Sad Farewells

After three fantastic weeks of fascinating experiences, amazing people and crazy challenges we finally said some very tough farewells to our little (and not so little) buddies at CCD. We've been able to get to know these guys quite well - it's amazing how much can be shared despite language barriers! Miraculously, we finished part A of our mosaic - a big feat which we were really stoked with! As we were working outside the school, we unexpectedly found ourselves with loads of opportunities to connect with the wider community beyond CCD. We felt that this was really important - it was great for us to get to know different people, great for the visibility of the school in the area (which is trying to build it's enrolments), and great for the boys from Muktaneer who helped us and who do not have many opportunities to connect with the community. These were unanticipated benefits to the project, which was otherwise more of an aesthetic and creative project. The community connections were extended on Sunday night, when we invited all CCD connections and the broader community to the school (CCD Academy) to give the boys an opportunity to share some of the creative outcomes of the workshops they'd been involved in - short stories, photographs, musical items, drawings, a huge painted quilt, school based activities and a mosaic launch. The turn out was great, and the boys and CCD staff were really proud. Some of this work will be showcased at an exhibition in Melbourne in May - stay tuned for an email!!

We flew to Mumbai yesterday afternoon - exahausted, filthy and pretty damn wrecked! We're feeling better today, having spent the day hanging out doing our own thing around Mumbai. The fact that we find ourselves in a comfortable hotel has already helped. Would have like to spend longer in Mumbai!

Thanks for persevering with our ramblings, and for your comments - it's been really great to feel connected to home. See you all soon.

Jeff and Gin.

Parties, Pujas, and Plastic Taps

We're writing this entry in the short window between school finishing (10:45) and shops closing for the afternoon (1ish pm). India time is it's own being, and most of our shopping gets done on our way back to the house where we are staying at about 10pm each night, when streetlife is at it's peak!! So it might be a short one before we have to get back for lunch (LOTS of dahl and rice and vegies).
The last few days have been a real highlight for all of us. We have spent some time checking out a women's self-reliant group which CCD set up about 10 years ago in a local village - Duttapukur. This is a small project where women are taught vocational skills, and then form groups where savings are pooled in order to allow loans for large items such as sewing machines, tractors, wedding celebrations, houses, cows etc. These items would be otherwise unobtainable. The groups also have a strong focus on social cohesion, such that all groups are made up of women from similar age groups and very small geographical locations. This enables them to offer one another social support, especially when significant social issues exist such as domestic violence. In this particular village, we are told that domestic violence has all but disappeared, and we really felt the positive vibe of the place - lush greenery, healthy livestock and children, women who seem much more empowered, better quality housing and a vibrant school and creche. A couple of the rules for connecting with the self-reliance program are that you must vaccinate your children and commit to their schooling. There has also been some very successful family planning education happen, which is evident in the family sizes. This gave us all a real boost to witness, particularly after some time visiting sites of exploitative child labour and learning more about the issues.
We also visited ISW, which is the women's organisation that Friends of Kolkata works with. We spent some time running workshops at a school in Kidderpore for children of the local slum areas. They have been running for 30 years and have seen a number of muslim families commit to sending all their daughters to school (a huge cultural shift!). We particularly loved spending time with Sumi - an amazing artist and designer who has been employed as a result of F.O.K support to teach the girls art and design. They have been making goods such as jewellery which will be sold for a fair price in Oz and the money sent back.
We have managed to weedle our way into the CCD kitchen to alleviate the cooks a bit (much to their chagrin!), and yesterday we enjoyed celebrating Kylie's birthday (one of our team mates) with a delicious meal of pasta (weirdo Indian style yellow penne! - we bought Madhyam gram out!) and vegie spagetti sauce, sponge cake and flowers. Apparently the India way to cook pasta is to deep fry it (of course - we should have known!).
School was chaos today, due to the much-talked about puja tomorrow - a Hindu celebration to the god of education. The kids are pumped and we're looking forward to quite a party!!
The reference to plastic taps stems from Jeff's impressive start to this morning, waking up the hosts of our house at 6am by tightening the plastic tap so hard it broke off in his hands. Amidst a geyser of water we eventually turned it off at the mains...leaving Suhaus with a repair job to keep him busy today! I think they thought it was quite amusing!
Thinking of you all in the midst of Melbourne's weirdo weather.
Lotsa luv,
Jack and Jill (or so we've become known!)

ps. we've fixed the comments so you don't have to have gmail to comment - sorry about that!

It's a rollercoaster ride!!

It's hard to believe we're a third of the way through our time at CCD where we are volunteering for three weeks, and only 2 weeks left in India - time flies!!
The time volunteering at CCD so far has been a real rollercoaster ride. Our swirly mosaic design is very symbolic of how it has felt settling in and getting used to life in Madhyamgram!

India surely feels like a man's world, and I have really felt this throughout our journeys. In some ways being a couple has been great, as it's meant I've always had Jeff around which has definitely helped with feeling safer. In other ways it's been really difficult, as we are often dealt with as one - namely Jeff. This has been a real challenge and at times very frustrating for both of us. The Friends of Kolkata team working at CCD (a bunch of 9 talented, energetic and amazing individuals) have been great to connect with, and being with the team has allowed us both a bit more freedom - I don't have to feel like I'm burdening Jeff to come out and about with me all the time, and he doesn't feel the burden of needing to be with me all the time. This is so different to our experience of life in Melbourne, and goes very much against the very (sometimes too) strong independent streak in my personality! I think this has been the toughest thing for me, but has provided much food for thought, a great appreciation of what I have in Melbourne and greater learning about myself.

Like I said, we are working with a fantastic team full of brilliant and creative individuals. Some of the other guys on the team have been working with the boys at Muktaneer (the CCD boys home) on projects such as creative writing, block printing and drawing, photography and film-making, so we've had the chance to see the boys coming up with some really fun and creative stories, photographs and pictures - the guys love it!! Our work on the mosaic at the front of the school has attracted much attention from the locals (see attached photograph of some of the CCD crew working mosaicing to the local audience!) which has provided opportunity to chat with them a little bit and they all very excitedly await the next installment! The house where we are staying is about 4km from the school, and we walk or catch a rickshaw cycle van to and from school and the boys home each day, giving us a chance to wander through the market and the streets to and from work - there's plenty to see, smell, hear and taste (mmmm... way too many bengali sweets for us! They are apparently world renowned for their sweets!). In the morning we have been working at the school helping to sort out new resources, and it has been great to chat with a couple of the teachers and learn a bit about their lives. My absolute, absolute favourite times of day are 6:50am (yes you read it right!! I have become a morning person in India!) and 5:30pm when the boys do prayers. The boys stand in lines facing the front from shortest to tallest, and sing their prayers with their hands pointing heavenward in a prayerful gesture and their eyes closed. I am told that the "prayers" are not any specific religion, but a general prayer about tolerance, and good for all (but it's all in Bengali!). But the boys are so earnest in their singing (apart from the odd peek through closed eyes or cheeky wriggle), and particularly in the evenings all the staff join in. It's beautiful to watch and listen to, and reminds me to still myself and refocus, providing some points of plateau on rollercoaster ride that life sometimes feels like!

Photos finally added!

Just letting you know that we've finally managed to add new photos. Scroll back through to see the images that go with the reflections!!

This photo on the left is Deep Das, the youngest boy in the home, who has become one of my little friends. Today I spent the day at ISW, another FOK Partner in Barasat, where I was able to assit in surveying a site for a Womans Shelter that is soon to be built. It was nice to be able to apply a few of my skills! Gin continues to work hard on resources at the school, and has begun assisting in writing funding applications for CCD - Something she's pretty good at! Continuing to enjoy things here...hope you're all well.

Cheers...Jeff

Early days at CCD

Apologies that it's been a while since our last post... we've jumped headfirst into things here at CCD, and today's the first chance we've had to find some internet.
We met up with some of the Friends of Kolkata mob in Sudder Street where we were staying(Bad Hotel, glad to leave!) and then shared a cramped jeep ride with 8 people and 15 bags, as we crawled our way the 35km to CCD in Madhyamgram. http://www.ccdftc.org/ccdftcindia/
CCD is based in a 4 storey building that houses offices, and the homes for 38 boys and 3 women, that feed and look after the boys, 24 hours, 365 days a year. The boys are either orphans, or cannot be supported by their mothers at home, and most have some background in child labour.
Madhyamgram is much bigger than we expected, with bustling markets, and shops everywhere. There are some amazing vegie markets, and lots of tasty sweets (misti) to sample.
We're living in a room at Suhaus's home, (think Shoe-house) who is a friend of Swapan the Director of CCD. It's clean and comfortable, though we were initially a bit uncomfortable as Suhaus went out of his way in true Indian Fashion, and installed a western toilet, and built new beds prior to our arrival. Aussies just dont get true hospitality.
We've spent a few days getting our bearings, and spending some great time with the fantastic boys. They're great little blokes, and are loving some extra people to hang out with. They've got an incredibly busy routine of school, chores and study, but we've been able to do some little workshops with them which they love. We spent a day at Sports day, which included fun events like the biscuit race!! (See the attached photo)

Amazingly, we've managed to get a good start on the mosaic project which was just an idea when we left home. On mentioning the idea, we were taken to a local tile shop and bought everything we needed. We've started on a swirly mosaic along the CCD Schools front wall, to brighten the place up a bit. We've been working with a few of the older boys who are great to work alongside, and have been regularly observed by over 30 locals who seem to think we're a bit crazy. We'll keep working on this over the next few weeks , though we're struggling to find good tile adhesive...we'll see how we go.

It's taking some time to adjust to some of the cultural differences here, particularly around gender roles, and how they play out in the organisation where we're working. We've got to keep reminding ourselves that we're operating in a very different culture, and choose our battles.
Despite this, we're really enjoying being here, and feel that our teams contributions to the boys have been really valuable to the boys so far. We're really glad for this opportunity, and are keen to see what the next few weeks brings.

Phase II: Discovering Kolkata...

We're a little sad that we have now had the last of our train trips across India as far as planned. Train is a great way to travel India - we've met some really interesting characters, including our friends travelling from Nagaland (see earlier blog), heaps of children who are very interested in how different we look (as well as many adults!!), and last night a friendly bunch of teenage boys (not quite your average teenagers from Melbourne's suburbs!). These guys were really keen to practise their English with us, on their nightly train trip from school in Varanasi to home in Mughal. They hunt for tourists to practise with. They have been learning English for 4-6 months (about the same amount of time we learnet Bengali for), but totally killed us in terms of their fluency!! They were keen to talk about Australia, cricket (everyone loves Ricky Ponting - more than any Indian cricketer especially at the moment!!), marriage, future... like I said their English was great! They were also nice enough to let us know that our very late train had had a change of platform, or we might still be waiting in Varanasi for the Doon Express!! Jeff informs me that overnight trains aren't the most comfortable for a nasty dose of the travel bug... but he endured it heroically!! He's on the improve now, hopefully!
Arrival in Kolkata came around quickly. Until now it had been a nervous wait to try and work out whether we would get an English sign at the station of destination, and if not whether we would meet someone who spoke enough English to help us out. This morning we were both asleep when we pulled into Kolkata, and it was a quick dash off the train and into the crazy station that is Howrah (the old name for Kolkata). We were a little nervous, as we had not booked a hotel for our one night in the city part of Kolkata, but with a few quick prayers and fingers crossed, the first place we tried took us in no worries.
Kolkata seems to be quite a different city to Delhi - not nearly as many animals roaming the streets and it feels a little more organised. We even found a park to sit in, and had a chat to a luvly guy named George. Today has been laying low, trying to kick the travel bugs that have been lingering a bit (nothing too dramatic though). We ran into one of our crew from Melbourne. We will all meet up tomorrow to head out to CCD where our work with Friends of Kolkata will begin. Who knows what lays ahead... things change everyday... but regardless there will surely be plenty to experience and learn and much to challenge us! Not sure what our internet access will be like in Madyamgram (where the boys home is), so our updates may become less regular. Thanks for tuning in and reading our ramblins thus far - your comments have made us feel really connected with our ozzie mob.
Lotsa luv.

some more of varanasi...

After a frustrating morning of persistant touts, being stalked down the street, and dodgy internet cafes, we've finally found a place to update you on our travels. Luvly.
Yesterday we had a full day of touristy stuff around Varanasi, beginning with a 5.30am sunrise boatride along the Ganges. This was a clear standout for us, as we slowly meandered past the ghats, observing hindus as they prayed, washed, swam, stretched, bathed, and in some cases cremated their family members. Needless to say this was an amazing glimpse into the cultures and rituals of hinduism. We have much to learn about spiritual discipline, or even spirituality. Many of these guys wash at this spiritually significant place everyday, summer and winter.

While we sat rugged up in the boat before the sun came up, mothers bathed their small children in the open air. Brrrrrr. We noticed a western woman brave the cold to do her Hindu prayers, but she only braved the cold water for a quick head and footwash. After an hour and a half on the Ganges, we were driven to a few Hindu Temples, and also took a drive around the huge campus of Banaras Hindu University, one of Indias largest universities.
We headed out again in the afternoon and visited Sarnath, which is the Buddhist centre of Varanasi. We really enjoyed this area, and it was a nice change from the plethora of Hindu Temples that we've already visited. The area had a nice feel to it as well, more trees and gardens, and many buddhist monks doing laps...it was all very welcoming.
At sunset we returned to the Ganges, and jumped on a boat to checkout Ganga Puja, the evening hindu prayers on one of the Ghats, complete with lights and microphones. It was a little like a hindu version of the nightly show at Ayers Rock...bit cheesy really, but it was nice to be on the river. (No offence intended!!)

Varanasi surely has its extremes, perhaps more than anywhere else we've visited in India so far. The levels of street badgering was pretty full on, but the streets and markets were fantastic, as was the glimpse into so much hindu ritual. The ganges river provides a peaceful oasis amongst all this, though it is atad eery after dark.

We leave for Kolkata this afternoon, signalling the end of the first travelling phase of our adventures.