Suicide Survivors Day Progam organised by Aasra

Appended below are links to the partial recordings of the event ‘Suicide Survivors Day’ held at HELP library on 12 Dec(instead of 21 Nov) 2009. Organised and devised by Aasra with video support from American Foundation for suicide prevention.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIkb-L-DD1I

This video is a Talk conducted by Mr.Johnson Thomas(Aasra) at HELP on 12th Dec' 09 : topic - "Re-engaging with Life" Mr.Johnson Thomas(Aasra Helpline) can be contacted at 022-27546669

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ossGPuKUj8&NR=1 (Re-engaging with Life Part 1.wmv)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=774cuWNN-bw (Re-engaging with Life Part 2.wmv)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8Ncrxv7h4Y (Re-engaging with Life Part 3.wmv)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZigAcDdVCQQ&feature=related (Re-engaging with Life Part 4.wmv)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXfhIHX29uY&feature=related (Re-engaging with Life Part 5.wmv)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXBvBl-TZ9s&feature=related (Re-engaging with Life Part 6.wmv)
Aasra activities Dec 2009, Jan,Feb 2010

Aasra volunteers conducted a program for suicide survivors day on Dec 12 the gist of which is appended below.
We also had consultations with other NGO's and Medical professionals with regards to networking and developing modules that will be more effective in suicide prevention under two seperate aegis-
1) The Nargis Dutt Memorial trust, Fly & 1298(mayor's initiative) on the 4th Feb 2010
2) The Observer Research foundation on the 6th of Feb 2010



Aasra volunteers also took up a stall at an NGO mela conducted by SIES college in Nerul , Navi Mumbai on th 30th of Jan. The response from the students to the information, posters , workshop lists was very heartening. Some even signed up as potential volunteers and there were others who wanted to experience the workshops.

Aasra has also had a few consultations with schools and colleges and medical professionals to draw up a plan for sector wise targetting of vulnerable groups including parents, teachers and students considering the alarming rise in student suicides in Dec 2009-Jan2010 in Mumbai/Pune. We plan to conduct open forum discussions for parents and teachers and coping skills workshops for students of the 9th,10th,12th and final year college students as they are considered crucial make or break years in a students life.

The director was quoted in sev eral broadcasts and podcasts by Mint, BBC, Rediff.com, Radio Australia, Al jazeera channel, Canadian radio, Morgan Passi
As It Happens, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
205 Wellington St. W
Toronto, ON CANADA
M5V 3G7

+1+(416)-205-2824
morgan.passi@cbc.ca

Feel free to peruse our show's website, available at
www.cbc.ca/asithappens/

Washington Post, Indian Newspapers Times of India,Navi Mumbai Hindustan Times, Mumbai Mirror, DNA, Asian Age, The Free press Journal, the Indian Express, India Today, Yuva, The Week, Samna, Maharashtra Times, Loksatta, Television channels like NDTV, IBM Lokmat, Bindass, TV9 etc broadcast our helpline numbers and continue to do so.



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Suicide Survivors Day Dec 12
To be held at HELP library 3.30 pm to 5.30 pm.

Invitation performa

AASRA

invites you to a commemoration of 'Suicide Survivors Day'

Surviving Suicide
Life's challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they're supposed to help you discover who you are.
-- Bernice Johnson Reagon
Life does not cease to be funny when people die; any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
-- George Bernard Shaw
I've learned that every day you should reach out and touch someone. People love a warm hug, or just a friendly pat on the back.
-- Maya Angelou
No one is in control of your happiness but you; therefore, you have the power to change anything about yourself or your life that you want to change. - More Quotes by Barbara de Angelis
Sometimes in life, events occur that break the very foundation on which we stand. Our life, as we have known it, seems forever changed and we find ourselves in an unexpected struggle, first just to survive and then to move forward.
For people who have lost a family member or friend to suicide, grief is often complicated by feelings of anger, shame, fear and guilt
Know that people can and do survive and even go beyond surviving. You can and will survive. You are with friends.

Event Details:

on Saturday, 12th Dec 2009, 3.15pm to 5.30pm

Program entitled 'Re-engaging with Life'

The program begins with a brief introduction by Johnson Thomas, Director ,AASRA, followed by a Welcome dance by noted danseuse Jeroo Chavda who will also recite a few lines from one of the greatest authors of Indian Literature and a sterling humanitarian, Mulk Raj Anand(The occasion is also his anniversary).An audio visual presentation from the American Foundation of Suicide Prevention followed by personal testimonies from a few (select and willing) survivors/family members, a song 'heal the world' by Aaskash Francis, a young supporter of AASRA and the evening will end with a soothing classical music recital by noted Sarod player Vivek Joshi.



Venue:
at Help Library,
DN Rd,
Opp CST station, the McDonalds' side leading towards fountain.

Hope to see you there

with best regards,
Johnson Thomas
Director
AASRA

www.aasra.info
Mob: 9820466726
Helpline: 27546669
office:27546667
email: aasrahelpline@yahoo.com
Suicide Survivors Day (Originally Nov 21) re-Scheduled for Dec 12
To be held at HELP library 3.30 pm to 5.30 pm.
PROGRAM ON THE DAY



GOOD afternoon friends. Aasra welcomes you to this commemoration function of ‘Suicide Survivors Day.’
Life's challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they're supposed to help you discover who you are.
-- Bernice Johnson Reagon
Life does not cease to be funny when people die; any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
-- George Bernard Shaw
I've learned that every day you should reach out and touch someone. People love a warm hug, or just a friendly pat on the back.
-- Maya Angelou
No one is in control of your happiness but you; therefore, you have the power to change anything about yourself or your life that you want to change. - Barbara de Angelis


Sometimes in life, events occur that break the very foundation on which we stand. Our life, as we have known it, seems forever changed and we find ourselves in an unexpected struggle, first just to survive and then to move forward.
For people who have lost a family member or friend to suicide and for those who have survived an act of suicide, grief is often complicated by feelings of anger, shame, fear and guilt
Know that people can and do survive and even go beyond surviving. You can and will survive. You are with friends.
I’d like to begin this evening with a poem titled ‘Reflection’- one that was left behind by Y.Doherty when he attempted suicide.
Reflection
Another day for you to wonder, another day for you to mournIt wasn't my intention to go before the coming dawnMy pain was deep within my heart and troubled headIt wasn't my intention to go without words said.My frame of mind seemed normal, or so I heard them sayIt wasn't my intention not to see another dayI did not mean to make you suffer or cause you so much painIt wasn't my intention to never see you again.Despair and confusion left my aching mind unsureIt wasn’t my intention to suddenly close life's doorIf only I could give you reasons and brush the tears awayIt wasn’t my intention to leave and not stay. I did not mean for you to grieve, now left alone to cryIt wasn’t my intention to leave you, forever askinq whyAs the burdens of life's worries slowly ebb from my heartIt wasn’t my intention to tear your soul apart.Y. Docherty
To begin the evening with a bit of culture and formality we have with us noted Kuchipudi danseuse Jeroo Chavda and she will perform a vandana for an auspicious start to the evening.



Today is also humanitarian, author and critic Mulk Raj Anand’s birth anniversary and we would like to take this opportunity to honour his memory by saying a few words about his glorious life.
Mulk Raj Anand was born on 12 th Dec 1905 in Peshawar as the son of a coppersmith and soldier. He attended Khalsa College, Amritsar, and entered the University of Punjab in 1921, graduating with honors in 1924. Thereafter Anand did his additional studies at Cambridge and at London University, receiving his Ph.D. in 1929. He studied - and later lectured - at League of Nations School of Intellectual Cooperation in Geneva. Anand also lectured, on and off between 1932 and 1945, at Workes Educational Association in London.



Mulk Raj Anand was a follower of Gandhi and a passionate advocate of Indian independence. Based in London during the inter-war years, he became part of the Bloomsbury Group and worked at the BBC alongside George Orwell and TS Eliot. His work was championed by EM Forster. Returning to India in 1947, his literary accomplishments gave him the status of a national treasure. Mulk Raj Anand is among the pioneers of the modern Indian Novel in English.
Anand started to write at an early age. He wrote his first prose in reaction to the trauma of the suicide of an aunt who had been excommunicated for dining with a Muslim woman. An unhappy love for a Muslim girl, who was married, inspired more poetry. In the early 1930s Anand wrote books on art history, but it was not until the appearance of the novels Untouchable (1935) and Coolie (1936), the story of a fifteen year-old child-labourer who dies of tuberculosis, that Anand gained wide recognition. Untouchable narrates a day in the life of Bakha, who suffers a number of humiliations in the course of his day. Bakha is an unclean outcaste, fated by his low birth to work as a latrine sweeper. In the novel Anand presented a powerful critique of the Indian caste system and British colonial domination of India, which has actually increased the suffering of outcastes such as Bakha.
In Two Leaves and a Bud (1937) Anand continued his series of socially conscious novels, which shared much with the proletarian novels published in Britain and the United States during the 1930s. The story told about a poor Punjabi peasant who is brutally exploited in a tea plantation and killed by a British official who tries to rape his daughter.





Also Anand's famous trilogy, The Village (1939), Across the Black Waters (1940), and The Sword and the Sickle (1942) was a strong protest against social unjustices. A novelist, playwright, philosopher, poet, essayist, critic, Anand was at heart a social activist and political animal. His writing would highlight injustice with an eloquence that touched people around the world. His close friend Alistair Niven, author of ‘Yoke of Pity’ – a critique of the writings of Mulk Raj Anand said about him “he was a great writer but, even more than that, a very great lover of humankind”.His concern for the disadvantaged and downtrodden is a pervasive theme in much of his writings. His contribution to the preservation and promotion of Indian Art is equally significant and Marg, a magazine dedicated to revealing lesser known facets of the world of art, will remain a lasting testimony to his greatness. Mulk Raj Anand’s ‘realistic and sympathetic’ portrayal of the lives of the poor, disinherited and the disadvantaged will always be remembered.
To continue with the celebration of life- I’d like to now call upon Shreyas Rao to share with us, briefly, his struggle with life.
The floor is open for anyone who would like to share their own personal battles and struggles with living.
Thank you for the sharing.
Akash Francis, a young and enthusiastic AASRA supporter will now render in his own voice the famous Michael Jackson written number ‘Heal The World’.
The next is a video from the ‘American Foundation of Suicide Prevention’ which is being shown across the world on this very day.
They say music heals. We have with us Pandit Vivek Joshi, a sarod player who will now play for us some truly divine and healing music.
Thank you for joining us in this celebration of life. I hope you enjoyed this event.
Report
A total of 55 people turned up for the event of which 22 were male and 23 female. Age groups- 12 from 50 and above age group
22 from the 25-35 age group
16 from the 35-49 age group and 5 from the 15-21 age group.
Their feedback to the event was verbal. Most of those present were vocal in expressing that it was the first time that someone had at least tried to understand their pain and provide some kind of solace.
We plan to have informal support groups running and the participants were eager to be apart of such support groups.

Thanks
With regards,
Johnson Thomas
Director
AASRA