April 22nd, 2009 Jo
For the most part, we shouldn’t be surprised by children’s behaviour. They learn it from us. They watch us closely - not just when we think we are “teaching” them, but all the time. They watch when we are under stress, when we are angry, when all our buttons get pushed. They watch us when we are hot and tired and exasperated and they store it all up in their bag of tricks to be brought out when THEY are hot or tired or exasperated.
Usually, this mea
ns trouble, and parents and teachers often get “caught,” so to speak, when we see our worst selves being imitated to perfection by our children.
So I was moved almost to tears on a visit to Karuna Vihar School today where I had the chance to observe children practicing what they have very obviously learned from their teachers.
Chotu is a boy with many difficulties, one of which is called “self-hurting”. It is painful to watch him hit and pinch himself or to struggle and cry to be allowed to. It always amazes me to see how gently and lovingly the teachers work with him.
This is Ramesh holding Chotu and he never seems to lose his cool or to forget the importance of what he is doing.
One of our strategies with Chotu is to keep the number of people working with him to an absolute minimum. So it’s an intense job for Ramesh, with few breaks. His loving interaction is inspiring.
And when I say inspiring, I really mean it.
Here is Shweta, who is a few years older than Chotu and has taken on the role of elder sister to him. Clearly taking her cues from Ramesh and others who work in Karuna Vihar, she looks like a young special educator in the making:
I know this speaks volumes about Shweta and what a wonderful person she is, but it also speaks libraries about the fine examples she has to emulate at Karuna Vihar.
Posted in Growing Up, Inspiration, Staff Stories | 9 Comments »
April 4th, 2009 Jo
Here are Raj Kumar and Harikala, holding their letters of acceptance to a six-month training course in Mumbai for Child Development Aides.
What a thrill! We are all so proud of them and so excited at this wonderful opportunity they have been given. The course is being run by our good friends in Ummeed - a beautiful organisation in Mumbai dedicated to child development, inclusion and empowering parents.
Vibha Krishnamurthy, director of Ummeed, called me two weeks ago to say that suddenly, out of the blue, the funding agency had offered to pay the accommodation costs for people attending the course from out of town: did we want to send anyone?
DID WE WANT TO SEND ANYONE???
I have watched this course take shape over the past year and quite apart from knowing that anything Ummeed does is going to be great, I knew this particular one was just perfect for our Foundation. And Raj and Harikala were the natural ones to send.
They have both been with us for several years (Harikala almost ten!) and they have distinguished themselves by their eagerness to learn, their innate understanding of children and their creative approach to their work. I knew they would want to attend, but I wasn’t quite prepared for the total enthusiasm with which they responded.
Without a moment’s hesitation, they both eagerly agreed to go - even though Harikala has a little boy of five whom she will be leaving with her husband for six months and Raj has family responsibilities to his mother and siblings. It is a tribute not only to them and their desire to grow as professionals but to their families who are willing to support them in their growth.
And everything has fallen into place. Their train tickets were waitlisted - no problem. My friend Anupama put in a word and miraculously, their seats were confirmed. No place to stay in Mumbai - no problem. My friend Fr Jose Parrapully wrote to a colleague and single rooms with attached baths, under our budget, miraculously became available. Their going would leave gaping holes in the organisation - no problem: suddenly, out of the blue, the perfect candidates presented themselves, once again, natch, miraculously.
In the picture, they are standing at Latika Vihar and the hectic activity you see in the background (kids learning bamboo weaving, playing the guitar, running toward the jungle gym) is just a tiny slice of what these two are involved in and responsible for here at the Foundation. By sending them for this six-month course, we are investing in them and in ourselves and it’s all for the good of our children. How lucky we are! How proud we are of them for their courage in leaving everything they know to go and get better at what they do. It’s how institutions grow and how the world is changed - by little and by little.
Posted in Inspiration, Out of Dehradun, Staff Stories | 3 Comments »
April 3rd, 2009 Jo
The Core Group!
It is an institution in the foundation, harking back to our earliest days, when the CG was comprised of Paula, Linda, Aparna, Manju and me. We met religiously every Tuesday and the original idea was that the session would last only 15 minutes: a power meeting for which everyone would come prepared and decisions would be taken at lightening speed.
But we enjoyed each other’s company so much, and we had so much to say to each other that the 15-minute rule never quite took off.
Over the years we came to accept that a two hour meeting once a week would be the norm and it got so we couldn’t do without it.
But we keep refining it and every now and then we come up with a stroke of genius.
The latest was to rotate its location.
Until about five weeks ago, we always met wherever my office was. The new idea is to hold the meeting in each project - a different one every week. Why had this never occurred to us before?
The Satellite EIC, which many of us had never even seen (SO far away - Defence Colony!), the school, (when is the last time you were there?), Latika Vihar (What? It’s at 135 Vasant Vihar now???), the CVT (they have a fancy meeting room!With a couch and easy chairs, and these amazing waiters and waitress who used to be little kids at KV School and are now all grown up and serving fruit salad) . . .
Immediately, a change came about in the dynamic of the meeting. Suddenly the presence of the children became more apparent. Even though we have our meetings in the afternoons when the kids are gone, being in their space - sitting at their tables (knees to our ears), seeing their toys all around the room - made us more aware of what we were really talking about. And the coordinator of the project where we were meeting seemed to grow in stature and authority in her/his own territory. They are the experts. The rest of us are learners. We have almost completed the full cycle now - the training centre is next and then we begin all over again at Latika Vihar.
It makes me think about the power of a small change. Sometimes all it takes to achieve awareness is one little adjustment, one little detail: looking people in the eye, remembering to use their names, introducing every staff member when a new person visits the office. Holding a child by the hand rather than by the wrist. Keeping in mind the “hard battle” everyone is facing.
And of course, there are always new opportunities for fun:
Manju discovered the ball box at the EIC meeting on Thursday and has already made plans to build one at the training centre!
Posted in Bright Ideas, Fun!, Staff Stories | 2 Comments »
March 30th, 2009 Jo
I miss our old staff. There are so many wonderful people who have worked in the foundation and then moved on - too many to list, really, and with my memory, I’m sure to forget someone absolutely crucial.
But they all live on in my dreams and they all pop up from places as far away as new Zealand and Milwaukee and Vishakapatnam and Jaipur and Chennai - they send messages on facebook and gmail and they call out of the blue and send boxes of things for Rainbow Resale and donations for the calendar and in some ways it feels like they haven’t really left at all. But I still miss them.
One of my favorite parts of staying in touch with them all is the baby pictures. They have the most beautiful babies. This is Gunjan’s baby boy, her sunshine, she says, though when she called a few days ago from the US where she is living, she said I could have him if I wanted because her husband was away, her mother-in-law had just left and little Mr Sunshine wasn’t sleeping a whole lot.
Gunjan was my Executive Assistant many years ago. She joined just as we were embarking on our first Advisory Committee meeting and she dived into the deep end and pulled the whole thing off without a hitch and it was love at first sight for both of us. That was in 2003 and she is still in touch, visiting me when I happen to be in a town near her, coming to Dehradun whenever she can, calling, writing, sending photos.
The Foundation is about much more than the daily passion for kids with disability. It’s also about relationships, about working together, about sharing stories and accomplishments and new dreams and ideas. And about babies.
Gunjan, I just want to say that I’ll take him. Send that little Sunshine across and you get a good night’s sleep.
Posted in Staff Stories, The Babies | No Comments »
February 7th, 2009 Jo
Those pesky farewells! It seems everytime we turn around, there’s another wonderful staff member leaving (marriages, babies, husbands getting transferred). It is never easy to say goodbye. Particularly when the staff member is as much of a treasure as our Sree.
This is a special educator for the pantheon. Talk about gifted! She is the sort of teacher you dream about, the kind of teacher every parent wants her child to have. It’s not just that she is talented, creative, delightful and imaginative. She is all that, but she is also a person who simply loves children.
I recently posted a blog item about government school teachers. I mentioned how frequently they don’t show up for work, and how, given the system, difficult - if not impossible - it is to fire them.
Most people, hearing such stories, react with anger, cynicism or sarcasm.
Not Sree.
Sree posted a comment on the story which was full of pity and compassion for the teachers. “Poor things,” she said. “They have no idea how much fun they are missing.”
That’s Sree in a nutshell. She loves what she does so much it is incomprehensible to her that anyone would willingly give up the chance to do it too. We can all learn so much from her. Her email address is happysree@gmail.com The address says it all.
Happiness comes from people. Happy Sree got it right the whole time she was with us and she will no doubt continue getting it right wherever she goes next.I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: that is one lucky baby she’s having!
Here she is listening to more praise from her friends, all true, all richly deserved. How we will miss her!
Posted in Staff Stories | 4 Comments »
February 4th, 2009 Jo
The future of the country is in the children.
And their parents.
Here’s Sree, giving us a sneak preview of one of our youngest new citizens, and a very lucky child indeed, with Sree and Manoj as her/his parents.
No matter how dark things seem, no matter how many times we hear of an atrocity or an act of terror or a violent crime, the thought of young couples bringing new life into the world restores hope and promise.
Weddings and births are all about faith in the future, faith in the essential goodness of humanity, for all its flawed nature and grim history.
So we celebrate life as we celebrate the Republic - Jai Hind!
Posted in Bright Ideas, Staff Stories | 4 Comments »
February 4th, 2009 Jo
Given the current climate of distrust and fear in the country, Rizwan’s prose poem, which he adapted from an ancient Persian poem, was particularly apt.
“Hindu, Muslim: what difference does a bomb know?” was the haunting refrain.
Posted in Serious Stuff, Staff Stories | 1 Comment »
February 4th, 2009 Jo
The presentations were many and varied. Skits, dances, songs and one original poem set to music - it was a wonderful compilation of talent and patriotism.
Here are some of the EIC team, enacting a series of jokes:
Then we had the training centre with a funny and most impressive little skit on the power of the flag as a national symbol, transcending individual differences and unifying all of us into a cohesive whole:
Here’s the Latika Vihar team in a superb display of choreography and style:
Two talented dancers from the College for Vocational Training gave them a run for their money:
Here’s the KV School choir:
And finally, we welcomed the team from our newest project, the Satellite EIC:
Posted in Staff Stories | 1 Comment »
January 16th, 2009 Jo
We recently hosted a small conference for the Sir Ratan Tata Trust which organizations working on disability issues all over the country attended. It was a very interesting and provocative experience, with many new ideas discussed and challenges raised. We all learned a lot and some of the issues which came up will keep us thinking for a long, long time.
But the thing I keep thinking about is the tiny detail of the nametags.
Sonam, who runs our Rainbow Resale Project, volunteered to make them for us and I assumed they would be the usual ordinary things – maybe a colorful piece of cardboard, with the name written out by hand. There were only forty people attending, so printing in quantity wasn’t economical.
But just look what she came up with! Blue tags for our guests, yellow for staff, and each one with its own individual design.
Mine had multi-colored apples, others had kites, butterflies, musical notes and flowers. They were beautiful and special. I saved mine. I’ll bet most of the participants did the same.
Such a small thing. It was only a name tag. But it was done with love and skill and it added an extra note of festivity and concern to the conference. It told the participants they mattered, that we cared enough to give importance to their names.
It was Sonam’s birthday, too. This year, WE got the gift!
Posted in Bright Ideas, Staff Stories | 2 Comments »
November 29th, 2008 Jo
Weddings are all about relationships. and since Indian weddings are so L-O-N-G, there is always plenty of time to observe and document: who’s talking to whom, who’s planning what.
So we had husbands and wives speculating . . .
Amaji advising . . .
Uncles conferring . . .
Aunts deciding . . .
Friends enjoying . . .
Sisters supporting . . .
Parents witnessing . . .
And finally, a man and a woman beginning . . .
Posted in Staff Stories | 1 Comment »
