Guria India Blog

Guria purchased 70 goats and distributed them to women in four rural villages in the Mau district. These women live in poverty and are vulnerable targets for sex trafficking, and the goats provide them with alternate means of livelihood to support their families. The goats are cheap to keep, yield practical products, and regularly produce offspring that can be sold.

The Guria community celebrated Holi two days early at the Varanasi Non-Formal Education center. Armed with bags full of  gulal  (colored powder), the children threw, sprinkled and rubbed color on each other. The festivities continued until, coated in  gulal , there was not a recognizable child to be found. Special Indian sweets  langleta  and  soan papdi  were served and fun was had by all.

Women’s Day is a celebration of appreciation for woman all over the world. In honor of the holiday, Guria hosted festivities at their Non-Formal Education center in Varanasi. The interns from Princeton University in America wore saris, and took a lot of pictures with and of the kids in the center.  Afterwards, Guria’s special guest Devorah Vester (Princeton intern Hannah Vester’s mother) taught the children American dances. The kids thoroughly enjoyed the dance classes and picked up the moves very quickly! The festivities came to an end with Bollywood dancing and candies from America for all of the kids.  

Guria received over 40 postcards from the fundraiser at Princeton University that took place on December 1 st , 2012. Past Guria interns hosted a concert at the University and sold postcards to students who could write a short message to the children at Guria’s Non Formal Education Center. The post cards will be displayed in the Shivdaspur NFE Center for all of the kids to see. Thank you to the Princeton students for their kind messages, and our past interns for organizing the fundraiser!!

The current Princeton Bridge Year volunteers at Guria were sitting in a café when they heard other customers nearby say one of their names. They turned around, thinking the other customers were addressing them, but it was only a coincidence that they referred to someone with the same name. After exchanging questioning glances, the volunteers started talking with one of those customers, first about the coincidence, and then about their experiences so far in India. They talked at length about their work with Guria. He was inspired by the efforts of the organization to end human trafficking, and their fearless presence in the red-light areas. After talking with the volunteers, he generously donated 10,000 rupees to Guria. We are incredibly thankful for his kind donation!

We recently hosted five volunteers from Global College, Long Island Univeristy, who spent three weeks in Varanasi as part of a year-long course on Comparative Religion and Culture. In addition to playing games with the kids at the Non-Formal Education center and helping out with English and Computer classes, they helped beautify the building by painting a mural on one of its walls, adding to the many murals painted over the years by various volunteer groups. We thank them for their help!

Guria’s Non-Formal Education center in Varanasi celebrated the holiday season and the New Year on Tuesday January 8 th . The center shook with dhol music, played from the rooftop of the new building (Kabir House). Everyone that attended the celebration gathered on the rooftop around the drummers for dancing.  The traditional Indian dessert halwa was prepared on the days leading up to the festival and served along with a Christmas cake. All who attended had a great time ringing in the New Year and celebrating the holidays!