Sugar Cubes: The 13 ad libs

Ambi#1

Confused right now…what to write??…..but the experience this week was great.

Ambi#2

Think about Kasauli seriously!!! (in pink)

Ambi#3

Something needs to be done about the funding

Ambi#4

I am concerned about the progress of the sector 35 project with the kids there.
PS : plan a We Volunteer outing

Ambi#5

Poor & rich, we don’t know. ‘We Volunteer” is ours that we know
Baki Kabhi aur (in Hindi)

Ambi#6

That’s a great planning!!
Before you move ahead, get it registered so that people out there can’t challenge credibility

Ambi#7

It’s gono get BIG!!!!!............
I know for sure!!!
Keep volunteerism…keep initiating

Ambi#8

All the best to new members. Hope they work for We Volunteer as their own organization. Raise it to great heights and have great fun along the way too.

Ambi#9

GuyZZ, atleat this time we have to stress to all that we presented and make sure that the spirits remain uplifted….!!!

Ambi#10

Sugar Cubes!!

Meetha hona zaroori hai kya??

Thinking of formulating something that ensures entry of worthy members into the organization????

Ambi#11

Keep up the Good Work & Your Spirits HIGH

Ambi#12

Concerned about the next generation, who will be taking charge once the existing ones leave.

Ambi#13

O!! Ji koi Fight nahin hai…….it takes time to put things in order. It’s very easy to crib…but I would just restrain and look ahead

Winds of Change

So here we are. After the astounding success of the campaign, “We Volunteer” has lived up to its promise; actually not promise rather the responsibility and duty to show the child beggars the right path of living. The classes for the kids formally kicked off on 4th of May, 2007(Friday). Education is not the only ingredient of the learning process. Rather, the most important things which we people take for granted are certainly missing in these kids. The feeling of brotherhood, team spirit, compassion and an ear for listening, all this is totally missing in their conscience. They have a great inclination to “beat the hell out of the other” on petty issues. Some kids are too violent and coercive. Infact, they just do not know how to settle things with dialogue. A girl named “Taqdeera” is taller than the group and she is just “wild”. But then again, these traits are visible in the privileged children too. To a lesser extent though. Teaching the child beggars the word of discipline is, and will be the most daunting task. Just as any normal kid, they cannot ensconce at one place even for a minute. They keep hopping around from one corner to the other, continuously badgering the “so called teachers” J. Sach mein…dimaag ka dahi banaa dete hainJ
But there is good news too. A few kids have started showing glimpses of inclination towards studies. An iota of improvement and the zeal to learn has been visible for the past two days. With 7 days of sessions the learning curve has still not risen to satisfactory heights for most of the kids. We have taught them counting and English alphabets. But they certainly have problem identifying them. So we have decided to teach them Hindi first and then move towards English. Any other teaching methodology is certainly welcome from anyone who knows about the classes or reads this post. Apart from the lessons, we make them play games like dumb charades, dog and the bone and treasure hunt. The idea is to get some team spirit and sensibility into the group. Dumb charades is a great hit amongst the kids. They are asked to pose or act like a contemporary object like a car, scooter, train, tree etc and the rest have to guess the object. “Dog and the bone” was also like by them. Treasure hunt was not much helpful. Infact they could not understand how to go about it. Anyways, a lot needs to be taught and learnt from them. It is strange that we have to actually go looking for them in the market and gather them to attend the class. But at the end of a 2 hr class, they do not intent to leave us. For the whole session, most of them forget about begging. This is not the case with just the classes. If we sit with them in the market, even at that time they just forget about their begging business and just talk to us or just smile around.

A few words from the volunteers

@Manish

Fisrt things first......i would like to congratulate we volunteer team
for starting their teaching project on a succesful note.
I visited sec 17 centre on May 4, the day when the teaching project was initiated and then i went on May 11,exactly a week later. The changes i could notice were remarkable. Earlier the children were very undisciplined, lacked unity, were abusive, hardly cared for one another. After a week,most of them could be seen playing in teams, in a disciplined manner. I can say for
sure if not all ten atleast half of them have improved a lot. No more abusive words could
be heard, and some like mithun, govinda, vinod and acp were eager to learn too. However
attitude of deepak and taqdira had hardly changed. Little girl Pooja deserves a special
mention as a i found her very keen to learn. she was grasping both alphabets and
numbers quickly. and trust me, govinda can beat hrithik in a dance competition. Another
thing that i observed was that children were not only intersted in learning themselves but
also encouraged the likes of deepak to learn. The signs of team spirit could be
well observed.

@Navnee

i had an experience of a lifetime working with those kids in sector-17....i've been going there since past 1 week or so and have learnt so many things from these kids that sometimes force you to think that despite so many facilities that we've got,we still are unsatisfied...but these kids have nothing with them and still they know how to live life......it was on 5th of may that i met these kids for the first time....i was actually happy with the way these kids welcomed us....all of them just getting up and coming to shake hands....all that they wanted was studying with a bit of masti....not all of them were serious about studies...although just the people like ACP,MITHUN,POOJA,VINOD who are actually interested in learning things....it is fun being there and spending a few hours of the day with them.....it actually gives u a feeling of satisfaction...the classes started on 4th of may and we had to start with the basic stuff like ABC nd then 123 and yea...most importantly the basic etiquettes...what we people noticed was that these kids lacked unity and constantly indulged into quarrels......so we had to think of some games to devise unity among them....games like DUMB CHARADES,DOG AND THE BONE and TREASURE HUNT were the ones which we thought could be helpful....DUMB CHARADES was sooooo much fun.....the kids really liked this one...they were alwayz eager to get there chance to enact something or the other......and to some extent we were successful in acheiving the motive with which the games were played....the quarrels were reduced...although still some elements are there which tend to disturb others as well..!!!during the study sessions we faced some problem in teaching them english i.e. the general ABC so ankush suggested that they should be taught hindi first so that its easy for them to recognize things.......hindi classes wil be started from monday....now let us see what happens..!!!the best part during these classes was wen the children gave their dance performances.....GOVINDA dances so well...!!!!u must c dat..!!!!!!!....dis guy GOVINDA has a totally DON kinds behaviour although hez the youngest of all i guess..!!!!!!! lol..!!!!!another thing which i gotto know was that one of these kids named MITHUN is into gutkha.....i was actually shocked that a guy of his age is into such stuff....it was at that time that we told mithun to stop all this on a condition that we'll get him a chewing gum everyday...and i guess....it was the last time he had gutkha....and now....he gets one chewing gum everyday...!!!!!!all in all....we are successful in what we wanted to some extent...but still a lot more needs to be done...!!!!!!

Great going volunteers!!!!!!


The kids who have been the attending classes are:

Mithun, ACP, Taqdeera, Deepak, Pooja, Savitri, Rahul, Bidiya, Sanjo, Monika, Govinda, Sunny, Vinod, Chottua, Sonu, Pooja(sunny’s sister), Aakash(not a beggar).

Volunteer Teachers

Preet, Kaval, Ankush, Ankita, Navnee, Rohit.

Sincere thanks to Manish, Dr. Vineet, Bikram, Prabhjot for chipping in too.

If anyone has any views, suggestions and better methodologies, please let us know...
Give us ideas through which we can inculcate a sense of team spirit amongst these kids.


We Initiate.....Do You???

Curb the Beggary Industry

Do you provide alms to child beggars?

If your answer is YES to the above question, …Thanks a lot then….you are inadvertently contributing in ruining that child’s future to some extent. Usually people donate money to child beggars out of shear compassion and empathy. But, little do they know that whatever money is being provided to these children is actually rendering them incompetent for the future. Most of these children start begging from a tender age of 4-5 years. Some are school dropouts and just run-away holding their slipping pants if you mention the word “school” while talking to them. For the past two months “We Volunteer” was involved in a research focusing on the child beggars in Chandigarh. We collected statistical data and profiles of these children begging in public places (sector 17 plaza, sector 36, sector 35 and many more). Most of the children who are begging in Chandigarh fall within the age gap of 5-13 yrs. People in Chandigarh are very generous I must say. All thanks to the highest per capita income in India.
Most of these children somewhere around 50-100 bucks per day in cash; apart from the usual food which people buy them. The cash flow follows a structure:

Let’s say a person gives a 10 Rupee note to a child beggar. 50% of that money is wasted into Junk Food (Zero nutrition value) and Cheap Drugs (fluids, tobacco). The other half is either snatched by an elder bully or is offered as a “Hafta.” Then the cycle continues where the money is further put into drugs and gambling. The child beggar seldom gives any money to his parents. And more surprisingly, some of the parents don’t even know that their kids are into begging. So much unregulated money is being fed into this industry that just in the city of Chandigarh; a whooping money mending industry is flourishing under the aegis of your compassion. A one rupee donated as alms to a child beggar is not serving any purpose; rather it is acting like an imprecation on him/her. The motive of “Curb the Beggar Industry Campaign” is to make people aware about the social irresponsibility they are doing by giving money to the beggars. If you really want to help a child then give him/her affection, put an arm around him/her, ask his/her name, get him some clothes to fully cover the body, buy him food to eat, put him into a good school and follow this up….try it on one child….nurture him/her but DO NOT GIVE MONEY.

“Curb The Beggar Industry” campaign kicked of at Sector -17 Plaza on 26th April (Saturday). It was signature drive where people had to pledge and sign then they would not provide money to the child beggars. As usual the Saturday fever was slowly beginning to sizzle with the backdrop of the sun slowly settling down. The campaign started at 3 PM and continued till 8 PM. Every volunteer was briefed before the campaign started.

Volunteers Present: Preet, Kaval, Prashant, Ankush, Rajeev, Richa, Aurodeepa, Shyam

With the campaign banner in place, the volunteers moved around the shopping centre stopping the Saturday revelers and telling them about the facts and findings of the research we carried. Some listened carefully and very cooperatively signed the sheet. Some did not care to stop and listen to the talk…”Time nahin hai”…..huh!
Meanwhile, there were a few who carefully listened to the briefing but did not affix their signatures. A total of 450 people signed at the end of the first day…Not bad!

The second day at sector 17 turned out to be more effective.
Some of the people had read the press coverage of the previous day, so they were a little aware about the drive. The drive started at virtually the same time and continued till 8:30 PM.

Volunteers Present: Preet, Kaval, Ankush, Richa, Raj, Abhishek, Sudheesh, Vrinda, Simran.

By the end of the day, another 680 people signed. Not bad at all!!...

The drive continues in schools and colleges all through the week.

Meanwhile, today we are going to start classes for some beggars to raise their knowledge to some level before putting them into a school.

*Special thanks to the guys who volunteered to help us in the drive at the plaza.

We Initiate.....Do You????