Who are the poorest people in the world? I think it has to be external or internal refugees, without food, without homes, in countries torn by civil war -- in Africa for example. I pray for the poor in Africa. I work as hard as I can to help the poor in the Himalayas. For surely, by any standard, Man-Maya (Loving Heart) and her grandchildren are poor. So much poverty is caused by ignorance. I've often said the best way to practice birth control is to educate children, especially girls. It offends no religious belief and is effective. SASAC's Sharmila and Sabita are married now. But because they were getting education and training, they married in their mid-twenties, not when 16 or 17. And they know enough to realize that in a country as poor as India, parents can no longer provide a human life for a dozen children.

In our villages the poor always have the worst land: rocky, steep, and landslide-prone. This is another benefit of our square meter gardening project. We teach our farmers how to make compost. Using it, they can grow excellent crops on the poorest land. Then the covers protect their beds from monsoon downpours. So they can grow vegetables during our 4-month monsoon. The pathways around the rows of beds serve as drains. They carry off the pounding rain that causes landslides. To prove that they can make a good living off the worst land, we set up beds on our very steep land. "Seeing is believing". Now they know even hopeless land can give them security, even relative prosperity -- very relative!!

In India there is a gulf between education and the life of the poor. Some of our farmers went to school. They left school and counting to go back to the realities of village life. Schools are schools, life is life and never the twain will meet! At SASAC it comes to them as a delightful surprise to learn counting can transform their miserable, hopeless lives. They all have green pocket books (my grandmother is a Murphy!!!) They guard them like treasures. In them they record their harvests, their income, their savings in our liberation bank! Now they count like calculators. Not without reason. The correct total means a full plate of rice!

Poor village people in our co-op bring their vegetables to our marketing center at SASAC ll twice a week. The 20 dear ladies in our shops help them by selling vegetables. But our villagers give each other more valuable help. To make this possible, we give them tea and buns. So they sit together and chat. In our mountains, houses are scattered, not clustered. Seldom can village people visit neighbors. So their visits to SASAC ll are 'community meetings'. They are also therapy time. They are all poor; they wrestle with the same painful problems. The wiser ones among them are the best qualified to counsel and comfort them. And if laughter is the best medicine then they give a good dose of it to each other twice a week!