Rajeshwari's childish cackle fills the corridors of the small white washed house which has pictures of Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse on the walls. Along with her mother, Rajeshwari has come to the building on Chinnapa Garden link road in Benson Town. A building on the outside, but a home for children like her...underprivileged.
The building is a classroom where children like Rajeshwari will be able to weave vivid dreams, make friends for life and know the world.
Freesia school is a haven for such less privileged children like Rajeshwari, when compared to the house where they stay with their family — in a nearby slum.
The school, a kindergarten, was inaugurated recently in Benson Town. Around 65 children have already enrolled in the day school and have started learning what the textbooks have to offer.
Along with languages and numbers, children will also be fed two meals a day.
An initiative of Building Blocks, a city based organisation, this school is yet another member of the already established family of six schools started by the same organisation over a period of time.
"The main challenge in starting these schools is finding a good property near a slum. We built these schools around the slums to ensure there are no dropouts. These children are too young to travel in buses. So we ensure that education is available for them easily," said James Suresh Ambat, founder of Building Blocks.
The school is funded by one of the biggest social international group in Netherlands, the Alphabet Club. Troy Swanson, an American, fell in love with Bangalore a couple of years back. A chance conversation at a local pub took Troy to the slums of Bangalore. After talking to the slum dwellers and looking at their problems closely, Troy was convinced that he wanted to do something that will change their life. And what could be more important than education. After a year he was back with a cheque in his hand and hope in his heart. There was no looking back after that.
Now he visits India thrice in a year to supervise the operations himself. "We built something out of nothing," he says with a smile.
Today, Troy and his team mingle with the children and their families like a family. Not only education, they ensure that right from the beginning, the children find a life of quality.