Curry, heat, monkeys and mango's..

I am back from India, the colour, cacophony, the assault on your senses all linger as I sit here back in my ordered world. My son asked me what my 'stickwithyou moment " was. Good question! One of three. First the hunger of some of the teachers to get their hands on the books I had taken over about the Olympics. There fingers were twitching  arms out, they WANTED those books. I asked them how they and their students access information- they can't, don't and yet so want to. Secondly- a young eight year old girl at a school we visited, so poor, covered in sores, minimal food, yet pleased she was allowed to go to school and learn. Here is hoping a meaningful education will allow her to break free of the poverty that finds her hopeless. Last one-  in the heat and downpour of the monsoon, finding ourselves in this bookshop, dripping soaking wet. This bookshop had every new book you could think of, stacked cover on cover maybe 20 high, it had Game of  Thrones, Rick Riordan Books, Hunger Games- I was surprised. But here is the thing- in the schools we work with, families have $50.00 a month to live off, so books are a non thought, a dream, a luxury. They are there in India- but not for those that worry more about shoes for kids, the cost of rice and dahl, and if they can rustle up school fee's.
So what is my response- well I need also to rustle up some funds to buys the books that are there and donate them to the schools for the kids to access free. In the mean time- I will look out my window here at work and gaze on the over 10,000 books in the library and hope the kids here value what others cannot have.
It is good to be back, but the  movies in my head play the scenes of another land. Maybe I need an intermission!