Everyone is back in good health today so the kids and I went for a visit to the orphanage. We took the same local train which dear son and I used to take almost every day to go see the girls while they were still in orphanage care. We traveled the same route which we walked daily for over three months. My son was only two years old, the girls only 18 months so they remember none of this from before.

Everyone at the orphanage, Shraddhanand Mahilashram, remembered us. They enjoyed seeing the girls, now six years old and, of course, now looking much older and different.

There is one sad point in today’s journey for me. To get to the ashram we always rode the local train and would come and go from the Kings Circle railway station. We would get down at Kings Circle, then walk about six blocks or so to the ashram. Frequent visitors that we were, some of the small children who lived in the slum areas along side the station became very friendly with us and would watch for us daily.

At the station there were two older girls, probably age 13 or so named Rahki and Peeka who would help me in the beginning and make sure I got on the right train headed toward home. Krishna loved them and they would play and entertain him as I waited, which was very welcome after a long day. I had hoped to find them again. Sadly, their tiny homes have been demolished and they have been relocated.

The homes in which they lived with their families were built near the base of the stairway leading to the train platform. It was not their land, but railway property. This happens frequently in Mumbai where entire homeless families have taken over sidewalks and roadway ditch areas as well. Their encampment begins simply as a tent and when no one removes them it is natural to begin to accumulate items and from there it isn’t long before first one permanent wall is built and then another beginning the transformation from tent to a more permanent structure. Before you know it . . . there’s an entire little neighborhood where there was none before! This said, I do understand why our friends were forced to move. Hundreds if not thousands of families were relocated who had built illegal housing along railway land.

Besides not being able to find these children again, the other thing which bothers me is what has been left in place of all these homes which have been demolished. Their tiny homes, although huts not much larger than my full-size bed, and although made from a bit of this and a bit of that and whatever they could find to provide the necessary shelter. Although they were not much to look at from a architectural standpoint, these tiny homes were kept spotlessly clean and it was obvious the amount of pride these people held in keeping their surroundings as neat and tidy as possible. So what is in their place now? Trash and six foot tall weeds. So sad.