Lohiyapuram and Epurupalem Medical Centers

hai,

Yesterday we visited two medical centers around Chirala. One is at Lohiyapuram towards Ongole and one is at Epurupalem towards Bapatla. Two areas belong to weavers community.  Majority of the people here do their traditional occupation from several generations.
Some have their own weaving Equipment and some work for a company who pays them little amount for their work which is not sufficient for their living. Majority of the weavers said that they have no unions to fight for their rights and no proper support from the Government to start their own business so some are going for different work like coolies and some old generation people who are afraid of losing their skill to pass on for future generations are staying back.

Government is allotting special areas for them to build houses instead of staying in rented houses. The Government is building houses and they have to pay back a little amount each month but most of the colonies are on the outskirts of the town. So the people  living there are far away from the town and even away from all the basic facilities.Local Government recently started building roads and giving water supply but still they doesn't have proper medical help.. Some of the local people took initiative to come up to us asking for medical help.We surveyed the area and we felt it is really needy and it would be useful for the people to have a medical help to those who can't afford to buy medicines and to those like old and handicapped people who can't afford to go to the town for even first aid help.

We started our medical support in Epurupalem in 2006 and the nurse working there is Buela Rani. She is a trained nurse with good knowledge about medication and people around her area are very happy with her services.

The Medical centre at Lohiyapuram started in 2008 and the nurse is Mrs. Varadamma. She is a village health worker who goes around the village and gives out medicines and injections. She is very familiar with the area and people there and people don't hesitate to go to her to just talk to her about their problems besides getting medical help. We are very happy with what she is doing their in that area.

Pedanandipadu Sewing Project

Hai,

Today we visited Pedanandipadu Sewing Project. Village surrounded by paddy and cotton fields. People mostly farmers and agricultural labourers. Mixed area with both landlords and daily workers.Majority of the single students in the sewing centre are farmers' children or married women working as daily workers.

Our instructor is Mrs. Sivakumari who's husband is a farmer too. Family depended on farming. Last year they had heavy loss on crops due to unexpected floods. At that time Sivakumari is the only support for their family. There are many such student families who are similar to her who are supporting their families in need with the knowledge they got from our Shoshana sewing centre and who are running their small tailor shops at home.

Sivakumari is a very good instructor who takes lots of care in teaching the students different new patterns available in the market. Her husband is also very supportive to her work which is a very essential part and necessary part in our work helping the society. Family support and local society support which makes her work more effective and gives scope for helping more needy women for their self help.

Railway medical centre

Visit to Shoshana medical centre- Railway area on Wednesday. One of the most needy places in Chirala who need desperate medical help. Most of the habitats in this area are migrated people from Tamilnadu in search of work. They are living in the outskirts of chirala illegally occupying the railway and municipal place for several years.

No proper place for living , in the middle of  cementary and mostly on roads in small huts. No electricity or water facility for them.People go for collecting dead animals on the railway tracks, meat for eating and selling dried bones.Some are rickshaw pullers and rag pickers. People here are far behind from the society ,un hygienic,backward  and wild.  Most men and women are drug addicts, thieves and all kinds of illegal activities.

Government started allotting housing plots for them and half of them still left behind waiting for the houses.  In rainy season the situation is even more worse, people living in half drowned houses.Shoshana started regular medical help in this area for the last three months. The nurse from Prasadha Nagaram Mr. Jaya raju is also working here in this area. There is no permanent place for the centre yet but Jayaraju is managing to give out the medicines on his bicycle just like a mobile dispensary.

The local society people applied for the Government to allot a place for them to build a medical centre so the people in this area gets regular medical help which is very necessary for these people living in such unhygienic area and no awareness of healthy life.

Vijayawada Sewing Projects

Hai,

Yesterday we visited our sewing projects in Vijayawada. We went along with our German friends to the projects since they are making the documentary on the work of Shoshana.

First we went to Wynchpet, Vijayawada via prakasam barage. The centre is more in the old city. The instructor, Mrs.Srivani is working with us from the beginning i.e from 2001 onwards. She is the oldest instructor compared to all our insturctors .

She was a regular teacher before in a school besides stitching  and that helped her very much in teaching the students stitching with more patience. She is very helpful and friendly to the students and more like a mother to them and really fighting for those women who need help since her class is in a muslim slum area. Her husband is a retired railway employee and he is also very helpful in sharing her work. We are very happy with their work.

Next project is Shoshana Sewing Centre, Giripuram. The instructor lady is Hemima. She is a trained dress designer so she has new way of teaching the students which is very practical. She  is making special maps for the other instructors too to make their work more easy and effective.We met her family and one of her sister is also a social worker for street children and her aunt is running a day care centre for the needy children in her area so her family is more into social work. Hemima acts not just like a regular  employee but really see that the needy people in her area get help to get up from their poor situations and be independent.

On the way back to home, we were at a cotton mill and chilli fields to see the situation of the people working there .The entire process like picking cotton from the fields to making the threads and cloth is very interesting but the life of people working in hot sun, dusty and noisy mills is very pathetic. Our students who are former daily workers feel much more comfortable and happy compared to their work before setting up their own tailor shops at home or outside, earning more money than a regular worker and take care of their children.

Pasumarru and Chilakaluripet Sewing projects

Hai

Today we visited two projects along with some special friends from Germany. One is Silke, member of Shoshana and a dress designer who has been helping our projects by sharing her stitching knowledge for the last  9 years and the other one is Benjamin who is a photographer, making a documentary on Shoshana and its projects in India.


First we went to Pasumarru where our project incharge Swetha is running her embroidery and painting class. She is an MBA graduate besides embroidery teacher. This is her third batch running presently. Her class is full of new and old students besides the present batch. Old students are using the centre as their work place where they meet the instructor regularly and have a chance to work under her supervision. Most of her previous students who finished the course are very well using their skills and earning sufficient money to support their families and present batch also started working while learning, about to finish their course at the end of this month. New batch is ready for the start and they came to watch the class and find out what they are going to learn. So it was a happy bunch of different students at different stages. Benjamin and Silke made an interview with Swetha and her students and they tried to capture their nature of work.

Secondly we visited Sumathi, incharge of Shoshana sewing centre, chilakaluripet. She is the mother of Swetha. She is teaching only stitching and Swetha is helping her students with painting and embroidery in her free time. Martha  felt very happy with the work of Sumathi and we had a chance to go around the area and meet some of her previous students who has small tailoring shops at their houses.

Previous students are very happy for setting up their own business at home instead of working in fields all day long and staying away from their family. They are still beginners but they are quite successful in growing their work day by day. We felt very happy to see them using their sewing class for their self help which the basic aim of Shoshana.

Swetha who is a business management graduate is in the process of using her knowledge to teach her students how to make necessary products and market them besides teaching her regular class which we expected from her from the beginning and to be an inspiration to other projects as well.

Hai friends,

I feel very sad to say that the son of our nurse from Ramapuram Medical centre is in a very serious health situation. The name of the boy, Naveen was born with several genetic disorders. He is 12 years old.Three years back Shoshana helped him getting operated on his bladder but he is very weak to get along with several operations from his birth. He was better for sometime but slowly his health started getting deteriorated. We tried to make his living better but his body is not co-operating.

He is admitted in a Government hospital for the last 3 days and i hope he will make it for some more days. We need your prayers for him.

Angalakuduru Sewing Project

hai,

Our visit to the second project today is Angalakuduru Sewing Project. This is the last visit for this week.

Angalakuduru is a village, 4kms away from Tenali.

Our Sewing Project at Angalakuduru is working for the last 7 years. Around 67 women finished their stitching class successfully.

Present batch has 10 students. Silent bunch of women, learning embroidery today. The instructor Mrs.Krishnaveni is teaching them some embroidery pattern to put on cloth bags which can be used instead of plastic covers. They already prepared a few with nice simple thread work.

Already some people are interested in using them. In future if there is prohibition on plastic then the women have a chance of going into the business of making bags besides stitching.