Major Rockstars

Today we all woke up early and went to the pool (river) to teach our daily swim lesson. There are about 40 students ranging in age from 10years to middle-aged men and they were all ready to start learning. They are so respect and they didn't want the lesson to end. We will be teaching these students for the rest of our trip. Everyday after our swim lesson we go to a different school to teach our water safety lesson. Today we went to Providence Catholic all girl school. We were treated like rockstars! The students all wanted to shake our hands, have us sign their school books, and sing us songs. When walking between classes mobs of students would rush us and it would take so long to get from class to class. Now for the amazing news that truly makes us rockstars...we taught Our Water Safety Education Program, today alone, to 661 students. This means our running total so far between our classroom teaching and our swimming lessons we have taught 831 students and we still have 7 more teaching days!!! Now it is nap time as we are all so exhasted and we will be doing this all again tomorrow. Wish us luck!!

~Nicole, Albert, Stacy, Becca, CJ, and Stephanie (Team Veliya)

Greetings from Kolkata

We've been in Kolkata for three full days now, and we are having an awesome time. Greetings to our fellow travelers! So far we have explored the Indian Museum which was awesome but as Dea put it, "it feels like the Gem Show" fossils we in drawers and just smashed in display cases. Dead animals we in half filled formaldehyde containers, even an eight legged goat. Fossils of a Blue Whale, which was totally random, and a brown Polar Bear... Today we went and checked out the Victorian palace which was massive, back staircases lead to more display areas and a huge wing with tons of information plastered on the walls along with smallish photos to help you understand what you are reading. It was mostly painting so towards the end we felt like our eyes were going to bug out. Well, peace out for now.
Samantha, Dea, Alex, Rebecca, Kaitlin, and Ben

first day of swim lessons

Today (1/3/10) we went to the Arujana Swimming Center. We had an opening ceremony for the pool. Nicole spoke to the whole village about what Swim India does. After that we did a demonstration to the whole village on water safety and swimming skills. Then over 20 kids and adults go in the pool and we did our first swimming lesson. We went to the owners of the pools house after for snacks and Chai. He then showed us many of the plants our his house. They are used for all sorts of things like headaches, bug bites, and diabetes. It was very interesting. Now we are off to finally get Stephanie and Albert's baggage. They are very excited about that. Until next time! BYE!

Nicole, Becca, CJ, Stacy, Stephanie, Albert!

Our first day teaching

Today (1/2/10) group Veliya set out to start teaching at a local Village school called Kavunthra and the Sukritam orphanage. There we taught our water safety education program. Then we went over to the local Temple's pool (pond) and taught a water safety lesson and a beginner swim lesson. We then had tea and snacks with the faculty. We were covered by the local newspaper and tv channel which was very exciting! We loved teaching the children...they hung on our every word...treated us like celebrities...we loved them all!!
Then we went back to the orpanage for a cultural lunch! It all tasted so good!! We discovered that we are all not very savy eaters with our hands. Check out the pictures!! It was all so beautiful and we enjoyed playing with the children who ranged in age from 4 to 13.
Our last stop was to the beach! There was camel rides, clam catching, and the beautiful sea water to swim in! We watch a beautiful sunset and it was the perfect way to end our day!
~Nicole, Becca, CJ, Stacy, Albert, and Stephanie

Namaste

Hello everyone! We are finally in Kolkata, we got in on New Years Eve about one hour before midnight. On our first day we walked around our area and went to the Central Park of Kolkata where we watched families play cricket and made friends with some local kids. We were going to look at the Victorian Palace or the Museum but they were really busy, so we went to a horse race! We walked pretty far to find the Ganges river, but were unsuccessful. I (Kaitlin) made friends with another local named Shaq who talked to us about everything from his philosophy on human beings to what celebrities he thought were attractive.

Today we wandered around the park area some more and went to the museum. It was enormous! It had fossils, dinosaur bones, minerals, fish, coins, artifacts, sculptures, paintings and dioramas of ancient tribes. Then we walked to a huge market that had everything from jewelry to a butchery. We ate lunch on top of a hotel with a view of pretty much the entire city, and are loving all of the food we eat! Especially our breakfast :) So far the people have been very friendly, and eager to talk to us. We were asked for our picture today at the museum, they probably thought we were part of the exhibit!

We are looking forward to teaching next week!

Love,
Kaitlin, Alex, Dea, Samantha, Rebecca and Ben

Ernakulam update!

Hey guys, it's Hannah. So we, in the Ernakulam group, got so fortunate yesterday. We took the ferry over to Fort Kochin and spent the day over there. We got to see the New Years parade--which was amazing. It included music, dancing, an elephant (!!!!!) people dressed up like the gods and tons of locals coming out! We also got to see a snake charmer on the side of the road. Simultaneously one of the coolest and scariest things I have ever seen in my entire life. We also got to help the fishermen pull their nets out of the bay. Those things are so rad. The island is so beautiful and the people are so friendly. I got to use some of my Hindi skills with a little boy in the park!! I was surprised that he spoke Hindi and not Malaylum (but also thankful because I cannot pronounce those Malaylum words to save my life). The city of Ernakulam itself is really cool too. We went to the mall yesterday (which is not like a mall in the US... at all.) And we also just explored a little. It's pretty busy, but much more laid back than Bangalore.
It's insane how different it is here. Just everything, buildings, streets, traffic, dress, cultural norms. Just literally everything. It's so weird, people on the island were like taking pictures of us and wanted to take pictures with us. Definitely never experienced something like that before. I can't wait to start teaching--the kids here are so precious. I already found my Indian son yesterday at the parade. ;) But really, I can't wait. I'm excited we get to teach the boat operators oceanside, too. That will be such an adventure.
Well just a little update. We took a stroll while everyone was napping in the room. And I think we are going to see a Bollywood movie today!

Oh ps, everything is so lush and green... Not like Arizona at all. <3!

Our first day of adventures around Calicut

First we would like to tell you all the name of our group...Team Veliya (Malayalam for Amazing, great, awesome, better than the rest).

First, our day started off with a trip to an art gallery. We were able to learn a lot about the local culture and see the different statues of the Gods and learn who each one of them were and what they stood for. We were also able to see many of the paintings of local artists. Then, we went to the local fish market where we were able to see all the different things they caught today and see many of the locals auction for different items. Stephanie picked up and played with many of the different dead sea creatures. Then, we went out to sea on a local fisherman's boat, where Becca and Stephanie drove the boat for a while and we saw some dolphins. Next, we went back to Mahadev's friend's house to meet his family and enjoy Chai and some yummy snacks! They gave us a tour of their home, and it was very cool to see the way they live and to meet the various members of their family. They had a very beautiful home! Finally, we went to an aquarium and saw many different cool sea creatures; including sea turtles, lion fish, eels, clown fish, small sharks, etc. By the way...CJ loves Mahadev's van and wants to buy one for himself.

After such an amazing day we returned to our hotel to rest. Tomorrow will be our first day teaching!! We will let you know how it goes! Wish us luck!!

We hope you enjoyed the pictures!

~Nicole, Becca, Albert, CJ, Stacy, and Stephanie aka Team Beliya