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A Reflection by Beth

Last week,  the woman who normally comes to clean the floors for the day at Sari Bari and make the morning and afternoon tea didn’t come to work.  I arrived, opening the office at 9, at ten minutes past, I realized I would be sweeping and mopping for the morning. Half way through I was drenched, as it’s now in the 100’s each day.  I was hot, sweaty, irritated.  But as the rest of our Sari Bari women showed up to work, each one rushed to find a cloth for mopping, bottles to fill with drinking water, the toilet scrubber was even fought over…and I passed one women smiling as she descended down the stairs disposing of a large bucket’s worth of yesterday’s trash…when I said to her, “you don’t have to do that” she shrugged me off, saying “ what is it to me, we’re all the same, I can do this work”…

And it was at that moment that I realized what great beauty exists in our midst at Sari Bari.  No work is too menial or dirty, they live it, they believe it.  They changed my perspective, by the simple act of helping me, picking up a rag and kneeling down beside me to get the necessary morning work done.  These women are my heroes and my sisters, teaching me and reminding me of the power of humility and service at it’s finest, even in my moments of irritation I continue to learn from these beautiful sisters in my midst.