School Days

Today our schooling took a little longer than usual. We are starting a science project and the girls were keen to do some research on the plants that they had chosen as the subject of their project. While I was helping the girls with that, Nadim was doing some rearranging and cleaning in our room.

By mid-afternoon we were finally ready to set out on today’s mission. We wanted to find a school and figure out what volunteer activities we could do. Within walking distance is Saint Anne’s Convent School. We had to stop and ask for directions and the kind fellow that we stopped tried first to explain where it was and then said it would be easier if we would just allow his son to take us there. So we hopped in their car and got a free lift.

We met with the head mistress and she suggested we help in the late afternoon with children that were boarding at the school as they come in from remote villages or are from families where the conditions were not so good at home. These children do not know English as well as many of the other students and so our task will be to help improve their English.

We met with them at 4:30 today and came away with happy hearts. We spoke with them about the seasons in India and in Canada. We talked a little about some of the games and sports they play. I think we’ll have to learn how to play some of them. They were keen to learn a song and wanted something with actions. When we asked them if they knew any, they sang a great song with actions. It was almost a dance and really most entertaining. They were full of smiles and both the students and we are looking forward to on-going sessions together.

This evening we cooked burritos for ourselves and just as we were rolling out dough for little flat breads, the power went out. So we finished our rolling by candle light. Once that was done we fried the bread by candle light and then ate by candle light. As soon as I said that I didn’t think we needed to do dishes by candle light, the power came back! Power outages are a daily occurrence so we’ve stocked up on some candles.

CM