Dear friend,
I am writing this before there is anything to show — before the first recipient, before the first ceremony, before anyone has heard of us. I want the beginning to be honest, and I want it to be small.
This fund exists because four people I loved spent their lives quietly believing in others. They were not wealthy. They gave what they had: attention, patience, a warm meal, a word of encouragement when nothing else was on offer. When I try to remember what they left me, it is not money. It is the feeling of being believed in.
I could not think of a better way to keep them near than to try, in some very small way, to pass that feeling on. And so, once a year, for as long as I am able, this fund will find one person in India whose work is quiet, unglamorous, and full of promise, and offer them a single act of belief — an award, a hand, a note that says: someone saw you.
It begins at €500 (approx. ₹55,000). It may grow. It may not. That is not the measure. The measure is that it will arrive, every year, without fail, for a hundred years if we are lucky.
If you are the person receiving this one day — welcome. You were worth waiting for. If you are simply reading, thank you for standing near us at the beginning.
With love,
The Roy Family