Thursday was picture day. I spent most of the break looking for Nosipho. Her hair is different! It’s so cute. It’s braided now with a red streak it in. Apparently that hairstyle is very popular here. I played with her for a while once I saw her and she saw my ring. Now keep in mind this girl NEVER talks to me, at least not in English. I have no idea how much English she knows but she pointed to the ring and asked “what’s this?” It made my day. I couldn’t believe she said that knowing that she never says anything to me in English. So cute!

Friday was an interesting day. Joel and I (the other long term teacher) had to do reading levels. Basically you give a child a page with a bunch of words on it (see below) and ask them to read the words to you. You have a list of all the words and you just check them off as they read or write an X if it’s wrong. It was interesting for me to see their different levels and learn some of their names. As a teacher’s assistant it’s really hard to learn all the learners name. There are so many of them (1) and 2. You never seem to work with the same ones, making it even more confusing. I suggested to Mel that we take all their pictures and have a resource with their pictures and names so I can learn them. Once they finish reading you count up all the ones they get right and that tells you his/her reading level. It’s very strange if you ask me. Who decided on the reading ages? And how did they decide on the words on the list? I guess I should look for the answers and get back to you on that. It was really interesting and I liked the fact that I got to learn some of their names. It was also a little strange that most of them got the word village right because I thought that was a hard one.

So the list below is what I give each learner. They read left to right all the way down, as far as they can go. I have to stop them after five consecutive wrong answers: that is a mispronunciation or just saying another word instead of the one written.

to	is	up	for
big	he	at	one
my	sun	went	girl
boys	day	some	his
that	of	am	wet
love	water	no	just
pot	or	now	things
told	sad	carry	village
quickly	nurse	beware	return
scramble	twisted	journey	lunch

 

If they do well then I give them this page of words which gets progressively harder. I was actually really impressed with some of them. As you might imagine encyclopaedia and steadiness were often mispronounced.

known	shelves	explorer	tongue
projecting	terror	serious	belief
events	emergency	refrigerator	steadiness
obtain	overwhelmed	universal	nourishment
encyclopaedia	unique	circumstances	fringe
formulate	motionless	theory	destiny
scarcely	exhausted	labourers	urge
atmosphere	apprehend	binocular	domineer
melodrama	economy	ultimate	reputation
humanity	excessively	philosopher	autobiography

 

Below is the chart used to calculate the child’s reading age based on how many words he/she reads correctly.

Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age
2	5y 3m	29	6y 8m	56	8y 9m	83	11y 6m
3	5y 3m	30	6y 9m	57	8y 10m	84	11y 7m
4	5y 4m	31	6y 9m	58	9y 0m	85	11y 9m
5	5y 5m	32	6y 10m	59	9y 1m	86	11y 10m
6	5y 5m	33	6y 11m	60	9y 2m	87	11y 11m
7	5y 6m	34	7y 0m	61	9y 3m	88	12y 0m
8	5y 6m	35	7y 1m	62	9y 4m	89	12y 1m
9	5y 7m	36	7y 2m	63	9y 6m	90	12y 3m
10	5y 7m	37	7y 3m	64	9y 7m	91	12y 4m
11	5y 8m	38	7y 4m	65	9y 8m	92	12y 5m
12	5y 9m	39	7y 5m	66	9y 9m	93	12y 6m
13	5y 9m	40	7y 5m	67	9y 10m	94	12y 7m
14	5y 10m	41	7y 6m	68	10y 0m	95	12y 9m
15	5y 11m	42	7y 7m	69	10y 1m	96	12y 10m
16	5y 11m	43	7y 8m	70	10y 2m	97	12y 11m
17	6y 0m	44	7y 9m	71	10y 3m	98	13y 0m
18	6y 1m	45	7y 10m	72	10y 4m	99	13y 1m
19	6y 1m	46	7y 11m	73	10y 6m	100	13y 3m
20	6y 2m	47	8y 0m	74	10y 7m	101	13y 4m
21	6y 2m	48	8y 1m	75	10y 9m	102	13y 6m
22	6y 3m	49	8y 2m	76	10y 10m	103	13y 6m
23	6y 4m	50	8y 3m	77	10y 11m	104	13y 7m
24	6y 5m	51	8y 4m	78	11y 0m	105	13y 9m
25	6y 5m	52	8y 5m	79	11y 1m	106	13y 10m
26	6y 6m	53	8y 6m	80	11y 3m	107	13y 11m
27	6y 7m	54	8y 7m	81	11y 4m	108	14y 0m
28	6y 8m	55	8y 8m	82	11y 5m	109	14y 1m

 

And 110 is 14y 3m but it wouldn’t fit nicely into my table (you understand). So not sure if anyone else will find this interesting but I certainly did. I am curious to find out who and how someone came up with this. I was going to write on the rest of Friday but this is pretty full so we’ll save the rest for another day (I know you’re all dying in anticipation).

 

Thursday was picture day. I spent most of the break looking for Nosipho. Her hair is different! It’s so cute. It’s braided now with a red streak it in. Apparently that hairstyle is very popular here. I played with her for a while once I saw her and she saw my ring. Now keep in mind this girl NEVER talks to me, at least not in English. I have no idea how much English she knows but she pointed to the ring and asked “what’s this?” It made my day. I couldn’t believe she said that knowing that she never says anything to me in English. So cute!

Friday was an interesting day. Joel and I (the other long term teacher) had to do reading levels. Basically you give a child a page with a bunch of words on it (see below) and ask them to read the words to you. You have a list of all the words and you just check them off as they read or write an X if it’s wrong. It was interesting for me to see their different levels and learn some of their names. As a teacher’s assistant it’s really hard to learn all the learners name. There are so many of them (1) and 2. You never seem to work with the same ones, making it even more confusing. I suggested to Mel that we take all their pictures and have a resource with their pictures and names so I can learn them. Once they finish reading you count up all the ones they get right and that tells you his/her reading level. It’s very strange if you ask me. Who decided on the reading ages? And how did they decide on the words on the list? I guess I should look for the answers and get back to you on that. It was really interesting and I liked the fact that I got to learn some of their names. It was also a little strange that most of them got the word village right because I thought that was a hard one.

So the list below is what I give each learner. They read left to right all the way down, as far as they can go. I have to stop them after five consecutive wrong answers: that is a mispronunciation or just saying another word instead of the one written.

to	is	up	for
big	he	at	one
my	sun	went	girl
boys	day	some	his
that	of	am	wet
love	water	no	just
pot	or	now	things
told	sad	carry	village
quickly	nurse	beware	return
scramble	twisted	journey	lunch

 

If they do well then I give them this page of words which gets progressively harder. I was actually really impressed with some of them. As you might imagine encyclopaedia and steadiness were often mispronounced.

known	shelves	explorer	tongue
projecting	terror	serious	belief
events	emergency	refrigerator	steadiness
obtain	overwhelmed	universal	nourishment
encyclopaedia	unique	circumstances	fringe
formulate	motionless	theory	destiny
scarcely	exhausted	labourers	urge
atmosphere	apprehend	binocular	domineer
melodrama	economy	ultimate	reputation
humanity	excessively	philosopher	autobiography

 

Below is the chart used to calculate the child’s reading age based on how many words he/she reads correctly.

Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age	Words Correct	Reading Age
2	5y 3m	29	6y 8m	56	8y 9m	83	11y 6m
3	5y 3m	30	6y 9m	57	8y 10m	84	11y 7m
4	5y 4m	31	6y 9m	58	9y 0m	85	11y 9m
5	5y 5m	32	6y 10m	59	9y 1m	86	11y 10m
6	5y 5m	33	6y 11m	60	9y 2m	87	11y 11m
7	5y 6m	34	7y 0m	61	9y 3m	88	12y 0m
8	5y 6m	35	7y 1m	62	9y 4m	89	12y 1m
9	5y 7m	36	7y 2m	63	9y 6m	90	12y 3m
10	5y 7m	37	7y 3m	64	9y 7m	91	12y 4m
11	5y 8m	38	7y 4m	65	9y 8m	92	12y 5m
12	5y 9m	39	7y 5m	66	9y 9m	93	12y 6m
13	5y 9m	40	7y 5m	67	9y 10m	94	12y 7m
14	5y 10m	41	7y 6m	68	10y 0m	95	12y 9m
15	5y 11m	42	7y 7m	69	10y 1m	96	12y 10m
16	5y 11m	43	7y 8m	70	10y 2m	97	12y 11m
17	6y 0m	44	7y 9m	71	10y 3m	98	13y 0m
18	6y 1m	45	7y 10m	72	10y 4m	99	13y 1m
19	6y 1m	46	7y 11m	73	10y 6m	100	13y 3m
20	6y 2m	47	8y 0m	74	10y 7m	101	13y 4m
21	6y 2m	48	8y 1m	75	10y 9m	102	13y 6m
22	6y 3m	49	8y 2m	76	10y 10m	103	13y 6m
23	6y 4m	50	8y 3m	77	10y 11m	104	13y 7m
24	6y 5m	51	8y 4m	78	11y 0m	105	13y 9m
25	6y 5m	52	8y 5m	79	11y 1m	106	13y 10m
26	6y 6m	53	8y 6m	80	11y 3m	107	13y 11m
27	6y 7m	54	8y 7m	81	11y 4m	108	14y 0m
28	6y 8m	55	8y 8m	82	11y 5m	109	14y 1m

 

And 110 is 14y 3m but it wouldn’t fit nicely into my table (you understand). So not sure if anyone else will find this interesting but I certainly did. I am curious to find out who and how someone came up with this. I was going to write on the rest of Friday but this is pretty full so we’ll save the rest for another day (I know you’re all dying in anticipation).

Today was a great day. It was challenging but it was still really good. I taught my first full class. I was nervous but comforted by the fact that my teacher did not leave alone ONCE in the classroom. I’m not sure if you’ve been reading this blog enough to truly understand the amazingness of that but let me just say that THAT NEVER HAPPENS. I was so happy!

So today I was working with my math teacher (by far the superior subject to English). We were (or I guess I was) teaching them about rounding to the nearest ten. It still amazes me how something so simple (at least to me) can be so difficult to teach (more props to my teachers). I started off by reviewing place value. Just to make sure we were on the same page. We were which was awesome but there was one problem that I had not anticipated: number lines. So I basically explain that to round you needed to know which two tens surrounded the number you were trying to round. For example, if the number was 12. You would have to know that 10 and 20 surrounded 12 in order to round. After that you could draw a number line (10 to 20) and then figure out where 12 was (fill in the rest of the numbers), then determine what number was 12 closer to 10 or 20? Simple right? Not really. It was a massive undertaking explaining to the kids how to figure out the tens, especially when we got to any number over 100. It was hard. Much more difficult than I imagined.

So I went through various examples trying to get them to understand. After a few examples, I gave them an activity to work on their own and helped out wherever I was needed, which as it turned out was everywhere…Yeah, it was exhausting but I still loved it because I felt like I was actually doing something. Sometimes it feels like I do nothing of importance so today was really nice.

We worked with that first class until break time. Meaning it took about an hour to get through my lesson and the activity and I’m pretty sure all of them didn’t get through it. After break, we moved onto another class and after some thinking during break, I thought of another way to make my lesson more effective. My kids love to use their fingers to count so I thought why not use that to my advantage. It sort of worked. I ended up going through the same lesson with the added use of the fingers method and helped out when needed as well. It went better than the first group but still as I went through and marked the papers there were still a lot of issues. It’s hard to really know what is the issue: language, delivery, methodology. But tomorrow I get to have at it again and hopefully the lessons from today will help with tomorrow.

I helped out with workshop today. Our theme for the month is space and the universe and it’s been really fun. Our display is awesome. Tomorrow is picture day so I’ll try to get some pictures! Today we had a literacy based lesson. We started a story with: Oh no! Our spaceship has crashed. I see all these strange things and I don’t know how to get back to earth….The kids had to finish the story. I was worried that it wouldn’t work because there were such varying grade levels but with our assistance it turned out really well. The stories were actually amazing.

Wednesday is also Nia day. Every Monday and Wednesday I take this dance class called Nia and if you haven’t tried, I urge you to. It’s amazing. It’s hard to describe but it’s a mixture of ballet, martial art, etc. It’s really fun. Today was extra awesome because Michelle (our dance instructor) brought in her awesome pants! So every session she wears these crazy pants that look amazing. Apparently she sells them, so I bought a pair instantly and I can’t wait for her to bring some more back.

The actual class was good too. We played with swords, invisible play swords that is. But it’s always fun. I love it but it’s a combination of following the instructor and then free dance so you can let it all out. It’s fun and you work up a sweat. What could be better?

Wednesday is also social night (so many good things in one day). It was trivia round which is always fun even if you know nothing (which I normally do). The coolest part was trying to figure out the top 25 songs from 2011. It was a crazy mix of all the songs and it was really difficult but fun to listen to and then there were normal questions, apparently brought to you by Australian day (which is tomorrow in case you’re wondering). It was a good time. What a good day.

Today was a great day. It was challenging but it was still really good. I taught my first full class. I was nervous but comforted by the fact that my teacher did not leave alone ONCE in the classroom. I’m not sure if you’ve been reading this blog enough to truly understand the amazingness of that but let me just say that THAT NEVER HAPPENS. I was so happy!

So today I was working with my math teacher (by far the superior subject to English). We were (or I guess I was) teaching them about rounding to the nearest ten. It still amazes me how something so simple (at least to me) can be so difficult to teach (more props to my teachers). I started off by reviewing place value. Just to make sure we were on the same page. We were which was awesome but there was one problem that I had not anticipated: number lines. So I basically explain that to round you needed to know which two tens surrounded the number you were trying to round. For example, if the number was 12. You would have to know that 10 and 20 surrounded 12 in order to round. After that you could draw a number line (10 to 20) and then figure out where 12 was (fill in the rest of the numbers), then determine what number was 12 closer to 10 or 20? Simple right? Not really. It was a massive undertaking explaining to the kids how to figure out the tens, especially when we got to any number over 100. It was hard. Much more difficult than I imagined.

So I went through various examples trying to get them to understand. After a few examples, I gave them an activity to work on their own and helped out wherever I was needed, which as it turned out was everywhere…Yeah, it was exhausting but I still loved it because I felt like I was actually doing something. Sometimes it feels like I do nothing of importance so today was really nice.

We worked with that first class until break time. Meaning it took about an hour to get through my lesson and the activity and I’m pretty sure all of them didn’t get through it. After break, we moved onto another class and after some thinking during break, I thought of another way to make my lesson more effective. My kids love to use their fingers to count so I thought why not use that to my advantage. It sort of worked. I ended up going through the same lesson with the added use of the fingers method and helped out when needed as well. It went better than the first group but still as I went through and marked the papers there were still a lot of issues. It’s hard to really know what is the issue: language, delivery, methodology. But tomorrow I get to have at it again and hopefully the lessons from today will help with tomorrow.

I helped out with workshop today. Our theme for the month is space and the universe and it’s been really fun. Our display is awesome. Tomorrow is picture day so I’ll try to get some pictures! Today we had a literacy based lesson. We started a story with: Oh no! Our spaceship has crashed. I see all these strange things and I don’t know how to get back to earth….The kids had to finish the story. I was worried that it wouldn’t work because there were such varying grade levels but with our assistance it turned out really well. The stories were actually amazing.

Wednesday is also Nia day. Every Monday and Wednesday I take this dance class called Nia and if you haven’t tried, I urge you to. It’s amazing. It’s hard to describe but it’s a mixture of ballet, martial art, etc. It’s really fun. Today was extra awesome because Michelle (our dance instructor) brought in her awesome pants! So every session she wears these crazy pants that look amazing. Apparently she sells them, so I bought a pair instantly and I can’t wait for her to bring some more back.

The actual class was good too. We played with swords, invisible play swords that is. But it’s always fun. I love it but it’s a combination of following the instructor and then free dance so you can let it all out. It’s fun and you work up a sweat. What could be better?

Wednesday is also social night (so many good things in one day). It was trivia round which is always fun even if you know nothing (which I normally do). The coolest part was trying to figure out the top 25 songs from 2011. It was a crazy mix of all the songs and it was really difficult but fun to listen to and then there were normal questions, apparently brought to you by Australian day (which is tomorrow in case you’re wondering). It was a good time. What a good day.

 

Wednesday was by far the best day of the week for me. I worked with my numeracy teacher and she had me take some groups out and I actually got to teach. It was then that I remembered how much I actually like teaching (because the two days before we lacking in that front), especially numeracy. They worked on the constant function. Basically it was introducing the idea of exponents and they got to use their calculator so they all did really well. Once we finished the assignment we played games and they were all really good at it. It’s really awesome when the kids get it and everyone’s learning and having fun.

Wednesday was also social night. I should have been suspicious when Cheryl, the new orphanage coordinator, started the minute I walked into the room but I didn’t really think much of it. Social night was in my honour! We celebrated my engagement through a fun competition on  who could make the best wedding dress out of recycled materials: trash bags, shopping bags, random cloth, tissue paper, toilet paper, etc.

It was hilarious to see what they came up with and at the end we had a fashion show. I was actually really impressed with one of the groups who made a dress that I would actually consider wearing. Two of the models were male which was, of course a huge laugh. One went for a toga look while the other went for a more scandalous barely there look with a really long train and then there was the pregnant bride (not planning on that one) who was planning to have her wedding in Vegas (not doing that either).  It was so much fun and I was so honoured that they did all of that just for me!

Not sure if this is appropriate for a blog post but there have been requests so I will oblige J On Friday January 13 (Friday the 13^th no less), Chris asked me to marry him. I was completely shocked and overwhelmed but said yes none the less.

He asked Friday morning as we were trying to decide what to do that day. He had given me a little stuffed bunny when I got back to the States and I was playing with it when I noticed something shiny on one of its ear. I was so surprised! I remember saying what? Over and over again because I was so surprised.  But yeah that’s it. Simple and cute and the ring is gorgeous (though the pictures don’t do it justice). I’m so excited. I have to plan a wedding!

We ended up going into Cape Town on Friday to finish up some shopping. We went to the Waterfront and despite the rainy weather walked to Green Market Square. We ate at a 24 hour Indian restaurant on Long Street which if you ever get the chance is amazing. Cheap and good food and Indian food my favourite.

Saturday was an interesting day. We had to check out of our lovely guest house with its beautiful views so we spent most of the morning packing up. Then we went to Journey’s End to do some more packing because Chris needed to take some stuff back for me (I’m dreading having to pack up my life here).  We also met some of my new housemates before walking up to Mont Blanc to see Tilda. She was so excited to see me which was nice and even more excited when she found that I was engaged.

After that we had drive to Cape Town to drop off the car. I really wish I knew how to drive a stick shift then we would have had the car later but it was alright because we were able to take a bus from the airport into Cape Town. We dropped off Chris’ luggage at the airport. Then we went to Green Square Market again to get me some pants but they were closing down. L Then we went to the Royale Eatery which is this amazing burger place in Cape Town. I’ve been several times and I love it every single time. I also got a milkshake which was delicious.

We then made the foolish decision to climb up Table Mountain. Foolish because it was late around 5:30 and we didn’t start climbing the mountain until 6. Also it was supposed to take three hours to climb the mountain, mind you we did it in one and half but still it starts getting dark now around 8 which meant that by the time we got up the mountain it was getting dark. I was panicking because I have been stuck on Table Mountain before and I also knew that they shut the cable car down for wind and it was windy. At several points, I was afraid of being blown off the mountain. Luckily none of that happened and even though we were the last ones off the mountain, we at least got off the mountain and Chris made his flight no problem. So it all worked out. It was just scary at the time. Not something I would recommend. Hike Table Mountain in the morning/early afternoon. Give yourself plenty of time. You don’t want to be climbing down in the dark.

This past week has been a very long seven days. I feel like last Sunday was more like a month ago rather than just a week ago. Not only did I have a frustrating week at work and have to visit Jodhpur three times, twice for work and once for a personal excursion, but I also had a friends visit the village for two days, witness a funeral in the village, and I have been party to hearing a wedding for multiple nights.

At the beginning of the week, a friend from Jodhpur, Madison, decided to come back from the city on Sunday night and stay in the village for two days. She, like the other American interns in my organization, has no time to herself because she lives in an Indian household where “me time” is not common. Not only is home not a serene place, the city itself offers no refuge due to the noises and bustle: honking cars and buses, rickshaws who won’t take no for an answer, the impoverished street children and women who follow you down the streets, and not to mention the lack of peaceful sitting options inside or outside. Being that home is no refuge; she decided that coming to the village to relax would be the best option at that time. This worked out well, since she came on a Sunday night and we had dinner and drinks with my host brother and his friends whom were in town from college, and the next day she had the day to ponder on life’s questions and challenges that become clear and pressing after realizing that your time in India is almost over. Madison will be leaving in one month and her time has really flown by from the time she arrived to the time that she realized she would soon be leaving.
While Madison was here, I was planning on working during the day, my normal business hours, but a woman in the village passed on and we shut the center for the village to be in mourning. Because one of the women at the center was related to the deceased, she has not been attending work lately due to customs. I have witnessed many things in the village, but this was the first funeral that I have encountered during my time here in Chandelao. Being in a traditional Rajasthani village, rituals tend to be time-honored as well.

The women of Chandelao are not allowed to be a part of the funeral procession as the men walk throughout the village carrying the departed wrapped in linen cloth and covered with marigold flowers. The men carrying the body on their shoulders can surely feel the weight as wooden poles cut into their muscles. Once they reach the lake, they burn the body and spread the ashes while washing themselves in the lake. This is the traditional ritual all over India, but especially in Rajasthani villages. Madison and I happened to be walking around the village and saw from afar the funeral activities at the lake, and although we wanted to go and witness this custom, we thought it would be culturally disrespectful to venture too close. On the thirteenth day after the death, there will be a funeral feast that takes place to the honor the deceased and all family from the village and farther will come to celebrate. During this time, there will most likely be child pairing as is custom with large gatherings, and they will be betrothed for the marriage to take place later in life.

On a lighter side though, during the winter months in India is wedding season. I have observed, been invited to, and even attended multiple weddings at the end of last year and the beginning of this year. This is no exception in the village and there have been quite a few weddings this season. Indian weddings traditionally last three nights and have different practices each night with the third commencing in the actual wedding ceremony. The village weddings are on a much smaller scale then the city weddings I have attended due to the cost and attendance, though they are no less joyful. For the past three nights, I have listened to the loud Hindi music blaring from the rented equipment set up to entertain the guests while they all dance and sit to view the bride and groom. Weddings are a whole other blog to get into, but needless to say, they are a charade that seems to never end. The village only gets electricity for a certain number of hours, and this posed to be beneficial to my sleeping. Around 10 pm every night, the blaring music, heard over sparingly from my window at the hotel, was cut off when the power cut out suddenly. I was thinking what a relief that it was off, since I had been listening to it for over three hours already from different areas of the hotel grounds. Well, that was short lived and the electricity came back on to plague my sanity for another hour until the power cut happened for real and actually kept the electricity off all night.

Since this week has begun, I have a long list of “to-do’s” and I hope I can make a dent in them before the weekend. With the bank account being at the top of the list, I will have to rope in the help of Praduman, my host father, to help me sort the paperwork and open the account in Jodhpur. I have also been asked to start going on the projects that the past interns had left behind, so I need to start the greenhouse project and allocate the money for training the women into finding a different training source than originally budgeted for, which means I have to re-write the grant proposal as well. Needless to say, I have a long week ahead and am already looking forward to a relaxing Sunday…

So the other day, I was sitting at work in a frustrated mood, for many reasons, and I was thinking about how I have been here for 3 months and only have 5 more here. I know that sounds like a ways off still, but in reality, it will go by really fast. The thing that really started weighing on my mind was that I have gotten nothing productive done and what will happen if I don’t have anything to show for once I am gone. It’s not like I do nothing on a daily basis…

I mean, because the manager left right when I got here, I have been acting manager of the crafts center since my time has begun and most likely will be until I leave. This means that I work everyday and oversee while helping the women make the crafts. Being manager also means that I have to run all the errands outside of the village, because the women either don’t want to leave the village or would not know where to go to get the materials needed. This has proved itself as being one of the hardest things about the manager leaving right after my arrival. Finding the materials needed means I have to go to Jodhpur or other surrounding areas and search for the goods without the means of communication or physical features on my side.

Before leaving on vacation, that is almost three weeks ago, I left behind a bag with two items (key chains and zippers) and a short lists of things that needed to be completed for the center while I was gone. I gave them to my host father and he said that his mother would take care of them while I was away. Now, I don’t know whether she ever got that memo, or who may have ignored or forgotten about it, but nothing on the list was done or bought. This is where my frustrations begin. I have found that if there is something that needs to be done, then the only way it will get done is to hold someone by the hand and lead him or her to the finish. The idea of efficiency is completely lost here. This realization brought about my struggles with figuring out how to complete projects while I am still living here. I have been left with two grants that previous interns proposed and received but never followed through on, as well as figuring out the marketing and business proposals that I have commissioned myself to impose.

Since I have started to realize that things will not be completed unless I am there as a constant reminder, I used this week to compel my host father to work with me on the items I needed his help with. The past two days have been spent traveling to and from Jodhpur looking for items needed in the crafts center that the previous manager had bought from a city much farther away. I took my host father with me to find the products and drive me, because he had errands to run as well. The first day ended up being a never-ending day of tasks that needed to be completed by my host father. The only thing on the agenda for the crafts center that was tackled was getting to a bank in order to open a bank account for Sunder Rang. And I use the word “tackled” loosely because all we were able to accomplish was getting to the bank and having a discussion. Apparently, opening a bank account here in India is harder than going to a doctor and getting prescribed painkillers. They require more paperwork than an adoption as well as three responsible parties, one of which cannot be me because I am a foreigner. Needless to say, we did not open the bank account yet, even though I had papers from the previous manager, who I suppose just gave up on the work. This will require more help from my host father though because all the paperwork is in Hindi, and I cannot read a word of it.

As for the market, yesterday was spent in the market of the Old City in Jodhpur searching for particular items. This was actually a lot of fun, and being that one of my favorite parts of traveling the world is visiting markets, I found it enthralling. It was good that my host father was with me though because he was able to speak the language and receive a much lower discount to start than I would have. While I consider myself a cutthroat bargainer, because they always rip the white folk off, it is much easier to have an Indian when shopping the markets. I cannot tell you how many times I have been told by my Indian counterparts, “Stay here, if you come with me to start then the price will be much higher.” This doesn’t happen all the time, but it generally happens after another Indian is going to show them different shop with the goods we are searching for. Yesterday was a success and the shop owners will now recognize me as the gori angrez that will come back for products the next time.

The new goal is to start working more towards the bigger picture and less on the day-to-day where my time gets slowly vanishes. I now have to implement a grant for training the women, which was not going to happen because the trainers did not agree. I have to rewrite the budget and proposal in order to find new trainers for this grant in the immediate future while working on the greenhouse proposal that another intern left behind. While this time in Chandelao has not turned out the way I thought it would have, I feel if I work towards the big picture I will have made a difference and helped to change the lives of others for the better.

Ok time for the recap. I have been so exhausted the last couple days that I haven’t written. Wednesday we went sandboarding like I said. It was really nice because they picked us up from the hostel and took us to Atlantis, a part of South Africa that I had never been to. Our guide took us to a rest stop where we got food and water before continuing on to Atlantis.

The dunes were empty. We were the only ones there. We left in the morning so it wasn’t too hot, but it was definitely bad when we were heading back. I was afraid my feet were going to be burnt off from the hot sand!

The actual sandboarding was awesome. We started out small, on hills where you could go straight down without going too fast. Chris has been snowboarding before so he had no trouble picking it up and I have been sandboarding several times so it wasn’t too long before I got into the hang out things.

The most exhausting part of sandboarding is climbing back up the dunes. Climbing up sand is not an easy task and after doing it a couple of times you definitely working up a sweat.

The weather overall was pretty nice. There was a nice breeze which made it a lot more bearable. Our guide taught us how to cut, which is when your back faces the bottom of the hill and you lean back on your heels. It’s pretty easy once you get the hang of it. I personally found it a bit scary not facing where you were going, but it isn’t too bad.

We left the dunes exhausted and satisified, having conquered some of the biggest dunes they had. There were a couple of falls which is to be expected but nothing broke, just soreness.

Then we got ready to come to Gordon’s Bay where I stay as a volunteer. We packed up our stuff and were off. It was only on the drive here that I realized we hadn’t eaten anything substantial since breakfast. Not fun. But after much ado about nothing (including several stops at Journey’s End for direction), we found our guest house. It’s beautiful. Our room faces the mountains and it’s gorgeous.

Once we had settled in, we finally had dinner at Habour Island which was a very short walk from our place. I tried the chicken malay which is a kind of special sauce made specially here and it was amazing. It was sort of like Indian food but not quite the same. It was really good though.

Yesterday was awesome. I got to show Chris my school and the orphanage and the nursery. We first stopped at the orphanage. It was very strange to be at the orphanage so early. The kids were very surprised (and thankfully happy) to see me. It was chaos but I absolutely loved it. I love those kids so much. They’re so adorable. I can’t imagine right now how hard it is to say goodbye especially after being here this long. Ok not going to think about that yet. I still have two more months!

After the orphanage, we went to the school and I showed Chris our classroom and the library. The library is currently a mess but still very much intact which is good. Then I took him to the classrooms where I work. He met all my teachers. It was very strange walking the classroom and seeing a bunch of new faces. Almost all my kids are gone. I’m happy for them of course but I won’t see them as much since they moved on to Grade 7.

After that, we stopped quickly at the nursery. They were actually pretty quiet but that was probably because they were eating. Feeding time is usually much less chaotic especially since the volunteers weren’t there and the carers were in charge. The kids don’t mess around with them. It was nice to seem them, though I was sad not all the kids were there.

After our visit, we went back to our place and made the plan for the day: first Somerset Mall, then Stellenbosch, then Franschhoek. We went to Somerset Mall to find a GPS because it’s kind of hard getting around here with just directions. But actually our directions worked just fine yesterday unlike on Wednesday trying to find the guest house. We couldn’t find a GPS for a good price so we quickly moved on to Stellenbosch.

Ok time for the recap. I have been so exhausted the last couple days that I haven’t written. Wednesday we went sandboarding like I said. It was really nice because they picked us up from the hostel and took us to Atlantis, a part of South Africa that I had never been to. Our guide took us to a rest stop where we got food and water before continuing on to Atlantis.

The dunes were empty. We were the only ones there. We left in the morning so it wasn’t too hot, but it was definitely bad when we were heading back. I was afraid my feet were going to be burnt off from the hot sand!

The actual sandboarding was awesome. We started out small, on hills where you could go straight down without going too fast. Chris has been snowboarding before so he had no trouble picking it up and I have been sandboarding several times so it wasn’t too long before I got into the hang out things.

The most exhausting part of sandboarding is climbing back up the dunes. Climbing up sand is not an easy task and after doing it a couple of times you definitely working up a sweat.

The weather overall was pretty nice. There was a nice breeze which made it a lot more bearable. Our guide taught us how to cut, which is when your back faces the bottom of the hill and you lean back on your heels. It’s pretty easy once you get the hang of it. I personally found it a bit scary not facing where you were going, but it isn’t too bad.

We left the dunes exhausted and satisified, having conquered some of the biggest dunes they had. There were a couple of falls which is to be expected but nothing broke, just soreness.

Then we got ready to come to Gordon’s Bay where I stay as a volunteer. We packed up our stuff and were off. It was only on the drive here that I realized we hadn’t eaten anything substantial since breakfast. Not fun. But after much ado about nothing (including several stops at Journey’s End for direction), we found our guest house. It’s beautiful. Our room faces the mountains and it’s gorgeous.

Once we had settled in, we finally had dinner at Habour Island which was a very short walk from our place. I tried the chicken malay which is a kind of special sauce made specially here and it was amazing. It was sort of like Indian food but not quite the same. It was really good though.

Yesterday was awesome. I got to show Chris my school and the orphanage and the nursery. We first stopped at the orphanage. It was very strange to be at the orphanage so early. The kids were very surprised (and thankfully happy) to see me. It was chaos but I absolutely loved it. I love those kids so much. They’re so adorable. I can’t imagine right now how hard it is to say goodbye especially after being here this long. Ok not going to think about that yet. I still have two more months!

After the orphanage, we went to the school and I showed Chris our classroom and the library. The library is currently a mess but still very much intact which is good. Then I took him to the classrooms where I work. He met all my teachers. It was very strange walking the classroom and seeing a bunch of new faces. Almost all my kids are gone. I’m happy for them of course but I won’t see them as much since they moved on to Grade 7.

After that, we stopped quickly at the nursery. They were actually pretty quiet but that was probably because they were eating. Feeding time is usually much less chaotic especially since the volunteers weren’t there and the carers were in charge. The kids don’t mess around with them. It was nice to seem them, though I was sad not all the kids were there.

After our visit, we went back to our place and made the plan for the day: first Somerset Mall, then Stellenbosch, then Franschhoek. We went to Somerset Mall to find a GPS because it’s kind of hard getting around here with just directions. But actually our directions worked just fine yesterday unlike on Wednesday trying to find the guest house. We couldn’t find a GPS for a good price so we quickly moved on to Stellenbosch.