My NGO: Niramaya Health Foundation

Went to visit Niramaya Health Foundation today. Its basically three small rooms in a part of Mumbai called Dadar. The associate director of AVSAR took me on the train again, I was a little more comfortable this time around. We spent about 45 minutes there, 30 of which were spent waiting for the woman who we were supposed to meet with to show up. They made it clear that they are not sure what they want me to work on because I am their first non-medical student volunteer. So basically, I am an "experiment" to see if the business side would benefit from volunteers. Talk about pressure. They advised me to take the bus there, but since I've been on the train for the past two days, the bus is going to be a whole new experience (and this time its going to be on my own). That will be Thursdays adventure.

Tomorrow is a holiday - the annual Ganapati festival.

Here's some info about it : The modern history of the Ganapati festival dates back to 1894, when the Maratha politician and Indian nationalist, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, or "Beloved of the People", gave it a distinct political face. Though the festival had largely been a private affair, where each family purchased an idol of Ganesh and then took it out in procession on Ganesh Chaturthi before immersing it in the river, pond, or tank, it had not been without its public and community aspect, since often several families pooled their resources to buy a larger-sized idol. But one of Tilak’s achievements was to make the Ganapati festival the vehicle for the aspirations of the Maratha people as well as those of other Indians who desired independence from British tutelage. Henceforth, the Ganapati festival was to become a largely public affair.