Visit to Shoshana Medical centre, Burlavaripalem.

Visit pics from 6/10.

Visited Shoshana Medical Centre, Burlavaripalem along with Mrs.Martha. Morning we visited Swarna village and evening we went to Burlavaripalem village which is around 10 kms from Chirala town.

Main occupation of the people here is agriculture and the village is surrounded with fields. Village is a far away from the town and there is no medical facility here like a health centre or a medical shop. People have to come all the way to Chirala for medicines. Ofcourse for major health problems they come  either to the Government hospital in Chirala or there are many private hospitals in Chirala.

On the request of the villagers, Shoshana started  first aid help in this village in Jan-15.
Mariamma is the nurse. She is also working in one of the private hospitals in Chirala. She has 2 daughters and one son.

Mariamma's husband was a daily workers. Unfortunately he was detected with cancer last year. He was on radiation and chemotherapy. Because of his sickness he is unable to work so Mariamma is taking care of the family. She is  in difficult situation, paying for his medication and running the family and he too is in need of medical help.

Visit to Shoshana Medical Centre, Swarna

Visit to Shoshana Medical Centre at Swarna village on 6/10.

Sharing a few pics from the health centre and the area around.

Came to know from the villagers that Swarna village has around 5000 houses and the area where we have our health centre,  has about 300 houses.


Health centre is in a backward christian area and the nurse Jayaraju has been working here for the last 3 years.

 The village has a Government Primary health centre but it is away from this place. For old people especially who can't walk that far , get their B.P check ups and sugar tests  done. Women with small kids  get their first aid help for small wounds and necessary medicine for seasonal diseases.

Visit to Shoshana Sewing Centre, Giripuram,Vijayawada.

The Managing Director of Shoshana-Germany, Mrs. Martha's visit to India in Oct-15. She is going to stay in Chirala, till the end of Oct-15 and will be visiting  different projects in this one month's time.


Our very first project visit on Monday, 5/10 and few pics and details from Shoshana Sewing centre, Giripuram, Vijayawada.

These group of women joined their tailoring course in Aug-15 and all of them are school drops ,some are married , some  of the girls are domestic helpers. They have no basic education so there is no other possibility for them except working as coolies or household helpers. This training would definitely give them an alternate opportunity of earning a better income.

Hemima , the instructor has 14 women as a group for this one year training course.

Former student of Hemima helping the new student

Giripuram is one of the slum areas of Vijayawada. Most of the people here are rod bending workers, coolies and rickshaw pullers. The houses are very closely built and the surroundings are very unhygienic. People
have lots of health problems. On the request of the local society, Shoshana decided to give out necessary medication to the needy people with the help of  a nurse visiting this area once a month .

At the sewing centre, we happened to meet the husband of one of the former students. He is 38 yr old and was a daily worker. He had a tumour in his brain and it was removed twice. Half of his skull was removed.  He needs a surgery asap once more to fix his skull, i mean a plate like thing to cover his brain.  So far his wife is taking care of the family and children. Because of his surgery he is not supposed to strain himself physically. Moreover they were not in a position to get better treatment.He came up to shoshana with a request for medical help .

Pics of Sewing projects, Narasaraopet

Indroduction of the new group of women in two sewing projects at Narasaraopet town.

Instructor Santamma with her students, Shalem nagar, Narasaraopet.

New group at Shoshana sewing centre, Navodaya nagar, Narasaraopet.

These  two groups of women stared their training at Shoshana sewing projects from July-15. All coming from different family backgrounds  like agricultural coolies, construction workers, cab drivers etc.

Each one has the same intention of using this training to assist a tailor  or to work on their own from home. Since all coming from needy background it is necessary for them to earn their living for their self help as well as support their families.

Pics from Shoshana Sewing centre, Giripuram, Vijayawada.

Pics from Shoshana sewing centre, Vijayawada City.


Sewing centre, located at Giripuram area, one of the slums in Vijayawada. Hemima the instructor has been giving her support for the past 10 yrs in different areas of Vijayawada for the self help of the women.

Hemima not only being a teacher for the sewing students but also taking  over all care for each woman.  This area is full of daily workers like construction workers, rod bending workers, domestic helpers etc. Most men are alcoholics and HIV patients. There is lot of domestic violence in this area.

So training in sewing and embroidery is providing an income for majority of the women  like women who are  victims of domestic violence, left by their husbands or who are taking care of their sick husbands etc.

Instructor Hemima is also taking care of their medical needs and providing them with basic medicines who are in need of help.

One such case:
Name of the student:  Lakshmi
One of the students from tailoring batch. 32 years of age, married. She has two small children.( 4yrs and 2yrs).

Left by her husband. Lakshmi is staying at her parents' house. Lost her father when she was young. Mother is old and sick. Lakshmi is working as a servant maid to take care of her family.

Presently she has Hernia problem and she needs surgery to get rid of the problem. She is very poor and she can't afford to pay for the surgery. Being the only working one in the family she has to work for the living in spite being in pain. She is asking her friends and relatives for help for the surgery. The local society came forward to help her to some extent but she needs more money. She is requesting Shoshana to please consider her case and help her to come out of the problem.

Have been to different medical projects in and around Chirala town and few pics from Shoshana Medical project, Swarna village.

The Nurse Mr. Raju has been taking care of two medical projects , one in Chirala and in Swarna. Depending on the need he is keeping himself available at both the projects.

Observed that  most of the people coming to the medical projects have acidity and Indigestion problems. People coming here are mostly agricultural coolies and daily workers. Usually they are having irregular eating habits. I think they need awareness camp regarding diet besides medication.

New pics from Shoshana sewing centre, Pedanandipadu village.

The instructor Mrs. Sivakumari has new group of women. Women not only from Pedanandipadu village also few students from near by villages coming either with an auto or bus.

Sivakumari has been working in this area for a long time so she is familiar as a tailor as well as teacher so many women are interested to join the course and she even has requests from other villages to start a centre in their area so they too will have an opportunity to get a free class.

The two girls in the above pics finished their schooling. Parents are illiterates and daily workers in agricultural fields. These girls sometimes helping their parents in fields or looking after the household work.

The woman in the middle is a school drop out and housewife, husband is a daily worker in oil mill.
All of them has no other better option to earn their living except working in fields. They are very much interested to utilize this free sewing class to support their families.