We arrived at Patrick and Romaine's farm in Chennai last night. We had a brief stint at the Radisson Hotel to get internet after Samarpan School and on the way to the airport.
After another flight, this one 3 hours, we arrived in Chennai. Patrick was clearly really eager to be home and to get to his farm. Romaine and Prianca arrived with the jeep, we threw our things in the back, Patrick rushing us to keep the local men from trying to load things and asking for money. We then got into the jeep, Romaine and Prianca sharing the front seat and Patrick driving. Oy. A drive like no other that we've been on. Jane said our obits would read, died in Chennai driven by Jesus. I said the last word we saw would be TATA, scribed on the backs of many little trucks. But we did arrive safely. Unfortunately for Sara, but fortunately for her and the rest of us, Sara started to feel sick and Patrick took one look and then settled down.
The concept for the project, wanted to do something in this state, Tamilnadu. This state owns one of the oldest languages in the world, Tamil, older than Sanskrit. Because of the language, it's really hard to get volunteers outside Tamilara into Ramili, Because Romaine grew up here and knows the language, it works. Prianca also has a working knowledge of Tamil. They were ideal to take this state. "We wanted to do something and when we looked at opportunities, it was huge. The most important thing was for the people to be aware. We started off with simple fact of mosquito awareness." Chennai was the malaria capital of the world. So much stagnant water, so many diseases.
Romaine went to the government of health and was appalled by the attitude They said, when they get malaria, let them come to the hospital. Prevention was not at all on the agenda. How do we get to this malaria.
"By having no agenda and being fluid, decided we could look at this. Researched chemicals, found a food grade chemical that sprayed on stagnant water, would dry it up to 40 times, This chemical is used for extraction of salt from seawater. Then realized that the rains are not constant, come in huge cyclones and then big dry spells, so to even it out, need trees. All started from the mosquito. So went to the government re trees, had little to no saplings, and wouldn't give to us. So we need to develop our own nurseries. Went to the campus of India Institute of Technology, Madras, which has 600 acre of forest in middle of Chennai. We were taking school kids on the streets and identifying trees that were indiemic, then had kids out to the farm to plant trees and see them grow in the saplings. The director of IIT welcomed school kids, they learned to swing on the trees, learned the deer and monkeys and saw so many trees they'd seen on street and could identify them. Then Patrick made up a few poems about trees and began awareness talks in schools."
When Romaine realized that she needed many more seeds, she sent out requests to the school kids asking if they would be willing to collect seeds from the ITT campus over 4 weekends. So many responded, they collected 30,000 seeds. They dried these and collected them in plastic bags and stored them in Gita's house. It was Romaine's dream to have a farm, but they didn't have one so it filled Gita's whole compound. "Wishes Come True Program", this was the first wish. It came true, and the farm was given to them by a guy who had used the farm for a windsurfing camp (big winds on the lake) and now these seeds are what are growing on the farm. The kids knew Samarpan because they had already been working to collect the plastic bottles and fill them with mud to build the bottle houses.
Nikesh, a volunteer, read about Samarpan in the newspaper and asked if he could help. He ended up being a huge help, helping Patrick lay the sprinkler system and lay out the framework for all the rows of black plastic bags, which were filled with Patrick's mix of the red clay dirt, lake bed dirt and cow manure/compost. They also harvested stunted saplings from under trees. Used old concrete bags that are strong enough to hold the saplings and then disintegrate.
When the kids were collecting from the ITT campus, they realized that many of the workers on the campus had eye problems, lot of cataracts. They then realized that there was a big need for an eye camp. A lot of hospitals already do camps, a way to get health care out to the villages, but the eye hospital had not done this. This eye hospital is known all over the world for their work. Romaine and another volunteer appealed to 3 different people who knew eye doctors, who knew eye doctors at the hospital, who knew the director of the hospital - word of mouth. The director knew of Samarpan because the camps they had already arranged, cardiac and basic vaccinations.
Romaine's next goal - how to keep the men from drinking. The women are abused and children are at risk. Goal - to do the same programs that Patrick started in Calcutta. He got the idea from Goa. Every other store is a bar, but alcoholism isn't a big issue because every town or area has soccer (football). So now they're hoping to get this going here in Chennai. Patrick - "if you can get men competitive they forget they want to drink alcohol. It builds comradery and social connections in a much healthier way."
When there's no agenda, can fill many people's needs; when you're rigid, you can break, when fluid, can flex.
Head of 14 villages, here to support the clinic.
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| Poster put up around the 14 villages |
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| Samarpan and hospital team putting on the eye camp |
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| Bottles |
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| They told me I was doing it wrong |
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| Filling bottles at the farm |
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| Filling bottles for the bottle building. These tiny girls came with a fewer older girls, promptly squatted down and started working. Amazing. |
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| Chennai. Piles and piles of trash next to the lake and water refinement plant |
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| 25+ being sent off to the city for eye surgury. Such a leap of faith to go off for cataract or other types of surgery. |
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Farm
1000s of plants grown from seeds and saplings, all given free. First person promised saplings/trees turned around and gave them 50 acres right next to the farm. She had asked for the trees for her business in Chennai. They had no idea that she owned land next to them. |
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| Member of the farm |
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| One suddenly realized outcome of Indian travel |
At the farm, we realized that all of us had been walking on increasingly swollen feet and ankles. We just lay there and laughed at our various conditions.
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| Goa |
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| Goa |
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| Goa brunch |
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| He does plumbing and electronics too |
