Warangal, Andhra Pradesh - 9th Feb 2011

“Have we reached Walangar?” Rakesh asks as he wakes up in the bus and looks out the window.

We pass through the town and see all the ads and stuff. Sister mentions that the Telegu script looks like Kannada. Sister and Prashanth can read it, but cant understand anything. Interesting..

The interaction we have at St. Anne’s School of Nursing is a little more different from the rest as they bring up the issue of dowry and abortion. Being all girls, they understood the importance of women empowerment and women’s rights and how they should not be doormats in society. They spoke with great vigour about not taking dowry and since they were all nurses, they were particularly sensitive to the issue of abortion and female foeticide.

One girl got up and said towards the end of the session how people look down upon nurses. How they don’t get respect. She said people take them for granted and don’t value the work they do. I want to say that as women, and especially as nurses and caretakers, these young girls deserve a lot more respect than we’re giving them. They have the knowledge and expertise to be caretakers and in most cases the doctor will examine and diagnose the patient, but it is the nurses who take over after that and bring the patient back to health. People tend to take advantage of all they do for us without realizing how much effort and care goes into it. It’s not right and the least we can do is to acknowledge their work and concern for us. It’s a genuine appeal to all to help change this situation. The world needs more love, especially here, where it should be natural to be grateful to the person who is taking care of you when you can't do that for yourself.

At JMJ Degree College Hostel for girls, the girls were hyperactive!! They were the loudest bunch we’ve come across yet! As Fr. Jayarao announced each of the K2K team they went wild with cheers! And all the boys got extra loud and high pitched screams! They weren’t complaining..

When Father introduced me, he said I was someone dangerous to be wary of coz of the weapon in my hands. This is what I ‘shot’ just then.. (The expressions!)

During the interaction, many things came up including the Telangana issue, which is a burning topic here. Someone came up and asked Rakesh that the K2K team came and discussed all these issues, but they wanted to know what we were doing for to fix them. 

“You all came and told us about these things, but what steps are you taking to change them?”

Rakesh explained that our purpose was not to come and fix the problems ourselves, but to inspire and motivate the young people who want to see a change in the things around them, to be able to stand up, speak out and make that change. The main thing is to be aware. We want to spread awareness about all these issues so that a change can be brought about. So many matters of concern aren’t addressed simply because people aren’t aware of them.

Rakesh later interviewed some of the girls separately and found out that they knew what was happening around them to some extent, but were more focused on what they wanted, rather than what the actual situation was. And some of them were blindly following the herd without a true understanding of what they were supporting. 

He said that young people of today keep complaining about the policies and the bills that get passed by the government which have no benefit for them or the situation of today. They feel that they should also have a say in the decision making process. He then said that each time a new bill is introduced, it is put up on the website of the related House for public viewing before it is passed. How many people actually knew this? If people knew about it, they would see it. If they saw it and didn’t like something about it, they would say so. If they said so, the thing could be modified. If the thing got modified, there would be more happy people (especially young people) in the country and less anger, fighting and unrest.

Nowdays the access to information is so much easier than it was before, with the internet leading all the methods. I believe there is a solution to everything, but being aware of the whole situation and its parts is very important. Each person has the potential to change something he or she wants to. I just hope people recognise that within themselves and just take that 1^st step towards positive change. Once you take that 1^st step, the rest aren’t so hard.