Namaste! (Appreciate our Hindi!)

We woke up this morning to the smell of curried scrambled eggs and with this fiery breakfast in our bellies we made our way to Kaplani Secondary School. Our greeting was decidedly less relaxed than on Friday. We were quickly sorted into parallel rows alongside the pupils. “Attention!” for the Indian National Anthem (which we had tried to learn the night before), then we were able to “Stand at Ease” as the children sang a prayer.

After our attempt at the National Anthem, the Headmaster decided that our knowledge of Hindi needed “attention” itself! We were divided between the junior classes, the children delighting in our hopeless efforts to learn their language. It was definitely an eye-opener to be on the receiving end of the teaching and gave us a new admiration for the ability of the children, for many of which English was their third language.

Our lesson plans for today included English, Crafts and Music. We were initially apprehensive about teaching students our own age; however, it’s amazing how much fun you can have with prepositions! We brought class ten outside and played a version of blind man’s buff to teach directions in English. It was great to laugh together as we intentionally directed each other into chairs and desks!

This afternoon we decided drastic action was needed to replenish our drooping energy levels. So, draped in our best ‘Tiso’ hiking gear, we set forth to conquer…the local shop. Now, when one is in Indian Himalayas, a craving for chocolate cannot be satisfied by a simple walk down the road. Rather, a 20 minute haul up a Himalayan slope (at high altitude) is necessary. Dairy Milk + Coca-Cola + Peanut M&Ms = energy well-spent!

We’ll leave you with a little something we learned in class today: Meera nam Mary hai and Meera nam Cara hai. (For the non-Hindi speakers out there; written by Mary and Cara) xx

Hello!

This morning we focused on many issues surrounding world poverty.   We started off with an exercise called “The Happening”, as explained last night.   We had a varied display which included a rap from 2pac, Martin Luther King’s famous speech and a wonderful quote from J.K. Rowling.   Some of us also shared verses from the Bible which meant a lot to us and a few people treated us by singing poignant songs, such as “In the Arms of an Angel”. We were all clearly moved by these things and enjoyed finding out more about the other members of our team.   Christine then lead a useful task which allowed us to view the bigger picture on how different global charities work and helped us to see what we should be doing to try to combat poverty and corruption, instead of only helping in the short-term.

After having our usual lunch of questionable sandwiches and ready salted crisps, we headed off to into the Himalayas with Titu, our guide. We trekked to “Flag Hill”, where there are rows and rows of colorful Tibetan prayer flags displayed.   Here Titu got lots of screams as he told us that leopards still roamed the hills and that bears had only left 5 years ago.   We then headed on further onto “Bear Hill”, a challenging hike.   The scenery was breathtaking, quite different from the Mournes, with some trails having vertical drops either side!   We all then made our way back to the centre, exhausted and happy that we had avoided any attacks from leeches or other creepy crawlies…

We have just finished our lesson plans for tomorrow’s classes at Kaplani School. Each of our teams are taking three classes either in Craft, English or Music and we are all very excited to be working with the children again!

Love, Loren and Connell

Today was the start of several things up here in Mussoorie. It was the first day of August, the start of our Global Awareness Weekend and unfortunately the start of the last week of this epic trip which we all wish would never end. In the morning we presented the last of our fantastic PowerPoint’s about various aspects of life in India e.g. Religions and the ‘Caste’ System. We also listened to Christine share some shocking statistics about India and help us to understand first and third world perspectives of poverty. After our stomachs rumbling (in a good way) for a while we were delighted when we got a lunch of peanut butter jelly sandwiches and the usual assortment of fruit juice, crisps, a chocolate bar and a pear/apple!

Today also brought us a new heat, not experienced thus far in the mountains. We trekked down to Mussoorie town which took about an hour. Down in Mussoorie the team indulged in sizzling brownies which were excellent on the taste buds! After this we shopped till we dropped in the bazaars, haggling our way into brilliant bargains.

We journeyed back to the youth centre with purpose and hunger in our bellies. Following this we did some preparation for the ‘HAPPENING’ which incidentally is happening tomorrow. This task was to find some lyrics/poems/scripture or inspirational words relating to our personal experiences in India that together we would reflect upon tomorrow.

We decided to cap the day off with some light hearted fun by playing ‘truth, truth, lie’ (a game in which the objective is to deceive as many people as possible). Susannah fooled the most people with Mary being the least good at telling lies (which is a good thing we suppose). Sitting down to watch an episode of Fawlty Towers ended the day brilliantly.

We all send our love back home and hope that everyone is doing just fine.

Eugene and Jenny