Summer in South Asia

Academically, I was able to actively compare my experience in India to similarities I found in stratification when I went back home to Egypt. This was especially prominent in the conversations I had with my friends in Egypt after the trip and tying together the cross cultural similarities between the stratification in both countries and how that impacts one’s vulnerability to certain situations. I was even able to take it a step further and compare social standards influence on vulnerabilities…

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My first half of the trip I was mainly doing work around the Sneha shelter, but the second half I was working with another initiative Sanlaap had started, which is the Child Protection Programme. This was a programme where drop in centers in red-light districts act as a place catering to children living in red-light districts where they can find security and are provided education, health services, and opportunities to build their skills. This was my favorite work at Sanlaap….

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Though I don’t have enough time to travel outside of Kolkata,  the city has so many beautiful buildings and spots that I’m not sure if I will be able to visit all the places I want to in time. One of my favorite visits was the Birla Mandir. I was in the Sanlaap office one day and finished work early and so I walked around the area to explore and realized I was quite close to it. The architecture of…

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I have been pretty busy during the week, so I haven’t had much time to see the city. Ramadan has started so it is getting hard to do a lot after work because I often am too tired from fasting and go to sleep right after I break my fast at sundown . What has helped is that more recently a lot of the work has been remote. I have been doing my fieldwork one or twice a week while…

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I returned from India a little over a month ago and in the time I have been back, I have been able to reflect on my time there. Living in India and working was an experience like no other that I have had in my life. I found a new freedom while there and a new sense of confidence in myself and my ability to navigate the world. When I think back to what my trip involved, from traveling alone,…

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My first few days have gone quite well. While I was planning my trip to India, I was in contact with my NGO but they suddenly became unresponsive when it came near my time to come here. They had said they would send me my agenda and I never got any information. So my first day, I woke up and went to the address of the NGO and asked for the person I had been contacting, Shruti. She came out…

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Last week I had the opportunity to tour and meet with people from Sulabh, an organization based in Delhi that deals with sanitation work. They are known for their International Museum of Toilets which is included on many lists of odd museums in the world. Like the organization I work for, Sulabh does have some work that deals with manual scavenging. I went to Sulabh with the other SKA intern who is also from America and a coworker from SKA…

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Over the past week and half, I have had the opportunity to do some field visits with SKA. For the particular project I am working on, the field visits have involved meeting with women who are in rehabilitation programs provided by SKA. These women are all of the lower caste and the majority have been employed in manual scavenging at some point in their life. They were selected by SKA to join a rehabilitation program due to how bad their…

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The intensity of my work has drastically picked up these last two weeks. I haven’t been leaving the office until around seven and will probably start working 6 days a week moving forward. The environment of SKA is very different from what I am used to. People tend to work seven days a week. Instead of every one sitting at their own computer station/cubicle to do work, people often sit together and are relatively social. The head of SKA, Mr….

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While in Delhi I am working at an NGO called Safai Karmachari Andolan. This NGO focuses on eradicating the practice of manual scavenging and rehabilitating those who have been employed in the practice. My first day at work involved a bit of shock when I learned that my boss had anticipated that I would be able to speak Hindi. Luckily, the majority of the people in the organization speak some English, though for most it is not a comfortable mode…

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