Adventures in India
It has only been a week since we last emailed you about our adventures in India but it feels like months to us! We have been so busy the time has warped. We are now in Kolar, the town where Mike spent two years in the Peace Corps and where we wanted to begin our water filter project. We have been here for four days and we already have a workshop site, people to work in the workshop and probable orders for 200 filters!!!
The people here have been hospitable beyond words. Whatever we want we get. We are working through the local Rotary club to establish ourselves in this area. One Rotarian, Ramachandre Gowda, has been an absolute saint. He has been with us every day since we arrived. He is an engineer by profession and offered us his factory area to establish our workshop. Today a contractor poured a slab of concrete for part of the manufacturing area. We have all of the tools we need and Monday after the slab cures we will pour our first filter!
Wednesday night we spoke at the Rotary Club of Kolar weekly meeting and people seemed excited about our project. Friday night we will attend the meeting of the Rotary Club of Bangalore Cubbon Park to do a slide show presentation. A week from Sunday we are attending a district Rotary meeting where they expect 600-700 people in attendance from 70-something Rotary clubs in this area. Ramachandre is going to ask the current district governor if we can have 10 minutes to speak about our water filter project. Ah….the power of Rotary!
Our expectations for what we could accomplish in 30 days in India has already been exceeded. As we continue to have success implementing this project we keep raising the bar of our expectations.
Not only have we advanced our water filter program, but the Rotary Club of Hamden will collaborate on a second water project with the Rotary Club of Kolar to provide pure drinking water at three public bus stations which each service up to 5,000 people per day. Our Rotary club has agreed to match a contribution by the Rotary Club of Kolar which we hope will be matched by the Rotary International Foundation in the form of a Rotary matching grant. This was an unexpected opportunity to do a lot of good with relatively few dollars.