Blogging Gapper from India

Here is a blog from our gapper, Lina, from her trip to India:

Hello to all from India again.

This past week we spent in a small village outside of Jhadol. We arrived there after a bumpy ride
of about two hours from Udaipur on the dusty roads of Rajasthan. We spent the first couple of days
sleeping in the boarding school. Our days consisted of excursions into the city of Jhadol, a visit to a local village to listen to some music and show off our Indian folk dancing, and a hike up a nearby mountain.

The village life moved at a much different pace than in the city and we all had time to settle down and catch our breath. Since the Diwali holiday was a couple of days before, when we arrived in the village it took the girls and the workers a while to trickle back to work. When they decided to return we had a full schedule during the days.

Our village home stay was a 10 minute walk from the school we taught at. The houses were all very close together and we felt very welcome in the homes of the villagers. Our days would begin at sun rise. The families would begin the chores and we would follow them around helping with what we could. After chai, we would head back over to the boarding area to eat meals.

Late mornings consisted of work in the fields and teaching at the girls' school. Teaching was both fun
and challenging. We split into teams of three and worked in different classrooms teaching various levels of English. Head, shoulders, knees, and toes was a huge hit as was the itsy bitsy spider. After about an hour of class, we would go to recess. The girls wore us out with games of tag, red-light green-light, frisbee, and duck duck goose. We would then eat lunch and take a quick breather.

In the afternoons, we spent time on construction at the teacher's school located right next to the girls'
school. We became pros at carrying sand and bricks on our heads as we ascended the stairs. We also
spent time mixing cement and plastering the walls. By the end of the days we were pretty exhausted, but we could usually count on our host families to encourage us into a dance party.

Other than our normal daily schedule we found time to partake in a number of different activities. The student teachers who were staying at the boarding house were always willing to teach us some
new dance moves and were fun to hang out with. We also learned to play kabbadi, an Indian sport which is a combination of red rover and tag. Halloween was not forgotten and the group got in costume and celebrated with candy and ghost stories. All in all it was a busy week full of new experiences and lots of fun volunteering.

We begin a new leg of our trip tonight as we head north to Amritsar.

Thanks for your continued interest in our adventure!
Lizzie and Lina