Hello everyone and thanks for your patience during my long hiatus!
Yes, I have two months to cover. I will therefore be summarizing and making harsh edits. I hope my overview does my experiences justice, but if you feel there is information missing, please comment below and I will add details as necessary!
Seven weeks ago, my first group of volunteers arrived. There are five girls in the current cohort, all of whom are here for exactly the right reasons. I've found in other organizations that people often volunteer for the wrong reasons-- they come to hang out with their friends or to get a nice tan by the pool instead of splashing around with the kids. They come because their parents thought it would be good on a resumé or because a job counselor said they needed more community outreach. So in the back of my mind, I was expecting at least one of the volunteers to be more excited for great shopping and traveling around the Himalayas getting massages and doing yoga than for working with the kids.
Going into the slums everyday is tiring, and I was ecstatic to find that despite the heat, the trash, the smells, and the dust, the volunteers are excited every morning to see our kids, teach them the lesson we've prepared, and show them we care. It's been truly inspiring to work with a group of women so dedicated to making a difference in the lives of kids to whom they have no forced obligations, kids that most of the world ignores and writes off as living in "an impossible situation." The volunteers don't care that some of the children wear the same dirt-filled outfit everyday, or that the lice is clearly visible through girls' braids. Fan not working that day? At least sweating cools you down. Classroom filled with smoke because of all the trash piles burning outside? Breathe shallow. We go in with a mission: make these little human beings feel like they're worth our time and our love.
Of course with six women between the ages of 20-27 living in a 2-bed, 2-bath apartment, there are bound to be a few small bumps in the road. But I was reminded the other day of the Robbers Cave Experiment-- when people who don't get along have a common goal, the differences and conflicts suddenly don't seem as important. So despite close quarters and a lot of together time, we are getting along surprisingly well, thanks in large part to the fact that we all want to create fantastic lessons for our students.
And fantastic they have been! Every week we go to the slum classrooms with a new theme. So far, we've had International Week (we have teachers from Israel, Italy, the UK, the US, and South Africa, and I taught about Samoa), Water Week (bodies of water: ocean, rivers and lakes; states of water: ice, steam and liquid; properties of water: polarity), Culture Week (music, film, and visual art), History Week (dinosaurs, Ancient Egypt, modern history and inventions), Job Week (with visitors! a doctor, a lawyer, and an engineer, as well as our own lessons on photographers, teachers, and soldiers). Some highlights for me have been teaching the children "Savalivali," my favorite Samoan kids song; taking them to the "Western Wall" to put in wishes; showing what it means for water molecules to like each other by putting drops on a coin then trying to mix water and oil; explaining the basics of opera and hearing 45 children ages 3-12 singing beautiful scales right back at me with big, round, supportive breaths (kind of); making the students the teachers and asking them to give a lesson to the class; playing a memory game with dinosaur names and pictures; getting to the classroom before the other volunteers and sitting with the kids for a few minutes while they excitedly tell me about what they're learning and show off their work.
We have two classrooms we go to everyday. In one room there are two classes, which means that the tiny tin shack holds up to 40 kids and two teachers (plus seven more when we're there). Last week was the first week that room had a fan, and its been much more bearable for everyone involved. Our second classroom has the same amount of children and teachers, but currently also houses a smaller 10-student class of 1.5- 3-year-olds. We teach to all the students in the room, meaning some days a group of 15 7- 9-year-olds and other days a group of 45 1.5- 12-year-olds.
"Teaching" can also be difficult because none of the students speak English (though a couple of the older ones are at an intermediate level at best). This means we stand in front of the class and deliver our lessons in short sentences, which are immediately translated to Hindi by our wonderful educational coordinator and assistant, Hayley and David. It is hard to get all our information across they way we would like to, and after a certain point it is up to Hayley and David what the kids are actually learning. The Indian education system is, in general, a system of brute memorization and repetition of facts, tables, quotes, etc. In other words, it is the opposite of a liberal arts education. Often when we enter our first class, the eldest girl is standing at the front screaming the times tables as the other students shout it back (3 times 5 is 15! 3 times 5 is fifteen! 3 time 6 is 18! 3 time 6 is 18!), while the students in our other class are usually hunched over notebooks copying the alphabet from the previous page. We try to switch it up a bit--our lessons usually start with a slideshow (the kids LOVE looking at pictures on the computer screen and watching videos), and then have a more interactive and creative section where we split into groups, teams, and pairs to draw, paint, build, sing, dance, etc. We try to always get the children up and moving and participating in the class.
It was hard for me at first (and still is, to some extent) to remember that we're not necessarily there to teach the kids lessons that will get them ahead in school. The actual material we teach is probably the least important aspect of our work in the slums. I found it frustrating that we couldn't sit down with a student and really delve into a subject, because of the language barrier, time constraints, and the reality that their educational foundation just isn't strong enough. I had to remind myself how much of a difference Camp Harmony, a camp in Los Angeles for kids living in homeless shelters, abuse shelters and low-income housing, makes. We don't teach math or English at Camp Harmony, but there is no doubt in my mind that it changes the lives of our campers. Similarly, if we show the students in Kalwa that we care, that they matter, it makes a difference. A huge problem in India (in my opinion) is that with the idea of karma comes the idea that what people have is what they deserve. I find it hard to believe, however, that the four-year-old who held my hand while we were learning about robots today deserves the infected rat bites covering his bald scalp. And even though my heart breaks when his face shines with pride as all the teachers high-five him for his awesome robot impression because I know he probably won't ever leave the slums, won't ever go to college, and might not even finish fifth grade, I know that learning our simple lessons and his smile in that moment is more than he would have gotten that day otherwise.
So that's all for my classroom update. I'll try to write again soon about all the other things going on here. I still have stories about traveling to Goa, helping to plan Limmud, eating new foods, attempting to meditate, and more!
Happy Thanksgiving and Hanukkah to all, and happy three-month anniversary to me!
Love from India,
Leah
