After lunch I went to the Slums to visit the community center built with recycled materials. We crossed a newly built bridge over the sewage. Until a week ago a log was the only means to cross this sewage creek. Regular falls into the sewage was common, and as a result skin disorder builds on your skin. Finally after a recent flooding, a motion to build a bridge over the sewage creek was realized. Now, people do not have to worry about falling into the creek to and from the slums.
Center was very creatively done. The walls are made of crate boxes and glass bottles. For one of the rooms the wall was beautifully hand painted.
A man on the wheel chair teach has volunteered to teach at the center after receiving the gift of the wheel chair. The wheel chair was designed by an man named Don in Hawaii who found a way to assemble the wheel chairs here at low cost with all supplies donated.
Other volunteers who speak Gujurati also teach here.
Children of the slums are encouraged to come to school to learn. It’s free and yet the place is not filled. After each class the students are given food to eat. A lot of the students come for the food in the beginning but either way it’s a way to get started. Here the major thing they teach the children is hygiene. Lots of girls are discouraged from going to school because there are boys there too. There is still the mentality that education is useless to a female. So often it is the women who inhibit other females. So often it is the mother who finds reason of chores for the daughter to do before she heads to school and never makes it to school because she was busy all to keep the girls away from school and getting educated.
In the center there is also a meditation room a sanctuary for prayer. It is an interfaith center.
