Peace After the Crowds Leave
It has taken more than a few days for the dust to literally settle after Kalachakra. The hordes of people finally left about days ago and there has been some space at the main temple to do some meditation practice and enjoy sitting under the Bodhi tree. The sun has come out and it has been just a pleasure to be here. This has to be one of the most international villages on earth. There are groups of pilgrims and monks coming here from all the Buddhist countries ,all dressed in their finest national dress as they make offerings of flowers and incense chant under the tree. Burma, Laos, Tiawan, China, Korea, Japan, Vietnam, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Mongolia, Nepal, Tibet, Russia, Bangladesh and various states in India.
This town is a place of extremes, great wealth in the monasteries and hotels due to all the visitors but great poverty in the villages.
Everyday I walk through the mud streets, with so much garbage strew everywhere. The houses are mud, brick or concrete, with no running water and maybe only a bulb for light. The women, in brightly coloured but tattered saris, squat out side their doors tending to small cow dung fires cooking chapati and vegetable curries as the children run around barefoot and often bare bottomed. The men are either in the fields or working in their small shops selling chai, cigarettes or tourist trinkets. There are also so many animals in the villages; goats, ducks, chickens and dogs so needless to say you have to watch where you put your feet and flip flops are never a good idea. Today I stopped a baby goat from chewing it's way threw a plastic bag and watched two puppies fight over a dead rat. However for all this utter poverty, people are kind,the women smile bashfully if you say namaste, the kids always want to play and constantly ask for sweet and shout HELLO; I see more smiles here in one day than I do in the Washington DC metro for a month. Often I think here I can see physical suffering but in the West even though we have all the comfort we have much more mental suffering.
As a tourist, whom the locals are very pleased to see, it is easy to romanticize poverty because Bodhgaya may be a bit better off than other areas of Bihar which are desperately poor. The harsh fact is that with no family planning or healthcare women often have lots of children and do not often have the means to feed them. Children go to work very young, some parents even send their children to be factory or domestic workers in the big cities or at worst, sell their children or leave them on the streets to fend for themselves. This region of India has many social problems and corruption and extortion keeps the funds from getting to the people who need help the most.
My plan was to work with an NGO here in town so I have been asking around to find a legitimate, non corrupt organization that is effective in it's work. An Austrian friend told me about The D foundation which have several programs, education for children as well as teaching basic health care, family planning and some vocational training for women. The Jaitpura Centre for women is a great program that is assisting destitute women in Sarnath, many of whom have been homeless all their lives. However after a few days of back and forth phone calls and meetings I discovered the foundation is in the process of getting started in Bodhgaya and the founder, who by all reports is a dedicated, kind and honest man in presently sick in Sarnath, so the program here is on hold.
http://www.dfoundation.net/
However, today after some re-thinking I met with a Hindu monk friend and I will be going to see 2 schools and another women's project tomorrow to see if I can be of some help. So fingers crossed.
