Tava

Defying gravity at the Baba Salahdin shrine near Kotri.












Today I had the honour of visiting 'Sikanderabad' and 'Baba Salahdin Hari' camps. Both have been set up to house families that were released from bonded labour for one of Sindh's influential landlords. A partner organisation of the NGO for which I work at the moment, gave them legal assistance and a place to live. Well, the camps are located on government ground, so nobody knows what the future holds.


(Pictures: our house.)

In both locations there is no access to drinking water. In Baba Salahdin Hari Camp there's a dysfunctional well, but when I asked the people surrounding me how much it would cost to fix it, they said: "Don't bother, the water is too salty anyway." It reaches ground water at about 7 metres depht, where a lot of minerals can be found. The proper depth would be 15 metres.


(Pictures: two little shops in Sikander. The lady to the left is Marvan, a senior social worker who was able to set up shop with the help of a government support program (named after Benazir Bhutto) that gives her 3000 rupees a month (about 25 euro). Pooja and Rahim, to the right, have a marginally bigger shop. The fact that they can sit in it simultaneously, is physical prove of that.)

It is high time for such a well, as the water bearers (mostly women) have to walk all the way to Kotri Barrage, which is a few kilometres away. In so doing they lose most of their day, run the risk of being harassed and suffer from the heat.


(Pictures: this family arrived yesterday and has inhabited an old hut with a broken roof. The piles of timber in front of tell that it soon will be repaired.)

(Pictures: work in progress. The lady to the right was making a thick paste of sand, manure and water that, frankly speaking, smelled awful.)

Sikanderabad is divided into three parts: one for Hindus, one for Christians and one for Muslims. In the Hindu part schools are closed at the moment. There's no teacher, which leaves the only brick building that I spotted, locked. In the Christian part the schools are functional, but there the lessons are given in Sindhi (to Christians, as well as Muslims), while the Hindus predominantly speak Urdu. I hope that there soon will be a teacher for the Hindu school again.

A second issue related to youth I noticed, is the total lack of playing possibilities. There are no toys or playgrounds. Not that many of them would have time to play, as they are badly needed as labour force to support their family, but still. When there's no school to go to, or toys to play with, there's not much that reminds of a childhood.

It doesn't have to cost much. In the weekends there could a match (football, or probably more popular: cricket), or other games (a ball, a rope, some buckets with water for a water race; anything that would teach the children about team play, creative thinking and exercise will do). A game every now and then would also be good to integrate the Hindus, Christians and Muslims, as they now live seemingly separated.

Part of this entry is what I reported earlier today to the director of the NGO. He asked me for my observations; an outsider often notices different things. I told him too that it might be a lot to do all in once, but if there's anything we could do to make the people in the camps feel that they did not fall from the tava - a frying pan used to bake roti - into the fire, then it's worth it.