HYDERABAD: While motorists whizzed along the wide road abutting Kasu Brahmananda Reddy Park in Jubilee Hills, a motley group of bicyclists made their way along the road’s fringes on Saturday morning. Cycling for a cause, the group included members from the United Kingdom, United States of America, India and City Police Commissioner B. Prasada Rao, who joyfully pedalled with the cyclists.

Conducted by Heal, a U.K.-based charity organisation, funds raised from the cycle rally would go towards construction of a selfsustaining model village at a 25-acre site, 15 kilometres off Gannavaram, near Vijayawada.

‘Paradise’, as it would be known, will house a residential school for 1,000 orphan and destitute children and all facilities that come with it. “It would have classes right from nursery to junior college level,” said K. Satya Prasad, founder of Heal UK.

“Materials used for construction of the village will be generated from waste. We plan to make the village self- sustaining and we will
harness solar and wind energies. Apart from collecting rain water, we will treat waste water in sewerage treatment plant for recycling purposes,” Dr. Prasad said during the cycle rally.

“We want to demonstrate we can enjoy life without causing any damage to the environment.”

“Through this cycle rally we also want to create awareness about the benefits of cycling and pedestrian and cyclist rights,” he said.

“This is the second time I am participating in this rally by Heal. If they do it again, I will come back,” said John Goldie, a cyclist from
U.K. “People here are friendly and caring. I am taken in by the scenery in rural India.”

Project cost Rs. 15 cr.

The cycle rally was one way of raising funds for the project estimated to cost over Rs. 15 crore.

The bicyclists who came from all walks of life had to shell out Rs. 2 lakh towards participation charges. The team had been cycling in
different parts of the country from the beginning of the year and the rally concluded in the city.

You can view the original article at:

http://www.thehindu.com/2010/01/10/stories/2010011059560500.htm

I recently took part in Cycle India 2010, a cycle ride through the Indian countryside in aid of HEAL, a small UK based charity that supports an Indian school and orphanage.

Cycle India 2010

The great news was that when we were done our group of thirty cyclists from the UK, US and India and our wonderful Indian support team had together raised over eighty thousand pounds for the charity.

Matthew Glover, Head of Fundraising, HEAL UK

My involvement began around eight months ago when a good friend and one of the organisers of the event, Matthew Glover, asked if I would be interested. I was. But, inactivity and a liking for the kind of food that adds large amounts of weight to the body over a number of years meant that interest alone might not be enough to get me through 190 miles of cycling over 4 days. After a few weeks of deliberation and some tentative, and very slow, outings on a bike I committed.

I want to share a few pictures that I hope tell a story of our adventures in India.

Cycle India Cyclists

This shot was set on a bridge in a very pleasant area. We had just flown down a particularly good downhill section and had stopped for refreshment. It was a great group of people and everyone really enjoyed themselves.

The HEAL School and Village

HEAL Children

Jumping to the end of the story but I just had to show a few of the children at the HEAL village – helping to provide an education and in some cases somewhere to live as well is what the whole adventure was all about. In total there are around eight hundred children who attend the school which is composed of a mixture of orphans who live in the HEAL village, local children from very poor, poverty trap, families and children from better off families who pay for their education.

It was not possible to capture the scene of several hundred Indian children welcoming us as they lined the entrance road for what seemed like hundreds of yards – every single one of them pleased to see us, cheering and smiling but the above photo gives a small flavour.

Anusha meets Jem, her sponsor

It was particularly poignant to see Anusha meeting Jem. HEAL allows people to sponsor one of the children at the village. It really is a one to one sponsorship and, from a western perspective, a ridiculously small amount of at £12.50 per month to ensure a child’s complete welfare is taken care of including year round accommodation, education, food and clothes.

Anusha was waiting for Jem when we arrived, her first chance to see him, and she spent as much as possible of the rest of the day with him. Looking at the photo I think that sponsoring a HEAL child really offers a chance for a special kind of relationship.

HEAL Village Accommodation

I took a lot of photo’s in the HEAL village and school but I really want to highlight the contrast between the basic accommodation and the smiles on the children’s faces. Happiness really does not come from wealth alone. Having said that, the village is clean, functional and well decorated with bright colours and the children’s art work, a lot more than the children from the poverty trap families have to return home to.

The Quarry

The Quarry

Just a ten minute walk from the school is a quarry. Some of the poverty trap children’s parents work there. For a hard days physical labour of breaking up and carrying rocks they can earn as little as £1.50 a day – barely enough to feed themselves. Without HEAL the children of these families would be in the quarry working.

One thing that many Indians seem to pride themselves on is their appearance. Over and over again I saw obviously poor people wearing bright and well presented clothes. How they manage to appear so clean and tidy considering the conditions that many of them live in quite amazing.

Kindergarten Quarry

When we arrived at the quarry this young girl was standing watching her mother carry rocks in a bowl on her head from where they had been smashed up to the small lorry. She clearly was not enjoying standing on her own in a dusty quarry. Fortunately for this young lady she lives close to the HEAL village and should soon be able to go to the school. The contrast between her face and the smiles in the village was stark. Many children from poor families in India will not be so fortunate.

The School Show

The School Puts on a Show

One of the highlights of our visit to the school was the just incredible show that we were presented with. Lots of lots of acts came on one after another including traditional Indian dance, rock and roll and even karate. The karate was completed with the instructor driving right over a number of his students with a motorbike no! Health and safety obviously takes a much more pragmatic view than it does here in England.

Rock and Roll from the younger children

It really was a privilege to see all of the children act and perform for us, some of them very clearly destined for Bollywood !

The Cycling

Cycle India was never going to be a flat out race. A very mixed bunch of people all with a desire to help the children contained a large mixture of cycling and fitness abilities. The majority of the cycling took place over four days with a warning that the first day might be quite hilly. I later learned that the Coorg region of India is renowned for its mountains and that one of the participants had been warned by a friend not to even attempt cycling in the area. Hmmm. This was the beginning of what turned out to be somewhat of a cultural difference between Indians and the members of the team from the UK and USA.

As it turned out the first days cycling turned out to be really hard work and seemed to go on forever. One of the highlights of the day was a stop at a beautiful holiday resort for lunch. We were met by a very professional young lady at the reception and we later discovered that the holiday chalets cost upwards of 12,000 rupees per night. One of a number of signs we saw of the vast difference between the better off and the poorest in India.

Children on the Way

A continual delight as we variously struggled along up hills and idled our way along the easier sections was a stream of local people coming out to greet us. The children were almost universally delighted to see us – waving and cheering and wanting to shake hands. Even the few children who were less enthusiastic i suspect were simply sufferering from shyness or shock at the sight of me in cycling shorts on a geared cycle (as I heard it described at one point).

Looking back at the picture above I can’t help but notice the, perhaps coincidental, change as the children get older going from the really cheeky chappy on the left to the almost regimental but very proud pose struck by his eldest companion. A sure sign I would have said of both natural child development combined with the remnants of the effects of a military British Empire running the country for many years.

Britishness

In a strange way I would also have to say that there were so many signs of Britishness everywhere you looked, especially in the towns, that I immediately felt a sense of feeling at home even during the first coach ride after we landed in India. From the greenness of the countryside, to traffic lights, driving on the left and many signs written in English as well as Indian. Later on in our visit we stopped at a western shopping mall for an hour and in there you might as well have been in the UK or USA – there was hardly a sign of the Indian language anywhere you looked, everything was in English.

There obviously remains a great respect in India for Britain, at least from the people I met. I am not well travelled but I suspect that there are other commonwealth countries where that feeling towards Britain holds as well despite the more unpleasant aspects of the empire.

Poverty

Along the way as well as the happiness and excitement of the children racing out to see us we definitely saw a lot of signs of poverty. Perhaps not the worst aspects of it that we might have seen had we had a chance, if that is the right word, to visit the poorer areas of a city but poverty none the less. It is hard to identify with such poverty so rather than say too much here are a collection of relevant photo’s:

An Indian Gentleman, dressed for the Indian winter (it was about 25 degrees !)

Digging New Drains, including the children

Living in Tents

Selling fruit at the side of a busy road.

A family outside their home

Children in the street

A Fancy jeep on a not so fancy road

The drunk…

… and the very drunk (see background

Culture Clash

As I cycled around the Indian countryside I started to feel gradually more comfortable saying hello to everyone as we passed. Most of the time we cyclists were fairly well spread out so a lot of the time we were in small groups or even alone at times.

As I must have said already, the children were incredible. They all ran out to say hello especially those in the villages. I was told that it was quite possible that some of them had never seen white people in the flesh before. Most of the children were really keen to have their photographs taken and the grins of delight were beautiful when they saw their pictures on my camera afterwards.

But, one thing struck me. Some of the adults almost ignored us. It seemed rather odd until I realised that presumably the reason for this was that they were of low caste in the Indian hierarchy of class. They were clearly not expecting us to take any notice of them at all. However, with a new found sense of freedom to wave and shout Hi to anyone in sight i preceded to greet them anyway. In most cases there was a pause as they were not sure that I really was talking and waving to them. But when they did realise you should have seen the huge smiles that erupted on their faces. What a privilege to have shared such a simple moment with them.

Even amongst the Indians with us, based in all of the UK, USA and India itself, there was a clear pecking order of authority. Several times I observed a request being past down the chain of command until it reached the appropriate level.

And, more than once there were clear moments of tension as different ideas of who should be allowed to join our social activities played out in front of our eyes.

Hope Worn Thin

More than anything, I want to share a simple observation that I made as travelled through the countryside. Almost all of the local children had bright shiny eyes so full of playfulness and hope. Many of the adults did not. It was clear that a lifetime of poverty and struggle gradually wore down that hope and left many resigned to yet more years of a difficult struggle to survive.

A difficult life in a poor Indian village

And yet, stood just a few yards away in the same village, I spotted a young girl clearly not yet tired of life. If there is anything we can do to allow this hope to stay with these young people throughout their lives it will surely be worth doing.

Hope and beauty amongst the poverty

Assorted Pictures

Not everyone in India is poor and they have a habit of painting their houses rather brightly

Traffic chaos Indian style

There were quite a lot of signs of progress in India including health and safety notices. The reality did not look quite so safe.

We visited an elephant training park. There were grumbles of animal cruelty at the sight of large chains and even a spike but they tend to be pretty thick skinned and it’s hard to tell if an elephant is happy

India was at times a curious mixture of poverty, wealth, hope, despair, animals and playfulness

Indian children

Prasad, founder of HEAL, falls off his bike just yards from a lunch break but bravely carries on despite what turns out later to be quite a serious injury.

Perhaps it is just me but I think think this picture captures a simple pride and purpose in his work that I suspect some people here in Britain have forgotten

You can see more of my pictures from Cycle India at: http://picasaweb.google.com/jontwigge

During our recent trip to India, Dr Prasad and I visited the Coorg area to check out the route for Cycle India. We travelled with a group of people including Nitin, the organiser of Cycle India, and Dr Siva (one of the organisers of the 2008 event who is helping and taking part again).

There will be a number of amendments to the initial Cycle ride itinerary. I’ll ask Nitin to send me an update to add to the website, but in the meantime, the main alterations I will discuss below.

We didn’t visit Mysore which will be the place we spend our first night in India, so I can’t comment on the accommodation, but have been assured it is a decent hotel and Nitin has organised for sightseeing etc after our journey from Bangalore. We will also be introduced to our bikes, which Nitin is hoping will be ‘Firefox’ bikes, which crucially will have gears (and brakes).

For day one of the cycling, we’ll travel by coach to the starting point which will be around 1.5 hour journey. The following picture shows the starting point, which will be near a small school and on the edge of a village:

The beginning of the bike ride is pretty flat, and the road is very quiet which will help us all get used to the bikes.
I do need to stress that the overall event is a lot hillier than Cycle India 2008, and Day 1 will be the toughest day. We’ll be climbing to Madikeri which is around 3,500 ft above sea level, from a starting point of around 2000 ft above sea level. There are no steep climbs, but there are a few long gradual climbs we will need to overcome. Siva is going to revisit the Coorg in the next couple of months and cycle the first day just to make sure it is not too tough.

We’ll be staying in the Hotel Crystal Court at the end of Day 1 and day 2. The following webpage gives you an idea: http://www.nivalink.com/crystalcourt/index.html. It is quite basic, but clean and tidy and should OK for the two nights.

Madikeri is the main town in the Coorg, and is on the top of a hill, so the good news is that days 2-4 are mostly downhill, although it is undulating in parts. I must stress that everyone needs to make sure they are reasonably fit, and not just turn up without having done a bit of exercise (like I did last time ). If anybody finds any of the hills a bit tricky, then there’s always the option of pushing the bikes for a bit, or if the going is really tough then the coach will be available.

The advantage of cycling through the Coorg is the fantastic scenery:

The roads are on the whole pretty good, although there will be a few pot holes to navigate in places:

During Day 2, we’ll visit Abbey Falls which we visited this time. With the monsoon weather, the scene was very dramatic, although I understand there will still be plenty of water in January:

At the end of Day 3, we’ll be staying near to the Dubbare Elephant sanctuary. With it being Monsoon season, much of the Coorg was flooded while we were there, and the area close to where we are staying at the end of Day 3 was no exception:

There’s around six cottages at this location, so each cottage may house around 4 people each. It may be that the guys may need to be in tents on this night, or in a dormitory style if there’s a large room.

At the end of Day 4, we’ll be staying in an old Coorg house with real rustic charm courtesy of a retired army general. There are a few rooms in the main house, but most of the group will be housed in a dormitory area in the following building:

Originally, we were planning having a Day 5 of cycling, but we’ve decided to cut this out of the programme so the bike ride will be shorter than 190 miles. The main reason for cutting Day 5 is it will create time to visit the Heal Children’s Village in Guntur.

We’ll travel back to Bangalore and spend the night at the Green Valley Resort (see http://www.travelguru.com/india-hotels/bangalore-hotel-green-valley-resorts.html) instead. Then, the next day, we’ll fly to Vijayawada so that we can visit the village. During Cycle India 2008, we cycled to the village, and it was the highlight of the event for most people. We feel it is important for all the cyclists taking part to meet the kids, and see where all the fundraising is being spent.

We may also visit the location of some land Heal is trying to purchase near Vijayawada where we hope to build our biggest ever project – a new model residential school for 1000 orphaned and underprivileged children. If everything goes to plan, then we may have a ceremony at the land to formally lay the foundation stone, before building starts.

The money we raise from Cycle India will be used to help build the school, so the more we raise, the better facilities for the children. The location is very picturesque at the side of a hill and bordering a lake (although it is dried up on this picture):

After spending the afternoon with the children, we’ll take an overnight sleeper train to Hyderabad for our final day in India.
Initially, the idea was for this day to be an opportunity to hold a press conference with the local and national media (there will be a lot of interest in India for our bike ride) and the chance for a bit of shopping.

However, we are looking into the idea of spending an hour or two cycling around the Hussain Sagar Lake (visit http://happyhyderabad.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/hussainsagar.jpg) which will create a lot of publicity for Heal. If we do organise this, then it will be an opportunity for a few VIPs from Hyderabad to join us cycling.

Conclusion

Hopefully, I haven’t frightened anyone when I mentioned the hilly terrain. During Cycle India 2008 we cycled around 250 miles, whereas this time we’ll be cycling around 160 miles over 4 days. Also, we’ll have better bikes this time, so I’m confident we’ll all be OK.

There will be quite a bit of travelling also, so everyone needs to be prepared for a busy schedule. Once Nitin has fully amended the itinerary then I’ll update everyone.

Matthew Glover
Head of Fundraising

For more information about Cycle India please email:
matthew@conservatoryoutlet.co.uk

We’re now looking for cyclists for Heal Cycle India 2010. If you fancy a real challenge, and would like to raise money for our charity then please read on.

After the resounding success of Cycle India 2008, where 30 cyclists from the UK, US and India raised £100,000 for Heal by cycling through the beautiful countryside of Andhra Pradesh, we have now begun recruiting a far bigger event this time.

We’re looking for around 50 people from the UK to sign up for this event, and commit to raising a minimum £2500 in order to take part.

This is a great way to experience the real India, and this time we will be cycling through Karnataka in the South of India. We will be visiting Bangalore and Mysore, and cycling through the picturesque Coorg area.

If you are interested in taking part then we have created our Cycle India website:

http://www.cycleindia.org/

We will be updating this website continuously with the breaking news, information for cyclists and updates for those taking part.

To give you an idea of the type of things you would experience, then please visit our Cycle India Gallery or watch the Cycle India Videos

If you would like to sign up for Cycle India 2010 then please visit the following page for more information:

http://www.heal.co.uk/register-for-cycle-india.html

The summer was very severe with the temperatures rising to almost 45 Celsius and when the rains came in the last week of June we heaved a sigh of relief!

In India the rains are special. They come after scorching heat and bring cool showers. We love to run out to play in the rain and get thoroughly wet!

But first of all the news about the tenth class students who passed High school in first class! Fourteen of them joined Junior College. So this year there are 35 Heal Children who are studying different courses in the local colleges.

We had a lovely surprise when Dr. Sathya Prasad the founder of Heal UK, Carl Brodie, the chairman and Matthew, one of the Directors visited us in June. We spent two delightful days with them.

They are organizing a tour Cycle India which is a unique opportunity to cycle 220 miles from Hyderabad to Guntur to raise funds to build schools for poor children, from 2nd January to 11 January

We are eagerly waiting to receive 25 of these brave cyclists from UK who promised to spend at least three days with us!

We are sending you some of the news clips covering their visit

An Old Age Home was built by Dr. Manga Devi, Secretary to Heal India with the concept that the young and the old living together find solace in each other’s company.

Dr. Sathya Prasad, Carl Brodie and Mathew inaugurated the Old Age Home.

A medical camp was conducted when Heal UK Directors were visiting Heal village.

We are signing off for the present.

We will have even more exciting things to talk about in the next news letter since a number of volunteers from UK are visiting us at various times the next six months!

Bye!

Children from Heal Village

Appeal for cyclists 
 
Three of the cyclists taking part in Cycle India make an appeal on Youtube for more participants.

The video was organised by Matthew Glover, head of fundraising, and organiser of the charity bike ride.

There are currently 22 cyclists signed up for this once in a lifetime opportunity, but there are still a few spare places.

If you are interested in getting fit, helping our charity and fancy a real challenge contact matthew@conservatoryoutlet.co.uk for more information.

Please note – this is an archived news item, but we are now working on a repeat performance Cycle India 2010.  Please look at the Cycle India section of this website for more detail!

We’ve got a more modern looking website now, and crucially we have the use of the CMS (content management system) which allows us to keep the website more up to date than we’ve been able to in the past.  There’s also a blog (which is what you are reading now) which allows us to create interesting new stories and share them with the rest of the world far quicker and easier.

There’s also going to be an easier way for people to sign up for our exciting charity bike ride – Cycle India – by using our Sign Up Now form.

We hope you enjoy our new website and please get in touch if you have any suggestions or comments.