Hi all,

First, some pictures from last Thursday's trip of the coastal huts (north of Chennai) built post-tsunami.

Ok, brace yourselves; I've got lots of catching up to do! Friday, two of the staff and I went south of Chennai near a place called Mahabalipuram. Try and say that ten times :) It's less congested than the areas we went to yesterday. Lots of trees and coastline. We visited a village along the beach to check on the progress of a woman who had been disabled pre-tsunami trying to save her child from on-coming traffic. She was hurt pretty badly and her husband left her. Well, her family (mother, father, and sister) really do look after her which is good (and often not the case in these situations) and she's been making steady progress. She good humoredly laughed at me when the other staff mentioned that I don't know Tamil. I told them to tell her I'd try and pick up a few things...We made a visit to another similar village...this time to check on the progress of a little girl. As you can see, AA makes really regular contact with the program coordinators and the program recipients to keep the focus stay on a personal level.


The Irulas

From there we went to two villages of tribal people (Irulas) who are even more marginalized than the general fishing people communities. This was an incredible experience. These people are discriminated against by the general fisher population...the latter prevents them from fishing in all but the backwater areas from where they fish for shrimp and small seafood. They are not allowed to get water from the same pumps -- a little Irula girl was beaten up for doing it last year. They are not really even allowed to live in the same villages (or even in close proximity). This also prevents them from forming solid communities. Until now, they have been scattered b/c too many of them living in one community draws the ire of the general fisher population. They also don't have the means to own land. After the tsunami, they really needed some help and so AA along with a partner org. helped them buy land on which they built houses and their own communities. We saw two villages and they are amazing.

The people are building the houses themselves with direct imput as to how they should look and with what materials they should be built. And you could really see the happiness and pride on everyone's faces as they were showing us around. There are also lessons learned from the Irulas b/c on the whole, the women are much more empowered than in the general fisher population. It was just a great experience.



Back in Chennai

Friday night I went to see the Germany/Argentina match with Michelle, a girl at AA who's been helping me out a lot. That night, I got "Delhi belly". That's the Indian version of Montezuma's revenge. good times! Thankfully it was a 24 hour ordeal and then it was over. My friend, Minari, (left) from Sri Lanka visited between Saturday and Tuesday and we just relaxed, shopped, caught up on each others' lives and hung out. It was wonderful to have her to celebrate with for my birthday -- we went to a lovely hotel restaurant for dinner; I even had presents to open! thanks roomie!

Now I'm back on my own -- this week I'll be at the hotel writing up what I've experienced the week before. The office is closed due to staff being out at a retreat/internal meeting. Hopefully next week I'll be moving to a more permanent residence and then I'll be able to cook, etc.


Whew, I'm sure you're all tired from this read! Hope all your summers are going well - Have a great 4th of July!!