Hi everyone.

Life here in Delhi is getting extremely busy. We have moved out to a little village in a place called Bankner which is one and a half hours drive from the main city. It is a nice little village and we have been blessed to be living by a couple who I have known for 3 years now. We are blessed for a number of different reasons. One: we didn’t have gas to cook with until yesterday and we’ve been at our house for 2 weeks, we had to apply for a gas connection first. So we were welcome to have meals with them as much as we liked. We now have gas so are able to try our hand at making chai, subji (vegetables) and chapatti. Two: For the first couple of days we had problem with water, there was none, so we were able to fill our buckets at their house. One day the whole village was out of water so the tanks came in and we filled our buckets from the tank.

The center is very exciting. We start this Monday the 12th March. During last week we walked around the slum with Julina, our wonderful teacher, and surveyed the families. I was amazed at the number of children who attended school, it was fantastic to hear. The children who weren’t doing anything fell in the ages of 3 and 7. So we now have a total of 20 children who are going to start. There are 13 boys and 9 girls. Our cook has a 1 and a half year old boy so he’ll be joining us as well.

One of the families we talked to broke my heart. She has 5 children. The father died of a drug related incident. Her in-laws are not doing anything to help. Her 12 year old son and 8 year old daughter work on the streets as rag pickers. That means they pick up rubbish, like plastic or anything that can be sold and recycled. So we are going to have her 6 year old girl and 4 year old boy with us. It would be neat to one day meet the older children and do something to help the family out.

- Jig