Riverdale seniors from PJA heal world in India

By PAUL HAIST, Jewish Review

article created on: 2012-01-01T00:00:00

Three Portland Jewish Academy graduates who are now seniors at Riverdale High School were part of a 12-student group from Riverdale that spent three weeks in India in November and December. They were there to help others and to increase their understanding of the world’s diversity.

Anna Steckel, Maya Volk and Ben Yablon have been classmates for a long time and, in fact, are no strangers to traveling together, having taken part in PJA’s 2008 Israel trip for eighth-graders.

The biennial Riverdale “Bridges to India” service project was created in 2003 and aims to involve students in reaching out to another culture, working with them and learning from them.

This year’s trip took place from Nov. 18 to Dec. 10.

The school partners with the Portland-based Hope Charities founded by former Riverdale parent Dr. Daisy Kuchinad.

The mission of Hope Charities is to serve the needy and working poor of two small villages in southern India in the form of medical, psychosocial and financial assistance with emphasis on community health, and women and children’s welfare and empowerment.

Hope Charities created and maintains the Hope Clinic in Kurumbanadom and also provides medical services in Kumaramkery, villages in the state of Kerala, the home of Kuchinad’s parents.

According to student Ben Yablon, the real work of the project takes place before the group goes to India.

“Most of what we did really took place here,” he said. “All the money we had to extensively fundraise went straight to the clinic.”

The fund-raising goal is $40,000, most of which is raised through various events, according to Riverdale biology teacher Laurie LePore, one of two chaperones on the recent trip.

“As of today we are a bit over the $35,000 mark,” she said. “By the end of the year, we should be close to $40,000.

LePore said the students’ travel expenses are underwritten by the students themselves, their families and other sources.

While learning about a remote culture from a classroom in Portland has merit, actually visiting the place has a lot more impact, as Maya Volk pointed out.

“I have a new perspective on life, especially after seeing so many happy people living without excessive material things. I did not realize how different the world is,” she said. “India has taught me patience, appreciation and has broadened my world view.”

Anna Steckel had a similar response.

“Seeing how happy the people in India are with the little that they have has made me a lot more thankful for what I do have,” she said.

Yablon said he too learned to appreciate more what he has. He told a story.

“I was hanging out with a bunch of the village boys…when one of them got bitten on his foot by some sort of jungle ant,” he said.

“He was wearing old, torn flip-flops in the thick brush, as were all the other boys. I absent-mindedly told them that they needed to get some sneakers, and immediately regretted what I had said.

“Bibin, the boy who had been bitten, looked up at me and said, ‘Us, no money for fancy shoes.’

“It’s things like that that make me appreciate what we here in America tend to take for granted. I think the next group should bring those boys some shoes,” said Yablon.

While in India the students say they mostly worked by providing public service.

Volk said, “We helped out…Hope Charities by reading to children, painting a room and then later adding a mural, organizing books, sewing and providing medical supplies and visiting schools.”

The school visits were enlightening. Volk said they were “her favorite way of interacting with locals,” while she agreed with Steckel that the schools were very different from Riverdale.

Steckel put it this way, “The students we spoke with seldom asked questions of their teachers and seemed trained to respond with ‘Yes,’ when asked by their teacher if they understood recently taught material.”

“I couldn’t imagine attending a school like that,” she said, adding that it made her realize how thankful she is for the opportunities given her at Riverdale.”

Volk noted that there was “hardly any student-teacher…interaction.”

It wasn’t all work and no play in India. The group spent most of the first week touring, which the PJA grads said resembled their PJA trip to Israel.

They not only visited must-see landmarks such as the Taj Mahal, they also were introduced to some of India’s Jewish community.

They visited the 16th-century Paradesi Synagogue on Jew Town Road in Cochin.

“It was very fun to see a Sephardi Torah and familiar Hebrew after touring so many temples, churches and mosques,” said Volk.

The students expressed their gratitude to several people who helped to make the trip possible including chaperone/teacher LePore, chaperone Ron Borkan who is also the father of another student on the trip, trip organizers Karl Schulz and Catherine Ingvaldsen (the latter’s daughter was also on the trip) and Daisy Kuchinad of Hope Charities.

The three PJA graduates on the trip won praise for what they had done from two leaders at PJA.

“Anna, Maya and Ben are three wonderful examples of PJA alumni who think for themselves and work for the world,” said PJA Principal Merrill Hendon. “These students brought all that they learned at home, in the community, and of course at PJA, to their experiences in India and showed their hosts what true mensches they are.”

“It’s so gratifying to see that PJA graduates are taking their deep commitment to tikkun olam, to making the world a better place, with them into high school and beyond,” said PJA and Mittleman Jewish Community Center Executive Director Lisa Horowitz. “It’s not a surprise to us, as Anna, Ben and Maya all participated actively and avidly in service learning and community service projects while they were at PJA.”