Here I am finally figuring out this blog thingamajig, stalled as I was by internet failure, electricity failure, and stomach failure. The power is in and out constantly, sometimes ten or more times an hour. My stomach, fortunately, has been mostly in since a rather painful and seemingly interminable initial bout of what we'll politely call "indigestion." Suffice it to say that I thought I was dying and certainly hoped I would (lest this deter any potential visitors, it was actually NOTHING and would never happen to YOU)!
But on to the kids: Rising Star Outreach is a home for 140 children whose parents have been affected by leprosy. Although the disease is curable and not nearly as contagious as commonly believed, patients in India have been compelled to relocate to leprosy colonies. Their children live a grim existence, at risk of developing the disease themselves (there seems to be a genetic factor in its transmission, although unsanitary and crowded living conditions also play a role) and unable to go to school. In fact, the little girl to my right on the above image had leprosy as a baby.
The kids are divided into eight "families," each with a housemother. A family shares a minuscule apartment of three rooms; there isn't any furniture and life is acted out on the concrete floor.
A recent tonsure day:
The children do their own laundry (by hand, I might add):
I often do feel like I'm Alice in Wonderland, that I've fallen down a deep hole and have landed on the far side of the moon. Ubiquitous unaccustomed sights provide constant entertainment: cows wandering down the middle of the street, families of five perched precariously (or not?) on a motorcycle, construction workers wearing saris.
What next? A large blue caterpillar seated on a mushroom, quietly smoking a long hookah?
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