Travels to India: Hope Amid Harsh Realities

Orphanage Care


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Our normal expectation of an orphanage was of a sad place, with kids sitting in corners lost in deep melancholy. But these kids were all smiling and laughing with one another, and each girl possessed a deep and fiery spirit to give back to her community. Khaja, a 10-year-old girl, wants to be an engineer and build robots, while little Afiya dreams of being a pilot and soaring the skies of India. Ghouse was the only boy at the orphanage, brought in at the age of two after having seen his mother buried in the ground and spending the next 13 months at the hostel scratching the earth in search of her. Now as a six year old, he dreams of becoming a police officer to protect the people of his community. It’s not every day you meet girls as hopeful and uplifting as these beautiful souls. The bond and love I saw between all of them is a relationship quite contrary to the one I have with my own sisters — one that is devoid of any quarrels or complaints. They didn’t have biological families, but created their own in the little space they had. I wouldn’t trade anything in the world than to have known them.