The history.....and today

When a system breaks down, it takes with it not just its components or people involved in it, but also the courage from them to try again...But did it happen to us? Not really....Team VNC was a happy playful and huge group of young minds enthusiastic to make a change...Then, a system broke down...and from the ashes of the burnt out spirits arose the real team VNC....a score of people who just wouldn't bow down to the whims of the tides....When nothing clicked together, a new idea was given a chance...each one of us aware of the risks involved....the disappointment failure could get....and above all....the precious time and energy that would go into this....yet there was a commitment each of us had....not to anyone else but to ourselves.....to accomplish what we dreamt of......Education, I have heard, leads to the complete and much craved for picture of self sustenance...and that is exactly what team VNC aims at....

Today, VNC works from a tiny room in a little known basthi [slum area] on every Sunday of the year, come hell or high water....Somewhere in a small corner of our unimaginably big country, there is a group of kindred souls who goes about in a strange land asking, not if one can help, but if one wants help.....Every weekend these youngsters come together to interact with their seasoned facilitators to build a community within the basthi, that will enable the basthi to come out of its ignorant helplessness...to bring out the best in each individual, no matter what his bank balance, notwithstanding his or her caste, colour or creed...

What we get from it? In worldly terms, no self benefit....no certificates to show off to our career launchers.....no money to load our pockets with....Maybe just a little push of confidence which says " you are doing your bit".....Maybe just a little peace of mind in the utter chaos of daily unrest....maybe just a few hours of innocent and un-polluted happiness....and I guess...that's all that WE, VNC can ask for....

We aren't the descendants of Hercules....we take little steps at a time, which maybe insignificant on their own....but when we look back to map our path....the distance we have covered gives a satisfaction, that very few other things in life can compensate.....

In the thousand little joys that VNCiites experience every Sunday, some come from the several little buds we get to nurture in our freshly laid garden....children of all ages come to us with their beautiful hopes and inspiring aspirations, depending on us to help them reach their stars....and so we try.....Apart from this....we get to meet those simple hearts who reside in these unexplored lands...We sit and chat with them, share little tidbits over tea, about how they came to live here.....what they had thought and what they became....what they pray for their little ones to turn into.....and what colours we can help them with, to paint their lives in a slightly brighter shade.....For we, at VNC believe that every one has the right to freedom.....the freedom to see their dreams come true....And no one has it a little less or a little more....We believe...in the essential human virtue....that we are often taught but which is easily forgotten.....the virtue of sharing....

And so our journey goes...inching little by little....but steady and firm.....

We don't ask the world to make way for us or join us.....just take the hint...and start a journey of your own....