Sambhali Trust was started 5 years ago with the intention of helping women and girls from poor families or lower castes learn to read and write. Often in Indian families, if there is not enough money to send all the children to school, then only the boys will be sent, while the girls will stay at home to help their mother with the housework. At Sambhali, as well as learning to read and write in Hindi, the girls learn basic English and Maths. In the afternoons they also learn sewing and embroidery.For the graduates of the school the trust has started a sewing centre where the women make various items such as stuffed toy elephants and camels that are sold in the Sambhali boutique. This provides them with a small income and enables them some financial independence.

In addition to the school in Jodhpur, the trust has also opened a school in Sitrawa, a town of about 3000 people, about 100km from Jodhpur. This school is for both boys and girls aged between 5 and 10 or so. During my first week in Jodhpur I taught English and Maths and helped out in the boutique. Although the students do not speak a lot of English they are keen to learn and were excited to meet a new volunteer. At a meeting of the first day, Govind (the director of Sambhali) told me about the background of the girls. Some of the girls have quite difficult home lives, with abusive, alcoholic or absentee parents. Attendance at the school is often sporadic. Today I noticed one girl disappeared part way through the lesson. When I asked the other students where she had gone, they told me that her husband had told her to come home. It is difficult to imagine this kind of situation happening in New Zealand! However despite all this, the students for the most part seem like normal teenagers/young women and it is easy to forget the difficult situations from which they have come. In the last few week I have also been working at a shelter home for children, which is a new project that the Sambhali Trust is getting involved in. The children here are mainly girls, and although many of them do in fact have parents, their parents are unable to look after them for one reason or another. Some of the girls have been abandoned at the railway station. I am not certain but I wonder whether this is because they are girls and the parents know they will not be able to afford the dowry when it is time for them to marry. In some situations the parents are in 'prison'. The 'prison' is next door to the shelter home. The 'inmates' appear to be unmarried pregnant teenagers and women with psychiatric problems. The children themselves are really lovely.. they hardly speak any English but are always so excited to see us. We spend some of the time there teaching English, but we also spend a lot of time playing games..over the last few days I have been playing cricket with them, at least the cricket jargon seems fairly universal! I can't help wondering what the future is for these children though. Some of them go to school, but some of them, even though they are 8 or 9 years old do not go... without an education, I think life will be difficult for these girls...It makes me realise how fortunate we are in New Zealand to have a relatively good education system that is available (at least until the age of 16) to all!