From the ladies team!

While Dick has been doing medical stuff and Nigel has been doing banking stuff Julie and I have been using our strengths- chatting to people! We have been to 3 different slums, stood in doorways chatting to beautiful but shy ladies,  admired children in all different shapes and sizes and generally been made really welcome by so many different people. The women in particular are really friendly, giving us hugs and chai!

We visited one place where Asha have only worked for 4 years and we heard about the CHV having to go out to help deliver babies at all hours. (She has helped over 100 births!) We all sat in their 2 room house and when we asked where they all slept there were roars of laughter! Answer- on the bed platforms, on the floor- in fact,  on every available space! We rounded the corner to find everyone cutting plastic with big scissors. this turned out to be the straps or ‘steps’ for flip flops. Bit shocked to realise it takes a day to fill a big bucket. For this they get 30 rupees (about 50p). We also turned round to see the baby with the blade of the scissors in it’s mouth. The slums are a dangerous place for children. we have seen several with bad scarring from burns and cuts. One little boy fell in a pot of boiling rice when he was a few months old- now he has no hair on one side- but a great grin.

This afternoon Freddie took us out to a new settlement, a long way out from the centre of the city. In August 2006 the government flattened a slum with a few hours notice. First the people were all homeless and had to live on the streets. Then Kieran and Asha persuaded them to accept the governments resettlement plan. They bought plots 10 ft by 20 ft out on empty land. Now it is growing into a community with wide streets, fields beyond, a breeze and no slum landlord to cause trouble. They own their own plots. Some have built brick houses, others a simple shack, but there is a good feel to the place. Freddie was so proud of the place- so much better than what they had before. a new community. We met two sisters who have an embryo church meeting in their house. new life in the new community!