Birds, Dots and Palm Trees


This is going to be a short post because of how tired I am, haha.  Today I went to my first leprosy colony:  Bharathapuram!  Of all the leprosy colonies, the Bharathapuram Colony is the most successful.  It is made up of more than 400 families, which is huge!  While we were there, we got to visit many of the colony's resources (a well, a toilet plumbing system, and even a children's care center!) , and we met many of the small business owners and learned about their products/services.

My favorite place to visit though, was an art studio place, where several members of the colony gather and paint pictures!  When we got there, they presented us with stacks and stacks of paintings that we could go through and purchase if we were interested.  They were very impressive!  It was phenomenal to see how they had crafted the paintbrushes in such a way so that people without fingers or hands can still be successful painters!  I bought a few paintings, and then I was given the opportunity to have my picture taken with the artist of each painting :)  The artist of the third painting wasn't there, so I invited two other women to stand with me:




All in all, it was a wonderful visit, and a wonderful first experience in a colony!  There is so much I'd like to say, but my energy is lacking, so I will have to save the stories for another day.  I would like to wrap this post up with a picture I took of one of the monkeys in the colony today!  So awesome!  






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