Trip to India     Jan/Feb 2007

Thank you to British Airways who made this trip possible and for the extra baggage allowance enabling the transportation of necessitous children’s clothes, blankets, educational material and toys.

Melanie’s visit to India.

When the day finally came for me to go to India, it was a dream come true, and I could still barely believe it. I’d only ever dreamed of going to the land of my father having been  brought up in the very English countryside of Devon. We have been supporting an orphanage in Andra Predesh in India for 20 months.

From Manchester I went to London Heathrow, where I caught my flight to Chennai, Madras, on the Bay of Bengal.  It was a 10 hour flight. The cabin staff opened the plane door, and a wave of heat just hit us like an oven door opening, after the turkeys are cooked.  Immediately the smells of spices and curries wafted up my nose. Galli, and his sons met us, and took us to the train station,. Coolies carried my very weighty bags on their heads :  with out a flicker...I stood in amazement.

We caught a train to the city of Tirupati. Tirupati is a Temple city, where 1000s of people come on pilgrimage to visit the Hindu Temple.

There are still a lot of villagers and city women aborting the little girl babies. Sometimes, when a baby girl is born, they put poison in their mouths, so they will die. This is because of the dowry. Every girl is expected to give her in-laws a very large sum of money. Parents who are poor and  have no chance of their girls getting married, if they do not have this dowry.  The culture also has a  casting system. If you are born a Brahman, then you are the very highest caste, but 7 castings lower, and then you will be an untouchable, and that means literally, no-one must touch you, or you would be contaminated, well I touched them, and hugged them, and kissed them, and told them I loved them.

We went into the children’s prison, in Tirupati .  One little boy was 4 years old. He just sat, with his big black eyes wide open in amazement. We told them stories, and jokes, then gave them all a yoyo, a balloon, and a dinky car.

On to the women’s jail and thank goodness there were only 6 women here. The conditions were foul. The ladies listened intently, as we told the story of the man who gave his heart away. They had to sit crossed legged on the floor  through out and  to have their backs straight, and were not allowed to speak.

The Village people, the Tent people, and the Fox people, ( these are the ones who eat foxes, and cut off their tails and feet, and sell them.), were all fascinated with our tales and antics. They had never seen Europeans before, and just stared intently at Thelma and Carol. I sat in the cool of the evening, quietly being eaten by mosquitoes ............zzzzzzzzzz I dislike those insects more then I care to say.......but they seem to like me very much.

The Leprosy Colony, now called Jothi Colony. has about 30 families living in it. It is way out of  the city, and is really like a reservation. It has big gates as you enter, and then you can see little houses each side of the dirt track road. The road led up to a meeting hall, where everyone gathered to hear the latest news. So on the first part of the trip  we went into the schools, children’s prisons, leprosy colony, fox peoples homes, and to the untouchables. We attended women’s conferences, and also took part in seminars.