beyondBeijing2008.com

 MUMBAI, India –  Dr. Harish Ahire led us through a maze of crowded, narrow alleyways, navigating around excited groups of barefoot children and women washing pots in buckets of precious water, just inches away from open sewers.

“When it rains, the sewage runs into their homes,” he told me.

A woman rose from her washing, gesturing with broad sweeps of her arm from the sewer to the door of her tiny room, home to eight members of her family, who were huddled around a small television watching a soap opera.

Watch a video showing the plight of the poor in Mumbai. The entire piece is viewable on the San Jose Mercury News site.

“The big problem is contagious diseases – from the water. There is no clean water, no proper sanitation, no ventilation,” Ahire said. Almost on cue, a large bedraggled rat strolled nonchalantly across the alley. A woman took a half-hearted swing at it with a stick, more through wary familiarity than any sense of shock.

We continued to the edge of the slum, where piles of rubbish tumbled down the banks of a stagnant river, into which most of the slum’s waste eventually found its way.
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