Food Politics

As a child I remember my mother trying to coax me to finish my unwanted dinner by reminding me of all the starving children in Ethiopia. The response of a six year old was to refuse to eat at all: “please send my food” I would ask. Now I eat and give thanks. Not to any man in the sky, but to my fortune. Based on nothing but birth and privilege. Built upon exploitation and racism. I give thanks that I have a choice. A choice to look dirty because my clothes are unimportant to me. I can buy new ones. No one will judge me from my material appearance – only from my “Fair and Lovely” skin and my “Barbie hair.” I choice to eat – not based on money but based on appetite. And now even a choice of whether I help someone else eat or not, not by sending left over food to television images, but by literary handing boxes of rice and curry. I have no idea what image, feelings of emotions these words are creating within you, but for me already I am feeling the humility of this work which I am trying to describe.

Bending down to take off the elastic bands wrapped around each food package, to empty the individual plastic bags onto the bed of white rice. Taking a few seconds as always to wonder that perhaps they didn't want their lentils mixed into their fish? Feeling a sense of dread and guilt if I spill some daal onto the inanimate pavement. Feeling incredibly humble as I pass over the boxes into wet hands, or place it onto the ground. And then moving on. No time to talk, just a few seconds to check that Niraj's fever has not grown worse since yesterday lunch time. And if we are delayed by trying to pull Pugli up and sit her in front of the little cardboard package, wash her hands while she stares through us to some place far beyond, within minutes she has dozens of pairs of eyes staring down at her.

And it is this guaranteed curiosity from which continues to both amaze and frustrate me. I still see taxis stopping in the middle of the road, windows wound down, drivers' ear pricked, just to overhear random street conversations. Groups of men will arbitrarily form, watching and listening to no-one in particular. And the homeless are not exempt. Every lunch time seems to be like “feeding time at the Zoo.” In fact, we regularly have people urgently calling us over and then to ask “What are you doing?” It is indeed a fine line between making a public statement – interacting with the destitute – and turning them into public spectacles. Attention can all to often be most unwelcome when it can be from the authorities, who in previous years have come down incredibly harshly on the homeless living in the train stations. One of the less violent techniques was the construction of a carpark outside of Sealdah station to try and 'clean' it up, although I don't think it has worked.

This is anther risk of using volunteers; although we can draw attention to the need to act, we can also embarrass the authorities. This may cause them to crack down on the extended presence of tourists in the train station or alternatively push out the homeless (although I have no idea where they could go, the streets already seem full). Some of Kolkata's largest charities actually attempt to carry out their work in the stations silently, with the volunteers asked not to talk about their work. Now with packs of very 'visible' foreigners walking around with bags of food seems a little too ambitious. However, it is certainly true that the few programs running at the train stations offer some sustenance/ hope to those with nothing. I know of one old man who was found recently, with sticks for arms and a skin bag for a body, with the only form of identification on him being a slip from Kolkata Medical College. At least those who had dismissed him had the foresight to deposit him where he might be transported to the Mother House and receive 'free' 'care' if not medical care. But this isn't the case for all – other old men, the mad, the drug addicted and far too many young men seem to have little alternatives.

Out of the fifteen people on the Food Program four are women and eleven men. Now I have typed and deleted and typed again, but I have no idea how to describe these fifteen people without using labels such as 'old' 'mentally unstable' 'disabled' or judgmental observations such as 'surprisingly clean/ polite/ happy'. But basically the poorest and sickest of the poor seem to be either the oldest or young men such as Niraj, Raju and Ramu; all of whom seem to have no apparent physical or mental disability but appear to be 'institutionalized' into destitution after years of living at Sealdah station.

Before I came came to Thailand I spent a few days with a close friend of mine. A cyclist who was touring around Asia raising money and awareness of the lack of help for mentally unstable young men in the UK. My friend is young and brave and with a combination of personal determination and external support he has managed to fight years of depression to turn his life around. Now think of India. Full of children growing up on the streets. Living next to abuse, addictions, mutilation. Children with physical 'imperfections' which cast them out of society. Or those already born as outcasts – the Dalit community or the 'untouchables', the tribals or the lower castes. Throw into the mix some unemployment, poverty, illness, disease and soon the question of why there are so many young men of the streets suddenly doesn't seem so obvious. Add a degree of mental trauma or instability and the perhaps the participants of the food program no longer appear as outcasts, but as survivors – men who are still sane despite all the daily challenges around them; Men who still take pride in their appearance. Who still wash their hair, hands and clothes, and for who the provision of one small box of food every lunch time may be enough to sustain or even improve their physical or mental health just enough to continue to live.

I don't know exactly why but I am finding my experience of the Food Program hard to express. Perhaps because the provision of food holds connotations of power, luxury, choice and survival. Perhaps because I don't feel I have the right to 'describe' the people I have the briefest interaction with every day.