Team Reports |
Ranebennur revisitedDavid Kiddle -- Milton, ON
February 16th begins like any other day: mist hangs over the fields, isolated palms stick up above the fog, and the village slowly comes to life. The Mullah has already called the faithful Muslims to prayer at 6 am and a few of the villagers are outside their dwellings performing their morning ablutions. A smoky fire has been started and some animals are on the move ready to begin the day's work pulling a plow or a cart. In some places, where they can afford it, small tractors are coming into use but the routine of thousands of villages in India remains the same. The land has been there forever but the number of people needing the food increases yearly and people must work hard to produce it. It is a long drive to Ranebennur, a small town south of Hubli. A crowd eagerly awaits our arrival and a great shout arises when we come into sight because we have been here many times before. The local Rotarians, with the help of the Rotary Club of Belgaum, have hosted successful distributions for many years.
Our 2010 distribution is in a Rotary-sponsored school. There is a large photograph in one of the classrooms of a man in a 1970s business suit with a garish tie -- it is Murray Dryden, Sleeping Children's founder, taken thirty years ago. He looks quite young and he smiles, looking quietly confident. This year's distribution will be different because we have Murray's daughter, Judy, as a team member. The photograph of Murray is brought to the distribution area and pictures are taken. There are tears all around. After setting up, our distribution commences and we complete our task flawlessly with the help of the many volunteers. This place also has special meaning for me. My wife, Elizabeth, came here with Laura Harper in 1987 and we often look at a photograph where she sits forlornly on a bed surrounded by a mosquito net with holes large enough for birds to fly through. That distribution started a tradition in our family to help poor children in the world through Sleeping Children. Both my daughters and I have also been on a number of distribution trips. Ranebennur is a dry, dusty spot and the way there is bumpy and relentless. There is very little to recommend this place. There are no views of consequence, just scrubby fields and a few trees sticking up here and there. But this village is the place where people hang on, earning possibly the equivalent of two dollars a day. Their houses have no furniture. People sleep on the floor, sometimes three on the sleeping mat provided in the bedkit. Yet we see the smiling faces of people going cheerfully about their work and of excited children on their way to school.
They say that you haven't seen the real India until you go to the villages. This is not Bollywood or the stock exchange in Mumbai. Here there are creaking carts pulled by bullocks with horns painted red or blue and impossibly high loads being moved along the roads on bicycles or a person's back. Many women are carrying a pot of water on their heads with a small child held in one arm. Country people are naturally shy but, if spoken to, a beautiful smile will light up a face. Timeless India is not in the resorts but in the faces of the villagers whom we meet on our travels through hot and dusty Karnataka. |
