Daily Inspiration: Meet Bakhtavar (Becca) Desai

Today we’d like to introduce you to Bakhtavar (Becca) Desai.

Hi Bakhtavar (Becca), can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
I came to Ohio in 2003 with my family and since then we have been in Fairfield. I worked as a public accountant for some years, until i decided to give up my career to become a caregiver to my aging parents and be a full time mom to my three kids. I volunteered in my children’s school for many years, giving my services to whatever the teachers needed me to do. Then I was asked by a trustee of my local food pantry to join their team as a trustee and help them in running the food pantry. I helped mainly with bringing in funding for our pantry through grants and fundraisers like organizing 5K Races for Ending Hunger in our community. Our pantry was serving about fifteen thousand people in my local community who were facing food insecurity.
Working as a volunteer was very fulfilling for me, and I enjoyed serving others, besides everyone in my own family. A few years later I was invited by a friend of mine to join the team of people running an organization called Restore Hope Liberia, which was a US based non-profit which raised funds to provide for programs in rural parts of Liberia to holistically uplift the communities there out of poverty through education, health care and earning opportunities.
My love and passion for helping others kept growing, and I loved giving my time and service to bring about a difference in the lives of people in the world. I knew by then that this is how I will spend the rest of my life, as a community volunteer, helping wherever there was a need; working with groups of people in the community that were striving to: build beloved communities and bridges of peace through interfaith understanding and friendships; lift the voices of marginalized communities, and make our planet healthier and more sustainable for all creation.
As people in my community got to know me and my work they invited me to serve on their boards. I serve on active boards of: EquaSion, and The Interfaith Center, two major interfaith organizations in the greater Cincinnati region; Shared Harvest Food Bank which serves over a hundred food pantries in five counties in Ohio; a local youth group called Friends for Good; and Faith Communities Go Green.
I am a Zoroastrian by faith and have been leading my local Zoroastrian community of the tri-state of KY, OH, & IN as their President. I had a dream for my Zoroastrian community that someday we would have our own Zoroastrian temple in Cincinnati, and after almost two decades of fundraising, we finally have our own house of worship! In my service to my religious community, I also conduct free monthly virtual religion classes on Zoroastrianism which kids from around the country join. I represent my religion nationally in Religions for Peace, USA, where I serve on their Executive Council, and in other interfaith events locally and nationally.
Once you set upon the journey of serving others in the world, the happiness you receive from such work is so addicting that you never turn back, but just want to keep going.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It is never a smooth road for almost all of us. It was not for me as well. The needs of my family increased as I got more entrenched in community service, like for eg, my mom got Alzheimer’s , which required me to restrict my volunteer work outside the house, as i was her full time caregiver. But I still managed to find time, mostly after the day ended for everyone at home, and then I would put in a few hours of work for the organizations I was helping. This period continued for almost 8 years until my mom passed away. The satisfaction of taking care of one’s parents is amazing and one of the most fulfilling things I have done in my life.
The war between Israel and Palestine took a toll in our interfaith friendships and our work together in our local interfaith community, as it created tension among certain religious groups. Just when we feel we are on our way to building bridges of understanding and respect and peace among the various groups, setbacks like these come looming over us. But our minds become even more focused and our desire to bring people together became even stronger, and our work still continues as our community strives to keep building a beloved community.
We have received setbacks in funding for our work for climate action and care for creation, as grants and donations have diminished considerably. Similarly we have taken a big hit in funding for my international non-profits like Restore Hope Liberia.
These setbacks don’t stop us in our tracks. They certainly slow us down, but we become more resilient, and creative in finding ways to continue doing programming to make our communities and our planet more sustainable. For eg, one of the things we do as faith Communities Go Green is to help Houses of Worship in the Greater Cincinnati region to become more sustainable by helping them start Green teams, doing Level 1 and Level 2 Energy Efficiency Audits for them, and come up with a plan of action which can help the house of worship reduce their utility bills and begin their journey toward making there house of worship sustainable. We used to get grants to do this work, but it has been hard to get funding these past couple years. Instead of stopping this work, we have found other creative ways to do it without much funds. At such times, the community comes together to help even more, and we have found several volunteers who are willing to get trained by professionals for free, and then these trained volunteers go and do the energy efficiency audits for the houses of worship in our area!
So the roads are not always smooth, and struggles keep coming along the way, but we always find a way to deal with such struggles, and in doing so the community becomes even more close knit and stronger!

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
As a volunteer who serves people and several non-profit organizations, I am known for bringing people together, helping organize programs in our community for interfaith work or climate action, or for my religious community.
I have done fundraising for many years and that is why it has been possible for my religious community to have our own house of worship today. When you work selflessly with hundreds of people in your life, for causes that are for the greater good, you need an endless amount of patience and perseverance, so you you don’t easily give up and turn away. My life’s experiences have certainly given me that kind of patience and perseverance which are my most precious tools in succeeding in the tasks I undertake.

How do you think about happiness?
Small successes make me happy. 20 years ago, in my community there was not much interaction among the people of various faith groups. People would not like to have a dialogue with one another on the rights of marginalized communities like the LGBTQIA+ community in our region. Today, we have more PRIDE Festivals happening even in the smallest suburban areas, than ever before, and we have interfaith PRIDE Celebrations in which people from so many faith groups come together to celebrate PRIDE in June.
There is a greater awareness and effort in our community towards Care for Creation, and changing one’s lifestyle for a happier, healthier and more sustainable Mother Earth.
All these small success steps make me very happy. We cannot change a lot in the world or make big transformations, but if our efforts are continuous and steadfast, we can make a dent in the world for the better, and for me that is a great source of happiness!

Contact Info:

• Website: fcgg.org, equaSion.org, https://interfaithcenter.wixsite.com/interfaithcenter, https://www.sharedharvest.org/, friendsforgoodcincy.org, restorehopeliberia.org, and zakoi.org
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsv6O-u1yRA4E8HNOeL3VYL4QaaU9S2er