November 16

Singing Spanish, french and Hindi songs, we marched with great energy today and passed many villages.
Our first tree-shade meeting was with women and men from Pardi community of Jhiriya village. We listened to their stories of nomadic life and their struggles of daily living in forest. They don’t have water facilities and they don’t own any right to live in the hill. We discussed the importance of not reacting instantly and thinking creatively to work towards constructive responses and movements like understanding the issue by spending more time with the tribes writing and building non-violent dialogues with the state and highlighting the strengths of the community too.
The second tree shade meeting created a new wave of energy when Sujaat khanji sang, “Phir Inkalaab des mein laane ki baat”.
In the evening prayer session, we had a Latin, French and Spanish prayer today.
After the prayer, Rajaji addressed Gyaraspur by saying, ” Why is there a need to raise our voice, why are we singing loudly, this is sound pollution. We must try to be as polite and empathetic as possible.
If we have love for our mother earth, let us not litter plastic every where.
“Instead of applying Gandhi’s teachings, we are only writing, lecturing and glorifying Gandhi, let us live Gandhi’s teachings.”