@GCCMorganIll |
Being selected to perform as a International cheerleader on Sony
for Extraaa Innings IPL6 is truly an honor as well as hard work. To give you an
idea, we've completed a consecutive 50 work days! Long, tiring hours at the
studio but every second of it has been worth it.
Dharavi entering industrial areas |
Fortunately, I was able to attend a walking tour with my
teammates to visit one of the biggest slums in Mumbai, Dharavi. Dharavi is
actually the slum that the movie "Slumdog Millionaire" was filmed in.
This tour is designed to show people Dharavi's unique strengths &
opportunities as well as challenges & issues in order to help raise
awareness and break down the negative impression many people have about slums.
We took a 2.5 hour long walk through the industrial & residential
parts of Dharvai. All the proceeds of the tour were given back to the community!
Dharavi, also known as "the heart of Mumbai", may look like just a
dirty slum for poor people on the outside, but I'm so thankful that I was able
to experience walking through it and seeing it with my own eyes because I've
never seen so many hard workers in my entire life!
Residential area |
We first experienced the industrial portion of Dharavi. This
part of the slum is where everyone works and makes a living. The workers cannot
afford to pay rent for a house in Dharavi, therefore they sleep in the
buildings where they work. The owners of each business have no problem with
this because they don't need to pay for security to watch over their businesses
at night, as well as not having to worry that their workers will be late in the
morning! This is why we see so many people sleeping on the ground and around
their work areas. The legal working age in India is 14 years old, but it was
not uncommon to see boys as young as 8 or 9 years old working hard in factories
to help support their families. There are even some jobs in the recycling
business that require the workers to breath in toxic fumes every day,
shortening their life expectancy, and yet they still work for more than 12
hours a day in order to provide for their families. I felt extremely blessed to
see this. Every person there was hard at work for hours a day just to provide
and survive.
Next we toured the residential part of Dharavi. Yes, those
little "shack" looking houses. There are about 1 million people live
in Dharavi. The houses are all extremely close together, in order to make space
for the vast amount of people. Families stick together, and generation after
generation will continue to live there as they take great pride in the fact
that they've built their homes. As we walked around, we saw women making food
from scratch and washing clothes with soap and water on the ground, as well as
children playing and finding joy in the simplest of things. What a joy it was
to see small children that have barely any clothes on and walking around with
no shoes laughing with huge smiles on their faces just by playing drums on old
rusty pots & pans, and sliding down a slide that they've made on their own
from aluminum leaning up against a tree. I thought about some of the kids in
back home that act as if they can't have fun without their iPads, Phones, &
Playstations and helped me to put things in perspective. With all the houses
being so extremely close to one another (literally on top of each other!) there
was a huge sense of community and pride for what they've built and where they
live! It was an amazing feeling. Everyone was so welcoming, yelling "hi,
hello!" as we walked past them, and children sprinting up to us to shake
our hands and touch our blonde hair!
This tour definitely will open your eyes to a different
life-style than anything we have seen. It was an experience that will forever
change how I look at life and an experience I hope many Americans get the
privilege to see someday.
I hope to make a trip back to India sometime soon because there
is so much more I would love to see and do.
That's all for now, stay posted for GCC Sarah's blog next week!
Love,
Morgan