On our fourth distribution day, we arrived in the village of Barrackpore, about an hour outside Kolkata, to an open field surrounded by waiting parents and children. The Rotary Club members were eager to help us transform this barren area into our SCAW distribution site.
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| From Kolkata 2011 |
As we meandered through the long colourful line, shook hands, and photographed the incredible faces, I began to shake a little boy's hand. He was wearing a blue knit sweater with two white reindeer. As i shook his hand and looked at the sweater, my thought process was as follows: "I've seen that pattern on a sweater before ... It is definitely Canadian ... It looks familiar ... My boys had sweaters just like it."
And then it hit me. My mother knit my sons sweaters just like it years ago. I gave them away to a charity a few years later. In my emotional reaction to this discovery, I checked for a label to make sure I wasn't going crazy and that maybe it was a storebought purchase. No label. It was a hand-knit sweater. What are the chances that this could be one of the two sweaters my mom knitted a lifetime ago? This little boy halfway across the world may be wearing a sweater my boys wore. I am shaking as write this blog still in disbelief thinking that this could not possibly be a reality.
I just know that this SCAW distribution in a little village outside Kolkata is where I am supposed to be at this point in my life and that, maybe, my mom agrees.
Marianne Langford
for Team Kolkata 2011
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