Impressions of a visitor

A Beacon of Hope in a City of Darkness
Impressions of a visitor to the Ilm-O-Hunar in December 2007
Written by Sohaib Anwer – currently based in Houston, Texas

 

Through streets of Lyari where piles of garbage lay unattended except by stray dogs, and down narrow alleys ripe with the stench of filth, Mr. Abdullah Khadim Hussain led me and a couple of his relatives, to the door of an old dwelling, rising three stories above us. I had heard about the Ilm o Hunar school, but I had to see it for myself to believe it. Except for the modest billboard outside, the exterior gave no clues about what lay inside. As we entered the building a narrow hallway lay before us with stairs, without a railing, leading upwards on one side and three small rooms on our left hand side. The second story like the first one also comprised of sparsely furnished rooms while the third story was basically a wide open space covered by a corrugated steel roof.
The rooms were full of teenage girls learning to be more than what their social surroundings had condemned them to be. They were attending school in an area of this city where the local government did not have a school for these girls to go to and where the social norms usually dictated that the girls grow up without proper schooling. These girls were busy in acquiring not only elementary level school education but also skills that are meant to economically empower them. The set of skills being imparted to the girls ranged from embroidery, tailoring, creating small artifacts and beautician’s skills.
A conversation with the school staff revealed the odds against which this school has managed to continue educating about 100 girls of various ages. The funding for the schools mainly comes through private donations which are by no means a guaranteed source of income. Social pressures add another dimension to the challenges faced by the school staff who has to keep interacting with the parents of some of the students, who are not in favor of educating their girls. They do this either directly or through other students to try to keep some of the girls from dropping out of the school.
Mr. Hussain’s single minded passion for philanthropy might have made this school what it is today, but truth be told, its long term survival depends on its acceptance by the community in which it exists and a stable source of funding that can keep it afloat.
Some may ask what difference can a single small school make in a country full of depressing news? For me the answer lay in the sparkling eyes of those girls that were in the classrooms…..it gives them HOPE!

 

 

NEWS PAPER COVERAGE

A clip from the coverage of the SSSS's Ilm-O-Hunar School (Titled " Many Benefit from free school, centre in Lyari) in Pakistan leading english daily newspaer - DAWN.