We hear and see so much, both positive and negative, that it is very difficult to recount it all, so we�ll try to give you just a flavour of it here.
There are things we have seen, heard and experienced that do not make comfortable reading, but we want to share with you a few of these with you so you get a feeling for the contrasts. Some children stole from volunteers who had been working tirelessly in an after-school play scheme. The police became involved and parents were shouting abuse at the volunteers! One of our volunteers has been in hospital with suspected dengue fever (transmitted by daytime mosquitoes) that has no known cure and can be fatal. She is OK.
There was a brief tsunami warning when the earthquake occurred a few weeks ago. Everyone is so jittery about it. How awful it must be to live with that fear. Some volunteers (not with our organisation) gave gifts to tsunami families with the best of intentions but, because there were not enough to go round, they received death threats.
We met a Sri Lankan lady whose friend was away at a hotel by the beach when the tsunami struck. She lost all her children, husband and parents. She is now receiving counselling that she can afford as she is wealthy. What of all those who cannot afford this help? We have heard that there have been waves of suicides in the tsunami affected areas, but this news doesn�t generally filter through.
The girl at our local post office gave up her degree to look after her family when her mother died. She later got a job in customer service with HSBC but gave that up to look after her father when he had an accident. She doesn�t like her job much and is learning Tamil and Hindi in her spare time. She cannot be promoted at the Post Office despite passing all her exams as she is not permanent staff.
Deborah went to visit the homes of very poor families in one of the areas where we work, She found one little boy of about 6 years old with cerebral palsy. He lies on the floor all day. There are so many people that need help, it just goes on and on.
The trainee nurse to whom John has been giving English lessons and who completed her academic training and has a hospital placement, has been told by her parents she must marry. We fear that the end of her nursing career may have finished before it begins!!
More and more people come to Shanti wanting sewing machines, fishing nets, a place to live, a job, etc. Most requests cannot be granted as funds, formalities and practicalities do not allow. One lady arrived whose husband is dying of cancer (she brought his X-rays). She will have no income and has 2 children to support. Shanti was able to give her a pot, a burner and a bag of rice so she can begin a small business selling food.
A long-term volunteer has been working with special needs children and has been successful in getting hearing aids for some of them and an operation for one boy to remove infected bone in his ear. The night before the operation, his parents refused to allow the operation to go ahead. In fact, the father didn�t want the mother to stay overnight as she wouldn�t be able to cook his meals!. The volunteer had to stay overnight herself and will try to put the child into a guest house for a week whilst he recovers to reduce the likelihood of infection if he went home to the filthy conditions in the tsunami camp. One of the nurses looking after the boy in the hospital had lost her 11 month old baby and a 2 year old in the tsunami - such wonderful work people are doing and such traumatic stories.
Now let�s tell you some less emotional stories.
Deborah has been involved with a number of elders� programmes and has introduced chair yoga and hand massages. She has learnt how to scrape coconut flesh from the inside of the shell, sitting on what is a bit like a spinning stool and using a serrated blade attached to the front. Lots of ginger tea is drunk and there is lots of �conversation�. We have had a few lessons in the common Sri Lankan language Sinhala so we can at least ask how people are and tell them who we are. Sri Lankans love sweet tasting food so everything is heaped with sugar.
The children continue to be a delight. Making hats from old newspapers was a hit. They love being creative using coloured paper and glue! They love receiving stars for their efforts. They are so funny, or they think we are! We took in some pictures of the British royal family as somebody had been talking of them. They thought that John was Prince Philip and Deborah looked like the Queen (good grief!) At the end of a meeting of all the project coordinators (all conducted in Sinhala), we were all unexpectedly asked to demonstrate dancing. Everyone was reluctant, so we got up for a brief waltz. At the end someone asked, �Is that all?�. So Deborah encouraged the other volunteers and organised an impromptu barn dance, calling the moves and �singing� the tunes!
We went to visit the girls� school at which we hope to work in September. We had been there only 10 minutes when we were invited to attend a ceremony in the hall with no idea of what it was about. We were ceremoniously placed on the top table next to the Buddhist monk, helped to give out prizes with children blessing our feet and John was asked to make a speech. Bizarre!
We have been asked to start a project taking family photographs at tsunami camps for displaced people. We felt quite uncomfortable about it, but all their possessions were destroyed and they seem delighted to have their photos taken. Deborah now organises the work schedules for about 20 volunteers in addition to her own work. There are complex variables in terms of different projects on different days with different combination of volunteers and all leads to much frustration.
Other things make such an impression especially the wonderful smiles that we receive, a lasting memory of Sri Lanka. In the evening at about 6.00pm, we look up in the sky to see dozens of sarungalas (kites). If boys cannot afford to buy one (about 20p for a simple one), then they make one out of black plastic bags. Boys are as keen on kites as they are on cricket, which is played everywhere. Sri Lanka�s victory in the recent Indian Oil series (with India and W. Indies) was very popular. We went to see them play West Indies in the first round where they lost!
There is a group of Italians working at Shanti for a few weeks. They are so enthusiastic. We sat having a very animated lunch with them and Father Catalano and didn�t understand a word. A group of trainee Sri Lankan priests has also arrived to do a work placement. It all feels surreal at times. To end on a sweet note:
Dessert some evenings is avocado with sugar (not actually so bad)! After 30 years of not taking sugar in tea, we now ask for it like that (it is often served ready made) and it just seems the right thing to drink.
We have recently become involved with some more tsunami work�.. watch this space.