Debbie's Placement in India 2018

Mondays seem to be coming around faster and faster! Today we went out with Mani for the final parts of our cultural exposure program and seeing more local economic activities. Main had carefully planned the day, and she was very disappointed when some rare heavy rainfall interfered with her hard work! I joked that at least the farmers would be happy, but Mani pouted and said that it wasn't even a good time for rain right now - rain is good when it comes and fills the water tanks, but now this much rain might just spoil any crops that have been growing. It really made me think about what a difficult and precarious life rural people here have to live. Mani made a few more phone calls, and with her excellent planning skills she was soon able to reorganise the day. First of all, we met with Radha in Somandepalli, and went to a factory where incense sticks are packaged for distribution. The packing is all done by hand by local women, just working on the floor of an otherwise empty ...

We arrived at the house for the  Seemantham , and were immediately invited inside for some food. The food was served on paper leaves on the ground, and was mostly sweet. We had a type of sweet and cardamom roti, which could be drizzled with milk to make it extra delicious. There were also gujiyas and other dishes flavoured with sugar and cardamom. After we ate we went back outside the front of the house to make room for more people who were arriving and coming in to eat. My camera is absolutely no good in low light... Out the front, although there were men and women present, it was clear that for this occasion the women had the prime spot, while the men stayed further back. A chair was prepared by draping a decorative cover over it, and the pregnant lady sat in this chair. In front of her, laid out on the ground, was an increasing selection of sweets, bangles, saris, fruits, and flowers. The father of the new baby rigged up some extra lighting outside so that p...

Well Saturday came around again quickly! Today is the science exam at school, but I decided to go to the exam today as I feel like I haven't spent enough time at the school recently. I stayed until school finished at midday, doing whatever I could to be useful and supervising the children. There was a gap between the children finishing school and our lunch being ready, so I went to my room to read a little. When I came out to go up and do some work at the house, I saw the hostel boys downstairs wrestling with a snake! I quickly went back for my camera. The snake was a Russell's viper, a very dangerous Indian snake, and this one was a relatively small example. Manil had been walking along and had almost stepped on it, but luckily the boys had a holiday from college and so had been called to deal with it. Using a special implement to secure the snake's head, they carefully picked it up and put it into a rice sack so that they could take it out to the uninhab...

We went to the school again today, but I had forgotten that they had their second unit tests at the moment. They seem to get a lot of tests for such young children, I hope they don't find it too stressful. Today's test was the English test, and as usual they began with a few hours of revision, which Alex and I helped with. When the children had their break before the tests began, Alex and I decided not to stay for the exam itself, as we are often a bit superfluous for that. Instead, I went to the office again to see if I could hear any more lectures. I had to give up when the next lecture was almost entirely inaudible too, with the only parts I could hear being the embedded videos and the guest speaker's explanations of some visuals which I couldn't see... Giving up on the lectures, I downloaded some more of the readings instead, and continued with some planning and notes for the next assignments. When I came back up to the farm house, I saw Anil - one of the h...

I was hoping to feel better by today, but I still feel pretty bad. The fever is much reduced though, so that is a massive relief. I got up early to go and help with getting breakfast ready at about 7.30am. Mani was there, even though she was supposed to be resting! So there was not quite so much to do as we had expected. Manil dealt with the washing up and Mani was preparing the food, so I helped Saroja with whatever odd jobs needed to be done. This included some cleaning up, sweeping, disposing of the food waste and foody-but-soap-free water into the biogas unit, disposing of the cleaner grey water by using it to water the coconut palms, and other general to-ing and fro-ing. With the kitchen clean and ready and the food prepared, it was time to start cooking. Mani showed me how to make the aloo (potato) dish first, and I helped with stirring it and putting it out ready. Next, she showed me how to make the dough for the puris. I helped cut the dough to the right sized pieces, and ...