Sewa Day: International Day of Volunteering by Hindus and Indians Celebrated in USA

(CHAKRA) “Sewa Day” was celebrated by the Indian and Hindu communities at multiple cities in the US. The objective was to bring together a diverse group of volunteers representing professional bodies, associations, linguistic, temple, spiritual, social and cultural organizations from the Indian, Indian-American, Hindu and wider communities for a day of community service.

Hundreds of volunteers of different ages and backgrounds worked on a wide range of projects at locations across the country for a few hours to make a difference in their communities. In San Diego, California, about 50 volunteers inspected, sorted and bagged 10000 lbs. of fresh fruit for immediate distribution at the Jacobs and Cushman San Diego Food Bank. New York/New Jersey area volunteers coated a million square feet of rooftop in Brooklyn to make a greener, greater New York as part of the NYC Cool Roofs Program. Sewa volunteers in Bloomington, Illinois helped the Ecology center with a marathon to raise funds for recycling in Bloomington Normal. In Cleveland, Ohio, volunteers helped the temple to organize a health fair for Bhutanese refugees and provided transportation and other logistical help. Volunteers at San Antonio, Texas worked at the Hindu temple with cleaning, food preparation and attending to devotees. Volunteers in Atlanta, Georgia cleaned up and maintain one mile of county road as part of the adopt-a-mile program. They also helped construct a low-cost home under the Habitat for humanity project. At Houston food bank in Texas, 36 volunteers sorted and packaged 4600 meals at the state of the art facility. Austin Texas volunteers cleaned up a temple kitchen that would be used to prepare and serve meals. Sewa Day projects are scheduled at a few more cities in the coming weeks. The Washington DC chapter will assist Earth Sangha in planting native grass and wild flowers while eliminating/weeding out invasive plants in Virginia. At Boston MA, volunteers from Sewa and CVS Pharmacy will cook vegetarian Indian food at the meal center for 450 homeless people. Volunteers in Chicago, Illinois will clean and decorate the HSS Karyalay (Community and Cultural Center) that hosts meetings, books, cultural and spiritual activities. Sewa USA is proud to a part of this worldwide initiative to give back to our communities, and we thank all our volunteers, sponsors and participating organizations.

About Sewa Day – Sewa Day is a project of Sewa International. It is an international day of volunteering where thousands of good-hearted people across the world come together to perform service and experience the joy of giving. By participating in this collective endeavor, we hope that the seeds of Sewa (Sanskrit for ‘selfless service’) are watered so that acts of kindness and public service are performed more often. Sewa Day is being celebrated in over 10 locations in the US, as well as in UK, Australia, India and many other countries. It is a day of pure service and no fund-raising is allowed to take place. We invite the community to join us again next year and be part of the movement! For more information, please visit http://www.sewaday.org.

About Sewa International
Sewa International is a 501 ©(3) Hindu charitable non-profit service organization that is works in the areas of education, healthcare, women’s empowerment, child welfare, rural and tribal welfare, disaster relief, refugee support, etc. Sewa works with communities in need, and is active in India, USA, UK and other countries. For more information, please contact us at [email protected] or 708-USA-SEWA.

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