Our last day and yet again the teacher and children fill my heart with joy. We were due 40, but only 24 arrived. Phew, a few tearful ones, but once again after Albert the toy monkey entertained them, their smiles came out. We decorated the room with fish, played with the balloons and bubbles, always a pleasure!
All the women in the village brought along a small amount of food and (about 15) cooked us a wonderful meal. Suda once again played his little tricks. I don't mind spice, but those green chillies and the tears and sneezing from me upon eating them gave him great delight. The teachers, again with little to no resources, were a credit to the children and the community.
Howard:
On my usual morning walk from my chalet to have breakfast I said
good morning to the alligator who seems to have taken up residence in the
lagoon just a few steps from my hut. I kept a wary distance from him to make
sure that I wasn’t his breakfast! I thought it was a joke until the boatmen
last night showed us some grisly photos of a fisherman who had been attacked by
an alligator and had had his arm and leg bitten off
Another day at the office…….the office this time being the small pre-school
at Kanchirankkuda. Sandra, Reanne and myself travelled the relatively short
distance (45 minutes) along mainly dirt roads. We didn’t have too much
difficulty in finding the school and as usual on arrival we were given a rapturous
welcome. We arrived in time to start school (8.30am) and there were about 20
children waiting for us, but gradually more arrived until we had about 30.
There were 2 teachers. Sandra did some dancing games and Reanne read them the
rainbow story, with Akshaya interpreting. As we had now run out of fish hats,
we used fish paper plates which the children decorated and hung on the
classroom wall. There seemed to be an adequate supply of tables and chairs. I
led a simple outdoor ‘sport games’ session and we kept each game to about 15
minutes as it was very hot.
The school building consisted of 2 rooms and was well constructed
with a sound roof, albeit asbestos. As usual there was no glass in the windows
but wire mesh. Also there was no toilet, running water or electricity. Again I’ve
come to realise this is quite normal. There was no well, water was being taken
from a plastic tank near the road which was refilled every so often by a water
tank vehicle. When it was time for the children to leave, we gave them each a
knitted teddy, a toothbrush and tube of toothpaste. All the children seemed
happy and healthy.
No comments:
Post a Comment