JOIN USM Shahdani, 55, who resides close to Mother House - the global headquarters of the Missionaries of Charity founded by the Mother - recalls her ever smiling face. “I first met her in 1974 here outside Mother House. She was indeed a noble and a polite lady. Whenever we used to meet we shared pleasantries. What I remember the most about Mother is her ever smiling face,” Shahdani said.
Born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje, Macedonia August 26, 1910, Mother Teresa left her parental home at 18, and joined the Sisters of Loreto, an Irish community of nuns with missions in India. She arrived in Kolkata in 1929. Years later, she took Indian citizenship and left the convent with the church’s nod to serve the poor and the ailing. She set up Missionaries of Charity in 1950 at 14, Creek Lane, but shifted to the Mother House in 1953.
To Shaukat Ali, 50, a homeless labourer living on a pavement near the building, the Mother was god. “There will be no one like Mother again. She was like god to us.” “She used to give us bread to eat, sometimes cake. I was born on this footpath in front of Mother House and will die here. But the love, the affection we received from her, we will never forget.”
Agencies