A drop that I contributed !

One of the very good things that I love about the company I work in is the kind of goodness it is trying to spread in the world. I never bother about the real intention; the only thing I care about is if despite the reason, is it affecting anyone’s life towards anything better? And, if the answer is yes, I am proud to be a part of it. So, this was the CSR Day, the last day of training, the full-on emphasis of the company people on “inducing” me into the company.

So, here it is my whole-day experience. This might just be a very touching story or another equally boring medieval history topic types.

So, the first thing I would start-off with is the rains of Bangalore. Apparently, the city is not receiving adequate rainfall and everybody fears the scarcity of potable water. But, when it comes to any fun event it is going to pour for sure and because I don’t carry an umbrella, may be forget or don’t want to, I get wet and catch severe cold for coming few days and later regret and wish that never happened.

So, we reach the Infant Jesus Children Home while it was raining, a place that is saving lives of so many little cute earthlings and will always consistently be devoted for this wonderful cause or so I think. It is solely dedicated to the HIV- positive children who either have been rendered orphans by their own families or those who have been rejected by the world as a whole.

So, we enter the compound where everyone started cornering each other just to remind each other to not make these children feel bad, or sad and dejected more than they already are; by no means whatsoever, don’t mention anything that could just make them feel any more depressed, rather in nutshell provide them with an ambience where they could also feel like they belong to this world and they are no different even if it is just for few hours. I too got along with the crowd. Never did I give it a thought until later when it was time to leave them behind. Was providing them with few moments of happiness enough? Was our duty done? Was it enough? Was it right to raise their hopes up by being there, by being part of their life for few minor hours and then again pushing them back into the darkness they have started to live along with.  I never got the answer and the coward me doesn’t need it anymore because even after crunching my head for so long, I couldn't get any answer other than the fact it could never be enough.

The first thing I saw once I stepped inside the courtyard was ‘Let the children come to me’ and the funny thing is I never saw there was Jesus painted sideways who was speaking out those words. My mind started flowing in another direction and I started thinking if that is what the children home is striving for, is it one of those very few institutions whose name I have heard on the news for doing good to the society, is this one of those places which stay alive to prove 'God exists' . They have their hands open for every infant, every kid, every child who the world consider unfit to take along with itself and I felt a chill rushing through my blood and I got back from my own world of dreams.

I could see a number of children huddled together, some sitting, some playing with each other, some chit-chatting. The only thing that was eating into me was, will I ever be able to make these children feel different even for a minute, was I capable of making them feel happy, make them feel as if they belong to this world, will I be obvious in my intentions to them or will I be able to carry the phony persona naturally in front of them, will I be able to carefully veil my intentions over the crude reality, what if they crack my dilemma?

I was just trying to make myself comfortable, I was confused which I had never thought I’d be. For God’s sake, I tried to copy into the footsteps of what others were doing, the thing I never would do even in my dreams. Then suddenly something re-energizing got into me and I was able to sideline all these crappy ideas and utilize whatever time I was provided with. Once the child inside you takes over, everything starts falling in place. I started running around with those kids. I let myself get punched so many times, I played, I danced, I jumped, the kids were so happy and I felt their happiness and felt so proud. I shook hands with almost every one of them I came across, one of the few things I am very uneasy at but nothing was going to stop me now. I told them my names, and asked for theirs and tried really, really hard to remember all their names and I still could remember most of their names. Suddenly one of them grabbed my wrist “Your name is Shreya?”And started to pull me with him in the opposite direction I was headed. I was perplexed about where was he taking me. He started towards a group of girls. “This is Shreya Akka. Where is Shreya?” “Hospital.” Sadness showed up at his face. “There is a girl here whose name is Shreya but she has gone to hospital today. She will get back by afternoon”. I don’t what happened in that blitz of moments, but the way he pronounced my name … Shrey-i-ah Akka just got stuck in the bottom of my heart. I felt such a strong connection with this kid. And this was Manesh, a 8-10 year old who had just made a place in my heart. 

Everything was planned. As soon as we got in, people started off with cutting papers, for the drawing competition. I never thought it’ll be as much fun it was because fun can never be planned is what I believe in. We had enough papers and pencils but shortage of erasers and crayons. So, I kept running trying to provide every one of them with erasers and the particular crayon color. It was so much for everyone. Not only were there small kids, but few grown-up children belonging to were the age groups of 15-17 years. Few of them had real nice drawing skills. There was one girl who was quite proficient in Rangoli. I congratulated her for that. I could feel their happiness, delectation. But still I was worried if they were enjoying enough or were they able to decrypt the hypocrisy in everything?

Everybody was so happy; the group games went awry because they were taking time to just organize as I had thought. I was swayed in the favor of letting them all do things they wanted to and when they asked for more drawing sheets, I got them many more. They wanted pencils, I got them bunch of pencils even when I was told not to. I was enjoying contravening this time.  My God, the talent they have, the competition we had was based on age-groups. This Johnny boy drew the rainbow, a very beautiful one, the level of accuracy he portrayed while differentiating within the colors was phenomenal. Rani drew Flag, and colored it so nicely that I felt had I started drawing, she’d have agreed to give me classes. Many of them drew flags, houses, mountains, river etc. They kept asking me the spellings for various objects they were drawing. Mallika drew everything using tricks. Every time she used to draw some number of dots and join them in different pattern, which differentiated the figurines that followed. But even when it was clearly visible, when asked she never revealed the secret. She used to give this very diplomatic smile, clearly trying to conceal her tricks. The urge to win was the same here. This led me to think about two things. These kids were at least getting minimal education and these normal human beings held the same perception and ideas as the others. Manesh drew a bus-stop with people waiting for buses. He precisely drew 3 buses. The only modification I suggested was to name all the buses and not just the one and to add smile to everybody’s face on totally unrelated note.

There was Anusuya who was awesomely sweet to everybody.  Debita, 2-3 years old, who was also made a part of this drawing competition wanted to just scribble, scratch lines all cross her sheet but everybody was stopping her from doing that. One of my friends, who went along with me to the Infant Home, used to take her hand and draw on her behalf. But then she left for some work and job got assigned to me.  I let her draw whatever she wanted to but then Pallavi, a grown-up home-girl interrupted me and asked me to help Debita draw and herself started undoing the lines she had drawn. It felt so nice to see these people were actually taking care of their younger ones – the basic human instinct. Rani, who after completing her sheet, took the job in her own hands and started colouring Debita’s, sometime holding Debita’s hand and sometimes not when the time deadline started nearing. I was left to do nothing but to watch. I felt these people must be thinking of me as another carefree brat. I realized I should help Rani in the task even when she never asked for it. But Debita still was oblivious of what all was happening around.

When the whole event started nearing the end, we were asked to dance and sing, and then those kids performed. Praveen, another of the children, sang some Kannada song so ethereal it was. Another of the older girls, Dear God, I am forgetting her name. She sang another of the beautiful songs in Kannada or so I think on audiences’ demand.

Finally, time to leave! I don’t know if it was because I was leaving the city behind or I was getting away from these children who just in hours had impacted me so much, but I was near to sweating. We started packing-up. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Manesh appeared and started dragging me towards something, “Run Shreya Akka, take what sister is giving out.” I had no idea what that was all about but I scurried along with him and I took one leaflet that sister was handing out. Once I took it, he pounced back at me just to show where he was in the group photo. Seeing that, others also jumped in and everybody started fighting with each other just to show me who all took part in the various events that had a mention inside the leaflet. They all would have hung themselves around me had they been given any such opportunity. They literally were turning the pages and I was just the dummy holding it. I felt so proud of myself, I have no idea why? The excitement they were having, it was all coming to an end. But the noteworthy thing was they were hell scared of sister whose one order for ‘line-up’ just made them disappear from my side. It was this time only when I asked the sister how was it possible that the few of HIV infected got eradicated of the disease, the fact I was told when we were getting introduced about our CSR and I just couldn't believe it at that time. This was because of the generation of some anti-antibodies inside the humans of very small age when provided good care, nutrition etc. and after which these children are sent out to the government orphanages for adoption, the sister told me. Outside when we got, everybody was seeing us off as we were leaving for airport; at the same time running came Manesh, to just to show me his school. I could just wonder if ever will I be able to get to meet him again!

I felt thankful to everything;, to the opportunity provided to me, having being able to come across such kids, and to finally be assured that these people now had a family who took care of each other with a sense of responsibility for their younger ones and the basic amenities provided to them to help them survive through, when once they were just left on the roads to die.