A Visit to an Old Age Home

On Monday, 30^th   September 2019

At TJIS, Kanpur

Love your parents and treat them with loving care for you will only know their value when you will see their empty chair!!

“Let us never know what old age is; Let us know the happiness time brings, not count the years.

Parents are treasures that children should guard jealously. Putting them into old age homes must never be the first but the last option. Treat your parents as an asset not liability. Let them feel wanted not a burden.

Though it sounds unbelievable but it’s true that there are children who leave their old parents as destitute to die. This has added to mushrooming of old age homes in our country. The old age homes should be homes only to those types of people who don’t have anybody to look after them in their old age. To survey the situation and to help them the students of Std. VIII-XII of The Jain International School, Kanpur visited The Swaraj Vridha Ashram, an Old Age Home and spent their whole day there. There could have been no other better way of commemorating ‘The International Day of Older Persons’ which is observed on 1^st October every year.

 The students reached there early morning and were greeted with kindness and warmth. There were two types of old people - one who was abandoned and the others were suffering from some sort of disability. No matter what the cause was, what mattered to us the most was their age. According to Shakespeare, old age is the age where the person behaves like a child again we witnessed the same. They were in hunger of love and to love. The people of old age were very compatible and friendly. They treated our whole day with their beautiful smiles and didn't reflect their problems even for a second. Later the children addressed people as dada/dadi and greeted them with flowers and handmade boxes. Our students have offered them various food items and clothes as well which would definitely be a great help for them. In return they all blessed the students and invited them to visit again. The day turned out to be fruitful and happy. The head of the shelter home was overwhelmed by our presence and was happy to have us here.

Though the time spent with them was just a few hours, however, it taught us the lesson for a lifetime.