Close on the heels of Chennai beneficiary meet, a similar beneficiary meet was organized in Mayiladudhurai on the evening of March 1st . The meet took place in Kumar Sir's tuition center. Kumar sir is our facilitator, mentor and acts as the pivot of Vidial's activity in Mayiladuthurai region. Kumar sir is working as a Tamil teacher in Melaiyur School, he is a multi faceted personality. For example despite being a Tamil teacher, he takes Maths tuition for Xth standard, is one of the best public speakers, takes part in a number of philanthropic activities and so on. We can go on listing his activities which would take a long time, lets come to that at a latter point of time. Presently, Kumar sir is taking care of 8 beneficiaries and is one of the important pillars responsible for our increase in our beneficiary count this year.
The beneficiary meets organized at Chennai and Coimbatore had given us some good lessons and hence we were geared up a little better with a decent plan. Since the meet place was a Tuition center, the center students also joined the fun. It helped us in a certain way that nobody except Kumar sir and Vidial members knew who are the beneficiaries. With the almost everybody being in their later part of their teens we were also able to link with them easily. After the games, everyone was asked to speak on their aim in life and whatever they wanted to tell. Initially it was tough to make them speak, but once a few spoke, the momentum started building up and at one stage we were pondering how to wind up since it was getting late. Speaking to a Public Audience gives a person a lot of courage, hence, we made sure that everyone spoke. One of the students in the tuition center got pretty much excited and he started narrating how he started dancing, how it gave him confidence, how his friends helped him, etc for about 15 minutes, it was with some difficulty we made him sit. We felt bad in stopping him, but already it was about two hours and it was getting dark, hence we had to stop him. Every beneficiary had spoken about his aim before the audience itself which was meticulously noted down. We had a private word with each of them to know what are other things which they needed.
The parents who had came thinking that this would be another meeting stuff were amazed by what happened. One of them asked everyone of us present there to take a pledge that, "After getting a job, each and everyone should contribute to the society in some way". Certainly, it moved us a lot.
We were honored by the presence of Pannerselvam Uncle, Elanthangudi School headmaster, who is also our facilitator at Mayiladuthurai. Pannerselvam uncle is a benevolent headmaster and is an active philanthropist.
On the sidelines of the meeting, a tri-cycle was to Soundarapandian, who got crippled due to Polio. Soundar has completed M.C.A after overcoming a lot of challenges and currently is looking for a job. We would like to strongly reiterate that this is not an activity done by Vidial, it was undertaken by the personal interest of one of our members and Smt.Ankayarkanni, teacher of Soundar. This was done in a Vidial meeting to show the the confidence, hard work of Soundar and our hopes were not dashed. The willpower Soundar radiated not only inspired but motivated everyone of us who were present there.
Vidial don't have words to express our gratitude to Kumar Sir for co-ordinating and organizing the meet in a splendid manner. We would also like to thank Pannerselvam uncle for making it to the meet despite his various commitments. We would also like to thank all the parents, who have made it to the meet and those who due to various reasons who could not attend the meet, but sent their children.
We will post the photos of the beneficiary meet soon.
