The following post features student writing.
On Saturday (July 16), after eating our breakfast we headed off to visit the all-girls school in Nadol that we had been at a couple days prior — some of us in a bumpy rickshaw, and others in the Jeep. Once getting to the school, we could just jump right into our lesson plans considering all the girls had already been introduced to us. In the class I was teaching with Lucilla, we began the lesson by teaching them some animals, actions, and body parts in English (cow, dog, running, eyes, hands, etc.). After we thought they had gotten a good grasp on what all the words and their meanings were we had them break into three teams to play a game of charades. This was a fun way to get more comfortable with the girls. We also played a handgame after charades that involved the months of the year and their order, taught them basic phrases in English that they could use in conversation like “my name is…”, “my age is…”, and so on. In the classes beside us I could hear the girls yelling the letters of the alphabet and learning how to dance the “Cotton-Eyed Joe.” Once our time in the classrooms had come to an end we were all invited to sit in the front yard with the students and their teachers for a special thank you ceremony for coming there to teach. Each of us was given red paint on our foreheads, a marigold garland, and were fed a sweet that resembled honeycomb.
After coming back to yet another great lunch at Raola, the group whose turn it was to work on embroidery with Taraji headed over to her house for one last session. Many stiches of sewing and beads later, we were all back at Raola again to have a quick chai time and to get ready to visit the pottery place, where we painted our creations with naturally made mud paint. We then came back with some time to walk around the village and play with all the adorbale kids here, have our nightly meeting, eat dinner, take showers, and then finally go to sleep!
Yesterday morning we woke up earlier than usual in order to get on the road for a day trip to two different temples. As always, the drive was very scenic and relaxing, which was good considering the hike ahead of us at the first temple. When first arriving, we visited a smaller temple that was on the way up to the main temple (which we couldn’t visit due to the amount of time we had, how tired we were from the hiking we had done already, and bee nests). The hike was beautiful.
Once we completed our visit to the first temple we got back into the cars and drove to a hotel that is owned by friends of Mahandraji (the owner of Raola) to eat lunch. The next stop in our excursion was a beautiful temple that was made up of stone columns that were intricatley carved. Walking around the temple was extremely relaxing and enjoyable. We then got in the car again to head back to Raola.
The girls gather outside of Fateh Bagh.
Once we arrived home, we went out for village time and then came back for the nightly meeting and to watch “Bridge of Spies,” have dinner, and then head up to our rooms to shower and go to sleep.
Today, we all awoke from a good night’s sleep, ate breakfast, washed the dishes, and then headed off to the temple to continue our work on the chabutra and painting the fences. We were pleasantly surprised to see the chabutra’s construction had been completed and that we could begin painting it. Once it hit noon, we got in a rickshaw back to Raola for lunch, then the group whose turn it was to have an embroidery session with Taraji went to her house for their last time, while the rest of us had some time to rest. After everyone was back, it was time for some hot chai and “Parle G’s’”. Once we finshed, we got henna done on our arms and hands by the girls who have been teaching us dance. After waiting impatiently for the henna to dry, we finshed watching “Bridge of Spies” (which was great, and very interesting). We then had dinner and then headed off to bed!
Until next time,
Julia