I love the salmon pink colour of the sunset in India. It is good to spend a time with family drinking chai (milk tea) every morning and evening. In India, time flows slowly than other countries like Japan. I came from Japan. I married an Indian and live in India. I live together with my husband's family. My husband and I run 2 hotels in Bodhgaya. We also run free school for poor children. I would like to introduce my amazing life in India.
Volunteering at Surya
Bharti: An Enlightening Experience
Day 1:
Arrival in Bodh Gaya
We had
arrived. Over 24 hours after taking off from U.S. soil, we had finally made it
to Bodh Gaya, the holy land where Lord Buddha was enlightened. We learned from
several travelers that this was a special pilgrimage time, when there were
Buddhist celebrations and ceremonies in Bodh Gaya that only occur once a year.
But for us, this trip was not about making a pilgrimage to the Mahabodhi Temple
or witnessing the Dalai Lama (though the significance of these events was not
lost on us). To us, Bodh Gaya was where we were to finally meet the students of
Surya Bharti school.
Yuki-san
and several of the Surya Bharti alumni greeted us at baggage claim with
cheerful smiles and kind eyes. It was a sunny, warm day despite the winter
season. Our greeters’ faces were framed by this sunshine, set against a
backdrop of desert-like dirt and a subtle, yet distinct smell of smoke that
pervaded in every direction. It was surreal to meet the flesh-and-blood
versions of the faces we had encountered several times over Skype: Yuki-san,
Niraj K., Vikram, Sushant, Amane-chan. I’ll admit that it was initially
difficult to put names to the right faces – blurry Skype sessions do not
suffice for a general lack of knowledge of Indian names. Luckily, names and
Hindi words became ever-so-slightly easier to remember over the duration of the
trip.
A short
car ride later, we arrived at Mahamaya Palace, Yuki-san’s family hotel and our
residence for the next five days. We met Niraj Singh, one of the first Surya
Bharti alumni we met on Skype over two years ago. After more cheerful
introductions, we ate a hearty Indian lunch and quickly fell into a
jetlag-induced sleep in our comfortable new room.
Bihar forms 14000-km long human chain against dowry, child marriage
On 21st January Sunday, 6th grade to 10th grade students from our Surya Bharti School participated in an big event to make human chain which was held all over Bihar state.
It was a campaign to support the law against Child marriage and dowry system.
The new law was settled by Bihar state government.
Although Child marriage and Dowry system were already banned by law long time ago all over India, there weren't many people following the law.
We, Surya Bharti School have been educating about preventing Child marriage from more than a decade.
Child marriage is very common in rural villages around Bodhgaya.
Usually, parents decide their daughter's marriage and her husband to be when their daughters are around 8 years old.
It is called first marriage, and the boy and the girl usually stay at their parents houses separately.
It is like an engagement.
But, in some cases, there are very young girls around 7 or 8 years old who are sent to her husband's house as a labor to help farming or households.
When a girl start having menstrual system, she would be sent to her husband's house permanently after having their second marriage ceremony.
They are about 13 to 15 years old.
In the beginning of our school since 2001, there were many girl students (around 13 years old) who suddenly quit school because of forced marriage by their parents.
I was shocked that a girl who was a brilliant student were forced to marry when she was in 6th grade.
After that, I asked our teachers to help give education about legal age of marriage to our students.
In India, the legal age of marriage for a girl is 18 years old and for a boy it is 21 years old.
★
If children get education and jobs, become rich, their parents could live easily in the future.
I Recommend marriage after getting job.
(there are many cases that children got married when they were students or at a very young age. It is difficult for them to continue their education, so they give up education and become seasonal worker.)
It is very important that girls get education because they will take care of their children's homework at home after becoming mother. The more better education a girl gets, the more their children's ability to study becomes better.
If women gets education about how to care or nurse when their family member especially small child gets sick or gets injured, they can help them very much.
If a mother has knowledge about hygienic life or infectious diseases, she can save her children and family members from diseases.
★
I have been telling these above things to the parents in various occasions.
And, of course, we participated in this human chain.
I'm afraid that this law can not make all the people to follow it.
The tradition can not be changed easily, without very strong actions by police.
Dowry system is also a very big issue.
It is a custom continued from ancient time, that bride family give dowry(money) to bridegroom's family at the time of marriage.
The dowry amount is cheaper when a girl is younger.
That is one of the main reasons that there are so many child marriage in rural area.
If parents want to get a daughter's husband to be rich then they have to pay much more dowry.
Parents who have many daughters have to pay dowry for each of their daughter's marriage which leads to serious economical problems.
In India, ultra sound test for foetus gender determination is banned strictly, because there are so many cases that people get abortion when they find their foetus gender are female.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar settled a law to ban Child marriage and Dowry system strictly in Bihar State in order to get rid of the bad custom.
I agree with him indeed.
I would like to spread this activity to more people with the help of teachers and the students of our school to co-operate with Bihar state government.
The students who took the JLPT test on December 2016 received their results at the end of January 2017.
Chanesh and Niraj passed N3 level, and Vikash passed N5 level!
Chanesh and Niraj came to see me early in the morning when the results were declared.
I was wondering why they were smiling.
I asked them "Maybe the result of JLPT would be declared till 10 am today, so would you like to check it?"
Then, "We've got the result! It was 10 am in Japanese time when the result was declared. Thank you, madam!" they said and touched my feet as an expression of traditional Indian gratitude.
Other students couldn't pass the test.
One of them, Rahul couldn't pass the test due to lack of only one point, even though it was the first time for him.
Everyone has started studying for the test in July.
I'll try my best so that more students can pass the test next time.
Around noon on 2nd Dec., students of Japanese language class departed to Delhi from Gaya to take the exam of JLPT(Japanese language test).
There were 2 students for N3 level, 2 for N4 level and 6 for N5 level.
2 teachers were also with them to take the exam.
The train in which the students and teachers sat departed around 2 pm from Gaya and reached New Delhi in early morning on the next day.
This time, three of my children also decided to take the JLPT exam.
They are Japanese, so they don't have to take it but they wanted to measure their own abilities on Japanese fluency.
My elder son took the exam for N2 level, elder daughter took for N4, and second son took N5.
My children and I departed from Gaya by another train around 10:30pm on 2nd Dec.
It is winter in north India from December to January.
Trains tend to be late because of heavy white fog in that season.
Our train was expected to arrive around 10am in the morning on the next day, but it arrived at around 7pm.
<3rd Dec.>
It is usual for trains to be late in winter, so there are some extra food stocks in the trains.
The extra menu which are provided when a train is late are very simple, like rice, beans soup and pickles.
The simple food was tasty this time, maybe because the cook was good skilled.
It was 9 hours late, so we had been sitting for about 23 hours on the train.
After reaching New Delhi station, we rode Metro(subway) to our home.
I usually take taxi from New Delhi station because I always bring a lot of luggage.
But this time I rode on a train of Metro with a baby and a lot of luggage because I didn't have much money to hire a taxi.
I think some people know this news that India government suddenly banned old 500 and 1000 Rs. notes, so people rushed to bank to exchange them into new notes but there had been less new notes in banks.
The students and teachers would have stayed at a hotel near New Delhi station in our plan, but since we didn't have any money, so I decided to let all of them stay at my house!
My children and I arrived home at around 9 pm.
The train the students rode hadn't arrived at Delhi yet.
They finally arrived at New Delhi station around 11 pm.
The expected time of riding the train was 16 hours, but it was more than 32 hours ride.
They caught the last train of Metro and reached my home.
They ate plenty of chicken curry which my sister in law prepared for them.
We spread mattresses and blankets on the floor of the living room and they squeezed to sleep all together.
<4th Dec.>
They had to reach the venue for the JLPT exam before 8 am next morning, so they woke up around 5 am to get ready.
They slept for only 4 hours.
They took Metro to the venue.
the exam took place in some schools, which were separated by the levels.
The JLPT exam started at 9 am and ended at 12 noon.
After that, they went for shopping and directly reached New Delhi station around 7 pm.
The train for Gaya should have departed around 10 pm at the night, but because of the foggy weather the train was late and it departed at 6 am in the next morning.
They had slept on the platform whole night while waiting for the train.
<5th Dec.>
My children and I couldn't get tickets for the train, so we flew from New Delhi to Patna (took about one and half hour) instead, and rode a car to Bodhgaya from Patna.
The road was jammed by trucks, and it took 6 hours to get to Bodhgaya, though it usually takes 3 hours. We arrived at Bodhgaya in the midnight.
<6th Dec.>
The students and the teachers arrived at Gaya station at 5 am in the morning.
It took over 23 hours for them to return.
Well, the results of the exam will be out after 3 months.
I wish they will get rewards for their efforts...!
