Saathi

If we have felt a sense of confinement, isolation and frustration during the pandemic, one can only imagine what people in old age homes have faced. Our primary aim was to understand issues faced by individuals in old age homes, and the impact of the pandemic in worsening issues such as social exclusion and loneliness. We aim to form a basis for interaction between us, the students, and members of the old age home through a series of activities and events to help alleviate this sense of distance that lies on both ends.

 

We focused on sensitising ourselves to interact with the members of the old age home in the best capacity that we could. We built on this further by conducting our own research, and we realised that we might be severely underprepared to do so. We decided to turn to an expert instead, to go beyond the books and train ourselves for an experience none of us had had before. For this, we spoke to our school counsellor, Mrs. Vasundhara. We met her during our break so we could talk to her and sensitise ourselves to dealing with senior citizens with neurodegenerative issues such as dementia. We collaborated with our juniors who had founded various artistic clubs such as music and dance club, to put up a series of weekly performances on zoom for the members of the old age home. We worked with BHN Health Care, a residential home for senior citizens. We planned weekly sessions on Sunday evenings, at mutually suitable times to interact with the people of this home.

 

 

Our Housie event was conducted on the 24th of October. The goal behind it was to raise funds for the village of Kumbhalgarh, which our school has been associated with for some years, whose houses and school had been destroyed by the recent Cyclone Nisarga. However, through this event, we also engaged the senior citizens at the BHN center to give them a medium of communication with the outside world.