The Pink City

WEDNESDAY
We took an early morning train from Delhi, leaving the hotel a little before 5AM. Even that early in the morning, the station was bustling.

It was a 4.5 hour ride to Jaipur, fairly comfortable in our first class cars. Not sure we'd have been able to handle second or third class, with no air conditioning and cramped carriages.

On the train, several of us decided to spend all the rupees that we'd been given - better to keep it inside the country, so we hired porters to carry our bags. Not something I'd normally do, but the money means so much more to the people here than it does for us - it was 100 rupees per bag, about $1.50.

Jaipur, the capital city of Rajasthan, is known as the Pink City because of the color of the old buildings. The warm salmony pink is the color of welcome, and most of the buildings within the walls of the old city still retain this shade. After checking into the hotel, we toured the major sites of the city. We passed the Hawa Mahal - the Palace of the Wind, which is actually more of a wall and is in the middle of a street full of shops.

Hawa Mahal - an extension of the Women's Chambers of the Royal Palace

We went first to the City Palace, where the Royal Family of Jaipur still lives. The day before our visit was the coronation of the crown prince, whose 18th birthday was on July 2.

The palace complex houses several museums, as well as several outdoor courtyards including the Dancing Courtyard featuring the doors of the four seasons. 

The Peacock Door, depicting the Monsoon Season

After touring the Palace, we drove across town to the Amber Fort. This 16th century fort is on the side of a mountain, with views all through the surrounding valley. We took a jeep to get up the small, winding streets, then explored the fort. I got a private tour from one of the guards, who decided to take me all through the back chambers because Mario told me I had to go see the latrine with him... we both got special tours and saw much more than the rest of the group, but I had to RUN to get back in time!

 

THURSDAY

Today we spent the entire day in a rural village 3 hours outside of Jaipur, at an international service organization called Barefoot College. The primary goal is to provide vocational training to the women of the most isolated, rural, poor communities of the world. The target are grandmothers - women, not men, because men are 'untrainable', and grandmothers - in these community, means ages 35-50. Most women to attend courses are illiterate, and many don't speak English or Hindi - people come from all over the world for basic training as a solar tech (to bring power to their villages), a medic, accountant, etc. They believe you don't need a certificate to be an expert at anything, and for these communities, an expert is just someone who has practical skills and knowledge.

Women from Fiji,Tanzania, Senegal, Guatemala, and other developing
countries learn how to market and grow their own small businesses.

Barefoot college has workshops making toys from reclaimed materials, a weaving room, a carpentry room, classrooms for medical tech, dentistry, acupuncture, puppetry, and other various jobs. They even help women learn how to make their own solar parabolic cookers.

A parabolic solar cooker - the back is a weighted pendulum that allows
the mirrors to follow the sun and direct a beam of light onto a cooking pot.

The 'textbook' for the parabolic cooker - painted onto the concrete floor.

It was impressive seeing how many people the organization has reached, particularly given the focus on the most isolated, rural communities. Barefoot College has helped over 1,300 villages in over 70 countries all around the world. Founder Bunker Roy, who we had the privilege to meet, gave a TED talk about his vision.

Fulbright-Hays India group, with Bunker Roy.

As an aside, driving in and around Jaipur is absolutely crazy. We commonly see cows, herds of goats and sheep, piles of garbage, elephants, camel-drawn carts, and cars driving in the wrong direction...

FRIDAY
Today was spent visiting two important NGOs in Jaipur. Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang Sahayata Samiti (BMVSS), otherwise known as the Jaipur Foot Factory, is the world's largest organization serving the disabled. Their main goal is to provide artificial limbs, calipers, wheelchairs, crutches, and other aids, totally free of charge, to the neediest people in third world countries. To date, BMVSS has served over 1.5 million patients in over 70 countries.

Each patient is individually fitted by creating a plaster cast of the leg.

The Jaipur facility is know for its prosthetic legs. Patients travel from all over India, and are given free housing, food, and clothing while they wait to be fitted for their new limb. They can fit and make a leg in about three days, and each limb lasts for about four years.

For above-knee amputees, BMVSS teamed up with scientists from Stanford University to create the Jaipur Knee - a cheap and functional joint that has allowed greater mobility and durability.

The Jaipur Knee-
cost: around $20

Because of the work of BMVSS, these patients who would otherwise lose their livelihoods are given the freedom of movement - and more importantly, maintain their dignity.

In the afternoon, we visited the headquarters of the Jal Bhagirathi Foundation, a non-profit trust dedicated to providing safe drinking water to the desert communities of the Marwar region of western Rajasthan, in the Thar Desert. These are extremely remote communities, in the middle of an area known as the Land of Death. This is one of the harshest environments in the world - not only do summer temperatures reach over 50°C (122°F), but the land is plagued by devastating droughts and unpredictable weather patterns due to climate change.

Project Director Kanupriya Harish,
showing us the water cycle
educational tool

Women hold the responsibility of getting water, and the majority of their day is spent walking on average 5 kilometers to reach a water source. Most villages don't have potable water within 1.6 kilometers, so women and girl children must walk to get drinking, cooking, and cleaning water. Jal Bahagirathi calculated that the average woman in this area will have walked the equivalent of 2 to 3 times around the circumference of the earth in her lifetime.

The Foundation helps local communities get clean water and sanitation through education and sustainable water management, most notably rainwater collection techniques.

We also had a question and answer period with Dr. M.S. Rathore, an expert on water and climate change. Humans are the only animal, he says, that create huge problems then try to solve them. But we can solve them - we just need the will to try.

SATURDAY

The Maitree dairy farmers of Dooni

Today we spent the day in the rural village of Dooni, in the Tonk District south of Jaipur. Dooni is one of the poorest areas of Rajasthan, so SRIJAN (the NGO that we visited in Delhi) decided to intervene and assist women in forming Self Help Groups. This allowed them to get away from moneylenders who would charge exorbitant rates and fees, allowing the collective to borrow from banks. SRIJAN helped educate women, who then banded together to form a federation of 348 SHGs from 113 villages.

The federation decided to focus on dairy as a common livelihood activity. With the help from the World Bank's District Poverty Initiative Project, they subsidized the initial costs of starting Maitree Dairy, primarily by purchasing buffaloes. Maitree helps farmers with a market to sell surplus milk, as well as giving them access to cheaper credit. Now, the women in Dooni earn around 46,000 rupees ($650-700) yearly because of their work; the average woman has 25 cows.

The Dooni community activity center

We met with the SHG in the community (daycare) center in Dooni, sitting on the floor of a darkened room. The women presented their numbers and explained their history and the work they were doing. Some told us about the resistance they faced in the initial stages - family members who doubted their abilities, who did not want them to be educated, or who mistrusted the system or goals. They themselves were apprehensive at the start, wondering if they would kill the cow. Gradually, they worked to support each other and now they have full support from everyone in the village. They even report that girls and boys are treated equally in the village, and that the women have found strength and friendships from working together.

Despite the language barrier and initial hesitancy from both the Dooni women and the Fulbright teachers, both groups got more and more comfortable and by the end, we were taking selfies with each other, and the entire village it seemed came out to the party. Unfortunately we had a long drive back so we couldn't stay to see more of the village, but it was a wonderful visit.