This was typed up on Sunday on Word while at the farm and even though it's been a couple days since then, I was too lazy to edit it so there wouldn't be any continuity issues. So, you'll get it as is:
I probably should've blogged when were still in the city since the dial-up here on the farm doesn't always let me to go Blogger, but Saturday was crazy, so that in combination with waking up at 5 am that day and not having a restful night's sleep didn't seem to make for good blogging conditions. In a nutshell, I got to join a group on Saturday that was bringing notebooks to kids in schools in a remote area.
In government-funded schools, the students get their uniforms and textbooks from the government but not notebooks, so the NGO I'm volunteering through was able to buy 20,000 notebooks with the help of a software company. The guys crammed 8,000 notebooks (in huge, 100-lb bundles) onto our hired bus and we drove out of the city to some small schools in the villages, It was quite surreal for me to be in a bus with huge parcels of notebooks in the aisles (thus forcing all of us to climb over said notebooks to get to our seats) and an Indian radio station blaring on the speakers as we were driving out into the countryside.
I didn't know what to expect, so I wanted to pack lightly and worried that bringing my camera would be cumbersome to carry and to touristy of me to be snapping picture Some of the volunteers took pictures of the children and of all the sights, so now I'm bummed that I didn't bring my camera because it was all a really amazing experience to remember. If I do get to do it again, I'll definitely bring my camera. I only brought my wallet and my lunch, which I actually didn't need because we stopped for food a couple times. I learned the hard way that chutney has powdered nuts in it. but luckily my nut allergy isn't serious or life-threatening so I was fine. I also got some horrible nausea from the bus ride because it got pretty bumpy out in the country with the dirt roads. I was so afraid I'd end up throwing up out of one of the windows and not only grossing people out, but perhaps being known as that one American volunteer who couldn't hold her lunch. I started sitting at the front of the bus which made my nausea disappear, though. Hopefully no one got annoyed that I hogged the front seat since I noticed that everyone else was changing seats after every stop.
We made stops at various schools in the area to give out different kinds of notebooks to different grades (or standards, as I think they're called), such as notebooks with gridded pages for the younger students or more lined notebooks per student if they're older. Sometimes we'd drop off people so we could cover more ground by splitting up and we were sort of pressed for time because not only did we leave late, but Saturdays are half-days at the schools so we had to get to the schools before the students were dismissed and some schools had arranged to have a longer day so that they could wait for us.
For one of the schools, the road through the village was too narrow for the bus to pass through so we took the notebooks and walked the rest of the way to the school. Luckily it wasn't a long way off, but I didn't mind the walk because we got to see the houses lining the dirt path. At least one of the schools we went to consisted of a single room for all the grades together with no lights or anything to circulate the air inside. It was surreal to see such a school since those are the kinds of schools I'd only heard about but I got to actually see one.
It was a pleasant surprise to see how much a smile on my end would make the other kids laugh and smile. I feel like a lot of the children came up to me or looked at me in curiosity because I was obviously a foreigner, but once I smiled and greeted them, they would giggle with their friends, smile, and wave back. At one school, a crowd of children came up to me and I chatted with them a little bit, partially hoping that it would take my mind off my nausea. Everyone would ask me what my name was, and where I was from, I tried to ask as many students as possible what their names were too, although some of the other students would just watch me and it's been nearly impossible to learn all these unfamiliar Indian names!
At one of the schools where it was a single room, there was one group of little girls where we'd keep exchanging smiles and waves with each other and later they followed me and the other volunteers when we went to visit the nursery school right across the dirt road. despite the language barrier, it felt like we could connect and it was fun to make faces at them to make them laugh as they watched us through the doorway and the window. I saw so many faces that day but I think I'll always remember that short-haired girl and her friends.
We ended our distribution at a girls' hostel, where we were served rice and sambar and where I finally ate with no utensils. People's stares don't bother me, but I felt like such a foreigner when it came time to rinsing our hands before we ate (people were watching me as it was obvious I didn't know what I was doing) and when I first dug into my food with my right hand. Afterwards, I got to talk to some of the girls and one of the girls pinched my cheeks and told me I looked like a doll after I had told her how old I was (yet we were nearly the same height)! They were quite cute and sweet, and I think we were both amused by each other.
Yesterday was kind of crazy and I wasn't running on a lot of sleep, but it was so amazing to go out and try something like this. Ever since this trip was planned, I fantasized about being able to do something where I'd make people smile and come home tired and dirty after a long day's work. This was just the sort of thing I wanted to experience, and I got to see another part of India in the process. There might be another notebook drive sometime, so if I can make it, I'll try to bring my camera the next time!
[edit]: Miraculously, someone did email me pictures, right out of the blue when I hadn't even asked. I was so happy to receive them in my inbox last night and I feel weird about posting pictures with people in them on my blog so you'll probably get to see them when I get back!
No comments:
Post a Comment