If my heart can believe it, I know I can achieve it

This year Ganesh Chathurthi was indeed a very special one. It was on a Sunday - so lots of time to enjoy (not by watching T.v. programme). So what made it very special - it's none other than my own apartment which made me enjoy this day. Being in a cosmopolitan city, staying in apartment is inevitable. I had never liked staying in an apartment because I lose my free space to have my garden. But this day, I felt - yes - apartment life has its own value. Hmm... Ganesh Chathurthi starts with collecting money from apartment people even a month before. I used to wonder why they need so much money - where there are 125 houses in this apartment. This time I saw why they need it. They had arranged for a Pooja and it started nearly in the noon. It was a huge crowd - I saw many new faces only that day. And Pooja of course was followed by delicious prasadam... :) Don't wonder if I am saying the delicious prasadam took me to such happy tones!!!! It is the evening cultural programme that gave a new meaning to all these functions. Yes, the cultural committee had organized for a nice programme - dance and music by some external party. So wondering what's special in the dance and music. It is special because it was performed by children who cannot see. It was from an NGO called "Samarthanam" in Bangalore. I have heard about people who cannot see dancing - but this is the first time I saw it. I should say I was spell-bound looking at their performance. The programme started with a prayer. It was sung by -------- (I am poor in remembering names. :)). She had a really good voice and her performance was also good. But the way, she entered the stage is worth mentioning. She had dressed so well, entered the stage with no shy. She was shown where the steps were and she was on the stage. Their coordinator just showed her where she has to stand (middle of the stage) and yes she had begun singing with her fine tuned voice. The next program was again a song and this time it was not just that girl, but she had 4 other people sing with her and a guy playing drums for their song. The guy was partially blind - just managing with one eye. After the song she introduced her mates and we were surprised to know she is working as a part time singer performing smaller stage shows and it is she who trains her friends to sing. (Who said you need eyes to teach??) The next performance was the one that made me really surprise. It was a dance by 3 of the people who had come down to the apartment for the performance. The coordinator took the 3 of them to the stage, held their hands and started working across the stage. And those 3 had been counting the number of steps in each direction - they had virtually measured the length and breadth of the stage. Now they were left in their positions and a Lord Nataraja statue was placed at one corner of the stage. Then started their performance with the usual beginning prayer steps followed in dance. And yes, everyone among the audience was surprised to see the coordination between them. I was reminded of the school drills we used to practice where each of us would be performing with different counts - though we had performers all around us and we could have easily seen them and measured the speed. These people did not need the line of sight to know their coordination. They were perfectly in sync and the first dance ended with all 3 of them showering flowers exactly on the Lord Nataraja statue placed on the stage. I don't deny the fact that the steps were not really perfect. Of course, it is not trained dancer like Ms. Padma Subramaniam dancing there. It is a person who got trained themselves fighting against their disability. Train them - they might turn out to be god's master piece. So the program continued with few other songs and 2 more dance performance. We had the coordinator delivering the thanking speech. Apart from the usual donation strategies there was something else which he mentioned - that made him worth for a standing ovation. Yes, he had married one of the girls from Samarthanam. This girl Roopa who was one of the dancers, is partially blind and is involved with the sports team. They both had a better understanding, decided to marry and they were already 8 months married. After the performance was over, all of us were busy enjoying the delicious dinner ;-) when I had a chit chat with those people from Samarthanam. That chat is worth mentioning. The part time singer was the front desk receptionist at Samarthanam. One of the singers in her troop had completed her M.Com and is currently searching for job. The other girl in her troop had completed her B.Com. There is a C.A holder (who hadn't come that day) who is working for Infosys. And all of them at Samarthanam operate Computer (!!!). Their medium of study is only through computer and they have a better English than what I had imagined. I don't think even most of us resort to learning only through computers - but all of them at Samarthanam learn only using computer. There are special softwares which read aloud all the contents. They scan their documents, feed to computer and learn through that. They operate all basic Windows software like Word and Excel. One of them was really worried that this software is not compatible with Tally and hence it is a big problem for her. She shared her mail Id and asked me to mail her. I did mail her and she interacts with me. All these things were really a surprise for me. So this doesn't end here. I am not writing this blog just to say what happened on Ganesh Chathurthi. I want to mention how enthusiastic and interested they were.

When people like us who are blessed to have all 5 sensory organs intact - don't have the courage to speak up, when we people sometimes lose confidence, when we people think we cannot do it, when we people carefully shift blame on others when something doesn't happen, when we people keep on complaining, when we people forget to care for the feeling of another person --> these people - whom god/ science left with a problem -- have such a high confidence level, so much of interest to learn new things, so much of motivation, so much of enthusiasm to prove their capabilities, so much of care for each other. We should learn lessons from them. Every person in this world has problems - I have problems, my friends have problems, and yes these people at Samarthanam do have problems. They also have worries - they can't see colors, their eyes can never be treated with the beauty of the earth --> but it is the way they handle the worries. The worries are overtaken by their spirit to live. When people with no disability resort to conclusion like suicides when they have problem; these people resort to live - live and prove. The simple old truth - repeated by so many people --> disability is not physical. It is all a mental factor.

"If my mind can conceive it and my heart can believe it, I know I can achieve it" - They did that.