Buddha's Smile School

2005 bat mich eine Kommilitonin, während meiner Indienreise doch mal in Sarnath, einem buddhistischen Pilgerort in einer armen Gegend Nordindiens, eine Schule für kastenlose und unterprivilegierte Kinder zu besuchen. Sie wußte, daß ich Webseiten gestalte, und die Schule benötigte dringend eine, um für Spenden zu werben. Im März 2005 war ich dort und hörte die mitreißende Geschichte von Rajan und ihrer Schule.

It’s very difficult to find someone like Rajan, my aunt. It’s like opening a 1,000 shells under the sea to find one pearl. Anybody can love a rosebud it takes a great deal to love a leaf! It’s very easy to love someone who is beautiful, but love the one who can make your life beautiful…

The following is part of an informal trip report by Karen Kotoske, Executive Director, Amistad International: Buddha’s Smile School (BSS) is located in Sarnath and is only a short walk from the historical site where Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha delivered this first sermon. Amistad International has been the primary sponsor of this school since 2004 when BSS had only 60 students. 239 now attend this free school for the poorest of the poor children in the area.

With brightly shining eyes the children say goodbye to Rajan and the other teachers at the end of the day. And with brightly shining eyes they wave back when leaving in the rikshaws Rajan has organized to bring them home. Home means those places where they had been picked up, the places where the poorest [...]

My wife, Gita and I had the pleasure of meeting Sukhdev and Rajan during our recent visit to Varanasi. They were kind enough to guide us in the prayers that we had to perform for my son’s final rites before his ashes were immersed in the holy Ganges. In fact, they took time to be [...]

Our first morning in Sarnath, my travelling companion and I walked into a small cafe next to the Tibetan Institute where our host was studying, and begin conversing with a kind Australian man. He told us that he had come there as a volunteer, to help build a website for the school that the cafe [...]

After experiencing such poverty in both Bodhgaya and Sarnath, Buddha’s Smile School was a completely enriching and perfect experience. Meeting Rajan, we spoke of love and in her I saw a heart too big to fit in her chest. Sure enough her generosity of spirit and deep love for all the children (including her desire [...]

From Kolkata I took a train fifteen hours west to Varanasi (India’s most holy city) where Rajani Kaur and her husband, Sukhdev, met me at the train station and took me to their apartment above her Amistad International funded school for 200 children from the slums. I awoke the next morning to witness Rajan’s students, [...]

I first met Rajan Saini and her husband Sukhdev in 1999 when they were living in Ashapoor and I was visiting the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath. At that time, that which is now the Buddha’s Smile School was a bare patch of brown land, on the far side of which were [...]

The first thing that strikes me about this school is the name. What indeed would leave the Buddha Smiling? It would be the relinquishment of ignorance and suffering it would be compassion and wisdom….and succinctly, it is all the characteristics that define the philosophy of the Buddha Smile School and its founder Rajan whose instinct [...]