All across India, thousands of children have been writing heartfelt letters to the students of Pakistan, and thousands of children from Pakistan have been replying. Friends Without Borders are now inviting every school in both countries to take part and join this historic heart-to-heart experiment.

The idea is simple: writing a letter will leave deep and lasting impressions that will help to humanize the other and be the seeds that promise to mature into a safer and friendlier world.

From this original idea, sprang the World’s Largest Love Letter. Written by the children of India to the children of Pakistan, this now famous collection of kind words is massive! Bigger than a football field, it measures 240 by 360 feet. It is so big that it would not even fit into its intended resting place the huge Chinnaswamy Cricket Stadium so they had to leave the border pieces off.

Written in Urdu, English and Hindi, it reads: Dear Children of Pakistan, Let’s join hearts in friendship. Together we can make a better world – The Children of India. Thousands were bused in to view the gargantuan letter and asked to write along a yellow strip. On the return home, the yellow strip, which was 1,008 feet in length, was laid out on the ground. Named The Golden Bridge of Friendship and covered with thousands of messages, it stretched from inside Pakistan, all the way through the Wagah Border, which is known as No Man’s Land, and right across into India itself.

Friends Without Borders are also organising a major historic Independence Day Concert in August. Musicians and celebrities will come together across the India-Pakistan border to help lead the children of both countries into a new era of friendship and cultural interaction.

Dil se Dil, the Independence Day Friendship Celebration, is a celebration of our past, say the organisers. It also acknowledges our shared history while recognising that these two great countries are pursuing separate national destinies. Dil se Dil is a celebration of our present, displaying our common humanity. It is a celebration of our future, demonstrating that mutual dreams of much more peaceful, open, collaborative relations are indeed close at hand.

Contact: Friends Without Borders,

c/o Routes 2 Roots, 16 Apsara Housing Society, 2nd Floor, NDSE Part I,

New Delhi 110 049, India

Tel: +91 98942 77315

Website: www.friendswithoutborders.org

Email: kid2kid@gmail.com

Photo: Maria Durana/FWB