by Anuradha Bakshi | Jan 5, 2007 | Uncategorized
It is back with a bang. Nanhe’s lost smile was there to greet us when we went visiting yesterday, reminding us that children have their own way of dealing with problems, ways that remain mysterious as Nanhe’s battle is far from over.
But the feeling was short lived. His mother was still lost in her dream of getting a new kidney for her child and not willing to listen, let alone understand the enormity of the situation.
She was excited to share that she had found someone who had told her that were she to part with 10 000 rupees, things could be arranged. We were aghast as earlier she had told us that what was needed was 100 000 Rs. As she went on we realised that she had been caught in some network that runs deep in government run hospitals and feeds on gullible and desperate families. Lost in her own world she refused to listen when we tried to explain what a transplant meant. She just wanted to believe in what some doctor had told her and held on to those words as gospel truth.
We tried hard but were no match to the desperation and determination of a mother!
We all know that no organ transplant can be done in a paltry 10 000 Rs. At the same time we know that Nanhe’s mom is not lying. Then what does this imbroglio conceal?
At best a new found way of feeding on a poor mother’s desperation and then finding a cowardly way out when one has milked her dry. Or is it something darker and deeper. We cannot retreat into the wait and see option. Too much is at stake: the possibility of Nanhe’s mom sinking into a debt trap, the risk of some sham surgery done on the child to appease the mother and justify the monies extracted…
We need to find out more.. after all it is all about Nanhe’s smile
by Anuradha Bakshi | Jan 2, 2007 | Uncategorized
Come January 1st and we all set out making new resolutions for the new year. I use to do it too and then somehow these were forgotten as life took on its course. This year I just let January 1 be like just another day, the difference being that I watched it go by with more awareness. And just another day it was with its share of simple joys, its tinges of drama and its moments of weariness.
In the street where I work and which is far remote from the glitz and glamour, nothing seemed different. The street vendors let out their call at the appointed time, braving the cold and morning fog, shops opened their shutters, people set out to work as a day missed would mean a hungry family and barring the rote like ‘happy new year’ people exchanged, it was an ordinary day.
2006 had slipped into 2007 without much ado.
To me each day is a new beginning and that is what makes it extra-ordinary. As one set out in the morning one cannot begin to imagine what it will hold. But come to think about it just the simple fact that it goes by quietly is a celebration in itself. So much could go wrong, and yet nothing has.
Each day also brings its set of challenges that need to be met as well as moments to savour: it could be an extra smile or a tiny achievement many would not see or that warm cup of tea enjoyed in the watery sunlight that was finally agree to pierce through the dense fog.
We seem to have lost the ability to seek out simple joys and look for causes or crutches to ‘celebrate’ and maybe January 1st is one of the most jaded.
Yet it is just another ordinary or extra-ordinary day, depending on how you wish to look at it.
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 28, 2006 | Uncategorized
Nanhe’s predicament haunts me ceaselessly. As someone wrote: this is the battle of the mind and the heart, and none of them are wrong.
Nanhe is precious to many of as we are addicted to his smile. Somehow when Nanhe smiles than for that tiny moment everything seems so easy.. and most of us would like to believe that we would fight to save it no matter what.
Easily said than done as this time the battle is anything but fair. Till now, every time the smile was in danger a few days at the hospital, a surgical intervention, a few strips of medicine was all that was needed. But now he needs a new kidney and suddenly the adversary has turned formidable.
The docs dismissed the mom by quoting an sum that would seem astronomical to any one, let alone a poor widow with three challenged kids and a pitiable cart that she fills with whatever she thinks saleable. It would have seemed the same to us but somehow offers have come without our asking.
But the real issue is not whether we can raise the money or not, it not even whether we can find a kidney or not in lies in doing what is right for Nanhe. I recently read an article on compassion and about the need for caring, and how little of it there is around. But in situation like this compassion itself is challenged. Where does true compassion lie: in getting a complex surgery done knowing it is wrought with danger, in spending an astronomical amount of money to give some more time to a child who will never be able to survive this world, in finding the courage and the right words to tell a mother that her son is dying.
One could also try and explain to her that it is in not simply the one hundred thousands rupees asked for but the cost of dyalisis and expensive medecine, the risk of rejection and so much more and the care needed afterwards. one could gently remind her that she has three more children two of whom as challenged and the other a daughter that needs to be married soon. But have you ever tried talking to a desperate mother fighting for her child’s life, even the gods in heaven sometimes have to accept defeat.
Once again today I wish I had a dream catcher
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 26, 2006 | Uncategorized
My mother died of cancer. Many do. The difference was that she stubbornly refused all form of treatment. She bore her excruciating pain with rare courage. Life had to be lived till the very last breath was her leitmotiv, and she did, remarkably alive as she quietly died.
She could have had the best treatment and at least the most sophisticated pain killers, but somehow she refused them all. For many years after her death I battled with ifs and buts and ceaseless torment. My demons were only set to rest when I met a leading oncologist who shared his view about terminal diseases with me.
Dr de Souza had been with Bombay’s leading cancer institute for many years and has held a unique discourse to many patients and their families who come remote parts of India. Strangely enough he has ofter sent them back, counselling them not to spent their meagre resources or sell their last possessions for a treatment that will never cure the disease. One must remember that the poor only come to such specialised institutes when the disease is too far gone. His advise is to take care of the living and their future rather than fight a lost battle. Instead of hospitals he set up hospices so that the terminally ill could be cared for, and the family find some support.
All this came back from some recess of my brain as I made sense of our poor little Nanhe’s mom was trying to convey. She had just been told that both Nanhe’s kidneys had packed up and that his only chance of survival was a kidney transplant. I wish he had just taken the Dr de Souza way and sent her home with the right advise, no matter how harsh and cruel it sounded as what awaited her was even worse.
The doctors who gave her this unreachable ray of hope knew Nanhe’s condition and what awaited him. They were aware of the fact that even if he got a kidney he would never walk, never comprehend the world and never be able to survive. One is not even thinking of the innumerable obstacles that exist on the way to an organ donation. To rid themselves of the constant nagging of a loving mother, they just told her to buy a kidney at the cost of Rs 100000. Maybe they thought she would be scared away by the astronomical figure, but they forgot they were dealing with a mother.
But we know we are.
But how does one tell a mother that there is nothing much that can be done for little Nanhe. How do we tell her that her son is slowly getting ready to move on to another and hopefully better world. How do we explain to her that what the doctors have said were empty words, and that for this one time ever a mother’s prayer will not be heard.
We have had many a difficult moments, bu this is one that defies them all as where does one find the words to say that Nanhe’s smile is today in real danger?
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 25, 2006 | Uncategorized
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The world celebrated Xmas. In a tiny lane of an urban slum in Delhi a bunch of very special kids did too. Just like children all over the world they wanted a Xmas tree and nothing could stop them.
Nothing to write home about, some would say, but what if I told you that each and every child in this little group is different: some have remarkable minds locked away in useless bodies while others try to make sense of the world with limited means. Some are condemned to a world of silence while others live in immobility. Oops I forgot to tell you that all of them have never known the thrill of opening a present and have only survived on hand me downs!
But somehow the Xmas spirit is such that it breaks down all barriers so we were not surprised when we saw them storming to the terrace in search of a potted plant, any one would do. In the most remarkable example of cooperative effort and armed with bits of papers, cloth and heavens knows what else, they set out to create the most beautiful tree I have ever seen. True it broke all conventions, but while doing so it set its very own and these seemed closer to the Xmas spirit.
This tree was imbued with the purest form of joy, it was one that needed no borrowed trimming or expensive decoration, even a discarded old white sock looked pretty as it dangled in the blowing wind and as they proudly posed for the customary picture, the air was redolent with the abundance of giving that emanated from this humble tree.
I do not know whether anyone of them knew about Xmas and its significance, but somehow they had intuitively grasped its ever essence.
Isn’t that what xmas is all about!
by Anuradha Bakshi | Dec 16, 2006 | Uncategorized
Imagine my surprise when a mail dropped by this morning from another land asking me whether I would give a motivational talk to the staff of a big organisation. The reason stated for choosing me was my can-do-never-say-die spirit.
The idea was daunting, particularly for one who has never liked centre stage. In spite of what some may believe, my tryst with the media was short lived as I realised that for most of them, one was just a good story, and my illusion that it had a role to play in making a difference was just that: an illusion. I just carried on my work strong in the belief that there was a reason to it, and as long as the reason remained, solutions would come.
Project why has been a one day at a time saga, often making it difficult if not impossible to really define its ambit. True we are an education support organisation but we also.. and the list becomes endless, as one takes on every challenge that comes our way and find a way out.
I wonder whether this is what comes out as a can-do-never-say-die attitude.
When I look back on the seven years of pwhy I must say in hindsight that there are many times when normal circumstances would have made one give up, or say no, or look away, I just know that I could not have.
How do you turn away from the wondrous eyes filled with pain that look at you from a scalded one year old baby, how do you send away a limping brave but worn out father who desperately seeks your help to fix his son’s heart, or a mother who knows her child is dying?
Do you walk away when you know that your detractors want just that, knowing that in doing so you are trampling the dreams of so many children? Never mind the allegations, the broken tents, the bulldozed classrooms? Do you leave children to the jaws of predators lurking to suck them into their dark world just because of a threat? Do you give the complex administrative machinery the satisfaction of wearing you down to the point of saying, I am better off not doing anything.
It is not a never-say-die attitude. To me it is simply the only way worthy of anyone one with a modicum of a conscience. Anything else would have been not acceptable. So if I am to go and share the last seven years, it would be simply to say that sometimes it is not easy to be true to the little voice you hear inside you, one just has to and the doors open for you.
That is what the miracle call life is all about.
