Participants: Jordan Ehrlich
Series Code: HIM
Program Code: HIM000014
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00:21 India is a land full of
00:26 contrasts It's a Land of great mystery and beauty 00:29 It's a land of unspeakable 00:32 despair But travelling through India, One thing is for sure 00:36 It's a land filled with people who should never be 00:41 underestimated For the last 40 00:42 years Asian Aid has invested in the futures of people 00:45 who have never been given such a 00:48 chance And their investment has proven infinite returns. 00:52 Driven by the vision of Helen 00:54 Eager, dedicated to helping those who have the least, 00:57 Asian Aid is an organization implementing diverse development 01:01 projects and sponsoring thousands of children... 01:05 Their outreach spans throughout Asia, from Bangladesh to Nepal, Sri Lanka and beyond... 01:10 From remote villages and empty fields to sprawling centers of 01:15 education... From nothing... to 01:19 the unimaginable Now, Asian Aid has decided to document the work it's been doing all these years 01:23 with a desire to show the world what is possible. 01:27 By digging wells in remote villages for clean drinking 01:31 water. And bringing much-needed healthcare to the women of Nepal 01:35 By providing an education for Orphans, Deaf and Blind children 01:38 giving them a sense of place, a 01:42 home. But what we really discovered was being given was 01:46 hope. Giving hope to children, giving hope to women, 01:50 Giving hope to the ones who 01:54 needed the most. This is Hope In 02:37 Motion. When I arrived in India, I had a lot of things on my mind 02:42 as a filmmaker. Sponsoring an orphan wasn't one of them. 02:46 My crew was stuck in the States dealing with the politics of 02:50 Indian visas. My equipment was with them, and we only had a 02:54 limited time in each place Asian Aid wanted us to visit. 02:58 At best, I would get about half the material we needed. 03:01 And at worst, the crew wouldn't make it to India before I had to return to the States. 03:06 So the last thing I expected to do was the first thing you shouldn't do as a filmmaker: 03:13 get involved. 03:18 My first day in India made my concerns seem rather small. 03:21 I found myself in one of those villages that you see on 03:25 television, you know the kind. 03:28 Children's faces moved in and out of my frame all day long. 03:32 I had seen these faces before-- distantly, on my TV or the 03:40 internet. Like everyone else, I 03:45 was insulated. In India, orphanages number in the 1,000s, 03:48 and I was about to start filming at one called the Elim Home 03:52 located on the outskirts of 03:56 Hyderabad. The kids that I was photographing at Elim seemed 04:00 well-adjusted. Stories of their parents' demise replaced by friends, meals, school and 04:06 playtime. I found myself having 04:09 fun with them. They were just 04:11 like my kids. Have you ever wondered what an orphan really 04:15 goes through when they're rescued off the street? 04:17 I wanted a chance to film the 04:20 process of a child transitioning 04:23 from life outside to life inside--the beginning. 04:26 So when Helen informed me of a new arrival, I grabbed the 04:30 camera just in time to meet a little girl named Keerthana at 04:53 the gate. Her mother had died three years ago when Keerthana 04:57 was two. Her father left for Mumbai, India to clean 05:01 commercial trucks, and he never 05:04 returned. A local pastor familiar with Keerthana's plight 05:08 took her in, planning to raise 05:14 her as his own. The plans changed, however, when Keerthana's stepmother 05:17 said they couldn't afford to 05:19 keep her. It's not uncommon for stepchildren to be abandoned 05:22 when the expenses can't be met. 05:25 So at age five, for the third time, 05:28 Keerthana was an orphan once 05:38 again. "How long do you think it will take her to transition 05:42 or to feel comfortable here?" 05:46 "It will take one week." 05:49 "Really?" 05:50 "Yes, one week to feel 05:52 comfortable because this is a new place, a new environment." 05:57 Honestly, Rueben and I didn't believe that Keerthana would 06:00 adjust to life in an orphanage in just one week. 06:12 "I was like mortified. 06:15 It was the most uncomfortable, I 06:20 mean, at one point I just 06:23 stopped the camera. Then I thought, you can't stop the camera, you gotta keep going. 06:26 Rueben's looking at me as he's snapping stills 06:29 and he's--we don't wanna get too 06:32 close-- she's looking at us like, you know, aren't you gonna 06:40 do something? "When I saw her, I 06:43 remembered my life when I first 06:46 came to Elim. You know, I'm just wondering because the pastor 06:49 brought me here and he was trying to leave. And I went all 06:53 over the campus looking for the 06:55 pastor. He, like, I could see him, and there were other boys 07:00 running behind me who held me back. But it really made me 07:08 worry. I could see that here's a little girl who just came 07:11 recently and she faced the same 07:13 problem. So I admit when I saw her--the pastor leaving her and 07:17 trying to hide, trying to be away from her. It was the same experience that I felt. 07:22 I had the same experience that little girl had. 07:35 "When Keerthana was dropped off, 07:38 she wouldn't stop crying. 07:42 You could tell that it was something traumatic for her. 07:46 Days afterward, she wouldn't talk to anyone, 07:49 she wouldn't go to school, she wouldn't go to study hall. 07:52 She would just be with the cooks, cutting vegetables." 08:01 The only father figure in Keerthana's memory had just 08:08 walked away. "So here's a real 08:11 tough situation. This pastor, earning less than $20 (US) a 08:14 month, has raised this child. And he just simply cannot afford 08:19 it anymore." The first night in the orphanage was rough. 08:22 She didn't sleep well, even though the orphanage gave her a 08:25 bed. She insisted on sleeping on 08:27 the floor. It's what she was 08:29 used to. "When I gave her a bed, she was so happy. But at nighttime she was coming down. 08:34 And we made her sleep again on 08:37 the bed. She ate very little 08:41 food when she came. Then the next thing that ended up 08:45 happening was that she didn't 08:48 have a sponsor. And so all of this chatter started happening 08:51 about how was she gonna stay 08:54 here. Because, you know, she just has to have a sponsor. 08:57 There's also questions about whether or not there's space 09:03 available. "I find that maybe 09:06 the hardest thing to do is to refuse some of the children 09:10 because we don't have enough 09:14 sponsors. But we try to take all the blind, all the deaf, all the 09:19 total orphans. But of course there are a lot of other tragic 09:23 situations, as well as those." 09:31 "The bottom line is that, I 09:34 just, that night, when we went back to the hotel, 09:38 I Skyped my family and I told Rebecca, I said, 09:44 Are you ready to sponsor a 09:49 little girl? She just like started crying, she said, "well, 09:58 just bring her home. In fact, I asked Helen, I said, Helen, can 10:02 we do something? I mean, Rebecca wants me to bring her home. 10:05 I said, if I can facilitate that, you know, that's what she 10:09 wants me to do. Helen said, she said no. She said, Listen, everything will be okay. 10:14 She's actually, it's better to 10:18 have her here. Because, she said, quite honestly it's very 10:21 difficult to be, you can't adopt these kids out of here. 10:24 Everybody in India gets a free shot at an orphan, 10:27 which sets them up for all kinds of abusive situations. 10:33 I started the process of becoming Keerthana's sponsor, 10:36 but it was time for me to leave. 10:39 There were more places to film, more faces to capture. 10:42 In two weeks I would return, 10:45 but I kept thinking about 10:48 Malithih's words about Keerthana assimilating within a week. 11:22 "A week, a week and a half after she was dropped off, 11:25 she started playing with the 11:28 children, she started eating 11:31 with us. At first she ate very 11:33 little. Keerthana was still a 11:36 little bit in shock. She was, you could tell she was trying to 11:42 take everything in." With 70 kids at Elim Home, I figured Keerthana would quickly 11:45 disappear into the crowd. 11:50 By the time I returned, the rest of my film crew had 11:52 caught up with me in India. 11:55 They brought with them school supplies, some clothes, and 11:58 gifts that Rebecca and the kids had put together back in the 12:03 States. Given the high level of emotion surrrounding Keerthana 12:06 when I left I wasn't expecting much of a positive outcome. 12:10 I was wrong. 12:22 "When she came first, I used to get after her, 12:26 but now she's after me and after all the kids. 12:29 She's very playful, and she says now she's very happy to be at 12:35 Elim." "She truly has settled in. She's settled in to school, 12:38 and, you know, I've spent some time with her, 12:42 I got her introduced to my family on Skype. 12:45 And I'm looking forward to-- and so is my family-- 12:48 to that day that investment pays 12:51 off. It's already paying off now, but I look forward to that 12:55 day when she finishes her degree, whatever it is that she 12:59 wants to do, and that she's able to take her rightful place in 13:04 society. And she's gonna be able to live a principled life. 13:08 I think it's great." 13:16 I realize every orphan success story starts here. 13:19 They're dropped off. 13:21 And all they need is someone to take them in, 13:24 someone to believe in them, 13:26 someone to give them hope. |
Revised 2014-12-17