Busy-busy; our last weekend and much eating to be done

January 24th

Saturday  

No blog yesterday as chief blogger was afflicted with the nasty migraine after a full but very satisfying day. Pam and I were at the centre shortly after nine and we set about arranging the two play rooms as I have decided they should be in future. That is, I have realised that it will be better to have distinct play areas set out, so that a full range of activities can be offered for the children every day. So we set about re-arranging and sweeping, although of course our lovely teachers and ayah could not bear to see us doing this, so made sure to prevent us from doing any such menial work! Sometimes it would be nice to have these wonderful women in one’s normal life back home, I think…In behind the book shelf we found a rather large lizard which set Pam running to the other side of the room. I was surprised to find that Padmini also wanted to run away from it, as somehow I imagined these tough village women would make nothing of the odd scurrying creature. Boona said she didn’t like them as they sometimes run right up your leg, which I didn’t much like the sound of, but nonetheless she took a broom to it and efficiently shooed it out of the building. We set out a home play area, a book corner, a table for drawing/ art, a place for dressing up and role play, some jigsaws in a corner on the floor, a corner for blocks/ construction, water play and sand play. I was quite pleased with the results, I have to say.

By this time Sekar had arrived and he brought with him Sam, from RUHSA, who is the person supposed to be taking over from him regarding work with the Pachaikili. He told us he has made a few visits already. It was certainly a good idea of Sekar to invite him to this training session as I think he took in quite a lot of what we discussed. For the training I basically took the teachers and Boona through the different areas of a child’s learning and asked them to think how they would be developing, relating it to the new play areas in the play room and the different activities they undertake in the day. I was so impressed by the way they responded to this. They did not need any prompting at all by Sekar or me to be able to reply about the children’s learning using examples from what they see every day in their work with them. They seem to remember everything I have ever taught them over the years, and to be able to use their own initiative and instincts very effectively. 

We ended with me explaining how I would like them to start keeping a very simple Learning Journal for each child, in which they keep observations which I asked them to undertake for five minutes at a time, on one child, doing five such observations between them during free play sessions, every week. This should mean that each child is observed once a month. We are ordering a camera for them to use in the centre to take photos of the children when engaged in activities, to go in the journals. Sam said he would come once a month to the centre to download the photos on to his laptop and put them on a stick, to be printed locally in KVKuppam. I also asked the teachers to keep a log of the activities they plan each week for their small group sessions with the children. 

Finally I asked them what they feel about their work, and what problems they have, if any. They replied very quickly that there are NO problems and they are very very happy. They love being with the children, watching them at play especially when they don’t realise they are being watched, forming a relationship with them, having fun together. They find it interesting and are bored if there is no school! They then also talked about the elders and the relationships they have with them, talking to cheer them up if they are a bit down. Once one of the women didn’t come for a day or so because she was ill, so all the three women went to visit her at home and encouraged her to come back. On another occasion one lady came straight from getting her pension and they realised she had only Rs 500 instead of the Rs 1,000 to which she is entitled. One of them went back to the post office with her, where the post man told her that the old lady had left too quickly before he could give her the full amount. A likely tale, we thought! The teachers also mentioned that the elderly people will notice and enquire after a child who is absent, so clearly the relationships in this group of elders and children are quite significant. I said ‘You are like a big family’ and they agreed that this is how they do feel. How fortunate we are to have these wonderful staff working in Pachaikili, and the SHG cooks also, who clearly all have a strong sense of commitment to the community.

There followed a  great lunch, of course, prepared by Rani because this year she can’t invite us to her home because she is having work done on the house in preparation for the marriage of her only son Morganraj in June. The chaps had arrived on bikes to participate in this and afterwards Pam and I got in our wonderful air-conditioned taxi to go to Vellore, to shop. This expedition is unavoidable at some time, usually towards the end of our visits, and has always been hellish in some degree. The A/C taxi, however, made all the difference this year. We went first to a toy shop, which I had discovered on line, called First Cry. All the toys are very plastic, but we felt they had some value for play in the centre. As we are now working strictly to Rita/RUHSA/ rules we had to choose the items then list them with their order numbers and price. Hopefully the staff will keep them by for us until the order can be raised by Vinoth and then approved (by whom? Not sure, someone at CMC?) and then he can place the order and hopefully it can be fetched from Vellore. Just so long as it doesn’t take more than a year like the repairing of the trucks did last year!!! Pause for sound of Sally screaming in frustration… What with it being Current-Off day in Vellore so shop AC not working, and the next venue being a posh Indian sweetie shop, also no fans working, you can begin to fathom why my head started to throb at this time, perhaps! It is unbelievably humid here at the moment with the air sitting lifeless and heavy upon one’s head, not a breath of breeze. Home in the taxi just in time before full ‘womiting’ as they say here, set in.

Sunday

At the last minute yesterday, after our training and lunch, we were importuned by Vimula and Indra the two cooks, who wanted us to ‘come my house’. I had tried to sort a schedule for us weeks ago and was surprised that they hadn’t already asked for a lunch date. Alas however, a date now had to be found and we were really short on time, so I finished up agreeing to breakfast on Sunday at Vimula’s. I did this whilst Pam was out of hearing and I said, oh dear, Pam will not be happy. However, bless her, she took it in good part, knowing these things are inevitable. Come this morning however, I was too ill to go, so off the cheerful three went for the first of three stuffings scheduled for today. They arrived back mid-morning by which time I was feeling better, so we all went to Boona’s for a very nice, large lunch with her family, who are really delightful. A niece was there, home from her degree course at Chennai, and she helped a bit with English. Home again then, for a few hours respite before the final sortie to Tuthitangel to Selvi’s house. We knew that we would never get away with just having a small coffee with her, of course, but in the event we were very pleasantly surprised by the lighter meal she offered, with very nice dosai pancakes and a few small curries and lovely mint and groundnut chutney. She herself was looking and feeling much better after the nasty fever and cough she has had. Just as we were leaving the village to come home we were hailed in our auto by someone, who turned out to be Gauri, a long ago friend who worked for years for BTC. We managed to understand each other enough for me to find out all her four girls are married, she has two grandsons and two granddaughters, but her husband doesn’t work as he has, I think, diabetes problems. 

And so finally home, me only two thirds as stuffed as the rest of the party, and all of us flat out under the fans in terrific heat. Tomorrow is our last day, when ends have to be tied and farewells said all around Seetaramanpet. One of the things we have to do is to see the RUHSA engineer with Sekar, he who couldn’t work out how to repair our toy trucks so left the work undone for a year. He has been to see the steps where we need a hand rail and has decreed that it cannot go up the middle because it can’t go to the very top step (as it would prevent the gate opening) Brian has explained to Sekar that it could go to the penultimate step and still leave room for the gate to open. Ah, says the engineer, who perhaps may not be the sharpest of them, but this is no good as they still have one more step to climb. They could however very easily hold on to the edge of the other half of the gate, which is always closed. No says our man, it will be fixed to the left hand gate, welded to it. Ah says Pam, but that gate swings open if you touch it. She and I cast looks at each other and start to imagine elderly people flying round the gate, holding on to a hand rail, and become slightly hysterical. Dear god, we both think. It may be very interesting to meet this design genius tomorrow.