A volunteer

So why did I come back to India? As I mentioned, after I visited India the first time, I decided to come back as a volunteer. Also, I wanted to see the south of India, and especially Kerala, since all the Indians I know told me that it is a beautiful region. If you consider that Kerala is also called “God’s own country”, well, there must be something special about it.

I first visited India in 2006 but only now I have had the time (and money) to allow myself to stay here for 2.5 months. It took me a while to find a “serious” place where to volunteer, because when I started googling “volunteer India”, I found several 2-weeks holidays that, for a huge price, show you some poor houses and maybe let you help some old people for a couple of days. Not at all the kind of volunteering I was looking for. Then I found a list of Kerala’s NGOs. I wrote to many of them and only one replied, which was and is perfect!!

I am volunteering in a school for drop out students, called SISP (www.sisp.be). Students here tend to drop school because their parents need them to work. The family income usually only comes from the father, who often is a fisherman. There is a high level of poverty and although Kerala is the region of India with the highest rate of literacy, still many people are illiterate. SISP helps children to resume the school pathway and after a few years at SISP, children are ready to go back to normal school.

SISP also provides medical and financial help to more than 200 families in the area. During the first weeks I was here, I joined the social workers in their visits to the beneficiary families. These are extremely poor families, where often the father died or cannot work, and the mother has no income source. It is not rare to see children with psychological or physical problems, and they obviously cannot support the family. I have seen people in terrible conditions, but my consolation is that now they have some support.

I will describe more about SISP in time, but what still amazes me every day when I enter the school is to see how a project that was born about 15 years ago thanks to the good heart of a few people can develop so much and improve the life of hundreds of people.

The photo was kindly provided by Friends of SISP Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Friends.of.SISP