Family Night

This post is kind of a combination of a few nights with the boys! This
Is my favorite time of my night! I look forward to spending time with these boys and their house mother Kala every night! The first night I went in with the boys it was crazy. Five of them would jump on me at one time! They didn't know us and were so excited to have new volunteers with them! Spending an entire hour with 20 overly excited boys seemed too long! As the kids got to know us better each day the better the night was! I want to spend more and more time with them as the days go on! I can honestly say I love these boys and will miss them terribly when I leave!
Chenelle and and I both bought henna in the junction. So for the past few nights we have been spending lots of time doing henna for the boys! I can say I'm not an artist but I will say I'm pretty proud of my little drawings!


The first night we did henna, Kala sat the boys in a line outside her bedroom door. I sat on the floor and had two little helpers on each side of me. Vishva would sit the kids down in front of me and translate what they wanted. There are a lot of young boys in my house that don't know English very well. Then Vijay would take a picture after each drawing. They were so sweet to the younger boys and I really enjoyed having them by my side!

Kala has to be the sweetest woman alive! I am going to miss her so much! I'm so thankful that I was put in her family! She has been like a second mom to me. She doesn't say much but she has such a peaceful presence about her that reminds me of my mom. Every night when we come over she pins in a string of flowers. They smell so good and it's so fun to get one when we come over.








There are a few kids that have to read each night for 15 min! Chen loves to read with Ruthish. He is so smart! He loves to read and his English is getting better by the day!


Ruthish put henna all over Chen's arms! My favorite part about him drawing is that he put his name in Tamil on her arm and asked her to sound it out. During our tutoring sessions at the school when the kids come to a word and can't read they either skip the word or just mumble something. We usually have to stop them and then we ask them to sound it out. After Ruthish asked Chenelle to sound out the writing on her arm made me think that this is what it must be like for them in tutoring. There is so much to be done in the school but these kids are smart they just need the one on one time tutoring from volunteers to help them learn and grow quicker.


Whenever We are with Anand our driver, he calls Chenelle Ruthish because he see's it on her arm and can't ever remember how to say her name. He also can't say Krissy so he calls her Krazy. He calls me either Sham or Smithsa. I seriously love hanging out with Anand and his fun personality.


Kala is pretty amazing person! She was so sweet to take the time to put henna on the palm of my hand! She is amazing! As I've gotten to know Kala she also has an amazing story. She has two very handsome smart boys. They are both serving missions in India. Kala was asked by a family if they could take her boys to Arizona to finish school out there. She agreed and they lived in Arizona for five years. One of her boys has been serving for 11 months and the other for 12. What an amazing person to let her sons live in America and be away from them for so long! She is so proud of them! She showed us pictures and talked about them you could see her love for them in her eyes.








When I leave every night I see all the little boys sleeping on the tile floor! This melts my heart. They sleep in the same spot every night. They are so stinking cute I just want to bring them all home with me! Can I mom? They are sometimes hard to handle they fight like cats and dogs, they punch each other, pull one another's hair and yell. But at the end of the night they lay down next to each other and they truly love one another.








The boys have chores every night before we come over. This is a picture of the kids doing their laundry. After they hand wash their clothes they hang them out to dry out on the play ground! This is M. Vijay and Vishva helping Kala!








P. Vijay loves spending time with Ben! He spends all of family time jumping all over him! It's nice to have Ben in our family because the boys need someone to wrestle with. I try but sometimes they can be too rough for me.

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A walk through the village

I swear the power is out here more than its on! One of my favorite parts of my day is coming back to my air conditioned room sent from heaven! Well on Wednesday the power was out more than it was on! Sitting in my once heavenly room was now like sitting in a Bikram class with winter gear on! Krissy was still out with the medical team so Chenelle and I decided to take a walk off campus and see the village!



The land around the campus and in the village is stunning. We were both feeling a little nervous walking through the village alone. We hadn't been outside the campus without our group and leaders. We were also nervous that monkeys might come out of the forest and want something. Don't worry we came prepared with food to throw if they came after us!






The buildings in India are pretty cool. They are always so bright and colorful. I don't think I've seen a brown house! I've seen green and neon blue, purple, pink, orange and a mix of the rainbow. I love how colorful everything is here. Not only are the houses and buildings colorful but the cars, clothing and even their cows have paint on their horns. (I think they are cows anyway)





As we came up the road a little ways we came across four beautiful women sitting on the side of the road. As we approached them they stood up and welcomed us! Their smiles as big as ever! They came up and touched our hands. One of the women looked down at my ankles. I only had one ankle bracelet on. All the women wear lots of jewelry here. That is how beauty is measured here. All the girls young and old wear earrings, toe rings, bangles, nose rings and ankle bracelets. But they wear them on both ankles, I bought two but one broke. They spoke a little English so I pulled out the broken one and said "it's broken" the lady took it from me and fixed it and out it on me? This to me was an amazing act of kindness. The fact that they would stop and take the time to talk to us and then help me fix my anklet and shake my hand. The love was apparent and I enjoyed our brief time talking with them!





As we continued down the street in this small village we passed a government school! The kids were outside probably getting ready to go home. They were so excited to see us walking by. They waved and yelled and came running closer to us. When they noticed I was taking pictures they all stood close together to strike a pose. By that I mean stand up straight with their hands to their sides. I haven't figured it out yet but when i ask to take pictures the people I've met always stand that way. Usually I have to beg them to smile! It's a good picture if I catch them off guard because then you see their personalities.


I am sorry if you don't like this next image but I had to post it! This is something that I would never see back home but I'm sure it's a common thing to see in villages in india. This man was just taking a shower to cool off from the hot summer heat!


Lucky for Chen and I the medical bus was driving by and Krissy got to join us for the rest of our walk!
As we were walking we kept talking about how we wished the junction was close enough to walk to. We wanted so bad to have a Pepsi or coke! Lucky us found a cute, slightly stinky. Okay really stinky shop! We bought one Pepsi, 2 mango slice juices, 2 Miranda juices, a bag of chips and some markers. We thought about the four women who showed us so much kindness when we were so nervous. They had a little boy so we bought him some markers. The Pepsi was frozen. Oh my gosh made our day. But before we could drink it we came upon the four women but there was a man with them! So we went home with a pack of Lays chips!

Just another Wednesday in India

What an amazing fun filled day of tutoring. It was specifically special today because my group was combined with Chenelle's group for tutoring. We don't get to spend a lot of our days together because we are in different groups! We started out sitting by each other in the library. Once school started we were busy with the kids! We got lucky and was sent up to the conference room with a few kids to read with! We were lucky because the conference room is air conditioned! It felt amazing to Chen and I but it was a little cold for the two kids! I got lucky and was with one of my favorite boys, who is also in my family of boys! His name is Vishva! I absolutely love him!




Vishva was excited to be with me but I think he was even more excited that I had my camera! He told me "after I finish can I take pictures?" of course he read as quickly as possible so he could snap photos. He took photos of me and then of us together, when he was finished taking photos he asked when I was going home to America. I told him I left in a week. His face looked so sad. He stared down at the floor then back at me. I was holding back tears when he asked if I would come back again next year? I told him that I wanted to but it depended on how much I could save up. He asked about my family then asked me to bring my brother back with him because he would like to play with him too!





Vishva has a sweet heart. He is not only adorable but fun to be around. He lights up a room with his smile. He always is excited to see me which makes me only that much more excited to come play with him every night! He is always so kind to all the little boys in his hostel and helps me with them when I'm there for family night! I fall more in love with these kids everyday and Vishva has found a special place in my heart!


After school some of the volunteers set up a bunch of crafts for talent day! The kids were so excited. They played a game of tossing bean bags, they made face masks and they painted bags! I love seeing these kids happy! I sat with Ruthish while he colored his mask. Ruthish is also in my family and I love him very much! He is very artistic. He loves to dance, sing and is a good little artist! I enjoyed spending some quality time watching him do something he loved!













Look who was at craft day! Anand stopped by to make a bag for his little girl. He loves his family so much. His marriage was an arranged marriage. He met his wife the day they got married. They have been married for six years and have one child. Their little girl is five! He was so excited that he could make a bag for her!








Look in the background of this picture. I was sitting in one of the classes and spotted Anand admiring the bag me made. I love watching him be so excited to have something to take home for his little girl!








Vishva loved his mask! He said he was Captain America! I love him! I'm so lucky to have been given this time with him! What a blessing he has been to my life!







These little guys were loving their masks.


The kids all lined up to wait for their turn to get henna! Ruthish was so excited! He didn't want him picture taken. He was being pretty shy.



I only have a few more days with these kids and I plan on making the most of it. I am so excited for Friday! It's our big water fight during playtime! I can only imagine how much fun the kids will have, oh and the volunteers! Check back for a post on the big event! Until then keep these kids in your prayers!



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Clean up day/construction!

Oh how I love construction day! I was really excited for construction because I had so much fun last week! When we met up after morning conclave we headed over to the green house! I was ready for a long day of throwing bricks and hanging out with my new Indian friends. Well I was wrong. They didn't need our help building the second story on the green house but rather cleaning of the area surrounding it. I thought "well that's not too bad" again I was wrong! We started lifting big branches from the coconut trees that were covered with HUGE red ants! They were not too happy about us cleaning up the branches, they bite hard ouch! We only had four girls in our group that day. Sandra was sick and in the hospital with Janet by her side. Janet's husband, son and his girlfriend hadn't showed up yet. I'm sure Carl loved us running around screaming and freaking out. We saw many critters that day. Snakes, jumping spiders, lizards, crickets, red aunts and all kinds of bugs I've never seen before. We like to call them spugs. A mixture of spiders and bugs! I don't think there is such a thing as a small spider or bug here. Unless its lice!


Austin was my partner throughout the day. The spiders were huge and ugly and we had no desire to be near them. In each pile of leafs we had at least 15 jumping spiders. We had to load the leafs onto these banners and haul them over to the fence and dump them! Depending on the pile; we would check for spiders and if there was a lot we would say "this is a running load" and we would take off in a sprint to dump it. Carl loved watching this!






After lunch we came back for more raking and dumping. We were tired, sweaty and didn't want anymore bug bites. Almost all of us had blisters on our hands. Mine is on my pinky finger. We even wore gloves. We started working, not too happy to be back if I'm being honest. Then a bunch of kids in P.E came running over to help us. They loved being with us and were excited to use the rakes. We mentioned that they needed to be careful because there was a lot of jumping huge spiders. MISTAKE!! The boys started picking up the spiders and chasing us! It was crazy but it was so much fun! The good thing that came from these kids holding the spiders was that I wasn't afraid to take the loads of leafs. Though I still don't ever want to come in contact with them ahh ill probably have nightmares.







My cute little kids hard at work!







This is Ruthtish. He is in my family of boys. Ive never met someone quite like him! I am going to miss him so much! Just thinking about not seeing him everyday breaks my heart. He has so much personality yet is so shy at times. He touches my heart with his smile and warms my soul with his sweet laugh. I so badly want to bring him home with me! I cherish every moment spent with him!















Oh it's just a lizard on his shirt. He had no idea until I started taking photos of him. The best part is the other guy was laughing at him and when I turned around he had a huge jumping spider sitting on his face! Seriously his cheek. How in the world do you not feel a huge slider on your face! I didn't get a photo because I hit it off his face. When I say hit it I mean it. He probably thought I was slapping him for laughing at the other guy!



We saw lots of snakes. Thankfully this was the biggest one we saw! My mom would have loved this project! I love you mom!


I love Nisha in this pic. I told her to smile with her teeth and this is what I got! Nisha is Indian. She is actually an albino. I was confused at first when I met her because she speaks Tamil and has Indian features. She is such a sweet girl. I love spending time with her! She had to go to the hospital today for a check up. I know she was scared but I heard that she was very brave!


At the end of the day I may have not loved cleaning up leafs and branches full of little or I guess big crawling things but I loved the time spent with my group! We shared a lot of laughs, created lots of new memories and are experiencing amazing things together! I never have felt like my time is being wasted here! I work hard everyday and I am almost always tired. But I figure I will have time to rest once I'm home! While I'm Here I want to put my whole heart and soul into everything I do. I want to leave here the most exhausted I have ever been in my life! I want to experience as many things as possible while I'm here! I don't want to waste a minute. I want to share all of myself with the people in India! I know that India will forever be a part of me. I only hope that a small part of me will stay with India!


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