an open area where he cultivates papaya, guava, tamarind, turmeric, lots of bananas, and much more.  It also has its own poultry coop.  The yield on this land is now over 1 million rupees, an amazing profit for the community and MBBCDS!  He does vocational training here for community members, helping them see new ways of using the high land between the rice paddies for a substantial profit.  The main agricultural product in Bengal is rice.  Basmati rice.  Acres and acres and acres of it.  In the spring, each seed is planted by hand, and workers spending entire days planting the paddies.  Then the monsoons hit and the water nourishes seeds.  We are close to harvest now and the green plants are turning a golden yellow.  I am amazed by the organization and vastness of the product.  These sub-products like Toyeb is offering are a way to use high land and diversify the income to serve more of the population, as long as they are open to learning a new skill.  

Ayesha’s mother  is waiting for us as we arrive at the home where she has raised 8 children, all with higher education, most with Master’s degrees.  Nasya is a tiny woman, in a white sari (the sari of widowhood) and she is obviously proud of her brood.  We sit on her bed, and again share a light snack.  Pomegranates, apples, bananas, sweets, and of course, tea.  A friend of Ayesha’s invites us each to introduce ourselves to mom - which she seems to appreciate with a generous smile.  

On the way back to the school, we stop at a few more kitchen gardens.  Everyone wants us to stop at their home.  The local Blacksmith shows us his skill at making handheld farm implements.  He has a bellows and boasts that he can make 8-9 tools per day, everyday.  The head master shares his cucumber crop with us and proudly shows us his second daughter sleeping angelically on a blanket in their two room home.  It is spotless and his wife tells me that she embroidered the lovely blanket on the bed.  

When we get back to the main compound, we eat fresh fish from Toyeb’s pond and share curried potatoes.  I see fresh tomatoes and cilantro and take a big bite - only to find out it also contains hot chile peppers!  They all laugh hysterically as Ayesha runs into the kitchen for a sweet - which cools my burning lips and tongue - at least for the moment!  

Next stop is shopping the bazaar that the village women have created in our honor.  The crafts are impressive.  Their main work is block printing fabrics which they then outline in embroidery.  The work is very intricate and Susan’s kashmir shawl was a two month project for two women.  These pieces are truly works of art.  Color blocked silk scarves with floral designs, even saris.  The printing is done in an upstairs room that was financed by Dining For Women.  There is a lovely slate plaque, and they have placed a ribbon in front of the door for Taryn to cut, inaugurating the room, officially.  This arid space serves as a training room and evening reading room for the children, as most only have one light bulb for reading.  Most evenings the children gather up here for two hours of reading, after dusk.  They have plans to expand and house a girls boarding school in the rest of the upstairs area, with a focus on science.  The dreams are big - and focused on empowerment, education, and vocalization.  Big dreams that need funding to come true.  

The rest of the afternoon’s activities include a drama/comedy that makes us all laugh hysterically, even though we don’t understand a word of Bengali!  When asked to share our own cultural offering, Susan, Martha, and I grab a group of young girls and teach them the Hokey Pokey.  The kids laugh wildly as we turn ourselves around, and that’s what it’s all about!  

After sunset, we once again gather with Ayesha’s amazing staff.  These 36 individuals demonstrate a palpable dedication to their community.  Comprised of an equal number of males and females, they serve as a shining example of the importance of empowering women to fully integrate and balance the yin/yang of progress.  We move around the circle, expressing our gratitude to them as they express their gratitude to us.  A mutual admiration society that has allowed us to form friendships in the last 36 hours that we all hope will last a lifetime.  I sit next to the woman who is in charge of the artisan program.  She has me write my name in her notebook, and I write her name in mine.  Next to hers, I write, “My new friend.”  She smiles brightly in understanding, touching her heart.  Senehara Khatun - my new friend.

As Ayesha shares more details about the hoped for boarding school for Tribal children, other teachers express their own dreams.  An ambulance for women during childbirth.  More agricultural cooperatives.  Expansion of the sanitary napkin program which involves making and selling these pads that offer freedom to girls.  If young women can’t go to school because they are menstruating, they can’t finish their education.  I say a little prayer of gratitude for the freedom I have taken for granted in the form of modern feminine personal hygiene products.  As we are closing, the staff asks if they can pray for our help with these dream projects and we encourage them to do so AND fill out the online applications.  We will certainly advocate for them and it helps that our entourage has actually seen the money transformed into reality, and also felt their enthusiasm.  

As the day draws to a close, six women scurry out and ask us to wait.  When they return, they wrap each of us in our own beautiful handmade shawl.  A gift from their hands to our heart.  We are all very touched and honored.  Their generosity in the face of everyday struggles is inspirational.  More hugs, a few tears, and we are back in the jeeps, headed for the Bequest Inn.  

Our hearts filled to the brim with hope, gratitude, and new understandings.

Senehara Khatun - my new friend, and the Santali seamstress that made this beautiful fabric.

PICK UP A PEN AND WRITE!  by Tina Romenesko

Early Thursday morning, we are met at our hotel by Ayesha - the director of the next project we are visiting, which lies near Sainthia, about 3 hours west of Kolkata by train.  She maneuvers us to the train station where we wait in the “First Class Waiting Room”, a rather dank room that thankfully has a few Western toilets, and a large balcony where many travelers are drying clothes they washed in the bathroom and are now quick drying in the scorching mid day sun.  

The train itself is simple, and a wonderful way to see India without a filter.  Vendors sell chips, chai tea, hard boiled eggs (which they peel and slice for you in their hand), magazines, even a shoe repair man wanders through with safety pins, shoe laces, and shoe polish.  Taryn and I finally acquiesce and order the Indian version of Coca-Cola, called Thumbs Up, complete with the expected mudra, or hand gesture.  (Merudanda Mudra)  It tastes kind of like Tab on steroids and is actually a Coke product.  When I take a closer look at the label, I notice that the name is actually “ThumsUp!”  We dissolve into laughter at the misspell.  Miraj.  Mirage.  Kwality.  Quality.  Anything goes with spelling, as it is mostly used to aid pronunciation.

The scene out the window is pastoral, and a welcome change to the hustle and bustle of Kolkata.  The landscape is mostly rice paddies and water birds - egrets, spoonbills, and the like.  It seems that all the animals are having babies - kids, lambs, calves, even puppies, everywhere frolicking in the open air.  Although it seems pastoral, this is obviously a hard life for the humans that eek out a living in this edge of the world.  The fields are filled women, men, and children, doing manual labor in the fields or on the streets.  The roads are often unpaved and full of potholes, and their shacks are so small that most of their time is spent in the street.  Many cook over open fires and gather around small storefronts.

After our arrival in Sainthia, we take two jeeps to the village and are greeted by the entire Santali tribe!  The drumming begins as six beautiful women with vases of flowers on their heads sway and dance in unison.  “It’s a processional for you!”, say Ayesha, so we follow behind them as the young children throw marigold petals AT US, laughing, shaking our hands, and yelling “hello!”.   I think I shook about 53 little indigenous children's hands - many of them came up later and handed us a marigold, shaking our hand again.  It was so dear.  We are celebrities!!!  A gorgeous welcome.  

In the training room, Ayesha explains the basics of their program to us in lovely English.  The organization is called, MBBCDS, an acronym for Mohammed Bazar Backward Classes Development Society.  “ Backward “ is a government term used to describe poor Muslims, poor Hindus, and Native peoples.  Ayesha has been trying to change the moniker - to no avail - so they always use the letters only, which people now recognize as her project.  The reach of this program is extensive and sees no boundaries between the three groups.  They work together, go to school together, and may even live in the same village, each in their own area as they share customs and food.  Over 800 children are served by the schools, but MBBCDS’s work includes social work, advocacy, kitchen gardens used to sustain families, nurseries which bring in revenue, training, community projects, and more.  Many of the Muslim women and children they serve were previously cloistered in their tiny homes.  Enter Ayesha and her team, reminding them of their Indian rights of freedom and education.  Issues like child marriage, prostitution, illegal divorce and polygamy are dealt with straight on.  Her actions takes great courage as Ayesha is Muslim herself, has suffered threats from the government and has been physically attacked 15 times in the past year. “ Pick up a pen and write! “, is her cry!  Get educated.  Write about your feelings and frustrations.  Make a difference!  She is also a poet and accomplished novelist in Bengal, but her books are unpopular with the government and consequently she gets no positive publicity in the press.  She is a strong voice for those who are just learning to talk, to write, to act, and believe.  

Our last stop is a visit to a Native home.  The small shacks all have cement floors (as cement is very available here in Bengal) - a huge improvement over dirt.  The walls are made of straw bales or and what appeared to be the local clay, with thatched roofs.  Five people live in this small space.  Items like clothes and utensils are in piles around the perimeter, as are the bedrolls.  It is small and cramped, but clean.  In a side room, the owner proudly shows us her bed, made from weaving inner tube tires to form a lattice.  Nothing here goes to waste.  She lays woven mats out on in front of the door, and under a nearly full moon we share puffed rice and sweets.  She is so proud to have foreigners visiting her home - and I think how lucky we are to be invited into her personal space.  As we wander the maze of paths toward the jeeps, I am filled with gratitude for the wonders of the day - and the many tiny hands that couldn’t wait to shake mine - grinning from ear to ear and proudly announcing, “Hello!” in my very own language.