children's home picnic.

A few weeks ago we decided it was time to organise another picnic for the Boys' Home boys. When we have a lot of interns we like to take the boys for a field trip to get them out of the home and to reward them for coming to class and being well-behaved and generally to give them something to look at other than the same four walls they see every day. Again, I think I'll steal Martina's words to describe the day to you:

"Today was the day of the boys’ home picnic, which was so much fun I can barely describe!! We each were told to have a boy – or, in my case, two – to look after so that they’d all be kept under our watchful gaze: my boys were Nishant and Ashok and I was so damn happy to have them. Originally Amaidhi was taking Nishant but he ran over to me and threw his arms around me and refused to let go. Hah! Similar situation with Ashok, only he took my arm. Oh it feels good to be loved! Nishant also told us later when we were teaching him “I like Lalbagh and I don’t like fighting”, “I like Tina!” Having said all of this, Ashok partially abandoned me for Lisa when she arrived, but it was fine: we have to encourage sharing, even of human beings.

So we played games with the boys and they did cartwheels and handstands and goodness knows what else, and then we had a really scrummy lunch which I shared with Nishant because little piggy boy was still hungry and had nicely sat himself next to me, probably in the knowledge that I would take pity and give him all my food. We also got them all juice and icecream, so they were happy! Mujaipasha was especially thrilled, and it was good to see Naresh out of the boys’ home for once…"

Next week we are planning on taking 20 girls from the nearby Girls' Home on a similar trip so they also can enjoy some fresh air and games.

In other news, our friend Saravana has organised his dance group to come teach the boys Kalari, an ancient dance/martial art. Their lessons begin next week, which ought to be fun!

the tree of hope.

To prepare for this year's United Games program in the Boys' Home, our interns Martina, Andrea and Rike prepared a "Tree of Hope" with the boys -- the idea was to find out what the boys want to become when they grow up and to see how we, as an organisation, can help to bring those dreams to fruition. What began as a simple tree painted on posterboard grew into a collaged tree complete with grass and even a rabbit, courtesy of Martina. Prabhu spoke to each of the boys about what they want to be, and their dreams - ranging from becoming a pilot to a teacher to numerous carpenters and tailors - were written on hands that they had traced, cut out, and coloured. It was a fantastic project, and the boys loved helping with it, from colouring their hands to tirelessly tearing out brown pieces from magazines to then glue on to the tree. Here's hoping we can help even one of those dreams come true.

children's day.

To celebrate Children's Day this year, Dorothy organised a program for our Kiddie School kids. Because many of the children had traveled back to their native villages for various festivals in the past few months, Kiddie School had been put on hold for some time, and we thought this would be a good way to re-start that program.

Instead of me describing the events as usual, I've stolen an excerpt from one of our intern's blogs (thank you, Martina) and will let her describe the day for you:

our belated children's day workshop - wherein we played games, sang songs, and showed of gymnastic 'talents' - was so successful today that we extended it to also include a colouring workshop in the afternoon! it was a lot of fun, even though many balloons were popped (i hid) and musical statues failed a little bit...

we also provided food in the form of tiger biscuits (yum!), alpenliebe caramels and boiled eggs. the latter is to ensure that they get their daily protein intake, at least for today. there was also juice which the kids loved and then also forced me to drink...how kind!

they're like little monkeys; they all climbed on top of us and clambered around to the point where rike was carrying up to 4 children at once! it really surprised me that when one of the taller girls climbed onto my back i could barely feel her, literally. it was as if i was carrying the smallest baby: i've had heavier bags while i've been here! (though that's hardly surprising as i absolutely cannot pack).

first aid workshops.

One of our current interns from Germany, Rike, is a trained First Aid instructor and expressed interest in doing a First Aid workshop with the boys at the Boys' Home. She researched various scenarios and decided to focus her workshop on scratches, cuts, and burns, three things all of the boys have some experience with. We broke the workshop down into 4 days, working with 10-12 boys each day, and taught them the proper ways to react to each scenario, including dispelling numerous stereotypes that they had been taught when they were younger. Through a series of plays (I got to show off my acting chops; watch for me on the award show circuit next year), we showed the boys different ways they can get injured, and Rike showed them how to apply bandages, get people into the recovery position, and call an ambulance to the scene, after which Dorothy, Maruthi, or Prabhu patiently translated the commentary into numerous local languages to ensure comprehension on the part of the boys. Overall the workshops were a great success on a topic we hadn't before broached in the Boys' Home, and Rike is discussing with Prabhu the prospect of including it in the schools program as well. I only wish we had been able to get some pictures, but it's always tough to take them inside the Boys' Home without getting caught by the staff. You'll just have to use your imagination to picture me pretending to burn myself while lighting an imaginary cigarette :)

ug fundraisers.

In addition to the Bake Sale, we also held a party at the Peace Child office to raise money for the UG. Guests ate, drank, and danced the night away, and were already asking when the next party is before they were out the door. Hopefully our next one will be even bigger and better! Here are a few pictures from the Bake Sale and the party:

weaving a web of change.

United Games of Nations is a youth-led youth exchange with partnerships is Austria, Hungary, Slovenia, Serbia, Germany, Czech Republic and India. Each country hosts a "Games" either annually or bi-annually where delegates from member countries participate in action projects and learn about the culture of the host country.

This year UG India's 3 focus topics are Child Rights, Sustainability, and Gender Equality, all on the them of "Weaving a Web of Change". The first two topics will be focused on at the Government Children's Home for Boys where delegates and local volunteers will prepare skits along with the children which broach both subjects. For the third, Gender Equality, we are preparing a sort of scavenger hunt along the streets of Bangalore to observe the differences in gender equality in the various social classes.

To host this year's Games we have begun our fundraising efforts with a bang! Yesterday we held a bake sale on Residency Road and had a fantastic turnout. What began as a small effort ended up exceeding our expectations. Thanks to generous donations from various family and friends, we had an amazing smorgasboard on hand: brownies, chocolate cakes, cookie cake, cupcakes, banana bread, peanut butter cookies...and those were just the desserts! We also had freshly made Belgian waffles, sarpotel and buns, veg and non-veg momos, veg cutlets, and pav bhaji. Thanks to the efforts of some of our UG members and other local volunteers, word spread along Residency and Brigade Roads, and we stayed busy throughout the evening. We even had one fan who went home and called a local news channel who sent their television crew! So some of us may have even ended up on the news! All in all, it was a great kickoff to preparing for this year's United Games. (pictures to come soon of all the goodies we had on hand)

We have many more exciting fundraisers planned for the coming weeks, so keep checking back to see what we have been doing. And if you are in the Bangalore area, we hope you can join us for the fundraisers and for the United Games in October!

kiddie school.

In addition to the Boys' Home and the government school project, we are also continuing the Kiddie School. For those of you who are new to Peace Child India, the Kiddie School is a makeshift school we created 4 years ago for the children of the migrant workers in the area surrounding our office/residence. Because the families work primarily in construction, they move around depending on where the work is, meaning that the children usually do not stay in one place long enough to attend school. However, because our area has been developing at a steady rate in recent years, many of the families have set up homes but are still not sending their children to proper school. Since the inception of the Kiddie School, it has been run primarily by interns, with assistance from Maruthi. In February of this year, we had two interns take over the running of the Kiddie School with great success (thank you, Olivia and Meije!), but since they've gone, we haven't had anyone interested in it, so Maruthi has been running the school every Friday for 2 hours. We realised there is only so much we can do at the Kiddie School with just one facilitator and children of such varied ages. The older children especially need a more structured education, so we have been working on identifying the ones who have the motivation and the potential and have been sponsoring their formal education (paying for books, bags, uniforms, stationery, etc). As of now we have enrolled 2 boys - Harisha and Karthik - in school, so our next focus is to get the parents to send their girl children to school as well. Many of the families wish for the girls to stay home and help with the everyday running of the house, but because one of the pillars of our organisation is the empowerment of females, we have told the families that we will only continue to support more children if they begin sending their daughters to school as well. We have many local volunteers who have expressed interest in sponsoring a child's education, so we are using their support and will hopefully have 2 girls enrolled in school in the coming months.

Thank you to all of you for your continued support of all our projects, and we hope you are enjoying hearing about all that we are doing.

Amaidhi Devaraj
Director
Peace Child India