Elephants love to take a bath, they enjoy all the scrubbing, splashing and the care given.

Date:  26 Sept 2007
Location: @ Kothamangalam, Ernakulam, Kerala, India
Camera: Nikon D80

Do you know that
Elephants are one of the most intelligent animals.
Elephants are self aware, could recognize themselves in the mirror.
Elephants have closely knit families/social groups.
Elephants have their own rituals if one of their family members are dead.
Elephants sometimes come back to the remains to pay homage to their ancestors.

You saw a happy series of photographs with the humans nicely interacting with the elephants. This hardly gives us an idea of the cruelties suffered by a majority of these large, intelligent creatures in the state of Kerala. Elephants are extensively used for carrying logs and for festivals in the state. For money and displaying the human pomp, the elephants go through all these:

• Their soft feet directly comes to contact with the hot, burning, tarred roads for hours while walking from one location to another. Along with the heave chains on their feet, foot problems and wounds develop, which rarely get a chance to heal.
• Endure the noise, the traffic, commotion, fireworks, while traveling and during festivals.
• Cruel treatment by the mahouts. A recent article published in Kerala Kaumudi points out that around 90% of domesticated elephants in Kerala are made blind or partially blind, so that they can be easily controlled, and don’t target their mahouts when they are angry.
• Lack of proper rest, food and treatment.

The more evolved and intelligent the being is, more is the depth of pain and sorrow.

There are rules in the state which address some of the issues stated above, but few cares! No wonder that in the recent few years mahouts have been thrown down and stamped by these otherwise gentle animals. It is time that they are at least given the proper attention they need! It is time for an elephant bath! They don’t belong to the cities; they are not a requirement for the festivals. Let us give some respect to the state animal of Kerala.

References:
1. Plotnik et al., 2009: Self-recognition in the Asian elephant and future directions for cognitive research with elephants in zoological settings, Zoo Biology, 28, 1-13 [link].
2. Plotnik et al., 2006: Self-recognition in an Asian elephant, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 103, 17053 -17057 [link].
3. McComb et al., 2006: African elephants show high levels of interest in the skulls and ivory of their own species, Biology Letters, 2, 26-28 [link].
4. Wikipedia
5. PETA India

Now let us see how the japanese school girls, in an english seminar on India, picturized the onappookkalam. Look at the animated faces and the colorful pookkalam!

This is a glimpse from the English Seminar where I introduced India to the Japanese highschool students. The students were supposed to prepare articles/newspapers on different themes of the country. One of them worked on the “festivals of India” theme and they liked the flower carpet prepared during the onam fetival of Kerala, the pookkalam, and included it in their article.

Date: Oct 2005. Taken 4 years back, while I was at Sapporo, Japan.

Onam this year (2009) is on the 2^nd of September. Happy Onam Wishes from Rocksea & Sarah!

Role of plywood in Kerala History

When I look back into time, one of the memories associated with onam are those when we had the school term examinations before onam. I was in class 6, but new to the school and getting settled. [Every other year I used to change schools, don't know why!] I had given little attention to the onam exam but I wanted to score something for pass marks…

One of my new friends, I think his name was Nelson, told me that it is easy to pass the history exam. How? I just needed to fill the answer paper with whatever words flowing through my mind. The history teacher will give marks according to the number of pages I fill in. That is cool, I thought. BUT I didn’t know how to simply fill in the pages with some unassociated words?!

Nelson had an answer to that too! I just had to copy those words from his answer sheet! And so I wrote the exam. Onam holidays came and went, and I had forgotten everything about it. One day after the school had reopened, the history teacher called me to the staffroom. He had my history answer paper in his hands! He went straight to my answer on Mamankam. [Mamankam is a medieval festival of Kerala, which was mostly celebrated under the auspicious of the Samoothiris (Zamorins), by the banks of the Bharathapuzha river]. The teacher asked me what was the role of “plywood” in Mamankam? I was like I just stood their dumbfound. Later I got the answer sheet. I saw that among all the other dumb words… I had placed plywood as an integral part of Kerala history!

Onam / Thiru Onam: Festival of Kerala, celebrated in the month Chingam (Aug-Sep), of the Malayalam Calendar. In memory of a mythical King MahaBali (Maveli) who ruled Kerala eons back. Legend is that Kerala reached the zenith of its glory under his rule and he was so famous that gods became jealous and send God Vishnu to send him down to the netherworld. Anyways, before sending him down, Vishnu gave King Maha Bali a boon to visit his people once in a year. This day we celebrate as Onam, to welcome Mahabali. One of the most attractive aspects of thiruvonam is the pookkalam or the floral designs we make.

Check here for an earlier article on >> onam with nature and oru ettukaliyude onappookkalam

note: cartoon sketch of mamankam by sarah

The word nostalgia comes from Greek, nostos meaning returning home and algos meaning pain. At a time in the past, it was used to describe as a medical condition! Nostalgia was one condition which used to cause deaths, especially to soldiers who were posted far away from home. Now it doesn’t exist as a medical category but still is attributed to many psychological conditions, depression and as a possible factor attributed to some suicides.

Age 7 (1987): OK, so back to my nostalgic memories comprising of just boys and girls. It was class 2 and I was like less than 7-8 years old. We were sitting in the classroom, I guess it was a free period though the teacher was there. Suddenly, in between, the boy sitting next to me poked me and went down the benches. Soon I followed, and there I watched with awestruck eyes the vision I will remember for the rest of my life. No, it was not the holy cross appearing on the wall. It was my first sight of the chaddi (slang for underwear) of a girl! and that too a blue chaddi! You can guess how vivid the memory is when I exclaim the color. Some of the girls were sitting on the floor, leaning their backs on the wall facing us, with their legs upright opening the gateways to a new, previously unknown, foreign land. These memories… that is what I call nostalgia

Age 10 (1990): By the time we graduated to class 5, complex, intricate, dynamics ran throughout the class. This we understood only by the end of that year. A smart, dynamic young boy had joined our class in the middle of the year and had shattered all the dynamics in the class. Just after 2-3 weeks of his joining, he captured the smiles of the smartest girl of the lot. This girl was smart in studies and sports and she was pretty as well!! There were too many fans for her in the class, but none shared the secret with others. By the end of the year, the whole world conspired against this smart boy and cornered him. Last day of that year, somehow, from all sides, 4-5 boys “including me” cornered him and started pushing him. We don’t know how we all got together because it was not planned at all. Anyways it didn’t matter to us. We didn’t want a newcomer to take the girl making a fool of all of us. When he was pushed back, he caught my shirt to balance himself. The shirt I was wearing didn’t have one of the buttons and I made that a chance, accusing him for tearing off my shirt. The pandemoneum which followed - dragged him from the classroom - all the way to the basketball court. Poor boy. My autorikshaw back to home was waiting near the basketball court. So, unfortunately or fortunately, I had but to hurry off leaving the job to the others. Those are memories… that is what I should call nostalgia, right?

Age 15 (1995): Then it was class 10. We were no longer at the mercy of external dynamics. We created our own, internal, dynamics. Probably it started off as an accident from our extra scholastic mind. Excessive and vigorous use of pens and pencils used to cause them to fall on the floor, confirming Newton’s gravitational discoveries. Following Newton’s discoveries, we had our own discoveries as well. If a pen or pencil fell down, we competed to go down and search for it. You know, Larry Page was not yet at Stanford, and google was not even in the embryonic stage. So we had to be our own crawlers, and we crawled on the floor, and did our own searches for the pencil. We “stumbled upon” several gorgeous, mind-blowing structures while crawling under these benches. We indexed these crawls in our mind, for later use (?!) and I could still visualize myself under those benches… Now, aren’ t they memories? Don’t they make you nostalgic??

Ok, you may have started saying that these are not typical school memories and those are not typical boys. “It is just 3 or 4 of you guys”, that is what you will say. You won’t even agree to the statistics saying that 95% of the males masturbate (and you will be that 5% who is now busy masturbating thinking on the blue chaddi in the first event).

Age 17 (1997): So let us move on to class 12. By this time, all of those boys had their hormones working at its peak. Especially those who previously sat ON the benches instead of crawling UNDER! This I came to understand through the daily football matches we had. After the school time, we had almost all of the boys in our class moving on to the school playground. This playground was blessed with a stream flowing by its border. So what? Semi clad, young, water nymphs from the neighboring regions used to take bath and wash their clothes in that stream. What other heavenly boon should an adolescent boy ask for?! It always happened that the football matches were one-sided. Or to be technically accurate, the football never touched one side of the ground. It was always rushing to the other side of the ground where the stream touched it; where those nymphs moved around. Blame the dirty football! It doesn’t stop on the other side of the ground, but it always rushed down the stream. About 5-10 of the boys run down the ground and to the stream to fetch one football. About 20 boys (including the goal keeper from the other side) stand at the brink of the ground watching the huge event. “Event” in the sense, retrieving the football; not the young, fresh, round, ripe, water melons waiting to jump out of the wet wraparounds of those water nymphs! When I tell you that this happened every few seconds during the match, and that all the boys in our class participated in it, you will understand the dynamics behind it. If I don’t get nostalgic about those memories, you or at least one of those boys will beat me up!

Young krishnas playing the flute

Shy gopikas…

Unnikannan in an autorikshaw

Sri Krishna Jayanthi is celebrated as a festival, reminiscing the birthday of Krishna. This year it is on 13-14 August 2009 in north India, but on 11 September 2009 in Kerala, due to the differences in the regional calendars. The images above are from the Sri Krishna Jayanthi of 2007, at the Sree Krishna Swamy Temple located close to my home, at Bharananganam in Kottayam, Kerala, India.

Few people know that the place name Bharananganam itself -probably- owes its origin to the legends associated with the Sree Krishna Swamy Temple. The temple is revered as very ancient, and legend is that the Pandavas stayed here for a while during their vanavasa (forest exile). Pandavas conducted their ‘Parana veedal’ (breaking the fast or vow) ritual here to end their vratha (vow). Since the place was used for ‘Parana veedal’, it came to be known as Parana kananam, as kananam in malayalam is forest. Later it evolved as Bharananganam. The presence of the temple has also given Bharananganam a synonym, Dakshina Guruvayoor. Dakshina is south and Guruvayoor in Thrissur district is famous for its Krishna Temple.

So, that is another face of Bharananganam, which is more popular these days as a christian pilgrim centre - of St. Alphonsa, whose mortal remains are kept in the Alphonsa Chapel near the St. Mary’s Church. Based on some historical accounts, I would say that this church stands as a symbol of harmony as the church was found (it is said, a 1000 years before) with the assistance of the local community including aids from the nearby Sree Krishna Swamy Temple.

Keralites are also proud of their ever expanding diaspora (both overseas and within India). However, the latter factor often counteracts the former one. While moving on to expanding horizons we often, naturally, forget about the family ties and the networks.

Genealogy as a window into ourselves

Genealogy (genea, “descent”; and logos, “knowledge”) is the study of ancestry and family history. More than just a peep into who are our cousins, relatives, and forefathers, a genealogy database is a window into ourselves as well. History is important because it tells the story of how today’s modern world has been shaped. Just like that, a history of your ancestors tells you how you and your immediate world has been shaped.

Why genealogy? Need and reason.

1. Know ourselves through our roots, achieve a better sense of identity.
2. Know our ancestors, the life and situations through which the present you and your relatives were “synthesized”.
3. Know our present relatives, connect and communicate with them.
4. Medical history. Lets you know if there is possibility of a particular medical situation passing through the lineage, and take proper precautions.
5. Cultural history. It is like a micro census spanning several generations, and gives an idea of the society through ages and its cultural heritage.

These are some and there may be a lot more reasons for each person to pursue a research on their own family tree. Whatever may be the reason, such a work will eventually provide an emotional gratification to you. A lot of far-off relatives will surely come up to you with smiles on their faces and may remain your friends for ever. If you travel to a new place, there may be a distant relative or a friend of a relative who can host you. There may be a doctor relative who may be able to give valuable advice to you on specific cases or a lawyer who can advice you on legal matters, who knows!

Difficulties

Genealogy research is a long term, time consuming effort. Apart from that, several other aspects add to the difficulties.

1. People die. There are lots of stories and information about your family which you will never get to know because the grandparent who could tell that is no more. I still dont know my grandfather’s sister’s name and nobody in my family knows that.
2. Lack of interest. Some of your relatives may be extremely happy to help you and will give you a lot of information. However, some may be reserved in helping you out.
3. Lack of records. In Kerala, proper and consistant recording of events started very late. Most (not all) of the palm leaf records available are from the years 1700 ~ 1950. Records on paper, are mostly from year 1850 onwards.

   These dates are “recent” for genealogical purposes. Also, it is not necessary that there are any records on your family even close to those years. Probably you may have written records which can date back to 30-50 years…!! Even the archaeology department at travancore started in 1891 and the kerala state archives department in 1962. Still, it is possible to search for the records and details among existing sources.

Sources

1. Family history books (kudumba charithram). It is possible that one of the families of your 4 grand parents have a family history book or a collection of records. It is also possible that a family history book not directly connected to you is connected to some of your relatives.
2. Church records usually contains register books and records with information on birth, christening, marriage, death, burial and headstones.
3. Tomb stones. Be aware that cemeteries are often relocated and the current location of tombstones could be misleading.
4. Internet. If you had an ancestor/relative who is popular, it is possible that you can extract a lot of information from the  internet. Currently there are a lot of communication networks which help in getting to know about your existing relatives. Church and congregation websites may give information about priests and nuns in your extended family.
5. Newspaper clippings. Newspapers provide a valuable source in forms of obituaries, marriage announcements, other news, and even recipes by family members.
6. Regional history books. There may be books regarding the history of your region. These books could give an insight into the environment, lifestyle,  culture and traditions during the period of your ancestors. They may also have one or two sentences to tell about your forefathers or your family.
7. Your immediate family and your relatives “could be” the best of the sources!

Reliability matters. Always cross check the information you got with other sources. Also, always attach the source along with the information. This will tell you or others where you got the information from.

What to collect? Never too much.

1. Basic info: names,dates, place and contact details like phone, email.

   Names include official names, nicknames, christened names, married names and all other alternate names. Kerala christian names! They appear in all styles and forms. A common practice among the kerala christians is to have the given name as first name and father’s name as last name. Though everyone has their own family names, many don’t use it with their names officially. My suggestion is to always use the family name as surname, in a genealogical record. Such a naming convention will provide easy identification of individuals. It also helps us to easily index and search the records. Married female kerala christians usually use husband’s name as last name. For genealogical purpose, it is always good to use maiden family name (family name at birth) as the primary name. Other family names, like those acquired through marriage, could be added as a secondary name.

   Dates should be collected for all important events for a person. Make sure that the dates collected are as accurate as possible. It was a common practice in the last 50 years or so, to provide a different birth date at school, than the original one. If it is an estimate, put a “circa” or “about” before the date. For eg: c.1873 or abt.1873.

   For places, make sure you always have the Post Office (P.O.), as it helps very much in communicating, indexing (eg: see place index in our family tree), or even for mapping purposes (eg: see google maps in our familytree).

2. Extra info: occupation, achievements, skills.
3. Photographs, videos, audios, letters (handwriting), newspaper clippings, obituaries, remembrance cards, wedding (and other) invitations.
4. Memories and stories. These are often overlooked, but integral part of a family genealogy, making it fresh and alive.

All the above for all your relatives. Which relatives? Starting with you (1) -> your parents (2) -> grand parents (4) -> great grand parents (8) and so on. And all the siblings, spouses, children branching from these. You may be surprised to find inter-relations, relations to your old school mates or friends

How to collect and record?

1. Go and collect on paper, forms.
2. Phone.
3. Postal. Send your forms along with self addressed envolopes, so that your relatives can fill and send it back to you.
4. Email. Email communication is essential in gathering new information, validating, sending files and pictures.
5. Online form. (eg: see a typical online form in our family tree).
6. Software. It is always good to organize all the collected data in a recognizable and usable format. Several free and commercial softwares are available for this purpose. Personal Ancestral File (PAF) is one of the free softwares.

How to publish?

1. Books, newsletters. Family history books and monthly/yearly newsletters. These take a lot of time and money in creating and publishing and sending it to family members. However, it is an effective way and the end user will benefit.
2. Email newsletters. Easy and least expensive, but less reach?
3. Internet. A genealogical site would provide wide access to the records from anywhere (eg: see our family tree). Family members can even register and add their details and branches of their family trees. Easy to keep updated. Usage will depend on the internet access abilities of the end user. However, this is gaining momentum with time. Several free and commercial software scripts are available for this purpose. phpgedview is one of the free softwares. In my family tree I am using the better, advanced, TNG software scripts.

Probably, a combination of all these would be the effective way to keep  the family tree together. An online database which can be easily updated and accessed, with less frequent and less heavy newsletters by email and snail mail.

Privacy, trade off.

1. Birthdates. Some people (living) like their birthdates to be kept private for several reasons. Like they don’t want their age to be known or due to the reason that birthdates could help access to credit cards. At the same time, birth dates are an integral part of family genealogy. Depending upon the situation, the genealogist can provide access to only registered users, avoid the year of birth or keep it open.

   In our family tree we have kept it open as registration and logging in deters a lot of non-web savvy users. Many birthday celebrations, anniversaries, etc have been triggered as the dates are available. We also use the year of birth for some facilities/calculations/statistics on the website. Then, again, most of these dates are available in publically available media like books, other websites, etc (not all of course). Also, birthdates have been gathered by many agencies (govt and non-govt) that it is not so difficult to procure them if someone needs.

2. Secrets. There may be family or personal secrets which people may like to keep private. We should respect these concerns.
3. Divorces, 2nd marriages. These are information which are publicly announced and available. Recording such details are upto each person, and depending on the situations.

Notes

Most of the information given are from personal experiences and viewpoints. Though this article is on kerala christian genealogy, many of the points discussed here applies to other communities also. There is ever growing interest in genealogy in other communities (eg: I know that some namboothiri groups are active in it) and it may be helpful to collaborate as the kerala history and culture transcends religious barriers.

Naming convention
The repetitive nature is mostly due to the naming convention followed: The eldest son/daughter carrys the name of the paternal grand father/mother. The second son/daughter carrys the name of the maternal grand father/mother. If you summarise these names, you can see that all those widely used kerala christian names count upto just a few, like ~25 for males and ~10 for females. A compilation of these names, with their origin, have been given in tabular form below.

Names, Origin and their Malayalam variants

_{Hw. Hebrew, Gr. Greek, Lt. Latin, Rm. Roman, Ar. Armenian, Ir. Irish, Ger. Germanian, Sp. Spanish
It is to be noted that the origin mentioned here is not the immediate origin from where the malayalam name originated, but the root of the name. The english equivalents given here are those used locally (in Kerala). Hovering your mouse over the english equivalents will give the extended meanings of the respective names.}

There are still other kerala christian names out there, and do comment us about them. Yet to identify the origin of names like Dummini, Outha, Kuriakose (Cyril or Cyriac?) etc., if there are any. There is a school of thought which says that ‘Itty’ is used as a prefix, like kutty, kunju etc. For example, usage of Itty Ipe, Itty Avirah etc could be analogous to Kutty Varkey, Kunju Ipe, etc. Hence do not take this list as conclusive or exhaustive.

Transition in the naming style
The transition beyond the 1950s (post independence) brought a multitude of names to the kerala christian name group, from simply the english quivalents (eg: George, Thomas) to the two-syllabled names (Sunny, Lisy) to the combination of parents’ names (eg: child of Sunny and Lisy will be Susy) to all kind of possible sounds! Sometimes while updating the database, I have the names but I would get stuck in identifying the gender of the person. Like, in our genealogy database of 2200+ (current figures), there are 9 of which I could not identify the gender by name.

<sub>Reference:
1. genealogy.rocksea.org
2. behindthename.com
3. Cross reference: The Syrian Christians by S.G. Pothen; from an article by Nidhin Olikara on nasrani.net.</sub>

Kozhikode was supposed to be only a ’stop by’ during our kerala trip. It ended up as one of our  major destinations. One reason could be the contrast in the regions within kerala. Though we belong to the pala (specifically bharananganam) nazrani achayan clan, boasting a  rich cultural and traditional backup, much of it is on the fading route. This could be one of the reasons that kozhikode, less influenced by westernization and still preserving a lot of its unique culture, came up as a heaven on earth for us.

Kuttichira community
The city centre itself is filled with a lot of smaller localities surrounding mosques and temples. One of our first venture was the Kuttichira community, specifically the Mishkal Mosque, Kuttichira Tank and the Juma Masjid. Though we started off as enthusiastic tourists, we ended up researching the history, culture, architecture and the community of the area. The local community were a lot enthusiastic to provide information, which showed their friendliness.

Mishkal Mosque at Kuttichira, Kozhikode, was built by Nakhuda Mishkal in the 14th century. Nakhuda Mishkal was a renowned trader and ship owner from Yemen. The title Nakhuda is of persian origin, meaning Captain of the ship; from nāv = boat + khudā = master. As you can see, the mosque was designed in the traditional kerala architecture of that period.

The Mishkal Mosque at Kuttichira stands as a symbol of communal harmony. In 1510 AD, the Portuguese had attacked the mosque and partially destroyed it. Supposedly, their mission was to divide and rule, breaking the harmony between hindus and muslims. The Samoothiri (Zamorin), the local ruler at that time, didn’t fall for this and helped in defending and repairing the mosque. 

The mosque was 5 storeyed, but after the destruction, it remained as a 4 storeyed structure. The walls of the mosque, except the ground floor are made of wood. Remnants of the portuguese destruction can still be seen on the upmost floor.

Do you know that the burka/purdah came to Kerala as part of the fashion and modernity, which was Arab influenced?

The kids in the locality actively involved in performing before our video/still cameras too.

As per the local residents: the area surronding this vast pool is a place akin to the Piazzas (Squares) of Italy, where the locals meet and the day/nightlife activities are carried out.

Shoal of fishes at the Kuttichira Tank…

Thanks to all Kuttichira residents for opening up a new world for us! We will surely visit you again.

More photographs on the Kuttichira Mishkal area are available at http://www.rocksea.org/images/kerala/

Geographical Location of the Kuttichira Mishkal Mosque is given below. Switch to the Hybrid or Satellite mode of the map, Zoom In, and you can see a tiny blue-white mosque and a large rectangular tank! Easily accessible by road from the Beach Road.

A few lines taken from in between a conversation I had with a 76 year old lady. She had come from Kerala to stay with her son in Secunderabad for 3 months in 2007. Her own grandson likes staying indoors and rarely ventures out.

She says, ” The contrasts of times”

In memory of her…
Born : 30 Dec 1930
Died : 20 Sept 2007

Through talks with Jaya Singh, the project-coordinator, I could learn much about the situations surrounding the organisation and the patients. Freedom Foundation (FF) began in 1993 as a de-addiction centre. But, soon they realised that most of the addicted were HIV cases as well, thus, prompting them to turn their focus on HIV patients. Though Government had been running AIDS pevention and awarness programs from long before, FF was the first organisation that came ahead to take care of the existing patients.

Over there, I got to interact with 25 HIV infected orphans for a few days. Each time, I would wonder how long they are going to survive; how hard it must be for a 13 year old to live with the fact that she is HIV infected, and to know what it means.

We sang, played action songs and colored. A few of their colored greetings are displayed in this article. To wish them on the few birthdays they will be celebrating, check the dates and send your wishes to:

Community Care Centre & Diya Children Home
No: 21, Carriappa Road, Bolarum, Secunderabad -500 010

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The first lesson: HIV is not AIDS

Most of the problem revolving around HIV and AIDS related subjects is ignorance or rather, little information. Many of us confuse between HIV and AIDS. Even I had no clear idea until I met them.

HIV- Human Immunodeficiency Virus
This is just the name of the virus. If a person has contracted this virus, he is said to be HIV+ve. Over a period of years, this virus causes AIDS.

AIDS- Acquired immune deficiency syndrome or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome
This is a stage where the HIV has weakened the person’s immune system to such an extent that recovery is impossible. Diseases that might seem nothing to a normal child or an adult will become life threatening to a person with AIDS. Death is inevitable in such a case.

This means that a person with HIV can live a normal and healthy life for years before he/she develops AIDS. Unfortunately, the transition to AIDS is accelerated due to the prejudices and discrimination shown towards them.

Drawing by Akhila

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The first step: by you, by the society
I can call it an eye opener. Mr. Jaya Singh told me that he was involved in AIDS prevention and awareness programs for a few years before he decided to join a place that truly involved in caring for such patients.

The mistake we make is either to discriminate them completely or show them so much of care and concern that they look at themselves as different and feel discriminated!

Though awareness campaigns educate people to a certain extent, it can never bring sensitivity into them. Jaya Singh told pretty blankly to me that even though he is aware of HIV and AIDS and has been handling these cases for few years now, if his own wife is HIV infected, it will naturally occur to him to treat her differently! Also, most of the patients get better not with medicines but social acceptance. Well, let’s say about 25% medicines can work, but the rest 75% is a contribution of the society, and his family and environment. That is why, while patients are treated, side by side, they try to counsel the family and get them to a mentality to accept the patient back into their lives as normal human beings. Many HIV patients turn into AIDS patients only because of the social disturbances caused to them.

Probably, the first thing that our country must do is to have all major hospitals establish departments to treat such patients rather than refer them to organizations like Freedom Foundation.

The other part of discrimination is shown in the fact that none of the hospitals accept HIV infected patients. At the time of child delivery, the women are checked for their blood and if they turn out HIV +ve, they are immediately shown the door and taken to organizations that deal with HIV patients. The number of HIV patients is so high that few organizations like these find it impossible to handle them all. Freedom Foundation has a 30 bed facility and 25 orphaned kids, all infected by HIV. They also treat 600-700 outpatients. However, they run on a meagre amount provided by the government which can support only a 10 bed facility.

What could be done is to train them in various fields of self employment and then encourage them by buying their products.

HIV patients have to be economically independent and they have to be shown ways for it by us. Networking a team of HIV patients to work in groups for self employment purposes will help them to build confidence and by and by feel as an accepted part of the society.

Educate all, beginning from the politicians and policy makers to school children.

Politicians so that they don’t make mockery of the HIV patients, Policy makers so that they work towards the best interest of such patients and school children so that they are taught from early age of the less-privileged in our society and help them to understand and accept them sooner.

 

Drawing by Harish

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The first help: Selfless heart to understand, Money to care

If we have to live thinking someone else will take care of them, then, let us not read this section.

A surprising fact that came to my light was that the government had been running ‘prevention and awareness programs’ for years together now. They spend crores over these. While such programs can be effective to a certain extent, statistics still show that the number of HIV infected population is rising. At some point of time, these people will require care and attention. The government seems oblivious of this hard fact. In the case of Freedom Foundation, the government supports financially for a 10 bed facility, but they run a 30 bed facility with 700 outpatients and 25 orphaned kids to take care of. Even innumerable approaches couldn’t budge the government to realise that money for patient care is required as much as it is required for the awareness programs. Such organizations are then left at the mercy of corporate individuals. Even for the purpose of awareness programs, the trail of bureaucracy involved takes 6-7 months before the program is put into action.

I asked if any politician visited them so far. Till date only one politician visited them and that too, with the media trailing after him for publicity. He was not let in ‘coz he refused to let go off the media. They do not understand the requirement to keep the confidence of these patients by not publicizing them!

Drawing by Likitha & Chandana

Drawing by Bikshapati

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The first touch: Kids of Freedom Foundation

The rooms were not painted and I felt they deserved a better facility. Jaya Singh assured that a company has volunteered to get the facility painted for them.

I wished to volunteer to teach the kids something for their summer vacations. The gladness in his face was evident. I walked towards the kids’ room with him. They were bright young ones with ages ranging from 4- 14 years. He said, as before, it is often the treatment of the society that pushes an HIV patient into developing AIDS sooner. Since children are not aware of their condition, they survive the best as they go about living their life normally. I was asked not to talk about their condition to them. But, when you look at them, they seem no different…just like any other….you forget that they could be the carriers of the worst viruses that human race has seen until now. I had nothing to worry.

HIV cannot spread by touch or sharing things or even dry kissing on cheeks. This virus is not airborne. The virus can pass on through internal body fluids like blood, vaginal fluids or breast milk. If one is careful not to come in contact or in exchange with these, you can lead a normal life with an HIV infected person.

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The first true joy: I feel like God

Three days, for a few hours each, I encouraged them to color their thoughts and imagination on paper and songs. Sometimes, I used to wonder, how many of them would live long. We cannot cure them, but we can always make the days that they live a little better by being around these little ones with no one.

Drawing by Akhila

When I reach them and they wait to welcome me, I feel warmth in my heart. When it was time to part, they colored a chart full to gift Roxy and they hovered around me for so long that I had to promise them to return one day.

A drawing for Roxy, by all the kids at Freedom Foundation

At the end of it, I felt elated, yet humble to be of service to these children.

At the VCA, I met the assistant director and two social workers. But more than meeting the staff there, what was more heartening was that I saw two parents who had come to take over their adopted kids. One was a baby of 3-5 months and the other was a girl child of 3 years.

In the previous articles, we dealt with some basic questions to be pondered and answered before we think of adoption. In this article, we lay out a step-wise procedure for a normal adoption, as told to me by the social worker I met.

1. Parents come to enquire about the adoption process.

Facts:
a. All adoption is based on first come- first serve basis.
b. A single male cannot adopt a child
c. A single female can adopt a male or female child. However, her parents should be supportive of her desicion. Her income should be atleast Rs 5000 per month and should own some property.

2. Once the parents let know if they want to adopt a male or female child, they are told what the waiting period is.

Facts:
a. In general, the waiting period for a male child is 3-4 years and a female child is 1.5 years. This is based on the availability of the children.
b. Many parents settle to adopt a female child in order to aviod long waiting periods for a male child.
c. Last year (2006), almost 85 female children and only 5-6 male children had been adopted.
d. Their claim is that almost 95% parents come asking for female child adoption.

3. The parents are given information about the adoption procedure and given a list of documents to be submitted to list them in the process for adoption.

4. After around 3 months of the document submission, the staff conduct a home visit to the applicant’s home.

Facts:
a. They make sure the home environment is fine.
b. They speak with family-members and neighbours to make sure that all are fine with the adoption process. Even if one person is not ready for it (parents, in-laws etc…), they can be termed as a home not advised for adoption.
c. Even the surroundings are checked for schools and basic amenities to help the healthy growth of the adopted child.

5. Once everything is fine with the home visit, the parents are listed for adoption and put under seniority process (i.e., first come- first serve).

6. When the child is available for the parents, a letter is sent out to the adopting parents.

Facts:
a. Only 2-3 children are shown to the parents for them to choose.
b. These children are selected carefully , to match the adopting parent’s face, features, complexion etc… This is to avoid any social problems that may arise later.
c. The children are already medically examined for fitness. However, if the parents will, they can conduct any further checkups on their own at their own expense. The child can be rejected if any medical problem is found and the parents will be given to have a second preference.
d. Children who are 5-6 years of age have a developed psychology, so their consent is taken before they are handed over.

7. After the parents are handed over the child, the legalisation process starts.

Facts:
a. They are shown to good lawyers who will file a case of adoption in the court.
b. The assistant director will go and testify the handling over of the child.
c. The orphanage has nothing to do with the religion of the parents who are adopting. Everything to do with the Christian Wards Act is dealt in the court as it is a legal matter.

8. At the Registeration office, the parents need to file the details of the child, for a certificate that will serve as a Birth Certificate in future.

Facts:
The parents can give a new Date of Birth for the child based on an approximate age determined by the orphanage. Usually the parents choose dates with favourable star signs, day, month, etc…

9. Subsequent followup visits are made to make sure everything is going fine.

Facts:
a. 5-6 year olds take a longer time to adapt, especially the boys. If they are given a lot of care and tenderness, they will adapt better to the new parents and environment.
b. Many kids are readily agreeable for adoption.

A peek over NRI adoption…
As stated before, after adoptions through VCA has been handed over to the  Women Development and Child Welfare Development centre in AP, a preference order has been laid down. It being:

1. Indian Parents
2. NRI Parents
3. 1 Indian and 1 foreign parent
4. Foreigners

Only children who have been continuosly rejected by the Indian parents residing in India will be put up for adoption by the others. They are very often children with disabilities. Right now there are 29 such children in AP for such adoption. Their names and details are in the internet.