Day 8: First Day of School

Day 8 consisted of the following:

• Last night
• School
• Food

Monday 16 November 2015

Last Night:

Last night after dinner I talked with the older boys in their room for a while, they are really great children, so friendly and nice.  It’s very difficult to put these experiences in writing because words just can't give the emotion felt that they deserve.  My heart goes out to these children so much, seeing them sleeping in cloth sacks on a flax mat on the concert floor is really hard to see.  Knowing that they have so little, been born into such terrible circumstances and seen such evil that no one should ever see, and yet they rejoice in the Lord, sing songs of praise to God and have joy in their hearts always.  The worries and cares of this world seem to fade away when I look at these orphans, it's really incredible, I  just hope to be able to love them, serve them and show them what Christ looks like, but yet I think they are more showing me.

School:

The school day runs from 10am to 4pm., with 8 classes and one half hour break.  The classes include English, Hindi, social studies, science, maths, P.E., History etc.  The big school bus arrived at 9am and everyone pilled onboard, including me.  There was about 3-4 kids to every seat, but yet they would insist on making room for me and making me feel welcomed.  It was such a strange experience being on a huge bright yellow school bus packed full of kids driving through the town of Hunsur, while dodging all of the crazy things on the road.

When we arrived at the school I was very impressed at how formal everything was.  All of the children lined up in age brackets then they all said the Lord's prayer from Matthew 6:9-13 word for word.  A teacher gave out a devotion, prayed then a student read the newspaper headlines for the day.  I also received an official welcome to the school, which was great.  After that all the children went to their classes.  I was shown to a class room, told that they were learning English and then I was thrown straight into teaching, literally given a textbook with the exercise they were up to.  After about 20 minutes I was then shown to a another classroom where I had to teach maths. It was a very difficult and challenging experience but I think I'll soon get use to it.  The other teachers seem quite casual and relaxed most of the time, as in leaving the class for 10 or so minutes and leaving the children to work on an exercise.  I couldn't get over how different the schooling system is in India compared with New Zealand in so many ways.  For example discipline is done with a stick.  All the students would greet me with a "good morning sir" and salute.  After the school day had finished I was so exhausted. But looking forward to tomorrow as usual.

Lunch time at school

Food:
Since the guests have left and I'm considered part of the family, for breakfast, lunch and dinner we have standard southern Indian food.  The food they prepare for me has very mild spice and is actually really tasty, I'm slowing getting used to Indian food.  I doubt I would be losing any weight while I'm here, if anything I'll be gaining weight, which is a good thing.   The children often have a type of food called "ragi ball", I think it is a type of seed or millet that is pounded into a paste, quite tasteless but very cheap and wholesome.

Unfortunately because of the caste system in India it is very hard serve these children on the same level as them as I would desire to, because I think they see me as a higher caste they always want to give me the best of everything even while they have so little.  It's really hard to accept certain things from them while knowing this because growing up I've always looked at people on the same level.

Since I'm now getting into a regular schedule and each day would involve the same activities I'll be updating this blog less frequently. I will try to get some more picture of the children and the school when it is suitable.