A ConneXions Artisan Story

Left Alone, She Found a Family Anyway

There is a particular kind of loneliness that comes not from being far from people, but from being right beside them and still feeling invisible. Anjona Sing knows this loneliness well. At 52 years old, after losing her husband, she found that the people who were supposed to stand closest to her — her own children — simply stepped away.

And yet, if you ask Anjona today whether she feels afraid, alone, unsupported — she will tell you no. Because somewhere along the way, she found a different kind of family. One that did not share her blood, but showed up for her anyway.

Widowed, and Then Left Behind Again

Losing a husband is its own quiet devastation — the end of decades of shared life, shared decisions, shared survival. For many women, that loss is softened, even just a little, by the presence of children who step forward to care for their mother in her grief. For Anjona, that did not happen.

Her son and her daughter, the two people she had raised and given so much of her life to, did not come to support her. Whatever their reasons, the result for Anjona was the same: she was a widow, ageing, and entirely on her own. No income. No safety net. No family to lean on in the way a person should, in their later years, be able to lean on those they raised.

She needed a way to survive. More than that, she needed it to be dignified — because survival without dignity is its own kind of slow defeat, and Anjona was not ready to be defeated.

A Neighbour’s Word, and a New Beginning

It was a neighbour who first told Anjona about ConneXions — about the work being done there to empower women just like her. In communities like the one Anjona lives in, word of mouth carries enormous weight. A kind neighbour mentioning a place where she might find work, might find respect, might find a way forward — that single conversation became the turning point of Anjona’s later life.

In 2012, Anjona began working at ConneXions, producing beautiful kantha blankets. The work suited her, and she suited the work. But she did not stop there. She was eager to keep learning, keep growing, and expressed a wish to be trained in sewing and tailoring as well.

ConneXions supported her in that wish, just as they had supported her from the very beginning. Anjona developed new skills and moved into bag production, where she now earns enough to support herself — fully, independently, on her own terms.

Independence at an Age Most Are Told to Slow Down

There is something quietly defiant about a woman in her fifties, abandoned by her own family, choosing not to give up but to build something new for herself instead. Many in her position might have folded under the weight of it all. Anjona did the opposite. She learned a new trade. She grew her skills. She became self-sufficient.

That kind of independence, earned at an age when society often expects women to step back and rely on others, carries a particular kind of strength. Anjona did not have children to rely on. So she built a life that did not need to rely on anyone — except the community at ConneXions, who never once made her feel like a burden.

“As long as I work at ConneXions, I am not afraid, because I always feel that the ConneXions family is with me.”

— Anjona Sing

The Family She Chose, and the One That Chose Her Back

The word “family” means something very specific to Anjona now. It is not the son and daughter who walked away. It is the women beside her at ConneXions, the trainers who taught her new skills, the quiet sense of belonging she feels every time she shows up to work.

When she says she is not afraid, it is worth sitting with what that really means. A widow, abandoned by her own children, with no one left to catch her if she fell — and still, she does not live in fear. That is not because her circumstances became easy. It is because she found people who showed up consistently, who never once made her carry her hardship alone.

Anjona Sing’s story is a quiet reminder that family is not always defined by blood. Sometimes it is defined by who stays. And for Anjona, ConneXions stayed — long after the people who were supposed to had already gone.

ConneXions is a social enterprise based in Kolkata, India, empowering women from slum communities through dignified work and skills training.

www.connexions.org.in