Barefoot College
Barefoot College
We spent 6 days in Pushkar. It must have been a godsend for the Banjare family to have Kaare visiting. Now they are sitting inside a small, but self-owned home, and they got their own camel. He went with the family to the larger neighbour city Ajmer, where he bought bicycles to the children, something they probably never have had before. Food was also bought, and during the evenings we ate various meat dishes, of lamb, chicken and rabbit, while sitting in the open in the desert. Meat and eggs are not served in the restaurants in the holy city Pushkar. Alcohol is not openly available either, after all this is Brahma’s city, so a traditional vegetarian Hindi cuisine is practiced here. I do not really miss the meat when I am here – with the food philosophy that is practiced here, one could provide food for the whole planet.
I got a message on Facebook saying that Pushkar only was a theater scenery, that everything is fake, fake, fake… I consider Pushkar to be a pearl. OK, it is a tourist magnet, and one can end up as one of those, going shopping and exploring in the small alleys in Pushkar. We spent most of the time in the desert with our gypsy friends. If one only sees the scenery, it will mostly be empty and fake, but we met people who now have become our friends. Pushkar is a small and easy place to start a journey in India.
African women at Barefoot College
One day we drove two hours to “Barefoot College” (barefootcollege.org) which is an Indian, eco-aware organization which makes solar collectors, solar panels and other devices to bring lighting and heat to villages. Here women are educated on how to produce and operate solar collectors and other solar cell technology through a six months course. When we visited, there were students from several places in Africa, Yemen and Ukraine etc. attending the courses. The organization was founded in 1972 and has educated thousands of women, who have brought light and knowledge to small isolated societies around the world. I thought this might be interesting for our Banjare friends, but they did not seem interested when we were there. -We are pulling through, they said. -We have always lived this way, and it is sufficient for us. But a they did want a rechargeable radio. Kaare filled in on this too, and now there will also be music in the small house in the desert.
Barefoot College
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