Day 75 : Tuesday May 25th. RTU

G.Kalluppatti is hundreds of miles from the sea, and I guess not the best place in the world for buying fish, so the classic English meal of 'fish and chips' wasn't really on. I decided to go for 'egg, chips & beans', with a glass of beer followed by ice cream and fresh fruit. In the morning I got the main ingredients with the help of Arokiaraj, who is in charge of the Nutrition Programme at RTU. He had some potatoes and there were some eggs in the fridge and he found some green beans and some 'butter beans' too. I went for the green beans. We found some ice cream in the fridge and a mango in the kitchen and Arokiaraj picked up the remaining ingredients from local shops. After peeling and chopping the potatoes and heating up some oil, I had a try at frying a chip, but it came out burnt on the outside and raw on the inside. Disaster. I can't recall ever cooking chips before, although I must have done. I do remember seeing a deep fat fryer in the kitchen at home a good 20 years ago, but did I ever use it? I'm not sure. I may have given the appearance of cooking with it, trying to impress the children with home made chips, but actually I'd probably be just be following quiet tips from Jacinta who really does know how to cook. I decided to boil the uncooked chips in water for a few minutes to get the insides cooked a bit, and to then fry them in the oil. It worked. Meanwhile, the beans were boiled to death. I fried and egg on a plate used for making dosai (a bit like a pancake). As Brother James turned up for lunch, I sat him down with a tray, and a knife and fork (here the right hand is normally used for eating - knives and forks are not. Occasionally spoons may be used, but rarely). On the tray I put a tiny jug filled with vinegar, and some salt, and on an extra plate a pile of bread and butter. And one tumbler of beer. Job done. It had been forty years since he'd had a proper unhealthy plate of chips. I'm not sure it was worth the wait, but he scoffed the lot.

In the evening I went to a village where a special meeting/celebration was taking place. A number of 'self-help groups' were meeting to mark their anniversary. Within each group, between 16 and 19 women met together on a regular basis to help each other. They would talk to each other, listen to speakers, debate issues and they would also save together. Their collective savings are banked, and the government gives additional money to the group after a certain period of time, providing they remain together. Individuals within the group can borrow against the group's assets at no interest. It is a very important programme, because through it the women can become financially independent and have a greater voice in family affairs and in the village. Collectively, the women can avoid the money lenders who used to cause so many problems in the past, where families would easily get into terrible debt. Such families were always in serious trouble because the moneylenders would never relax their grip on them. The desperately poor were forced to become poorer and very quickly too. Family relationships deteriorated often with terrible and tragic consequences. RTU has 92 self-help groups for women.

On the way back, our path was blocked in one village because of a festival, so an alternative route was found, which led through a village called Kottarpatti. In this village, thirty years before, I had built a school, with the generous help of my family, friends and the people of Middleton. It was good to see that the school still stood.

As we moved towards RTU, the sun was descending behind the hills of Kodaikanal. It reminded me of the many times I'd watched the sun going down whilst thinking of home and the people I loved. Then, as now, I was thinking about Jacinta.