We had certainly enjoyed the first three months in Kullu. In mid December Anine has completed her project and Modestas continued his own work until March.
It was difficult to adjust mylelf to the new emotional environment, as I inevitably felt lonier and lonier as time went by. Besides the children, to whom I would speak at school and Ankit's family, there were little people to communicate with.
However, ten days after Anine had left, me and Panki travelled to Delhi and a attended a conference called the training programme on counseling skills on children protection. For five days we were taught counseling and empathy and active listening and how to make an Asian PPT presentation.
Panki was my guide around Delhi for five days. He is a really warm and interesting person. He showed me the biggest electronics market in Asia. He took me to the biggest hardware market in Asia. And, finally, he told me of the biggest vegetables market in Asia, which we I haven’t had my honor to see.
Both of us found the conference interesting in one or the other way. I personally enjoyed all the ladies speakers. They were great communicators, and I have to admit, Indian women have beautiful eyes and smile. Once they are activated together, people tend to be lured into listening, subconsciously. The male speakers positioned themselves firmly into the chairs and gave us the “lecture”. I am glad that I have learned how to understand children's mind. The conference material is very applicable when dealing with the children in Kullu.
Kalyehli
Remember those thirty naughty boys living to together in Kalyehli? Well, it turned out that they liked Anine too much and I was no good substitute for her charms. Therefore I devised a new plan how to reach out for them. Firstly, by combining the forces of Hollywood and Bollywood I managed to increase their attention span. And whilst I taught them some Geography and English they secretly awaited the movie. I made lots of promises to them. A movie, a game and an opportunity to see me cooking in the kitchen... Even I loved travelling back to childhood when watching Disney animation (I must confess, I have never seen Disney movies as a child!) such as Mulan, Beauty and the Monster or Hindi movies like Salaam Bombay and Lagaan.
An interesting observation, the negative temperature change decreased their metabolism rate (?) and as the Himachali winter came, the boys slowed down – all for my pleasure! Also, in the previous post we complained the “Save the girl child” performance was called off. To our surprise we got to know that the boys have translated the play into Hindi and the resulting performance guarateed them the 2nd place prize in Shimla!
Mount Everest public school
Also known to us as the Nepali immigrant workers children school in Manali (NIWCSIM), it was closed for the winter holidays before the New Year and will never be hosted in that building again. It is looking for a new residence building in Manali. Aslo, Sonny, the main teacher, had left Himachal for her native Andhra where people eat rice and idlees.
KAB school for blind in Sarwari bazaar
Lots of changes have taken place in this institution. I had continued working with the primary section children until the end of January, when the youngest ones returned to their own homes for five weeks.
Before that I met a generous toy shoy owner who kindheartedly donated an Indian alternative for Lego toys. The children loved construckting the bricks, and their visuo-motor cortexes loved this activity as well! Actually, once the young ones were gone, we played with the elder students, as they showed great interest into expressing their inner selves. Once again big thanks to Anine who has nurtured the idea of action kinesthetic learning as opposed to the orthodox oral communication. Yet I printed out a book by Hans Ch. Andersen and read it out loud to the children. I still wonder whether they really liked my fairy tales reading time, but I did so for shure!
I have long thought of empowering the local plastic resources i.e. the bottles. I cleaned and dried (sapf oor sooki) 20 of them in various sizes and shapes. After all this laborious experience I left the children alone of putting the necessary (according to their superior hearing abilities which I lack) amounts of rice, chick peas, beans and plastic. Not surprisingly, rice had once again proved its reputation as the Universal Accoustic Matter (UAM).
On the winter mornings, I would find the teachers and their students cosily sitting around the stove. Despite the prevailing darkness where the stove stood, it was amazing to see teachers like Shakuntla , Sapna or Puja teaching their students. Trully intimate and personal sight, which I won't forget.
Nowadays, when the little ones are at home, I come to the blind school to see my old friends and record. I am constantly praised for my, here exotic, Eastern European accent.
Bharat Bharti public school
As always I start my visit to Bharat Bharti by climbing/hiking the Sultanpur and Dhalpur hills. Back home I will tell my friends that I was mounteneering in India quite a lot. This physical exircise is an insoperable part of Kullu. And besides, once at Bharat Bharti – I get a generous lunch offer.
Someitmes I recive a plate with four giagantic momos, or two sidos, or chao ming, or maybe potato chips and cookies (so much of the hiking experience...)
Nowadays I was assigned to work with the 9 graders who are really quirky. It is also much easier to establish my authority and control that gang of 30 students. And they really turn up in great numbers compared to the teenage angst symptomatic 11 graders. What we do I do with my new class?
To start with we played a variety of initiative and leadership games, trying to raise their self-confidence. It still shocks me to realize that the public education system is the true No.1 self-confidence killer. It's reversible of course. Additionally, we tried out making a theatre performance, but after two consecutive classes the final result lacked quality. Some of the children were less then eager to express their thoughts (and say those lines) most of the time.
We have also tried to attempt a few discussions about the soaring numbers of Indian students suicides and womens' rights. This time poor English skill were emegent, and once allewed to discuss it in Hindi, the students seemed eager to share their ideas. And in the end, Bharat Bharti's children are my best friends here in Kully, especially the 11 graders Diwia, Tejender and Tenzing.
I am eager to observe where will the Kullu project sets its sails to once I am gone.
Best regards,
Modestas (^ ^)
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Wednesday, 16 February 2011
Tuesday, 7 December 2010
2 Days in the Kullu Valley with the KULLU PROJECT
Hi all , this is my delayed entry for the blog for the Kullu Project, I went down for a very short visit in November 2009. As I was in India for only a week, I was offered a great opportunity by Ankit to go up and film the kids and volunteers at the orphanages. It was a long journey up the mountains, but I was warmly welcomed by 2 UWC volunteers Eloise and Kitty who had been staying up there for a few months.
I stayed with them in their small and cosy flat in Kullu where I had many warm cups of chai (tea) made by the girls. I was briefed on their efforts at the orphanage and was very impressed at the dedication and work they had achieved in the months they were living there. As young students on their gap year, they had a very responsible role in managing their own time and planning activities and programs for the children in various orphanages in Kullu and Manali. It was up to them to arrange their own time which completely differs to other organized gap year volunteer programs in India. The students here also only paid their rent and daily living .
On the first day I followed them to one of their regular visits to the Kaleyli Boys Orphanage. As it was my first visit to an orphanage, I did not know what to expect but on arrival I was greeted with a group of very happy and well looked after boys. The boys were alive with enthusiasm and excitement on seeing the volunteers arrive .A group of boys proudly brought out their medal for me to see as they had recently won the best skit in a nationwide competition. The boys were happy with their achievements and politely introduced themselves to me referring to me as ‘didi’ , which is sister in Hindi. It was heartwarming to see such a great home with children who have a lot of potential and also the most hospitable welcome. They very proudly presented their award winning skit and song and dance which the volunteers help them organize for the competition. It was great to see that the volunteer program was producing great results for the boys. It was obvious winning the skit was a great boost to their self esteem and morale. It was sad to say goodbye to them as it is one of the few places you can get such a warm welcome and actually have so much fun participating with them in their song and dance and listen to their stories, see their homework.
The next day I followed the volunteers to the Bashing Orphanage , where most of the volunteers work was centered on assisting the reconstruction of the management of the orphanage and looking for a new property for them in Kullu. There were fewer children in this orphanage and it was obvious these children needed a new property for the orphanage and were in dire need of funding for materials and sponsorship for their education and counselors. I was able to pass them some toys that I had collected in Singapore and take some great shots of them playing games with the volunteers. It was also good to see, that the volunteers time with them did make a difference for the children as it gives them something to look forward to in the day. The volunteers who have stayed there for a few months have established really good relationships with the children however it would be good to have someone permanent for them and hopefully funding can come in for this orphanage so they can at least experience some permanency in their lives.
The 2 days I had in the valley was truly a heartwarming and enriching experience, its was a good eye opener into volunteering, as it is something I have been wanting to do and the 2 days there have convinced me it is indeed a very rewarding experience. The Kullu and Manali region is also home to very beautiful landscapes and scenery. The mountain area has a completely different culture and atmosphere to the main Indian cities such as Delhi or Mumbai. It felt much safer especially for a young woman. I took a day bus up the mountain and a night bus back to Punjab, though a very long journey (10 hours) , it was safe and there were no problems.
I do hope more organizations/individuals would be interested in volunteering, the children look forward to the activities organized and one can learn so much from them as well.
Saturday, 20 November 2010
Introducing Anine and Modestas
Since September we, Modestas (Lithuania) and Anine (Norway), have been volunteering in the Kullu Project. We both spent the last two years of our high school at the Red Cross Nordic United World College in Norway. There we engaged in various social services ranging from the Amnesty International club to table tennis classes or yoga sessions with the adjacent rehabilitation center patients. Flying to India for a 6 month volunteering program seemed like a natural continuation of our UWC education. 
At a first glance, coming to a place just a few miles away from the Himalayas was quite stunning, with its colorful rickshaws and loud atmosphere vis-à-vis the humdrum daily European routine. But after two months in Kullu we feel like home – people are the same everywhere! So far we have worked in the following institutions: Bashing and Kalyeli orphanages, NAB School for Blind, Drug de-addiction and rehabilitation center in Jiri, school for Nepali immigrants’ children in Manali and Bharat Bharti Public School in Dalphur. Living in Kullu and assimilating to the local culture brings its own challenges (especially linguistic barrier!), but let us firstly elaborate on what exactly we do on each and every institutions.
NAB School for Blind
Students here are being taught Braille and Computer lieteracy from a very young age. Elder students who’d mastered Braille reading, writing and calculations attend a regular Hindi medium school. However, it would be naïve to expect the blind children’s’ performance at school match the one of a median Kullu student. That’s where the dedicated teachers step in – after the regular classes children repeat the same syllabus in the blind school. In the end, they are putting as twice as much effort to learn the same material!
However, the young ones, aged 4-10, are just getting their feet wet with the school routine and receive little attention from the teachers. Hence we have four 3,5 hour long weekly sessions together, starting at 10 am. Also, by the end of each session we receive a pleasant bonus – free lunch!
Our activities mainly consist of teaching the basic spoken English. In the first few days we were taken aback by their linguistic abilities, the only question they were bale to respond to was “What is your name?” However, through everyday practice we taught them how to introduce themselves in a “polite British” manner. Whether visited by the sponsors or simply meeting the fellow students, they master phrases “What is your age? How old are you? Where do you live? Do you have any siblings?” Whilst some might ridicule this “lesser” knowledge, but teaching a gang of 12 children these phrases is a milestone for us and took no less than a month. Knowing these phrases comes handy when the sponsors are visiting, so that they can see that the children are really learning and sometimes surpassing the English level of the fellow students in the public schools.
You may start judging us inadvertently, but besides some “polite” phrases we engaged into music, too. To start with, we were happy to find out that the previous volunteers made simple musical instruments: empty 0,5l plastic bottles filled with rice. Visually impaired enjoyed singing the Old McDonalds, Adams family, Kangaroo Joe and other popular children songs. Similarly, songs helped us to “slow down their batteries” and regain focus for more thinking intensive learning.
Also, twice a week we’d go to a local park, just 200 meters away from the school itself. What broke our hearts where innumerable amounts of thrash: potato chips bags, cigarette packs and glassware.
Sometimes I’d start picking it up myself, and when I see a child throwing away a candy wrapping onto the floor, the poor guy’s got to be in trouble! Kullu is to beautiful a place and saving the pristine environment is doomed, without teaching some “basics” first.
Finally, each Saturday is dedicated for the crafts. So far we have made paper hats, friendship bracelets, tasted various fruits, massaged each other whilst listening to Chopin and “cooked” our own playing dough from water, salt and oil!
Trip to Solang Nallah
A week ago, we went to the Solang Nallahl ski resort (15 km from Manali), which was yet to be covered with snow, but proved no less exciting. The blind school is organizing that kind of trip only once a year. I was pleasantly by the amount of noise, dance and rhythm which dispersed in our bus. By the way, it was a generous family of Anine who donated the money for the bus. Unfortunatelly, Anine couldn’t participate in the trip due to illness.
I felt partially deaf after a two hour ride with the drums echoing in my cochleae for a few days. Afterwards, we were elevated by a thousand meters right on the skying slope. Children drunk chay and enjoyed touching the ice.
After descending, we had a free lunch with a local sponsor, but before that, our children performed singing and dancing. Finally we joined the pilgrims from all around India at the Madimba temple in Manali. Children, especially Satish and Gotam, loved pictures being taken of them.
Bharat Bharti Public School
At RCN UWC in Norway, we have been instructed how to perform the First Aid. We expected to teach the Kullu Project institutions some First Aid as well, but in reality, due to their poor English proficiency we couldn’t instruct any. However, one day we paid a visit to the Bharat Bharti school, and met a wonderful couple running a prive English medium school. They kindly invited us to give two hour-long weekly classes, on Tuesdays and Fridays 3:30 pm.
Until now we were focusing on the spoken English, as the majority of students are spending their first year at an English medium course and show little confidence speaking English, although their writing is impressive.
Each week we’d introduce them to a different topic, make a short presentation on it and a class discussion afterwards. So far we have touched the legacy behind the corporate punishments at schools and home, honor killings and marital traditions, US political system and recently – Barrack Obama’s visit to India. We were happy to see at least six 16-17 year olds who spoke fluently in our class, however the majority remained shy until a few classes ago. After all, we are working with them to build some confidence.
Besides these popular media activities we ran a few linguistic competitions, and when it comes to competition Indian students definitely stand out! After each class, some of them would insist on staying for a longer time, therefore we’d play the initiative and ball games.
Overall, Bharat Bharti not only permits us to teach the First Aid, but also gives us insights into the young peoples’ lives in India. It’s a great asset to our project. Not to mention the fact, that the management is really lenient towards volunteers and before the each session we are treated with a plate of local Indian dish.
School for Nepali immigrant children
We have only been in contact with the Mount Everest Public School in
Manali since the beginning of October. The school is for children of
poor Nepali and Tibetan immigrant workers in the region, and so
provides teaching in their native languages in addition to Hindi and
English. Since the families of the children are very poor the school
is run mainly on charity from generous local people in the
surroundings of Manali, raised with the work of a small handful of
committed Nepali and local people. However, shortage of money is a
recurring problem. Some months the teachers have had to go without
pay, and in the worst cases there has not been enough money to pay for
the petrol for the school van and the children have had to remain at
home. A good thing that has helped the money cycle go round is that
the rent for the modest classrooms has been unnaturally low due to
that the building is still under construction. The back side of the
coin is that the standards are lower, for example no electricity or
outside space to play games. However, we have still managed to play a
bit of unofficial basket ball in the lunch break in the small entrance
space outside the classroom doors. This about 2 meter wide outside
corridor is the only space the children have to play and eat their
lunch. In contrary to government schools the children have to bring
lunch from home, and every time we are visiting it is always some kids
that have no lunch and have to go hungry, which makes the aloo
parantha brought from the local street shop taste a bit less tastier.
We felt that this institution, in addition to Bashing, is one that
needs us more than any. And so we decided to do some fundraising in
addition to weekly visits. The most urgent thing they needed was a
closet to store books in, especially after a generous donation of
educational books from a school in England. In addition, the school
does not have any other teaching materials than the books, a
blackboard, chalk, and homemade posters on the walls, nor any toys for
the nursery children. So, with the money left after the simple iron
closet was bought, we agreed with the main teacher to buy a globe and
a colorful building toy.
When it comes to our visits to the school, unfortunately, the school
is 2 hours away from Kullu with bus, so we had to limit ourselves to
go there only once a week, on Wednesdays. However, we stay the whole
school day and so can get a lot done each time, and it feels that it
is worth the humpy bus ride (and sometimes hitchhike ride, which is to
recommend as it is faster and less humpy!). There are only about 20
kids in the school, the number varying each time depending on the
families sending the children, and the age range is wide, from nursery
starting at 3 years and up to 12.
We decided to focus our time with
the oldest ones, mainly due to the language barrier and that we feel
they could pick up things more easily. We would do a mix of English
exercises, - games and songs, the usual “head and shoulders”, “Old
McDonalds”, I spy, hangman, and so on, and some geography, the solar
system, and simple natural science. We would also try to break up the
teaching with some arts and crafts, drawing, friendship bands and
mehendi painting on the hands, which they would really enjoy.
Kalyeli Orphanage
Located a few kilometers from Bhuntar, Kalyeli orphanage houses 30 boys, aged 5-15 years. It is run by the government and receive additional money from the private donors. We really enjoyed speaking with the married couple who are running the orphanage, and as we found out it has a strong material base compared to the other institutions.
We got there each Monday and Thursday at 1700, and stay for at least two hours.
Children had better language proficiency compared to the Bashing orphanage, but still only the elder ones could express themselves in an understandable manner. Therefore, our initial activities consisted of language games.
Later on we were informed about a state wide skit, dance and song competition. We decided to make a skit called "Save the girl child". It is known that a high percentage of female infants are subjected to cruel death due to their gender. Also, many dismiss women as less intelligent species, who brings loss to the household when the dowry has to be paid for the husband's family. We discussed these and other issues with the boys. They promised us to love and take care of women.
So, me and Anine have written a script for the play and assigned major roles. Boys showed great interest in rehearsing for a month or so, but afterwards their interest declined. Eventually we were informed by the management to stop preparing for the skit.
Besides that, we'd engage into watching nature's documentaries. They've particularly enjoyed BBC "LIFE" with David Attenborough! Afterwards we could name the animals they saw in the documentary.
Finally, we learned how to make Chapattis , and received a generous dinner offer each time we came there. Truly interesting place, but recently we felt like loosing authority over some elder students, a problem which is yet to be solved.
Bashing Orphanage
We started out working in Bashing orphanage immediately after we got to Kullu. This is the main focus of the project and as previous volunteers have described the children don’t have much here. A positive change in the situation now has been that Sarla, the one looking after the children full time, has been joined by another girl Pushpa, a local student coming here part time. Pushpa has a bit of a stricter hand and have started to discipline the children more, but they can still be quite naughty to each other behind your back.
We would go to Bashing four times a week from 4.30 to 6.30, except for
Sundays when we would stay most of the day. On the weekdays we would
teach some simple English, as their English skills are really low. we
would start with the alphabet, do simple things as colours, bodyparts,
days, favourite fruits, foods, subjects, and conversational English,
and combine it with English games and songs much as described earlier.
We would also put in some simple geography, looking at a map even
learning north and south was new for them, and natural science, and
put in some drawing and paper plane folding with flying competition.
We would break up every session in the middle with about half an hour
of games outside on the nice spacy grass field they have available.
On Sundays we would bring a laptop and watch a cartoon movie, which
the children would really love. As we would spend most of the day at
the orphanage it would be a relaxing atmosphere, just hanging out with
the kids and Sarla and Pushpa, do games on the grass outside, or
drawing or simply listening to music and dancing inside. Also, just
bringing a camera, taking pictures and letting the children try to
take pictures is very appreciated. Sarla and Pushpa are both very
sweet and it is always a pleasure to see them, and on Sunday
afternoons when we have extra time just chat and show each other
pictures of family and friends on their phones and our laptops :)
At a first glance, coming to a place just a few miles away from the Himalayas was quite stunning, with its colorful rickshaws and loud atmosphere vis-à-vis the humdrum daily European routine. But after two months in Kullu we feel like home – people are the same everywhere! So far we have worked in the following institutions: Bashing and Kalyeli orphanages, NAB School for Blind, Drug de-addiction and rehabilitation center in Jiri, school for Nepali immigrants’ children in Manali and Bharat Bharti Public School in Dalphur. Living in Kullu and assimilating to the local culture brings its own challenges (especially linguistic barrier!), but let us firstly elaborate on what exactly we do on each and every institutions.
NAB School for Blind
Students here are being taught Braille and Computer lieteracy from a very young age. Elder students who’d mastered Braille reading, writing and calculations attend a regular Hindi medium school. However, it would be naïve to expect the blind children’s’ performance at school match the one of a median Kullu student. That’s where the dedicated teachers step in – after the regular classes children repeat the same syllabus in the blind school. In the end, they are putting as twice as much effort to learn the same material!
However, the young ones, aged 4-10, are just getting their feet wet with the school routine and receive little attention from the teachers. Hence we have four 3,5 hour long weekly sessions together, starting at 10 am. Also, by the end of each session we receive a pleasant bonus – free lunch!
Our activities mainly consist of teaching the basic spoken English. In the first few days we were taken aback by their linguistic abilities, the only question they were bale to respond to was “What is your name?” However, through everyday practice we taught them how to introduce themselves in a “polite British” manner. Whether visited by the sponsors or simply meeting the fellow students, they master phrases “What is your age? How old are you? Where do you live? Do you have any siblings?” Whilst some might ridicule this “lesser” knowledge, but teaching a gang of 12 children these phrases is a milestone for us and took no less than a month. Knowing these phrases comes handy when the sponsors are visiting, so that they can see that the children are really learning and sometimes surpassing the English level of the fellow students in the public schools.
You may start judging us inadvertently, but besides some “polite” phrases we engaged into music, too. To start with, we were happy to find out that the previous volunteers made simple musical instruments: empty 0,5l plastic bottles filled with rice. Visually impaired enjoyed singing the Old McDonalds, Adams family, Kangaroo Joe and other popular children songs. Similarly, songs helped us to “slow down their batteries” and regain focus for more thinking intensive learning.
Also, twice a week we’d go to a local park, just 200 meters away from the school itself. What broke our hearts where innumerable amounts of thrash: potato chips bags, cigarette packs and glassware.
Sometimes I’d start picking it up myself, and when I see a child throwing away a candy wrapping onto the floor, the poor guy’s got to be in trouble! Kullu is to beautiful a place and saving the pristine environment is doomed, without teaching some “basics” first.
Finally, each Saturday is dedicated for the crafts. So far we have made paper hats, friendship bracelets, tasted various fruits, massaged each other whilst listening to Chopin and “cooked” our own playing dough from water, salt and oil!
Trip to Solang Nallah
A week ago, we went to the Solang Nallahl ski resort (15 km from Manali), which was yet to be covered with snow, but proved no less exciting. The blind school is organizing that kind of trip only once a year. I was pleasantly by the amount of noise, dance and rhythm which dispersed in our bus. By the way, it was a generous family of Anine who donated the money for the bus. Unfortunatelly, Anine couldn’t participate in the trip due to illness.
I felt partially deaf after a two hour ride with the drums echoing in my cochleae for a few days. Afterwards, we were elevated by a thousand meters right on the skying slope. Children drunk chay and enjoyed touching the ice.
After descending, we had a free lunch with a local sponsor, but before that, our children performed singing and dancing. Finally we joined the pilgrims from all around India at the Madimba temple in Manali. Children, especially Satish and Gotam, loved pictures being taken of them.
Bharat Bharti Public School
At RCN UWC in Norway, we have been instructed how to perform the First Aid. We expected to teach the Kullu Project institutions some First Aid as well, but in reality, due to their poor English proficiency we couldn’t instruct any. However, one day we paid a visit to the Bharat Bharti school, and met a wonderful couple running a prive English medium school. They kindly invited us to give two hour-long weekly classes, on Tuesdays and Fridays 3:30 pm.
Until now we were focusing on the spoken English, as the majority of students are spending their first year at an English medium course and show little confidence speaking English, although their writing is impressive.
Each week we’d introduce them to a different topic, make a short presentation on it and a class discussion afterwards. So far we have touched the legacy behind the corporate punishments at schools and home, honor killings and marital traditions, US political system and recently – Barrack Obama’s visit to India. We were happy to see at least six 16-17 year olds who spoke fluently in our class, however the majority remained shy until a few classes ago. After all, we are working with them to build some confidence.
Besides these popular media activities we ran a few linguistic competitions, and when it comes to competition Indian students definitely stand out! After each class, some of them would insist on staying for a longer time, therefore we’d play the initiative and ball games.
Overall, Bharat Bharti not only permits us to teach the First Aid, but also gives us insights into the young peoples’ lives in India. It’s a great asset to our project. Not to mention the fact, that the management is really lenient towards volunteers and before the each session we are treated with a plate of local Indian dish.
School for Nepali immigrant children
We have only been in contact with the Mount Everest Public School in
Manali since the beginning of October. The school is for children of
poor Nepali and Tibetan immigrant workers in the region, and so
provides teaching in their native languages in addition to Hindi and
English. Since the families of the children are very poor the school
is run mainly on charity from generous local people in the
surroundings of Manali, raised with the work of a small handful of
committed Nepali and local people. However, shortage of money is a
recurring problem. Some months the teachers have had to go without
pay, and in the worst cases there has not been enough money to pay for
the petrol for the school van and the children have had to remain at
home. A good thing that has helped the money cycle go round is that
the rent for the modest classrooms has been unnaturally low due to
that the building is still under construction. The back side of the
coin is that the standards are lower, for example no electricity or
outside space to play games. However, we have still managed to play a
bit of unofficial basket ball in the lunch break in the small entrance
space outside the classroom doors. This about 2 meter wide outside
corridor is the only space the children have to play and eat their
lunch. In contrary to government schools the children have to bring
lunch from home, and every time we are visiting it is always some kids
that have no lunch and have to go hungry, which makes the aloo
parantha brought from the local street shop taste a bit less tastier.
We felt that this institution, in addition to Bashing, is one that
needs us more than any. And so we decided to do some fundraising in
addition to weekly visits. The most urgent thing they needed was a
closet to store books in, especially after a generous donation of
educational books from a school in England. In addition, the school
does not have any other teaching materials than the books, a
blackboard, chalk, and homemade posters on the walls, nor any toys for
the nursery children. So, with the money left after the simple iron
closet was bought, we agreed with the main teacher to buy a globe and
a colorful building toy.
When it comes to our visits to the school, unfortunately, the school
is 2 hours away from Kullu with bus, so we had to limit ourselves to
go there only once a week, on Wednesdays. However, we stay the whole
school day and so can get a lot done each time, and it feels that it
is worth the humpy bus ride (and sometimes hitchhike ride, which is to
recommend as it is faster and less humpy!). There are only about 20
kids in the school, the number varying each time depending on the
families sending the children, and the age range is wide, from nursery
starting at 3 years and up to 12.
We decided to focus our time withthe oldest ones, mainly due to the language barrier and that we feel
they could pick up things more easily. We would do a mix of English
exercises, - games and songs, the usual “head and shoulders”, “Old
McDonalds”, I spy, hangman, and so on, and some geography, the solar
system, and simple natural science. We would also try to break up the
teaching with some arts and crafts, drawing, friendship bands and
mehendi painting on the hands, which they would really enjoy.
Kalyeli Orphanage
Located a few kilometers from Bhuntar, Kalyeli orphanage houses 30 boys, aged 5-15 years. It is run by the government and receive additional money from the private donors. We really enjoyed speaking with the married couple who are running the orphanage, and as we found out it has a strong material base compared to the other institutions.
We got there each Monday and Thursday at 1700, and stay for at least two hours.
Children had better language proficiency compared to the Bashing orphanage, but still only the elder ones could express themselves in an understandable manner. Therefore, our initial activities consisted of language games.
Later on we were informed about a state wide skit, dance and song competition. We decided to make a skit called "Save the girl child". It is known that a high percentage of female infants are subjected to cruel death due to their gender. Also, many dismiss women as less intelligent species, who brings loss to the household when the dowry has to be paid for the husband's family. We discussed these and other issues with the boys. They promised us to love and take care of women.
So, me and Anine have written a script for the play and assigned major roles. Boys showed great interest in rehearsing for a month or so, but afterwards their interest declined. Eventually we were informed by the management to stop preparing for the skit.
Besides that, we'd engage into watching nature's documentaries. They've particularly enjoyed BBC "LIFE" with David Attenborough! Afterwards we could name the animals they saw in the documentary.
Finally, we learned how to make Chapattis , and received a generous dinner offer each time we came there. Truly interesting place, but recently we felt like loosing authority over some elder students, a problem which is yet to be solved.
Bashing Orphanage
We started out working in Bashing orphanage immediately after we got to Kullu. This is the main focus of the project and as previous volunteers have described the children don’t have much here. A positive change in the situation now has been that Sarla, the one looking after the children full time, has been joined by another girl Pushpa, a local student coming here part time. Pushpa has a bit of a stricter hand and have started to discipline the children more, but they can still be quite naughty to each other behind your back.
We would go to Bashing four times a week from 4.30 to 6.30, except for
Sundays when we would stay most of the day. On the weekdays we would
teach some simple English, as their English skills are really low. we
would start with the alphabet, do simple things as colours, bodyparts,
days, favourite fruits, foods, subjects, and conversational English,
and combine it with English games and songs much as described earlier.
We would also put in some simple geography, looking at a map even
learning north and south was new for them, and natural science, and
put in some drawing and paper plane folding with flying competition.
We would break up every session in the middle with about half an hour
of games outside on the nice spacy grass field they have available.
On Sundays we would bring a laptop and watch a cartoon movie, which
the children would really love. As we would spend most of the day at
the orphanage it would be a relaxing atmosphere, just hanging out with
the kids and Sarla and Pushpa, do games on the grass outside, or
drawing or simply listening to music and dancing inside. Also, just
bringing a camera, taking pictures and letting the children try to
take pictures is very appreciated. Sarla and Pushpa are both very
sweet and it is always a pleasure to see them, and on Sunday
afternoons when we have extra time just chat and show each other
pictures of family and friends on their phones and our laptops :)
Thursday, 2 September 2010
Kailash Bodhi School, Rangri by Thangamma Cariappa
The words "Kailash" and "Bodhi" translate to mountain and enlightenment respectively. The school for Tibetan and Nepali refugee children in Rangri echo these very words. I was definitely inspired and enlightened by the teachers, who depending on the weather would be forced to teach two classes simultaneously!
The school has a limited infrastructure and it's four classrooms are occupied by 8 grades.
Every morning select children practised karate after which the school assembled for morning prayer. Interestingly, the Tibetan, Nepali and Indian National Anthems are sung, followed by an oath in English.
The first period starts at 10 am and school closes at 3 pm. I volunteered to teach all the grades which included the pre-primary children, aged 3 years, Lower Kindergarten and Upper-Kindergarten. This proved quite a challlenge because of the language barrier but they took quickly to learning action rhymes and songs.
I was able to do beading activities to hone hand - eye co-ordination and finger dexterity skills with all but the littlest children. We also played games, coloured shapes and drew pictures to depict each alphabet.
The school also has a well stocked library and I was pleasantly surprised to find "The Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle. The books were very useful for Grade 2 to 5 and the children looked forward to reading and listening to stories. Apart from constructing simple sentences, drawing and writing about themselves, the older children also did activities related to the Hungry Caterpillar story and palyed vocabulary games. Grade 4 and 5 were also introduced to the use of the apostrophe ie: My father's name is .... as opposed to "My father name is ..."
Over all the children were very diligent and eager to learn. Teachers were helpful and supportive and sunny days resulted in classes under the tree! The medium of instruction in the school is Hindi but they also learn Nepali, Tibetan and English!
Sunday, 27 June 2010
June 2010 - Michael and Katherine
We are Katherine and Michael from Newcastle (England) and are staying in Kullu with the Kullu Project for only a very short time of 5 weeks. The first thing we have to say is that 5 weeks is not enough! We spent our first week visiting the different institutions, planning our activities and doing a little bit of volunteering at some places. We have now spent 3 more weeks working at different places and now only having one week left we feel like time has gone too fast and wish we had longer! However that said, we have managed to keep a jam-packed schedule allowing us to make the most of our short time.
We have focused our time mainly at Bashing orphanage, Kaleyli orphanage, the blind school and the drug and alcohol rehab centre. Katherine was most interested in doing arts and crafts and Michael wanted to do sports with the children.
So we spent Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday evenings (5.30 -7.30) at the Bashing orphanage. We split the two hours into two sessions most of the time, doing one hour crafts and the other sports. The different arts and crafts we did included painting (finger painting flowers, printing leaves, symmetrical butterfly etc), name badge making (this was very useful to do at the beginning so we could get to know their names quicker), friendship bracelets, crown making, face portrait collage, papier mache masks (difficult for the small ones, extra help needed for them but all enjoyed the masks once they had finished them), picture frames, sewing and just coloring in some times. Details of methods and equipment for these activities are given in our portfolio for future volunteers to follow if they wish. The second part of the session was usually sports and games. Bought them a cricket set which they adored, also a football and badminton set and skipping ropes. Most of the time we just left them to it, with a little bit of instruction, however they aren’t used to sharing or playing anything by its proper rules, they just like to mess around and play. We jazzed it up some times by attempting circuits and adding a few games in there too e.g. the clapping game, hockey cokey (which they loved!), heads shoulders knees and toes, mingle mingle, musical statues (having an ipod and speakers with a Bollywood movie soundtrack is a great idea – we had Love Aaj Kal and it went down a treat!), sleeping lions etc etc , for more game ideas check out the volunteer handbook. An important point to make about Bashing is that the children are quite undisciplined and you need to watch out for them slapping and hitting each other behind your back! Sharing is also a problem, as is taking turns – make sure you establish a queuing system or else you’ll just have the big kids playing an the little ones stood around being left out. Also the age range is quite broad so keep in mind similar activities for the younger ones, carrying crayons and paper will do the trick. Overall we have had a great experience here, it’s been one of our favorite places to go to and the children really do deserve some fun as they have so little. Sarla, the full time care worker here is a lovely girl too who helped us with the activities and joined in as well, she is a fantastic girl who has become a good friend.
We went to the Drug and Alcohol Rehab centre every Monday and Wednesday afternoon from 3:30 – 4:30, this is in Jhiri just past Kaleyli Orphanage, about a 40 minute bus ride from Kullu. This centre makes a great change from the schools and orphanages as there are about 60 men aged 14-60 to entertain in a very small room. They are all very disciplined due to the nature of the rehabilitation centre, but very grateful for us to be there adding some variety into their very monotonous schedule. They’re a great bunch and we have had a real good laugh with them. The institution is very interesting because as you get know the staff they will tell you more about the ‘inmates’ as they call them, their rare escape attempts and capture. You also learn from the guys themselves, their experiences with drugs and how it has affected their lives. They are very open about their experiences and it’s a real eye opener if you haven’t worked with a group like this before, but they are really friendly and the staff look after you really well. As for what we did here we mainly focused on team building activities splitting the 60 odd of them into more manageable groups of about 5 to 10 to do activities such as Balloon Structure, Minefield, Blindfold Point, Egg Drop, Survival Scenario, Bridge Building, Bottle Lift, Truth or Lie and Show and Tell (More details of these activities in our portfolio). These went down really well, obviously it got them working together doing something creative, a little challenging, often requiring thought and planning. They all told us how much they enjoyed these sessions through our really helpful translator Manish (Former Inmate and escapee after a lonely valentine’s day, long story!), though Manish is only a volunteer now after finishing his 6 months and will soon be moving back home we are sure a member of staff of former Inmate will be there to help you out (and give you all the gossip on the inmates and the centre!). This is definitely a worthwhile place to volunteer as it’s a great learning experience for both parties, us volunteers and the centre itself. Highly Recommended!
Kaleyli orphanage we went to only on a Monday and Wednesday evening from 5 -6.30 after the drug and alcohol rehab centre. Compared to the children at Bashing Orphanage they are well looked after (8 care workers instead of 1) and are well disciplined. There are a great deal more of them though and can be quiet a handful, but there are a wide range of characters and there is very much a family feel! Our activities here were limited as we only had eight sessions but we managed to do name badge making, face portrait collage and a few papier mache masks (a lot of popped balloons!) for the craft sessions and cricket, skipping, circuit training and some team exercises e.g. bottle lift, mine field, balloon structure etc. Doing sports here however is very difficult as they only have a tiny court yard at the front, an a little dusty yard/driveway to the side. But they love cricket and have their own cricket bat, however this is looked after by the management and we don’t think they get to use it very much when volunteers aren’t around. There are a lot of them and you don’t get any help from the staff so advice to volunteers is to plan carefully. In general the children are enthusiastic, energetic and a pleasure to entertain.
A much larger proportion of our time was spent at the Blind school, we went every weekday morning from 10 – 12 here. This was also the most challenging project we undertook, as a previous volunteer said, ‘They are very small, and blind’, plus there is always the language barrier making it more difficult. However this was also part of the challenge and we were happy to put a lot of effort into it. After a lengthy chat with the manager we sorted out a structured plan which involved Friendship Bracelet making, face portrait collage, crown making, weather chart with a lot of repetition. We basically repeated each exercise every week at the managers request as they in particular need the repetition and time to learn anything properly (Simply putting glue on the paper in the right place rather than on the table is difficult for them to learn.). In our activities we tried to incorporate as much touch related objects as possible e.g. Face Portraits used wool for hair, straws to outline the face, buttons for eyes, shell ears, cotton wool nose etc. Although this may sound repetitive and tedious it is incredibly rewarding, especially after trying for over two weeks to teach one little girl to tie knots to make her friendship bracelet and now she can whizz through them no problem, even now adding beads!
Life in Kullu:
Thought it would be useful for future volunteers to know a little but about what its like living in Kullu. Kullu itself is a very typically Indian town, very few tourists stop here making it a more wholly Indian experience. Most volunteers now stay at Mr Bhapas house, in his unused downstairs rooms, which is just a minutes’ walk from Ankits (Local Coordinator) in Akhara Bazaar. For how much you pay its extremely decent, just a bedroom, hot shower, optional kitchen, what more do you need? It’s a good location too, as said it’s close to Ankits and just 10 minutes walk away from all of Kullu, plus the local buses drive straight past, very handy! There is a local market in the centre (Upper Dhalpur) where you can buy almost everything you will need for the projects, we bought books, crayons, cricket bats, stationary, craft materials, skipping ropes etc etc. As for restaurants, we ate out all the time as we didn’t use the kitchen at Mr Bhapas, we found this was ok but if you’re staying a while longer you may want to pay for the kitchen just so that your diet doesn’t get too repetitive, there is only so much daal and rotis you can eat! A more detailed restaurant guide will be added to our portfolios to help newcomers out. The people who run the restaurants are all very friendly and we have made many good friends with many of them which meant we could have a few goes at making our own dinner, we have to admit that our chapatti making leaves much to be desired though! You will find that as you settle in to life in Kullu you will get to know many people who are more than willing to make you feel like Kullu is your home! If we could have improved on our time here we would advise maybe bringing along a laptop and plenty of books as there is not much to entertain you in the evenings. However making friends with Papu next door or anybody else in Akhara Bazaar will ensure you get plenty of invites for chai and a chat.
Hopefully as you can tell from this blog we are thoroughly enjoying our time in Kullu, both with our varied and interesting projects and with homely environment everyone has made for us!
Katherine and Michael
p.s. We will try and add more photo soon!
We have focused our time mainly at Bashing orphanage, Kaleyli orphanage, the blind school and the drug and alcohol rehab centre. Katherine was most interested in doing arts and crafts and Michael wanted to do sports with the children.
So we spent Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday evenings (5.30 -7.30) at the Bashing orphanage. We split the two hours into two sessions most of the time, doing one hour crafts and the other sports. The different arts and crafts we did included painting (finger painting flowers, printing leaves, symmetrical butterfly etc), name badge making (this was very useful to do at the beginning so we could get to know their names quicker), friendship bracelets, crown making, face portrait collage, papier mache masks (difficult for the small ones, extra help needed for them but all enjoyed the masks once they had finished them), picture frames, sewing and just coloring in some times. Details of methods and equipment for these activities are given in our portfolio for future volunteers to follow if they wish. The second part of the session was usually sports and games. Bought them a cricket set which they adored, also a football and badminton set and skipping ropes. Most of the time we just left them to it, with a little bit of instruction, however they aren’t used to sharing or playing anything by its proper rules, they just like to mess around and play. We jazzed it up some times by attempting circuits and adding a few games in there too e.g. the clapping game, hockey cokey (which they loved!), heads shoulders knees and toes, mingle mingle, musical statues (having an ipod and speakers with a Bollywood movie soundtrack is a great idea – we had Love Aaj Kal and it went down a treat!), sleeping lions etc etc , for more game ideas check out the volunteer handbook. An important point to make about Bashing is that the children are quite undisciplined and you need to watch out for them slapping and hitting each other behind your back! Sharing is also a problem, as is taking turns – make sure you establish a queuing system or else you’ll just have the big kids playing an the little ones stood around being left out. Also the age range is quite broad so keep in mind similar activities for the younger ones, carrying crayons and paper will do the trick. Overall we have had a great experience here, it’s been one of our favorite places to go to and the children really do deserve some fun as they have so little. Sarla, the full time care worker here is a lovely girl too who helped us with the activities and joined in as well, she is a fantastic girl who has become a good friend.
We went to the Drug and Alcohol Rehab centre every Monday and Wednesday afternoon from 3:30 – 4:30, this is in Jhiri just past Kaleyli Orphanage, about a 40 minute bus ride from Kullu. This centre makes a great change from the schools and orphanages as there are about 60 men aged 14-60 to entertain in a very small room. They are all very disciplined due to the nature of the rehabilitation centre, but very grateful for us to be there adding some variety into their very monotonous schedule. They’re a great bunch and we have had a real good laugh with them. The institution is very interesting because as you get know the staff they will tell you more about the ‘inmates’ as they call them, their rare escape attempts and capture. You also learn from the guys themselves, their experiences with drugs and how it has affected their lives. They are very open about their experiences and it’s a real eye opener if you haven’t worked with a group like this before, but they are really friendly and the staff look after you really well. As for what we did here we mainly focused on team building activities splitting the 60 odd of them into more manageable groups of about 5 to 10 to do activities such as Balloon Structure, Minefield, Blindfold Point, Egg Drop, Survival Scenario, Bridge Building, Bottle Lift, Truth or Lie and Show and Tell (More details of these activities in our portfolio). These went down really well, obviously it got them working together doing something creative, a little challenging, often requiring thought and planning. They all told us how much they enjoyed these sessions through our really helpful translator Manish (Former Inmate and escapee after a lonely valentine’s day, long story!), though Manish is only a volunteer now after finishing his 6 months and will soon be moving back home we are sure a member of staff of former Inmate will be there to help you out (and give you all the gossip on the inmates and the centre!). This is definitely a worthwhile place to volunteer as it’s a great learning experience for both parties, us volunteers and the centre itself. Highly Recommended!
Kaleyli orphanage we went to only on a Monday and Wednesday evening from 5 -6.30 after the drug and alcohol rehab centre. Compared to the children at Bashing Orphanage they are well looked after (8 care workers instead of 1) and are well disciplined. There are a great deal more of them though and can be quiet a handful, but there are a wide range of characters and there is very much a family feel! Our activities here were limited as we only had eight sessions but we managed to do name badge making, face portrait collage and a few papier mache masks (a lot of popped balloons!) for the craft sessions and cricket, skipping, circuit training and some team exercises e.g. bottle lift, mine field, balloon structure etc. Doing sports here however is very difficult as they only have a tiny court yard at the front, an a little dusty yard/driveway to the side. But they love cricket and have their own cricket bat, however this is looked after by the management and we don’t think they get to use it very much when volunteers aren’t around. There are a lot of them and you don’t get any help from the staff so advice to volunteers is to plan carefully. In general the children are enthusiastic, energetic and a pleasure to entertain.
A much larger proportion of our time was spent at the Blind school, we went every weekday morning from 10 – 12 here. This was also the most challenging project we undertook, as a previous volunteer said, ‘They are very small, and blind’, plus there is always the language barrier making it more difficult. However this was also part of the challenge and we were happy to put a lot of effort into it. After a lengthy chat with the manager we sorted out a structured plan which involved Friendship Bracelet making, face portrait collage, crown making, weather chart with a lot of repetition. We basically repeated each exercise every week at the managers request as they in particular need the repetition and time to learn anything properly (Simply putting glue on the paper in the right place rather than on the table is difficult for them to learn.). In our activities we tried to incorporate as much touch related objects as possible e.g. Face Portraits used wool for hair, straws to outline the face, buttons for eyes, shell ears, cotton wool nose etc. Although this may sound repetitive and tedious it is incredibly rewarding, especially after trying for over two weeks to teach one little girl to tie knots to make her friendship bracelet and now she can whizz through them no problem, even now adding beads!
Life in Kullu:
Thought it would be useful for future volunteers to know a little but about what its like living in Kullu. Kullu itself is a very typically Indian town, very few tourists stop here making it a more wholly Indian experience. Most volunteers now stay at Mr Bhapas house, in his unused downstairs rooms, which is just a minutes’ walk from Ankits (Local Coordinator) in Akhara Bazaar. For how much you pay its extremely decent, just a bedroom, hot shower, optional kitchen, what more do you need? It’s a good location too, as said it’s close to Ankits and just 10 minutes walk away from all of Kullu, plus the local buses drive straight past, very handy! There is a local market in the centre (Upper Dhalpur) where you can buy almost everything you will need for the projects, we bought books, crayons, cricket bats, stationary, craft materials, skipping ropes etc etc. As for restaurants, we ate out all the time as we didn’t use the kitchen at Mr Bhapas, we found this was ok but if you’re staying a while longer you may want to pay for the kitchen just so that your diet doesn’t get too repetitive, there is only so much daal and rotis you can eat! A more detailed restaurant guide will be added to our portfolios to help newcomers out. The people who run the restaurants are all very friendly and we have made many good friends with many of them which meant we could have a few goes at making our own dinner, we have to admit that our chapatti making leaves much to be desired though! You will find that as you settle in to life in Kullu you will get to know many people who are more than willing to make you feel like Kullu is your home! If we could have improved on our time here we would advise maybe bringing along a laptop and plenty of books as there is not much to entertain you in the evenings. However making friends with Papu next door or anybody else in Akhara Bazaar will ensure you get plenty of invites for chai and a chat.
Hopefully as you can tell from this blog we are thoroughly enjoying our time in Kullu, both with our varied and interesting projects and with homely environment everyone has made for us!
Katherine and Michael
p.s. We will try and add more photo soon!
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