Save the Children has put photography at the heart of it’s campaigns right from the beginning. For our first ever campaign in 1919, Eglantyne Jebb (our amazing founder) distributed posters in Trafalgar Square featuring incredibly emaciated children.
Well what a day. Finally here in India and everything is such an experience. Trying to get some of the thoughts out of my head and into this blog after a comfortable night.
We arrived safely at Delhi airport after a good flight, although none of us got much sleep, because of crying babies. Anyway, they fed us supper at 11pm our time, (I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that late in all my life), and woke us by putting all the lights on at 3am our time to have breakfast.
The airport terminal was plush and could have been anywhere, apparently built specially for the commonwealth games, but the entire airport was surrounded by building work.
Jo, from the India office met us and and has been wonderful. Driving in India is not for the feint hearted. There seem to be no rules of right of way, other than who can honk their horn the loudest and who out-chickens who.
There was a vast assortment of vehicles on the road, which is full of enormous pot holes, honestly we moan at home but that is nothing!
There was a motorcycle with a woman, holding a baby riding side saddle on the back, bicycles piled high with goods, rickshaws and buses that look so battered you wouldn’t expect them to work, let alone be allowed on the road. But as yet no cows!!
The hotel is great and we have nice clean rooms with all the amenities. We wanted to explore Delhi a little this afternoon, sleep deprivation forgotten, to get a flavour of it, as we had not got anything on the itinerary, and were advised to visit the Lotus temple, just 10 minutes down the road.
After an exhilarating taxi ride (not brave enough to try the tuk-tuks yet) found ourselves at a beautiful oasis of green. The temple is shaped like a lotus flower in white marble, and there were lots of families there visiting, as tourists, like us.
It was beautiful and very peaceful. We had to take our shoes off and observe silence inside. It was a Baha’i house of worship, which as far as I could understand, wants to unite all the faiths of the world, bringing them to work and worship in harmony.
Many of their ideals, for equality of men and women, elimination of prejeudice and discrimination, universal and compulsory education, the elimination of poverty could all be those of Eglantyne Jebb herself.
The people were very welcoming, although we stood out, and were asked to have our photos taken by Indians who wanted their photo taken with a westerner. We were accosted by a large group of school children who all wanted to practise their excellent English on us, and they then laughed at us trying to say “Namaste” (hello) to them in return.
The families were dressed in their Sunday best and the children were beautiful in their colourful clothes. We noticed the black colouring around the children’s eyes, like eyeshadow, which looked very dramatic.
Later our photographer told us that the painting of children’s eyes is a cultural tradition and is supposed to ward off the “evil eye”. And actually, Save the Children, through the education of midwives, are trying to help people understand that the Kohl they use to give children the dark eyes is detrimental to their sight and can lead to loss of sight as it gradually blocks the tear ducts.
Other such traditions, such as removing a new born baby from the mother just after birth so she does not give the baby her yellow breast milk, which is thought to be tainted, is deeply ingrained in the culture and needs careful education to re-educate on the benefits of chlostrum milk.
We have had a fascinating and wonderful first day, but today we will see a different side to life as we visit a street children project and the slums of Delhi to see a mobile health clinic.
Tomorrow we have a very early start when we catch the 6.00am train to Jaipur, which if I can stay awake should be great.
People like Eglantyne Jebb the founder of Save the Children continue to inspire thousands of people to take care of children. Visiting her grave to pay my respects was a dear wish that finally came true on the 24th of September when I visited Geneva to attend the 55th Session of the UNCRC Committee reviewing Sri Lanka State Report.
Eglantyne Jebb died in December 1928, and was buried in a cheap wooden coffin at St George’s Cemetery in Geneva. From her grave it is just possible to see Mount Saleve, the imposing mountain just south of the city which Eglantyne had loved, and had climbed many times to help clear her head and gain some perspective on the issues that were concerning her.
This Saturday I got my first taste of spruiking. I always have books to sign and sell after giving a talk, but this was different; the real hard-core ‘roll up, roll up ladies pll-llease… I have cabbages, I have cherries, I have a new biography as featured on Women’s Hour…’ in the front of a Waterstones shop in Bury St Edmunds.
I am a very nosy person. What could be a more legitimate excuse for delving into the fascinating life, letters, unpublished novels, houses, bottom drawers, last will and testament… of someone who intrigues you, than writing their biography? Aware of the potentially invasive nature of the role, I once described it as psycho-stalking, and was duly ticked off by a more established writer.
Having researched, written and launched the book I am now in the middle of what is apparently the author’s main job – promoting the thing. For me this mostly entails giving a number of talks, including a few for Waterstones bookshops where I speak as part of a panel talking about ‘Women in History’.
Oh dear, I have found a new way to delay doing any work… checking the online Amazon sales ranking of my biography of Eglantyne Jebb – SCF’s founder. The ranking is a kind of scary irregular pulse that tells you how any book is selling compared to all the rest in Amazon’s warehouse on an hour-by-hour basis.
After seven years of researching the life of Save the Children’s founder, my biography of Eglantyne Jebb has finally published. It’s not the same as having a child of course, nothing like, but I do feel like I am losing protective control of this long nurtured thing and sending it off out there on its independent shelf-life
Hello – I have just been planning my first public talk about the book and someone told me that people are generally much more interested in what goes on behind the scenes in writing a biography, than your actual subject… I hope there is some truth in this because my biography of Eglantyne wears its research on its sleeve a bit
