The origins of One! international come from three little kids and a slum in Khar Danda, Mumbai. I had first contact with the kids by chance. Their older brother wanted me to buy milk powder, and I would not until I saw the 'baby brother' that he proclaimed really needed it. So he took me to his family and that day, one of his younger brother's had been run over by a Goods Carrying Truck and was in the hospital awaiting treatment. Their mother had died four years earlier; their father was an alcoholic and had disappeared and was nowhere to be found.

I never did buy milk powder. There was no need for that; but I bought them chicken biryani and left with tears in my eyes. How could this happen, how could this family of four be left to face the world alone at 15, 10, 7, and 5?

I went back to the hospital the next day. Who knows why? But, it was the best decision that I have ever made and has probably turned out to have completely changed my life. I went to the hospital just to drop off some pens and paper and food. I ended up returning later on that same day and spent three hours visiting and laughing and drawing and playing and smiling and enjoying the smiles that were lighting up their faces! So I continued to see the kids as much as I could - before work for an hour, after work for a couple hours and of course even more on weekends. They needed food and clothes and shoes and all those other material things; but what they needed most was an education and even more than that, was just a little attention and a little love.

Finally after a couple months of fighting with the doctors to get what was needed for Santosh, the boy with the broken leg, the kids got to return 'home'.