While visiting my friend once, she suggested an impromptu trip to the slums. She wanted to tell the kids there some stories with moral values. So we reached the venue, a section of space under a flyover, inhabited by a couple dozen people.
We stood there for five minutes trying to grab the attention of anybody willing to pay heed. After having declared that we weren't interested in purchasing the peacock feathers they sold and since we had no goodies to offer, no soul would hover close to us. One of those kids thought listening to stories was a joke and walked past us without even an answer.
After fifteen minutes of unsuccessful attempts, a soul took pity and pointed to one of their kins and said 'he's the leader, approach him.' The leader figure understood and coaxed everyone. They spread the cleanest piece of sheet they had for us to sit and everybody gathered around. Adults included.
Our story session began. They had never listened to a story before! They were patiently listening to us blabber. A little while later a car stopped by. Two men got down with smiling faces and tiny cartons of fruit juices. Our audience turned towards them. My friend requested them to wait for five minutes since we were midway through a story. They ignored her request and started distributing. We waited. The leader guy asked everyone to drink it once the story got over. The crowd complied.
We resumed. A few minutes later one of those men turned towards us smiling and asked,
"Which institution are you from? Do you belong to the church nearby? What do you do?"
My friend turned to them and replied,
"Sorry, we're busy right now."
Turned around and continued with her story.
That man left without another word.
The rest of the story-
After the session, they promised to tell others the stories they listened to. We parted with couple dozen smiles and a few pictures.
My friend told me after we left, "The audacity of that man to come asking after ignoring my request. Does he even have a clue of all the pain we took to get them to listen. Which institution do you belong to, he asks." I just smiled.