Life in Madurai

I've been staying here in Madurai with Lindsey, Kristyn, and Kyla the past few days. We didn't have high expectations for our stay here (the city has over a million people and is surrounded by mosquito-laden pnds) but have been pleasantly surprised. There's not much to see here, most tourists stay only a day or two, just long enough to visit the massive Sri Meenakshi Temple in the middle of town. Our luck has found all twelve of the massive temples (between 100 and 200 feet high each) under renovation and covered with thick scaffolding and palm fronds. But the people here are nice. It's a pilgrimage city which caters to local tourists mostly so we go unharassed for the most part. We're staying in a hotel that probably hasn't seen a white foreigner in years. Dozen of Indian families cook in the halls, hack up a lung at 6am, and watch the latest hit Bollywood films with the volume maxed. But at least it has character.

We taught at a high school right near our hotel today. The lesson went well in spite of the use of a translator (the students only speak Tamil). The class was all boys which made for a pretty rowdy CPR practice. One thing my students loved to do was to cup their hand and blow as hard as possible into their unsuspecting friend's mouth. At least it was interesting!

We have lots of activities planned for this week. In addition to teaching, we will be visiting our partner, the Grace Peter Charitable Trust's office to meet the staff, have dinner, and see the work they are doing here. Later in the week, we will attend a function where we will hand out backpacks to needy schoolchildren. It's nice for the volunteers here to get a chance to interact with the local community in this way.

This will be a big week for all of our teams across India. We'll all be teaching this entire week through the weekend. I'm looking forward to seeing all of the success we will have in just the next few short days.

- Ben
Madurai

Fun in the SUN!

Today we went to the beach!! We had a lot of fun and then went back to Fort Cochin. This makes our third trip to the island. It's beautiful and there is so much to do. The beach was great. Here are some pictures of us playing in the sand. And a fun note: As Shawn was building a sand castle everyone would stop on the beach to watch and get pictures with it. We guess they've never seen one before.Tomorrow we go back to teaching! Until tomorrow...

~Nicole, Jenna, Matt, Shawn, and Erin

Another Town

Just a short post for now. Ben, Kristyn, Kyla, and Lindsey all have arrized in Maduri. This is our last city that we will teach in. It is a nice balance between the 2 towns we have been to in india. The town is like Chennai but much cleaner. We met our contact here who is super nice and has everything way more organized than we could ever imagine. He even took us to a tamil church this morning, it was cool but different. The language barrier is much harder here and the fact that we need a translator for the schools means we need to rewrite our script a little. So we are pretty busy today getting that ready and our contact V.J will take us to the Ghandi museum which is kind of exciting. We will let you know how teaching goes tomorrow.
~Kristyn

Pictures

here are pictures from the cold in London, the temple, teching, and the whole group! i don't know if they posted in that order. Enjoy!

First day of teaching (Kerala)

Today we went to Rajagiri (university and grade school). We taught 3 classes total of 115 students. They all loved us. They were very excited and were surprisingly able to recite back to us all the steps of CPR. They also asked very good questions at the end of class. The campus was gorgeous! It was so green and clean. The kindergarden center looked like a theme park...seriously. We felt like royalty. Everyone seemed very pleased to meet us and have us at their school. We'll be back at their other campus on Monday to teach the grade school kids and Tues and Wed we'll be back to teaching the undergrad and master students.
Below are some of our new class photos. Enjoy :)

-Jenna, Nicole, Erin, Matt, Shawn

Our First Day Teaching

Our day started out great. We ate a delicious breakfast (porridge and bananas). After reviewing our script and figuring out what everyone was doing we took a taxi to the school we were teaching at. It was a little out in the country i would say, but it was worth it. Everyone met the principle and the coordinator. They brought us orange Fanta to drink as we reviewed and everyone became more nervous. We were told we would start teaching one class of 40 students. Finally we went to the classroom and it started all at once. No one knew what to expect so it was very exciting. The schools in India are very proper. The students stood as the 8 of us walked in and every time they were asked a question. At first they seemed a little shy and would not raise their hands or answer questions, but after a while they were a lot better: especially after breaking into the little groups. After we taught, we talked to the students and took pictures with them. They were very excited to meet Americans and kept asking when we would be back. They even made us feels more appreciated by taking out their books and journals and asking us for our autographs. Finally we went back to the hotel and discussed how well the day went. We all agreed it could not have gone any better. Then we cooled of and ate lunch, but no pepper steak so we had more indian food. After that Me and Kyla went shopping and had a lot of fun exploring the city. There is so much here to take in, its hard to explain everything. I think later we are getting dinner, going to the beach one last time, and then heading to bed early because Ben, Kyla, Lindsey, and I have to be up at 5 tommorrow to catch our train to Maduri. Hope everyone is doing well. Its Amazing here and everything is going great.
Kristyn




Mamallapuram has been amazing!! I love this place, it's almost like paradise! The first day here we just explored - did some shopping and ate some really good food. I've got to say the Indian food is good, but I do miss food back home! The beach is a little dirty, but it's a beach and that makes me happy! Today was our first day teaching and it went great. Schools are so different here than back home. It was hard at first, Lindsey opened up and the first time she asked a question the students didn't respond. We had practiced our script at local schools back home before our trip, so I guess we expected to get responses like we did in Tucson. We asked if they knew what a lifeguard was or does and got no response, it was kind of funny but when you think about it that's not a common job here. Although, while laying out on the beach today we did see and hear a lifeguard blow their whistle (woohoo). Anyways, we learned later that in order to get the students to respond to a question we must address them, they have to stand up and either say I don't know or answer. They also don't sit back down until you say they can. So that was really different, especially from schools in Tucson. The students are so bright, they picked up on CPR really quick and that was really exciting. Afterwards, they offered us delicious Chai and asked us for our autographs. They made us feel like celebrities :) Bree, Drew, Rick and I will be returning to that same school, so hopefully we'll get to see our friends again. I'm looking forward to more teaching - it's a different, yet an awesome experience! The language barrier is makes it difficult, but we make it happen! Ben, Lindsey, Kristyn and Kyla leave tomorrow, so tonight we'll be our last night together :( Slowly our big group is dwindling down. It's sad...this is seriously such a great group! Hope all is well back home...
<3 Lea

A Nice Change

Bree, Lindsey, Ben, Ric, Drew, Kristyn, Kyla, and Lea arrived in Mahabalipuram this morning around 10:00 am. The weather is perfect and it is a beautiful little town near the beach. We were all excited to see some non-Indian and seafood choices on the menu. We spent morning shopping and looking around town as Ben, Bree, and Lindsey finalized the teaching arrangements for next week with our Indian contact, E.K. He was very helpful and kind. It looks as though the plans are pretty solid and we will be able to teach many kids, including some that attend a tsunami surviver school (ironic?) We spent the afternoon visiting temples in the surrounding area. The intricate stone carvings were stunning and it was amazing to see how well they were preserved even post-tsunami. The local Indians were VERY interested in us: we shook too many hands to count and took numerous pictures with them. We look foward to a lovely dinner in one of the beachside restaurants. Lindsey and Kristyn are a little sad to have to leave this paradise in a couple days but are very excited for Maduri. Hope everyone reading had a happy new year,
Lindsey and Kristyn