Volunteer work at Missionaries of Charity

At the 10 of November we started to do volunteer work at Missionaries of Charity. Two of us chose to do volunteer work at Nirmal Hriday also called Kalighat home, a home for sick and dying people organized by Mother Teresa. The reason of choosing this home was because of the subject that we are going to write about in our bachelor Teases.

The most of the volunteers gathered at Mother House in the morning and they eat breakfast together. Every day at five in the morning the volunteers could join the mass. Here we found other volunteers that also where going to Nirmal Hriday. From Mothers House we took the bus number 45 B to Kalighat Road. When we reached to Kalighat Road we walked for about five minutes. At the Nirmal Hriday, there is sisters and massi working.

The first thing we did when we came to Nirmal Hridiay was to wash clothes. The patients changed clothes every day. After washing clothes the patients had different activated, for example drawing, having physiotherapy, walking or getting massage depending on which day it was. After the activities the patients got two bisects and one glass of water.

At 10:30 the volunteers had a break where they got tea (chai) and snacks as banana and bisects on the top floor. During the break we got opportunity to talk with other volunteers and get to know them little more.

At 11:00 it was lunch time for the patients and after the lunch we did the dish, while the massi helped the patients to the bed. After the dish the volunteers where of duty.      

Yesterday after the volunteering we went home and took a nap. After that we went of to Kothare medical center which is a non governmental hospital, a private practise. We where supposed to se if their would be a posibility for us to get in contact with some nurses to interview for our research. Every one was really helpful and in just about one hour we had spoken to the superintendent at the hospital, the nursing superintendent and some nurses and doctors.

They also gave us the opportunity to be there two days a week to se their hospital and their care. Ofcourse we couldn't say no to that. What a wonderful opportunity for us to realy know how they work here in India, and to se the nursing proffesion with our own eyes in close up.

There where both nurses and nursings-tudents at the hopspital. At every ward there was also a nursing-teacher who worked for the college. We had the opportunity to go too one of the teachers and intervju both her and her nurs doughter this evening. What a opportunitty and quick turn of our thesis problems.

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Today we where at out volunteering again. I was really trying to se te positive things that the sisters and the mazis where doing. There are many things even though the negatives are so much easier to notice. The main thing is tha theese children are alive, they LIVE. Only that is a big thing. Without the missionaries of charity this children wouldn't have been. They live and honestly, the most children are smiling.

When the sisters put volonteers at Daya Dan they say that it is importan that there are only volunteers who have planed to tay for a month or longer. The sisters are aware of the childrens need of consistency. Almost every child at Daya Dan suffers from autism. But you can't say that they are treated as autism chldren. There are notes on the walls with the childrens names and all of their needs and "no needs".

They write for example :
Hi my name is Manu, I am 9 years old and i have autism. When you are taking care of me, pleas do not carry me arround, as I just learned to walk and it is good for me to practise. I am of diaper but i need to be reminded to go t the bathroom. If i wet my self, pleas dont scream at me, just change my clothes.

When i am happy I use to do clicking sounds, pleas learn me other easy ways of comunicating by repeating easy sounds. I love to be kissed on the chin, you will se when I ask you for one.

theese notes are writen with so much care and it makes me happy to read them. It say what the kids likes to do, what they don't like. What they need to practise and what they can manage on their own.

It felt good to find theese papers as the day yesterday really made me wonder what i can do here.

I will unfortunately have to say that they didnt make much of a good first impression. I am in a bit of a chock and when we left I was about to cry! How can people treat children like this. These children have lived lifes that have caused them more disabilities than the ones they where born with from the start. Many of them has become blind because of lack of nutrition, others are stunted in growth due to the same reason. All of the children at Dya Dan has some sort of physical handicap as well as a mental handicap. There are children from the age of 6 up to 19 at the moment and all of them are just wonderful. I just met them and I can alredy tell that they have all got talent. There is one of the boys who is such a good singer. Annother one of the boys is so caring, he cant talk at all but as soon as another child gets upset he is there to comfort them.

The first thing we did in the morning was to do the laundry. All volonteers was standing there while the sisters and the mazis (that is what they call the permanent staff there) was giving the boys showers. And it was so painful to watch. They where so hard on them, many of the children where screaming. The mazis didnt show the boys any respect at all, they shampooed them as if they where a rug that needed to be deep cleaned. The children they had shampoo everywhere. They left the boys all wet and naked with soap all over their face to get another one and to give them the same treatment. When they had a bunch of boys covered in soap from head to toe, then they sarted to rinse of the soap, all at once. They usd cold water and the boys are where screaming.

When they brushed the teeth they put a stick under the chin and they pulled their mouth opened, ofcourse the boys where screaming, I would have screamed too.

And how they fed the boys, I can't described how it looked. they where just pushing spoonful into their mouths and most of the children they didn't chew at all, they just swallowed. Why don't they show theese children respect? I just don't get it.

As I said, im in chok. I hope tommorow will be a better day. Their must be something good that they do!

As I told you it didn't really work out as we planned when we spoke to the sisters at mother Teresa yesterday. They freaked out about our letter of consent and they will under no surcumstances give us any intervjues. They booked us in for a meeting today to discuss it but it was very clear yesterday that they had alredy made u their minds about it.

The process of getting new intervjues have started as well as finding new perspectives. There has only been one day and we have alreddy learnd something about this culture, if you are about to do something like his, have a backup plan...we didn't. 

It feels  good to have Raj who knows the languege and the people. He have alredy made some important phonecalls and we will visit a hospital and se if they can offer us some help. Honestly I have no idea what we would have done if it wasn't for him! Thank you Raj! 

When we had got home and left our bags in the appartment we immediately left to enlist our self at the missionaries of charity. We arrived there way to early o we sat down by Mother Teresas tomb and watched allot of people come and go. Some sat next to her tomb and prayed for five minutes, some sat there for hours. It was very emotional. After a while there were a sister who came with some novices and they sat on their knees and prayed for 30 minutes. Their prayer was very monotonous and quiet. Some of us wrote a note and left at the tomb for the sisters to pray for.

When the time for enlisting had come we met with sister mercy Maria and we showed her our letter of consent. However it did not go as in planned. The interviews for our thesis which we had spoke to them about for so many times was suddenly refused. Our stress level went from zero to a hundred within no time at all. Our minds started to work and we made up new plans for how to manage to get the information that we needed in order to be able to write our thesis.

Bavri and Kari Marie enlisted for work with the dying people at Kaligath home. The people who are there are picked up from the streets and taken to Kaligath so that they will get a worthy end of their lives.

Me and Raj enlisted for work at Daya dan, which is a home for physicly and mentaly disabled children. These children is not accepted in the Indian society and would most likely not be alive if they wouldn´t have been found and taken to Daya dan. Some of them are autistic, some of them have got downsyndrom, some are blind. 

We have finally reached Kolkata and the temperature is 28 degreads. The first thing that we se is poverty there are beggars everywhere and dogs are running free everywhere and are looked upon as vermin.

The air is filled with dust, maybe that is why even the light is different from home. There are small sheds everywhere where people actually has their homes and there are beggars and people trying to sell things at every crossing.The traffic is chaotic and i is so crowded. the infrastructure is old and you can tell that India has many issues.

But still it is so beautyfull, the women are wearing colorfull clothes and the children are smiling. You can tell from there eyes that turists are not common here. We all are so excited about what is to come.

We have now landed in Doha, Qatar. The trip here took about five hours and we have still got five more hours to fly until we reach our final destination Kolkata, India. Already we can se big cultural differences.

To start with, there are about 95% men at this airport. The most of them are immigrants from Bangladesh ore Pakistan who have come there to earn money to support their families at home. Every time you turn your head arround you se annother type of traditional clothes. You have so many different cultures here just as we have got at home. But obviesly they have not seen too meny Europeans here cause every one who pases us cant seem to stop staire but they are all very polite and they all seem to mean well.  

the temperature here is about 30 and ofcourse we enjoy the heat. Though there have already been a mosquito on my hand. Those I have not missed and seem to have forgotten about.