Rajasthan, India—When Caitlin Whelan ’07.5 was driving home to South Portland, Maine with her brother, she received a call on her cell phone from someone who claimed to be President Ruth Simmons.
Going along with what she thought to be a prank call from one of her friends, she realized that no one she knew would use phrases such as “where are you in route to?” and “are you going via car?”
The next sentence the caller said was something along the lines of “I hardly ever call students, but this is one of the things I enjoy most about my job, congratulations on being named a Truman Scholar.”
Whelan said she felt honored and surprised, mostly because it really was Simmons on the phone and what she had just uttered could not be false.
But, Whelan said that what really satisfies her is the reason behind why she received the scholarship — a community-based music school in India that she started in order to preserve the music of the Merasi, the lowest caste in that country often categorized as “untouchable.”
The story of The Merasi School begins with how Whelan stumbled upon the community and how she “relearned the world through the Merasi.”
Whelan took a year and a half off from college after having completed her freshmen year at Sarah Lawrence University in the outskirts of New York City. Floating from a documentary writing project to an urban arts education program in Maine, she eventually ended up working in an Italian farm for three months.
“I remember being in a sunflower field in Italy when I received a fax from Brown telling me my transfer had gone through,” she said, “but I was accepted for January 2005 and that left me with no real plans for the next few months.”
Whelan’s mother told her she would have to get out of the house soon and on that note contacted someone she believed would give Whelan something to do, Karen Lukas director of Folk Arts Rajasthan, a New York-based non-profit that promotes cultural, economic and educational empowerment of the Merasi community.
“She’s a one-woman show,” Whelan said, referring to how Lukas ran Folk Arts Rajasthan before she joined her.
When Whelan first began working with Lukas at FAR, she said she immediately was put in charge of a lot of projects.
“It wasn’t that I was really talented or anything…it was that there was so much to do,” Whelan said.
“I use to have very vivid dreams of being in theater, a Broadway darling. It was all about the betterment of Caty and how the world could see more of Caty, but I don’t think that was the best way for me to be most effective,” she said.
“I remember I had no interest in India whatsoever, not the music, not the food, not anything. South Portland only has two Indian restaurants and I didn’t really like going to either,” she recalls.
“But getting involved with (FAR and the Merasi) took my world and flipped it on its head,” she joked.
Whelan had her first taste of India the fall of 2004. She did not return in the summer of 2005, but opted to continue the work she had started from home.
“I interned with an anthropologist during the day and talked with Lukas on the phone at night. We were trying to see how we could bring eight Merasi musicians to tour the East Coast,” she said. “But, because they lived on the border with Pakistan and their last names were all Khan, no one wanted anything to do with them.”
“Thankfully, at the eleventh hour, we found a sympathetic ear,” she said. “I received a call from one of my senators’ offices saying that if we could have all the paperwork done they would provide them with visas.”
The following summer, Lukas entrusted Whelan with archiving the traditional Merasi music. She would go by the elder’s homes with her tape-recorder in hand, but aside from getting valuable recordings, Whelan found this to be an opportunity to discuss the biggest issues facing the community — “marginalized citizen status, crippling poverty, no access to political representation, sustained employment, or education.”
“Modernization is blazing away through India and traditional music is rapidly losing its popularity. But, their music is the only thing that others respect of the Merasi,” Whelan explained.
“Yet the younger generations are put to work and do not have the time to learn the old ways of the Merasi,” she said. The word ‘Merasi’ literally translates into ‘musician’ in the local dialect.
“In searching for a way of merging cultural preservation with social mobility, we came to the idea of creating a music school, which would also have a scholastic component,” she said.
“But it was important to make the school community-based,” she said. “The people of that community want to make their own decisions. They don’t want some white kid to come in and tell them what to do, then leave them with nothing as soon as they go home.”
With this in mind, Whelan found two members of the community to teach at the school, Anwar Khan for the scholastic portion and Lune Khan for the music portion. The students range from five to seven years for the “little group” and eight to 11 years for the “big group.” Class is two hours a day, six days a week.
“We realized quickly that we could not take the kids away from their families for much more than that, because of the economic conditions they live in,” Whelan explained.
The Merasi community in Rajasthan is composed of 15,000 people. The school currently reaches 18 boys and girls. In the future, Whelan said she hopes to contract another teacher (preferably a woman from the area), buy a taxi to transport the children safely and a building to house the school.
“There are few things less powerful than a physical presence,” Whelan said. “I want the kids to pass by the building and be able to say this is were I go to school.”
Classes are currently being taught in a building belonging to one of FAR’s partners, Lok Kala Sagar Sansthan. LKSS is an Indian NGO with the same mission as FAR. Its current director, Sarwar Khan, doubles as the on-site manager of The Merasi School.
In order to go through with her plans, Whelan needs $15,000 in funds, $10,000 more than the original amount needed to start the school. She said the first 100 people to donate $150 will be named part of the “visionary core” and their names will be featured in a plaque in the new school building.
“This is so that the children can see that there is someone out there that believes in their potential to grow through education,” she said.
“Not a day goes by that I don’t walk through the Brown campus and I am not aware of how privileged we are to have this, an education. All I want is to make that accessible to others.”
prior to editorial changes — © Copyright 2007 Brown Daily Herald
actual article here.
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