Sambhali Trust :- Final impression by Mr.Gernot from Austria -
-Jodhpur Project Jan-March08
Well, what can I say? Now, as my stay here comes to an end, it’s time for a short summary.
In the beginning, one of my greatest concerns was whether the participants would accept or reject a male volunteer. The most important task during this early phase was to find an appropriate level on which to interact with the girls. Due to the traditional gender separation in Hindu custom they naturally become shy and distant in front of men, a trait which, from a Western perspective, could easily be misinterpreted as impoliteness or rudeness on their part. For all intents and purposes, they ignored me. Only Monica and, to some extent, Sonya made efforts to brake the ice. Communication, as you might expect, was difficult, not so much because of any language barrier but rather due to the girls’ insecurity regarding the new situation they had to face. “No English!” was the main response I got at the beginning. They would even turn their heads away while talking. Teaching seemed to be impossible, so I was forced to think about alternative ways in which to reach the girls. What were their interests in the project? Academia, embroidery, languages, games, improving social skills? Or was it simply a desire to be recognized? So I started to observe them carefully, but in an open way in order to make them curious. How? Should I just gaze at them, should I draw them? Would they feel embarrassed to be watched? I had to experiment with different approaches. Finally I decided to draw their eyes, which meant they had to give permission for me to watch them. And of course they supported that idea, for as I have already mentioned, they had never before had attention of this kind. And guess what happened? They suddenly started to open up; they slowly began to have an impression of themselves, of their individuality and of their self-worth and dignity. So that’s what they were asking for. And they were narrating their incredible stories through their deep, dark eyes. Some of the girls are sanguine and spirited, some are a little crazy in a positive way, some are acutely sensitive to emotional circumstance, some are pensive, some of them always cry inwardly. And some of them will invite you to share in their lives, in joy or in suffering. Among this latter group there is a huge anxiety to be recognized. That’s the key to their souls. In spite of the language barrier, it became apparent that if one was observant and attentive one could nevertheless gain a meaningful understanding of their true character. This meant, however, that one had to be prepared for the great emotional impact. Gaining an understanding of the girls leads naturally to a better understanding of oneself; they were all extremely sensitive to my own thoughts and feelings, often more so than I was.
Anna, a very experienced teacher and volunteer, left some very interesting and helpful ideas regarding structural amendments (class timetable, daily routine, etc.). By the end of my work at Trust it was also high time to shift some responsibility to special girls like Pammy and Sonya. Sonya, one of the best English speakers, will be responsible for a basic English group. Pammy, meanwhile, will lead her own arts and crafts group in the future, with the hope that she might one day become a specialist and teacher. From my point of view, the Trust itself will succeed, especially when the older members are empowered to expand their specific talents and skills and to share their capabilities with other younger or less experienced participants. They need to be encouraged to discover their hidden aptitudes and to work hard to achieve their goals. It should be a high priority for the future to support this generation to carry on the philosophy of empowerment. And that, of course, means believing in them.
Karine and Ellisa's Joint Report on Setrawa Project Jan-March08
Final Impressions
After about a month of working at the Setrawa Project we have encountered such a range of both uplifting and disheartening experiences. These experiences relate to both our involvement in the project as well as personal and daily life. We are currently the only volunteers here and will be for the next two months. The project manager, Govind Singh Rathore and everyone else involved with the Sambhali Trust is in Jodhpur, are about a 2 hour drive from here.
Since arriving at Setrawa we have arranged the classes as follows.
Arts and Crafts 11:00-1:00 (Ellie)
Beginners English 11:00 (Karine)
Intermediate English 2:00-3:00 (Karine and Ellie)
Beginners English 4:00-5:00 (Ellie levels 1-7) (Karine levels 8-12)
Beginners English (Karine): The girls in the morning class are between 4-8 years old. It is difficult to know the exact ages of the girls are because many of them don't know themselves. This class is a new addition since we arrived so in the beginning we were just testing it out. In the beginning some of the girls were not comfortable holding pencils and none of them knew any English words aside from "Hello. How are you? What is your name?" When we would answer "I'm fine. How are you?" they would respond by again saying "How are you?" and on and on all the while smiling the most amazingly infectious smiles. The little girls that come are of school age but do not attend school so this is their only structured learning environment that they have at the moment. For the first couple of weeks the class was growing daily. At one point there were 10 students. However, one day an elderly woman came to the class with a deep frown on her face. We were going over the alphabet and vocabulary (ex: A for apple, B for ball, C for cat). She sat through the class and then left. We couldn't understand what she wanted. Reika wasn't available to translate either. After this day a lot of the little girls stopped coming. We are guessing that she may have had something to do with it or it could just be chance. We still have a steady 4 every day: Guddi, Laxmi, Bhakti, and Tampta..
Guddi: Guddi was the inspiration with which to begin this class. She was constantly following us through the village. She was always barefoot and beautifully wild. It's hard not to instantly fall in love with her. She truly has a unique energy (please pardon the hippy sounding lingo). Guddi was the only student the first couple of days that the class was held. We began looking over some picture books and learning animal names and then we played some letter recognition games in which Marion, the previous volunteer, and I hid letters and Guddi had to find them. In her fourth week of attending Sambhali School, Guddi can now recognize colors, count and write numbers up to 10, say and write the alphabet, follow and initiate commands (e.g. sit down, catch the ball, kick the ball, smile, clap etc.), name most major body parts, name many animals, and name all of the nouns on our alphabet board. Her strengths are drawing and writing. She is also a very good dancer and can keep rhythm. I plan on integrating some music into the class using the drum and tambourines that we bought and Ellie's guitar.
Laxmi: Laxmi is, like Guddi, a wild child. She and Guddi roam the village throwing marbles and getting into mischief. Laxmi is very good at naming all of the animals and colors. She has very distinct likes and dislikes and they change all of the time. Sometimes she wants to write, other times only to color, and others to sing. I have to try keep her engaged in her learning and focused at the same time. To keep Laxmi stimulated, she needs some sort of physical activity so I have now lengthened the class by a half hour and we have been learning and acting out action verbs with a ball and jump rope. It's been really fun and the girls love it. Laxmi is constantly testing me and won't give me back the pencils when class is finished. Sometimes she even refuses to participate in class. Most of the time this is when we are doing an activity that she finds challenging. It's evident that she lacks the confidence to attempt the task so I have been working on building her confidence. Telling her she does a good job doesn't necessarily do the trick so I have been choosing her to demonstrate activities that I know she feels comfortable with such as catching, throwing, and kicking the ball as well as naming the colors. We have also started giving each other "high fives" when I feel like she is getting frustrated. I know it may not be conventional teaching style but this really makes her feel good and she smiles and continues with the work.
Bhakti: Bhakti, although younger than Laxmi and Guddi, seems to retain vocabulary faster. She is really bright and has a very good memory. At times when the other older girls would be struggling to remember a word I'd hear this soft voice whispering it correctly. Bhakti has quite a difficult time with writing and drawing and she seems unsure of which hand to hold the pencil with often switching hands between strokes. I believe that she is left handed as she seems stronger with it. It was suggested that maybe due to cultural restraints she may have been discouraged from using the left hand as it is considered unclean.
Tampta: Tampta is Bhakti's little sister and is brought to class because the other girls are caring for her. She is probably around 3 years old and so is too young to learn the more difficult concepts. She has her own book in which she experiments with drawing in and she can repeat most of the alphabet and some numbers along with the other girls.
Laki: Laki is such a sweet girl and was coming almost every day until the start of this week (week 5). She is probably around 8 years old and is very affectionate, always putting her hand on my shoulder or leg as I'm teaching. She is slightly more reserved than Guddi and Laxmi in some ways but she is confident. She likes to draw and to sing. She knows the alphabet and I believe that she may have at one point attended school.
Maya: Maya is Laxmi's little sister. She is probably about 5 years old. She has not been coming much and is quite shy. Maya would really benefit from coming more often. I always ask the other girls where she is but they just shake their heads. She is a lot more reserved than the others and seems to hold a sadness inside. It really breaks my heart. When she does come to class I try to make her feel safe and comfortable. She likes to draw and she is creative and I often find her doing her own thing. For example, all of the other girls will be drawing fruits and vegetables (the topic of the day) and she will instead be tracing her hand and then drawing decorations on it.
So far we have been working on the basics: alphabet, numbers, shapes, colors, actions (e.g. running, kicking, catching, jumping), animals, hygiene and fruits and vegetables. This week (4th week) we have been working on vocabulary in our natural surroundings. For example, "This is a rock" to be followed by "What is this?" They answer "This is a rock" and then "What color is it?" to be answered "It is gray". We follow with trees, leaves, sand, water, the sky, the earth etc. Last week in Jodhpur I bought some books about the Earth which has been embraced by all three classes that I teach. The young girls in particular are fascinated with dinosaurs as most children are. We have also been working on writing and drawing. Some of the girls are very comfortable using pencils. However, a couple of the girls are hesitant and I have been focusing on building their confidence in their own abilities. My methods of encouragement include varying the lessons from day to day so that each child can experience an activity that they feel comfortable and confident in. For example, last week we drew pictures of our vocabulary words (Guddi's favorite activity). We also acted out our vocabulary words. For example, "I kick/throw/catch the ball" etc. Laxmi in particular really enjoys any type of physical play so she was giggling uncontrollably. All of the girls really love singing and Guddi and Bhakti love to dance so every day we sing a song at the end of class. They have learned a song about to teach the names of parts of the body and another about hygiene. Ellie will come out of her crafts class occasionally with her guitar and we'll sing "You Are My Sunshine"—The Sambhali Setrawa favorite and our current theme song.
Arts and Crafts (Ellie): While Karine teaches her little girls, I teach the arts and craft class which consists of teenage girls and women. During Edwina's (previous volunteer) time as the teacher, this class seemed to have become a kind of support group in which the women could come for two hours to sew, learn crafts and talk about their problems and joys. Although communication is difficult as I speak about five words of Hindi, we have made connections and can get by with hand gestures and facial expressions. During Edwina's time their main focus was making paper bags from newspapers along with side projects such as embroidery and sewing clothes for family. Similarly, I have chosen to initiate one main project, a painted and embroidered bedsheet. Allowing the women to either take part in the main project or pursue their own projects depending on their mood or interest. This freedom seems to be important considering the women’s purpose for coming to Sambhali. In these two hours the women can escape the rigidity of their domestic duties to pursue something totally unrelated to their chores.
We have spent about two weeks painting this bedsheet that I began by drawing a design of a traditional dancing girl. Three girls helped me measure up the borders of the sheet and ever since about five to ten girls at a time have been adding color with fabric color. It has been a challenge to try to teach painting techniques to vary texture and contrast without any Hindi, but demonstration seems to be working, except when the girls paint hastily and make it look messy! Several times I've tried to explain that "It takes time to make nice things", and I think it's starting to sink in.
The girls seem to be reluctant to draw designs or choose colors to paint themselves. This is a concern to me as I think initiative and individual creativity is the key to 'empowerment' – the aim of Sambhali. I got a drawing pad and asked them to draw sample designs based on anything – patterns on their saris, henna designs etc, and they seemed to open up a little bit by drawing various designs, and one participant, Indu, even took the initiative to draw some her designs onto the bedsheet.
We plan to finish painting and embroidering the bedsheet and then move on to try either twig trivets for pots, greeting cards or this finger painting. For me it's important to find out what the girls actually want to do by discussing this in class rather than simply saying "This is what we're going to do". This approach seems to suit the casual, social atmosphere of the class and decision making, however inconsequential, is in itself a form of empowerment.
Intermediate English (Karine): After our 11am classes we get an hour break which is spent cooking our food for the day, cleaning, and preparing for the next class. At 2:00 we teach English to the older women participants. Aside from song (and dance occasionally) the 2:00 class has been centered on conversational English. I work with the more advanced while Ellie has been teaching phonics and reading skills to Dhapu, a very kind and determined woman. This class is quite small and some of our students may come for a couple of days and then we won't see them for a week. Our two most constant students are Gunjan (also our neighbor who really looks out for us) and Lata (a girl in her upper teens). In English, we have been working on articles, prepositions, adjectives, and pronouns as well as introducing and conjugating more verbs (past, present, and future tenses). We have also been discussing empowered women, our students’ dreams and goals, the world--how big it actually is, and music.
Finally our last class is open and usually consists of girls ranging from 6 to 18 years old. This class has been particularly challenging because we have such a wide range of knowledge levels. There are some girls who don't know the alphabet and there are others who can participate in a casual conversation. We have now split the class into two with Karine teaching the older girls (Class 8-12) and Ellie teaching the little ones (Class 1-7).
Beginners English (Ellie):The younger girls are very enthusiastic and eager to engage in class but unfortunately they arrive at all times during class as different schools finish at different times. This has made determining what to teach slightly difficult because different girls are present each day and they all have varying levels of knowledge. Some can read fairly well, but don't seem to be advanced enough to be in Karine's class and others are still trying to sound out words. On the first day I asked them to individually sing the ABCs to assess their levels – however everybody can sing the ABCs and it takes more observation to determine how much they actually know. They learned how to say their age and their favorite color and I had them ask someone next to them: "How old are you?" and "What is your favorite color?" I soon learned that the question is the most difficult aspect to a conversation.
The first week we studied shapes and colors. I had various objects and asked them "What is this?" "What shape is it?" "What color is it?” I had them answer by snapping their fingers on each syllable which really helped them slow down and pronounce the words properly. For example "THIS (snap) IS (snap) A (snap) RECT (snap) TAN (snap) GLE (snap) !"
We have also been slowly but surely learning the song "You are my Sunshine". Songs seem to be useful because they really enjoy singing and they get a feel for pronouncing the syllables of words. We also spent a lesson reviewing colors and learning clothes vocabulary by having various students stand up and having the others describe what she was wearing.
Recently we began learning about Family. I had the girls draw their own family tree but didn't realize that it would be such a long process to write their family members' names in English letters! Because of that the activity ended up taking up much more time than I had imagined. We then wrote fill in the blank descriptions about their families eg. "I have ( ) brothers and ( ) sisters." I showed them pictures about my family and told them about my 11 year old brother, and they have now started writing letters to him, describing themselves and their families.
Intermediate English (Karine): This class consists of the girls that the previous volunteers (Marion, Edwina, and Stanley) nicknamed "The Duffers". These girls are not 'duffers' (a term that was new to me but apparently means someone who is incompetent or useless). Here is a quote from Marion's report. She states that these girls are, "A dismal lot. They have no spoken English at all. They took 45 minutes to understand the difference and use of I – YOU – SHE and were just about able to say and write sentences about themselves using the verbs SPEAK PLAY EAT DRINK LIKE." These statements and presumptions could not be further from the truth. These girls come to class every day and they are genuinely interested in the lessons. I have to say that I am extremely disappointed by Marion's lack of faith in these girls. Her attitude that these girls were incapable of learning must have been reflected in her actions and felt by the girls so they may have been behaving according to her expectations. I also am confused that after 30 years of teaching experience, she would put down her students. Even more bewildering is that she would do so in this kind of environment—one in which the aim is to empower and build the self confidence of the girls.
In this class I have above all tried to build the confidence of the girls in the context of teaching English in order to prepare them for their board exams. So far in the lessons I have covered parts of speech, articles, pronouns, prepositions and prepositional phrases, verb conjugation, opposites, and building vocabulary. We've also been discussing the earth and they have learned the continents and the oceans. We have learned about different biomes and the corresponding vocabulary. We have mapped out our solar system. They now know that the earth revolves around the sun and the moon revolves around the earth. The world now seems a lot bigger to these girls. I have introduced these concepts to the girls because I plan on incorporating in our lessons the environmental problems that we are now facing globally, regionally in Rajasthan and locally in Setrawa.
At the close of our teaching day we usually go to the market to buy our vegetables for the next day. Along the way we are trailed by kids, goats and puppies. It's really a different experience living in such a small village. Everyone knows about everything that we do. We can't step outside our bedroom, which is attached to the school room, without seeing little heads and eyes peering over our low wall "Hello Ellie. Hello Karine. Hee hee hee hee"
We enjoy the peace of the village, whether it be watching peacocks fly one by one from the top of our water tank into the Neem tree to settle for the night, or enjoying the simple meditation of preparing vegetables for dinner.
Admittedly, from time to time we feel the urge to let go and rock out to music (with all the doors and windows shut to our bedroom of course) or, at other times we have needed to wind down after a busy day. On such days we may treat ourselves and wash our hair (an act we do at most twice a week). Cleanliness has truly become a luxury that we enjoy whenever possible.
Govind has told us that some villagers have expressed concerns that those involved in the Trust are missionaries and that the Sambhali Project's aim is to convert their religion. They have more recently claimed that we are trying to change their culture. Hearing this was very disheartening as we both are strongly opposed to influencing anyone's religious beliefs, and while we hope to share our culture, we would never want to influence their regard for their own culture. Rather, we would like them to teach us about it. This represents a wonderful aspect of Sambhali – that while we teach the participants, they teach us as well – whether it be Marwari or Hindi phrases, or an embroidery stitch. The underlying purpose of Sambhali is to empower women, but we the volunteers are also being empowered.
Report 2These last weeks have been absolutely amazing. The girls have really opened up to us. We feel that we have now gained the trust of the people in the village. We've gotten a lot more comfortable and have found our rhythm. Occasionally, after a particularly demanding day we still find ourselves eating Parle Gs and shaking our heads in stupefied silence.
Luckily, this has been happening less and less as time goes on- the shaking of our heads, not the eating of Parle Gs (which we do quite often).
During this last month we have experienced a steady drop in attendance with the crafts class and the 2 o'clock class. It's possible that all of the weddings occurring in the village have had something to do with this. It appears that the entire village is involved with the weddings. This being wedding season it is not uncommon for some students who are related to the bride or groom to miss class for a week or longer to join in the festivities. However, during our last week we welcomed about ten new students to the afternoon English class, as well as one more young woman to the morning crafts class.
Now we realize that some of the students that had stopped coming to Karine's morning class are going to school as we saw one of them walking in her school uniform. This is very good news if these children are going to school. The children in the morning class are very bright and would benefit from attending school. We have asked our translator Rekha why these girls are not going to school. Her answer is that they don't want to. We don't know if it is that simple and we feel that this may have more to do with the failure of the parents to properly care for these children. We do know that the fathers of these children are alcoholics. We had learned this from the previous volunteers as well as one of the girls herself. This six year old girl casually remarked to Govind that all their fathers do is sit at home and drink alcohol all day. However, we have been confronted more and more with the answer given by our translator. It seems as if the children make their own decisions and the parents allow it. We have observed this in the case of one of our students, a seven year old named Muly, who showed up to class with a very bad wound on her heel. When we asked her parents why she had not seen a doctor they told us that she refused to go. Our student is only seven years old and it would appear that it would be up to her parents to ensure she receives proper care. However, we have realized that often these parents either lack the knowledge to judge the gravity of a situation or they are struggling to care for all of their children. We've noticed that in the latter case it is left up to the older children to care for their younger siblings. In Muly’s case, her slightly older brother was left in charge of administering her medication. Due to the language barrier we decided to keep the medicine with us and then give it to her in order to make sure that she received the proper dosage. She is at risk of infection because the wound is on her foot and it is common practice for the children in this village to run around barefoot through the sewage and drainage that runs throughout.
This experience with Muly has inspired us to give a seminar in basic aid. All three of us are trained in CPR and first aid. We told the girls that if they have a health problem that their family is unable to care for they must come to us and we will help them receive proper treatment. We feel that it is important that our students know that Sambhali is not just a center for learning but lso a refuge or place they can come for help.
A week after we began to care for Muly, we went to her home to check up on her and saw that her mother and aunt were weeping outside her home. We could not determine what had happened due to our communication barrier, so we brought Rekha to the family and we learned that Muly's uncle had fallen out of a moving jeep and had to be taken to hospital. Muly's mother asked if we could go to the hospital to help pay for the medical expense. We rang Govind and he suggested that we go to the hospital to see how badly the man was hurt and to ask the doctor how much the cost would be. The doctor said that he had not suffered any major injuries, and there would only be a small cost for medication. Then Muly's father approached the hospital as we were leaving and asked Rekha if we would be able to help pay for the medicine. Govind suggested we contribute a few hundred rupees, but then we considered the concern that this may set a precedent for other families. We have made it clear that we will help the girls in our school but if we help an outside individual we may be expected to help everyone in the village. Sambhali is a small and minimally financed organization so this would be logistically impossible. However, we did want to help this man. Our initial solution was to pay for his medical expenses with the family's clear understanding that it is a personal gift from us and is completely separate from Sambhali. When we returned to his home we were told to give the money to the family rather than pay the doctor directly. We told them that we would pay the doctor fees but they told us that they had already been paid. We felt that it would be unwise to simply hand out cash so we decided it would be best not to give money. These are situations that we face often. It is important to look at the bigger picture when facing these decisions. However, it can be very difficult and oftentimes heartbreaking. For example, a woman with a child has been coming to the gate asking for money and food. Our first instinct was to go get her something from the kitchen. However, we know that if we were to do this even once we may inspire her and others to continue coming for handouts. Giving in this way is not sustainable and may be problematic for the Sambhali School. Instead we told the woman that we would be happy to admit her as one of our students so that she could come to the crafts class and have use of the supplies and equipment.
We would like to have more parental involvement. As of yet it has been very limited. This may be partly our fault as we have set boundaries with the students by refusing to go to their homes for dinner. However, the new volunteer Karelia has been inspired to have a parents' night hosted by Govind. The aim of this night would be to reaffirm the goals and philosophy of Sambhali School in order to encourage the parents to continue sending their children to the School.
In the crafts class we have continued to work on the bedsheet. It has been the main focus for some of the girls while others have chosen to pursue their own sewing projects, such as clothes or bags. After an embroidery workshop with Tamanna from the Jodhpur project, the Setrawa girls were requested to make embroidered bracelets for several overseas orders, so for about three days in the middle of February they took a break from the bedsheet and worked on stitching bracelets. They seem to be much more comfortable with embroidering or painting designs rather than drawing them, which leads me to think that they like projects based around color combinations.
After learning many new stitches the girls began an embroidered border around the edge of the sheet. Then, towards the end of February we took another break from the bedsheet to try Aboriginal dot painting. I showed them some pictures of this traditional Australian artwork and explained to them that dot painting has been practiced for many years by the first people of Australia. I had done a painting beforehand, and made it clear that it was only an example, and that they should not copy it. I was so pleased when they created their own designs and took the time to make their work detailed and neat. They created some beautiful paintings and perhaps now that they have seen what they can achieve when they take their time, they will be less hasty.
The last week they began to stitch some flowers where there was some leftover space around the painting. The attendance in this class also improved during the last week. This class has a unique, casual atmosphere. The women really enjoy talking and laughing together, and we’ve had fun singing songs, listening to different kinds of music, and sometimes the girls ask me to teach them how to play a chord or two on the guitar. These women need this sanctuary to relax and have fun.
On February 10th, Govind came to Setrawa with many sapling trees ready for planting and new signboards identifying the Setrawa Project. He brought a photographer to take pictures of us handing the trees to our students who planted them at their homes. Several more were planted near the school. A week later we visited the students’ homes to check up on their trees. We were happy to see that they all looked very healthy, and were protected from goats and had obviously been watered each day. The girls seemed to be very proud of their trees, and happy to nurture them. Unfortunately the trees near the school had not been protected enough and the goats ate all of their leaves!
Two signboards were put in the village, and two were put on the main highway. They look very professional and bold, so hopefully they will attract passing tourists which will in turn spread awareness about the Setrawa Project and Sambhali.
Govind has been working hard networking and establishing relationships with other NGOs.
One weekend in Jodhpur we met Lillian and Alex from the Foundation for Sustainable Development. We told them about the aims of Sambhali and what it’s like to volunteer in Setrawa, and in turn they told us about their organization which trains volunteers and places them in projects around the world. Our conversation with them was very positive, and perhaps we will partner with them in order to recruit potential volunteers. Prior to this we met Joan Gurry who works for the Global Foundation for Humanity(Veerni Project) in Jodhpur. She had visited Setrawa and seemed pleased with the progress made there.
Towards the end of our stay in the village we have become concerned that Govind needs to have a stronger presence at the Setrawa Project. The Jodhpur Project is flourishing partly because it is based in Jodhpur meaning that Govind as well as others involved in the Sambhali Trust are a constant presence. As the Setrawa Project is based 110 kilometers away from the home of the Sambhali Trust, whoever is volunteering is in charge of the Project, a true privilege in many ways. However, since the volunteers change every few months, we feel that there has to be some sort of consistent force to sustain the momentum and focus of the Setrawa Project.
Many students have been asking us when Govind would be coming after he had been away from the project for a period of time. Although we are aware that Govind has many projects to keep track of, we explained to Govind that the Setrawa girls want to get to know him better, and want to feel a strong stable force keeping the project focused. Govind was very appreciative to hear our concerns, and decided that he would come to Setrawa every fourteen days.
Another concern has been our translator, Rekha. While her presence is essential in the afternoon class, we feel that if there was someone with a higher level of English available, that person should take her place. Even more of a concern is how on numerous occasions we have asked her to translate something to the class, and she has misunderstood, but pretends to know what we have said by smiling and saying “Okay”. If she simply asked us to reword the question it would be easier to deal with our communication barrier. At other times, she has corrected some girls when they were actually doing the right thing. We suggested to Govind that if there is no better candidate for the job, it is essential to keep Rekha for basic translations. However, if someone else with more advanced English would take the job, she should replace Rekha.
Two weeks before our leaving we were joined by a new volunteer, Karelia. She is a lovely, kind hearted Finnish woman, and we formed a wonderful friendship with her during these past weeks. She brought her dog Shila as well, who has unfortunately caused a few problems. We have been very concerned about the dog’s presence there, as Shila has a tendency to be fearful and reactive around those she is unfamiliar with including the students.
Karine and I had been worried that something bad would happen with the children, as she has been allowed to stay off her leash in the yard during the day. The girls tend to come to the School at irregular times, and sometimes when there is no class. One day, Muly, the girl we had been caring for, came to class early and Shila chased her from the gate and nipped her unwounded heel. The bite broke the skin very lightly, but we were still afraid that it would jeopardize her parents’ trust in us. Fortunately they still let us care for her, but we still were concerned that this feeling of unsafety at the school would ruin the sanctuary-like quality it has for the students. We voiced our concerns with Karelia, who was also concerned for the safety of the students. We all agreed it would be best to keep her on a long rope at all times. At this time of our departure, we hope that things are as resolved as much as they can be.
As our time here comes to an end we feel a deep sense of sadness. We feel that these girls, both in Setrawa and in Jodhpur, are our family-- our mothers, our sisters, our daughters. We had no idea how difficult it would be to leave. We had no idea how special these women and children are. We are so lucky to have had this time with them. We have learned so much. Thank you.
We Thanks a lot to Madam Jacqueline De Chollet of Global Foundation for Humanity for her Kind Visit to Jodhpur Project.
Cutting the cake - Suneeta and Asha.
Blowing the candle - Asha and Suneeta
Lady with baby, enroute Setrawa village.
Potters shop enroute Setrawa village
Ms. Meena, our 2nd local teacher at Setrawa Village. Thanks Karine!!!
Dry water ponds on the way to Setrawa.
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Holi Festival Celebration Jodhpur Project, Sambhali Trust
Charlotte and Guddi (participant Setrawa Project)
Pooja, Deepika, Suneeta at Jodhpur Project, colored in Holi festival.
Setrawa village Project teacher Ms. Rekha
Over loaded bus enroute Setrawa Village, a day before Festival Holi (Celebrating Harvest)
Cutting the cake - Suneeta and Asha.
Blowing the candle - Asha and Suneeta
Lady with baby, enroute Setrawa village.
Potters shop enroute Setrawa village
Ms. Meena, our 2nd local teacher at Setrawa Village. Thanks Karine!!!
Dry water ponds on the way to Setrawa.
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Holi Festival Celebration Jodhpur Project, Sambhali Trust
Charlotte and Guddi (participant Setrawa Project)
Setrawa village Project teacher Ms. Rekha
Over loaded bus enroute Setrawa Village, a day before Festival Holi (Celebrating Harvest)
1st picture has few guest and the girls dancing.
Sarika in white and yellow
We did a lot of games when we went to Mandore, some little competetions between the girls.
