By a wonderful coincidence, the Monday of Blackstump is World Habitat Day. The United Nations has designated the first Monday in October every year as World Habitat Day to reflect on the state of human settlements and the basic right to adequate shelter for all. It is also intended to remind the world of its collective responsibility for the future of the human habitat.

So while all the Slum Survivors are enjoying our last breakfast of rice and daal, and dismantling our slum, we’ll be joining with everyone worldwide to reflect on the rights and lives of the poorest people in our cities.

The UN Habitat website also has the annual State of the World’s Cities report, which is a great resource for information, analysis and action about, perhaps not surprisingly, the world’s cities.

In the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh, the men (always men) who collect the ‘rent’ from people living illegally on Government-owned land, are called Mastans. They’re not generally very nice people to know and are quite prepared to use their political connections and/or violence to enforce their will.

(I was hugged by a local Mastan in one slum in Bangladesh, when I visited last year, which was an odd experience. The friend who was showing me around explained that the man had initially been very hostile to community development work in his slum - and particularly by Christians - and had made many threats. But since he’d received a beating himself at the hands of another gang, he’d been trying to be a much more decent human being. This is not a sad story or a happy story. Just a story.)

The Blackstump slum will have its very own Mastans, who will use their powers for niceness, instead of for evil. Ben (me) and Carlyn, whose (2 years out-of-date) photos can be seen in the photoalbum will be living in the slum, organising the challenges, helping lead reflections, brewing chai and just generally being around if Slum Survivors want a chat.

I’m really looking forward to it.

For three glorious months in 1999 I woke up, dressed and ate breakfast in the little flat in Kathmandu, Nepal, where Lyndall and I were staying.Then I would walk to the corner of the Pulchowk Road, and walk or catch a bus, tuktuk or autorickshaw to the school where I was teaching. Between our flat and the road was a patch of waste ground. It was full of garbage, and dogs, cows and pigs snuffling through it for food scraps. Local people burned their rubbish here, and an open drain flowed along one side.

Every day two children played on this patch of wasteground. One of them about 5 years old and the other about 3. Their mother sat nearby on the corner of the busy Pulchowk Road, cooking popcorn in a tin cup on a small kerosene burner. Once it was cooked she wrapped the hot popcorn into twists of newspaper and sold it to passers-by, for 3 rupees a go (about 8 cents).

A decent meal for her and her children would have cost around 30 rupees. Life for her was pretty close to the edge.

And it struck me that I was walking out the door of our flat and straight into Scripture:

There was a rich men who dressed in the finest clothes and who feasted sumptuously every day. And at his gate, was a poor woman…

Luke 16:19 (slightly modified)

I am a rich man. I’ve never gone hungry, except by choice. I have an abundance of life’s material riches. And here I was, walking every day past someone in need. How did we respond? We bought popcorn every day from the woman, and shared it with her children whenever they were around.

But even now, back in Australia, the story still challenges me. When Jesus tells the story of the beggar Lazarus and the rich man, he reverses their order of importance. We learn the name of the beggar in the story - Lazarus - but the rich man remains anonymous. How much more important do I think my own desires are than the needs of the poor?

And through this stark story of judgement on lives lived well (Lazarus) or badly (the rich man) Jesus challenges me to respond to God’s heart for the poor - which I find everywhere revealed in the Old Testament: “Moses and the Prophets”. And, in responding to the poor, to respond to him - the one who was raised from the dead.

One of the targets of Millennium Development Goal 7 is to

Achieve significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020.

The indicator associated with this target is the number of slum dwellers with security of tenure. This is a critical issue, of course, as much of the vulnerability of many slum dwellers to exorbitant rents, forceable removal, limited access to services and amenities stems from their lack of secure tenure. However, there are many other indicators of what significant improvement in the lives of slum dwellers would look like.

One of my current favourite sites (I dip into it and follow up links from it every couple of weeks) is habitatjam. It doesn’t only address the MDGs and slum improvement, but features actionable ideas to improve our urban environments. The ideas all emerged in a global online conversation in conjunction with the World Urban Forum and highlight projects that are already being implemented, adapted and replicated.

Check it out, and be inspired by projects that are finding new ways to increase civic participation, create more ecologically sustainable cities, generate employment among the poor through garbage collection and recycling, or improve health through ecosanitation. If you are someone who feels the same yuk factor that nobbled Toowoomba’s plan to recycle effluent for drinking water, you won’t believe what you can do with poo.

Lucky Akter (13) lives in one of the many slums that that permeate the fabric of Dhaka (capital of Bangladesh) and are spreading rapidly at its outskirts. She lives with her family of five, in one small room (about 2 metres square) in a compound where seven other families live. The seven families share one toilet and a common outdoor cooking area. Their water source is a pump that serves around 100 families.

When Lucky Akter’s dad was made unemployed, her family were too poor to keep her in school. Her father had been a baby-taxi (autorickshaw) driver who was made unemployed when the Government replaced the baby-taxi fleet – which had run on petrol and other fuels – with vehicles run on compressed natural gas. He couldn’t afford the deposit and licence fee to operate the new vehicles and became unemployed. He now works as a manual labourer, seeking work on a day-to-day and contract basis, and earns a poverty wage.

HEED Bangladesh, one of TEAR Australia’s partners, has helped Lucky return to school, and - through her - provides a headstart on education for a group of children from the slum. Lots of kids in these slums miss out on school for a range of reasons - their parents are often illiterate and don’t value education, they can’t adjust to school, they are not able to study at home…

HEED provides financial assistance and other support for Lucky to go back to school. In return, Lucky teaches a class of twelve children in her cramped home every afternoon. Lucky teaches foundational lessons in literacy and numeracy and is helping to create a love of learning in these young children and get them ready for the transition to primary school.

HEED provides basic teaching training, chalk, slate, posters and some books for teaching for hundreds of girls like Lucky throughout slum communities in Bangladesh. The girls are also mentored by skilled teachers.

Lucky can’t get enough of education. Even though she attends her own classes for 5 hours a day, and teaches the children for 2 hours a day, when she graduates she wants to be a teacher.

(Gallery updated)

So, Slum Survivors will be eating two meals a day of rice and daal. What exactly is daal?

To answer that question and prepare for their ordeal, Survivors-in-training really ought to test themselves on this delicious and nutritious dish. When you’re done, take the Daal poll…

Recipe for Channa Daal

• 1 cup chana daal (a type of lentil)
• 7 cup water
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp cayenne
• 1/4 tsp turmeric powder
• 1/4 tsp cumin powder
• 1/4 tsp corriander powder
• 1 tblsp tamarind pulp
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tblsp vegetable oil
• 1/4 tsp black mustard seeds
• 1 chopped garlic clove

Preparation

• Soak the chana daal in 4 cup water for 2-3 hours then wash and drain.
• Boil 3 cups water and the salt in a pan.
• Add the chana dal, cover the pan and cook over medium flame for 30 min.
• Stir the dal when cooked.
• Add cayenne, turmeric, cumin, coriander, sugar the tamarind pulp (skin & seeds removed).
• Stir well and allow to simmer uncovered.
• In a separate frying pan, heat the vegetble oil over low heat and add the mustard seeds and chopped garlic to it.
• When the oil gets hot, add the oil mixture to the simmering pot of dal.
• Immediately cover the pot and keep covered for 2 min. while the dal continues to simmer.
• Cook chana daal uncovered for another 5 min. and the dal is ready to be served with rice or bread.