Inside the prisons…Opening their hearts.
Prisons are a place where people are punished for the past, markings of permanent guilt drawn on them and are eyed with suspicion and remorse for that act that “just happened”. I know there can be a lot of debate on this but when I visited the Korovou prisons in Fiji a month back, I found the environment still, but I knew there was a lot of movement within them. They were not imprisoned by the authorites but were their own prisoners of emotional trauma and ignorance of the self. They were searching for help, praying and questioning. When someone calls out, on the other side there is an ear which listens. The Guru heard.
Help arrived in the form of the Prison Smart Courses which I conducted inside, thanks to Ajai Punja who co-ordinated the entire course with the authorities. After two courses, the authorities were very happy that their search to change the life inside the prison had a full stop now, since they could see visible tangible changes in their life styles and behavior. The course is part of the correctional therapies in Fiji under the Yellow ribbon project.
Nuwan, who became an immediate friend helped make this video and after weeks of editing, here it is for your thoughtful viewing. Places where everyone wants an exit from, AOL enters. Inside the prisons…Opening their hearts.
Do forward it to everyone to remind them that the AOL does field work at the ground level, to create a society which is peaceful for everyone to live in.
email2friend
Twelve of us on a beautiful Monday morning decided to indulge into it. Some of them had done it earlier and were narrating horrifying stories to scare us. None wanted to show they were scared and everyone behaved like Dharmendra from some evil movie ready to take on the world.
The construction of the zips is what appealed to me at first, not a single ruthless nail being inserted into these ancient huge trees which grow as tall as they can, the taller the mightier is the tacit rule of the rainforest. The eight zip lines were sturdy and an art in their own respect, horizontally measuring a kilometer flying through the fresh pure air, the rivers below, endemic birds, coloruful flowers and unique insects. One can notice all this only if one drops the fear and has an eye to ogle at them along the flyway.Who would bell the cat, who would go first? Without doubt it had to be an eight year old boy, Shamik. For him, the whole thing was as easy as pie, effortlessly effortless and frenzied fun.
The ocean just goes. For me it starts from here where I am and ends at the horizon, but I know it is a part of a much bigger plan. It is huge, gigantic, calm and sincere as of now. But it can take shades of rage and rile and create a texture of destruction on its horizon. Like the Guru it knows how to draw faith in the human if not with love then surely with the shades of love.
And yes no sharks swam past me, or ate someone up as you are hoping to read 
The farm will produce vegetables and fruits and the net profit in 3 months is going to be 1.2 lakhs in a land of 2 acres. I, being from a concrete jungle gets overwhelmed when I see fresh broccoli getting ready to be surrendered. Fresh Chinese cabbage, earthworms swarming in the vermi compost pile ups and bio-gas being readied to produce electricity.
