The recipients of TCV Pocket Money Fund in winter program 2012

Last year when we started the Pocket Money Fund for those children who have not been out from TCV grounds since they started their stay there, 78 children benefited from this fund. They were each given 300 Rupees as pocket money to go on their trip.
This year we have 143 students again benefited from this program and we managed to raise their pocket money to 500 rupees each due to the generosity of various donors. These children/ teens were divided into 4 groups:-

One group consisting of 70 children will be travelling down to Hunsur Settlement and will spend their holidays at Gyurme Monastery learning Buddhism, dialectics, Tibetan language etc. besides touring around the Settlement. The group comprises of children from all TCV branch schools and will be leaving for Hunsur on 7th January.

The second group consisting of 13 children from TCV Suja. They will be traveling to Pondichery on 12th January to spend three weeks in Auroville and stay at the Tibet Pavilion. Different activities including cycling, swimming on the beach etc., are being arranged there. For them, it is a rare treat as Suja is not near to any ocean nor lake and during the winter months the temperature is very cold. To have a suntan and doing outdoor sports are something they can only dream of.

The third group of another 18 children will be traveling to Nepal to spend their winter holidays in Kathmandu and Pokhara. This is being taken care by TCV Allumni Association of Kathmandu and Pokhara.

The last group of 42 students, is on pilgrimage in Boddhgaya now and they are the graduating students of the Tailoring and Thangka Painting School in Patlikuhl. This is arranged every year for the students who complete their training course. Most of them came from Tibet and they have no source of income while they are in India.

Since we have a balance of 65,923 rupees from last year and this year's donation, it is not enough to meet the total amount of 71,500 rupees this year. Two of our VE members have donated an amount of 8,381 rupees to meet the amount required. Therefore now a balance of 2,804 rupees is left in the account. We hope to get more donations during the year in order to give pocket money to more students for winter program 2013. Therefore, we appeal to you and your friends to compassionately think about the next batch of students in the forthcoming year and hope that we can continue to support this winter program in order to let these children have a view of the world outside TCV.

  

Our Year End Report

Our Dear Friends, Partners and Supporters of Varada Effort,

Time flies and we are already two years old! Many events have taken place within our group since October 2010. Our members have doubled. All armed with a variety of professional skills, that has enabled us to render help in more diversified areas than just providing material help.

For our toilet project in Namgyal Monastery, we have handed all our collections of money from selling merchandise and outright donations ( please refer to our blog for the total amount collected) to the monastery. We are now awaiting for the toilet seats to be installed up by their foreman. In order to save water usage, since this being a big challenge in India today, 4 units of waterless toilets were purchased from Canada and shipped to Dharamsala in late April. Much delay was caused due to the complications in clearance of the goods. The experience of handling the custom and dealing with shipping rules in India was not only an unforgettable and educating experience but also an eye opener for me. On the other hand, I have learnt much about construction constraints and the making of a toilet...perhaps an extra skill for me in the future should there be any opening for a foreman in constructing toilets !

 

We managed to give some workshops to the students in TCV on lifeskill to better equip them when they go out to the real working world. This has taught them how to handle pressure from unfavorable elements which might lead them astray into consuming intoxicants. We also managed to train a Tibetan teacher in this area so that he will be able to follow up on our work should the necessity arises in the future.

Our on going Pocket Money Fund in TCV will provide a sum of 500 Rupees of pocket money to each child this year instead of 300 Rupees as done in last year. 78 students took part in last year’s winter program. Our fund raised during the year, will be able to provide for at least 100 students this time round. We are still waiting for TCV HQ to determine how many students will be selected to spend their first holiday out of the school grounds this winter. Do look out for our updates in our blog regarding this. We also like to appeal for your continual support in this program by donating to this fund.

At the moment, we are also trying to get different organisations to sponsor children books, specialised books for not only TCVs, but also LTWA library and some smaller community libraries started by individuals. Anyone who is willing to donate any amount of books is welcomed. Please contact us and we will try to arrange to collect the books from you. We hope to be able to send some books over by spring next year.

For 2013, we have started an ambitious project that will help more sentient beings not only in India but also in Sri Lanka. We will be doing cattle liberations in Sri Lanka in June and these cows saved from the slaughterhouse will be given to poor villagers to help them with their daily chores and also providing milk for the household. On top of this, we are dedicating the merits accumulated to our beloved guru His Holiness the Dalai Lama as a birthday present to pray for his long life. This project has been an overwhelming success since we launched it in our blog slightly more than two months ago. Due to the great compassion of the public, to date, we have bookings for nearly 220 cows, more than double of our original target of 108 cows. More than 500 individuals and several Buddhist groups from Malaysia, Taiwan, India and other countries have participated in this. Due to your kindness, not only 220 cows will be saved but, approximately 1,000 villagers will benefit from your kind act. Deeply touched by all you practitioners of the paramita of generosity, we sincerely thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

In June next year, we will be arranging for several batches of mini pilgrimage tours to Sri Lanka so that donors who are interested in witnessing the liberation ceremony can join us in this spiritual journey. Details of the tour will be released in another week or so. Do keep a look out for it! We would like to share this joy of giving with you!

As the year is coming to an end, on behalf of Varada Effort, we wish you a happy holiday season and a bright new year ahead.

Best wishes,

Rita
on behalf of the team from Varada Effort

        The receipt from Namgyal Monastery for the remainder money received for the toilet project