Beyond Brooks - India!

Saturday - one last day

2007-07-02T09:45:00.000-07:00

On our last full day we checked out early and climbed aboard our trusty bus to head north to Chennai. About half an hour after we started we ran into some mechanical difficulties and had to pull over and spend some time at a small cluster of roadside shops. Several mechanics later we were back on the road to the World Heritage site of Mamallapuram, an extraordinary archaeological site built some 1400 years ago and featuring one of the world’s largest bas relief sculptures. The site also has a gigantic boulder seemingly precariously balanced, but that has stood for centuries. We took the obligatory silly group photos and enjoyed the tour conducted by a local guide who called himself Shiva (but promised he wasn’t “the destroyer”).

After the tour we reboarded the bus and made our way to the Park Hotel in Chennai for our last night.

But first, shopping.

A group of intrepid shoppers headed into town in search of the fabled Indian gold bangle bracelets. Our first two stops educated us (prices of bangles fluctuated with the daily gold market – which already priced some of us out of the market – and the prices further varied by the workmanship involved in the bracelet.) Having realized we were shopping in the wrong league, we took our driver Anandh’s advice and headed to T. Nagar, a crazy, teeming market district that featured stalls at which we found plenty of costume jewelry (think: some combo of Faneuil Hall and Downtown Crossing on steroids). We also got to stand and watch life pass by for a while and take in a last few moments of our Indian adventure.

We ended the evening on the roofdeck by the pool enjoying the Park’s famous Saturday night kebab BBQ. We took a few moments to formally thank the wonderful Pradeep Gulati, who lived with us for the 10 days, guided us through all sorts of adventures, assured we were well fed and safe, and was undoubtedly glad to get home to Delhi and to his family, including daughters Sana and Naina, who missed him.

We were up at 3:30 the next morning for a 4:15 bus ride to the airport and the beginning of our 24-hour journey home. We lost Graham in London as he headed to Madrid and his next adventure, and the rest of us arrived, bedraggled but happy, at Logan at 7:30 p.m. Sunday night. As a last treat, we were greeted by Errol Flynn (seriously), a customs officer and colleague of Kelsey’s Aunt Colleen, who gave us the VIP treatment as we jumped through the last few hoops between us and our family members.

All were delivered happy, healthy, tired and full of fantastic memories and ideas about how to help the groups and schools we worked with.

In all, a tremendous experience for this group and a fantastic first step for Brooks in India.

Namaste from North Andover.

Friday - Fishermen, sightseeing and an elephant

2007-06-30T06:34:00.000-07:00

Today we visited a village I’ve seen spelled 3 ways, so I choose “Anumandaikuppam” – I know the suffix means “fishing village”, so I feel safe with that. One of the intents was too see a village that had been ravaged by tsunami and to hear about that, but to be honest, 3 years later as they are now engaged in normal daily life, that seemed a little trite. Instead, we simply enjoyed the experience of seeing yet another way of life – completely dependent on the whims of the sea (which are less predictable post-tsunami, the men said). On the beach we saw the various types of boats these men use – the old style, 4-5 logs lashed together which surf over the top of the waves (one hopes), the middle style, all wood in a more traditional long rowboat form, and the post-tsunami model, same shape as #2, but fiberglass coated to make them lighter yet hardier.

The rhythm of life is the same here – early morning they leave to fish – some 25-30 kms out to see with a variety of nets seeking a variety of marine life – and then after 8 hours or so they come back to the beach, hand off the fish to the middleman (who they have contacted via cell phone from at sea – a distinct change in traditional procedures!), the rest and fix nets and other equipment for the rest of the day.

The people of the village had become used to visitors, though they hadn’t had any for a while. Nonetheless, they were nothing but welcoming to us (the norm in India), and answered all of our questions through the stalwart Pradeep and our Tamil translator for the day, Mr. Ghosh (Namesake students take note – what part of the country do you think he is from??) After spending time at the shore we proceeded several hundred meters inland to see the new housing built by some of the relief organizations that came in after the wave hit. They are concrete cube houses set at least 50 meters back (by law). The mood – vibe if you want to get all hippy about it – by the sea was productive and peaceful. The new construction did not have that feeling. Despite the best intentions of the relief workers, there is still some ongoing tension between those who have relocated to the concrete homes and those who want to be on the beach, close to their boats and their livelihood as they have always been. It’s hard to know when it’s right to counter someone’s wishes “for their own good”.

We had a chance to visit the village school and the playground built through funds children in other parts of the country had raised. The kids, of course, are always a highlight – many cute pictures were snapped.

After that we returned to Pondicherry and had a tour of a fascinating handmade paper business run by the Aurobindo Ashram (see entry above about the prophet, and presumably you’ve diligently Googled him by now …) Seeing the process by which the people go from t-shirt scraps they have retrieved from a nearby factory to some of the most beautiful designer papers you’ve ever seen – with almost no waste at all – was extraordinary. Not only did the kids learn about a production process, but they saw a wonderful model of recycling and recycling again, from the water used to soak the cloth bits to the trimmings of the big squares of paper – it all gets reused. As an aside, we saw a monkey there, which I put on my critter life list. I'll figure out what kind once I get Internet access again!

We then toured the city a bit, noting the stark contrast (gee, have I used that catchphrase enough??) between the Tamil side of the town and the area known as “White Town”, and not due to the color of the buildings… The area the French occupied remains distinct in its character, though the French occupation ended in the ’50s. It is quiet, clean, colonial in architecture, and altogether lovely. The Tamil side feels much more like India – hot, crowded, dynamic, diverse and exciting. It’s nice to have both to balance between!

Next we had a visit to the Ganesh temple, where for a few rupees one may be blessed by Ranee the holy elephant, who takes the coins in her trunk (literally, you drop it into what I assume is the nostril), tucks it away in there (it jingles like a purse when she shakes it), then gives you a plunk on the head as a blessing. Graham, who has been desperate for elephant interaction, was a bit freaked by the process, particularly the coins in the nostril part. I’m not sure his blessing actually counted, he shied away so much.

We had ‘coconut water’ out of fresh coconuts beheaded by an authoritative lady with a sharp knife (who tried to rip us off with old dried out coconuts until Pradeep intervened), saw the Aurobindo Ashram and witnessed the devotees meditating as we strolled around the tomb of the prophet, and then hit the Promenade for lunch, which was a spectacular buffet and even better dessert, and headed shopping – another great adventure.

Our day was topped off by a delicious dinner at our hotel, the de l’Orient, featuring some local musicians playing various flutes to aid our digestion as we ate our way through the menu. The students opted for Pizza Hut (around the corner), and all were happy. The kids went off and had fun in their rooms, and the adults (including Pradeep) met up with a recently relocated French couple and enjoyed some fine conversation.

Another amazing and full day.

Tomorrow is our last full day in India. It is unfathomable.

Thursday: South down the East Coast Road

2007-06-30T06:16:00.000-07:00

Today we left Chennai and took a 3-hour bus ride south on the East Coast Road (sort of like India’s Route 6 on the Cape..) to Pondicherry, a holdover from the French colonial effort in this part of the subcontinent. The people in this part of the country are Tamils – they are physically quite different from farther north, and speak a different language and rarely have English or Hindi. They are more religious, and ornate colorful temples (and little “porta-temples” on random corners) are everywhere. There is also a concentration of Christians here – mostly with the last names of apostles and other Biblical figures (I met someone named George and Paul and thought the Beatles were the influence, but met a David and a Thomas and figured it out).

The ride south on the bus was like every other ride everywhere here- if you close your eyes for a moment you’ll miss something astounding. From trucks and busses crammed with people and goods to families precariously perched on motorbikes to ox-drawn carts going through major toll booths (imagine the Mass. Pike)… and once you have that in your mind, add cows permitted to wander undisturbed through traffic and meandering the median, safe in their holy status. Today we passed shrimp farms, spirulina farms, rice paddies and salt mines. “Back to the salt mines” and “holy cow!” have much more meaning to us now!

At lunchtime we arrived a Udavi School in Auroville, just beside Pondicherry. Auroville was started in 1968 as an experiment in peaceful community living (that is simplistic - please look at the Web site for more). People from 124 different countries came here to live a peaceful, accepting existence. Since then it has grown into a large set of townships including people from all over the world with skills to add to the community. This school is an effort to reach the children of the 13 local Tamil villages in this region, who otherwise might not get school at all, and certainly would live their lives at a subsistence level only. The school has 30 teachers and 40 volunteers who teach the 250 students on the beautiful campus, exposing them to art, language, dance, reading, English, maths, science and more. They may attend this school for 50 rupees a year (just over $1), make their own uniforms, and the experience they get is tremendous. Unlike schools we have seen which are quite rigid and teaching for a particular set of tests, this school offers teachers nearly complete autonomy. The volunteers are people who come from all over the world to immerse themselves in this very peaceful spiritual life, and they add so much (for example, the students are coached in volleyball by a Russian Olympic coach called Vladimir…)

At Udavi we arrived in time to eat lunch with the kids in their communal fashion (though we got spoons, as they typically scoop their food with the fingers of their right hand; plates are scraped onto a stone where the campus dog feasts), then toured the campus, then met to begin our service project, whitewashing a new wall for painting. During that project same of the girls brought out kollam powder and showed us how it is their tradition to make designs using this chalky powder outside their homes each morning. It is a skill typically practiced by women, though some boys joined in too (including Mr. Walczak and Erik!) The end results are gorgeous shapes which essentially wish guests to and occupants of the house a good day. After the labor we talked about our lives in a group, and then the Udavi students (9th graders) did a piece of classical Indian dance for us that was astounding.

Once that was over we all crammed into our bus and rode 10 minutes to a beautiful beach owned by Auroville (therefore not public), where we got our suits on and finally swam in the ocean. In Mumbai it is not done, so this was a huge relief on a very hot day!

After swimming we moved on to Pondi to an amazing heritage hotel, the de l’Orient, which I will post pictures of later. Suffice it to say it is extraordinarily beautiful and peaceful, and the French food is tremendous!

Tomorrow, a fishing village obliterated by the 12/05 tsunami that is nearly rebuilt. It will be a chance for the kids to hear about the tsunami from eyewitnesses and see the havoc it wrought.

Radio Silence

2007-06-29T04:31:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay in posting - the only drawback of Pondicherry is lack of Internet access at the hotel. In addition, the Internet cafes do not allow laptop use ... so I wanted to post to let you know that you'll be getting a bonanza of material tomorrow afternoon when we return to Chennai for our last night.

We've seen some amazing things the last 2 days, and being in this clean, quiet, beautiful, peaceful place has been such a stark contrast to the chaos of Mumbai that it's hard to comprehend.

The French influence here is strong, and it's quite a nice combination - it feels like the French blended better and were perhaps a bit less "imperial" than the Brits may have been ... but that's a layperson's opinion. The food is certainly tremendous and the local people speak their English with a French accent - very disconcerting to my ears!

Peek back tomorrow for full updates, pic and video.

Again, sorry for the delay. All is well here!!

A flashy goodbye to Mumbai, and hello Chennai

2007-06-27T05:45:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay in posting! The last 2 days have not been loaded with amazing photo ops as the past days have been (thank goodness – my trigger finger is sore!)

Yesterday we went up to “film city” in the hills outside Mumbai. We visited a new film school there, Whistling Woods, which is the new top of the line in the country. We had a good tour and met some students and faculty, but school was not in session so it was a bit one-dimensional. Still, another slice of life, and my big lesson for the day: Bollywood is not a place, it’s a genre. I thought it was both. Now I know.

In the afternoon (insert dramatic music here) …. we shopped.

This was actually the most fun cultural experience of the day. While the girls picked out sarees, we had assistants running around finding matching underthings (a petticoat skirt and a cotton shirt), and then wrapping them all up in the outfit. It was extremely funny, and in the end we all came home with an Indian outfit (except Mr. Walczak, who got distracted by the linens and things).

Last night, at the suggestion of several people including my dear friend Pradeep Kapadia ’74 we ate at Indigo, perhaps the best-known upscale restaurant in all of India. Pradeep’s next-door neighbor when he was a boy in Mumbai is the owner and executive chef, Rahul Akerkar. Sadly Rahul had left for Australia so we missed the chance to connect and tell Kapadia stories … another day!

Of course, we all donned our fancy evening wear for this, even the dads, who were dashing but not as flashy as the girls. No, Mr. Walczak did not wear his new blanket. He served as our “Western escort”.

We all had a wonderful time dressing up, and the food was by and large fantastic.

Today we started with 6 a.m. breakfast and got on the bus at 6:30 for the airport. We got the 9:00 flight to Chennai (formerly known as Madras – home of that sporty pattern we like on our shorts so much!) We arrived in Chennai and hopped the bus to our hotel, an elegant modern design that is both funky and confusing (e.g., the ‘sink’ in the restroom was just a glass slab – no bowl of any sort. I think I’m too concrete for that kind of challenge in the potty, and I know David Mallen is …)

The 8th floor rooftop infinity pool is gorgeous, and there are princely lounging beds around it with canopies. I think we could get used to this … but we can’t! Tomorrow we head off on a bumpy 3-hour drive south to the rural area to visit 2 schools in the next 2 days. We’ll say in the former French settlement of Pondicherry, where I intend to hold my American French accent up to their Indian French accent and see how I fare.

More later!

Technology making a difference

2007-06-25T07:56:00.000-07:00

Today was our day to see how technology is helping the kinds of families we have been visiting. We headed to a suburb to see 2 slum schools that have varying degrees of Computer-Aided Learning centers built by Pratham, the NGO whose shelter we visited several days ago. The first school had 2 such centers – one for pre-school through 4th, and one for 5th through 8th. Standing with the little ones I could have been in my son’s preschool – they sat at the same Little Tykes computer consoles and played games aimed at boosting their basic skills in math, reading, general knowledge and English. Rather than being canned programs, these were built by Pratham’s own programmers and specifically aimed at these kids. Their Jigar series and the tutorials they have built for Word, PowerPoint and Excel, which can be run in 3 local languages, allows students to self-teach if they are in an area where there are not knowledgeable teachers. Pratham operates in 17 states in India, and has “friends” branches around the US and UK.

After a yummy lunch at which we sang Michael Hendrickson “Happy Birthday” while he blew out the candles on his chocolate mousse, we headed to Pratham’s local office to learn about how they are using GPS technology in this context. We split into groups and went with a tech who showed us how to map a route using a handheld GPS. We then downloaded our data onto the office computer and created a map with precise longitude and latitude points and with landmarks and other text commentary included. Pratham has mapped 50 slums around Mumbai this way (an aside – 40% of this city’s residents live in slums – and there are 16 million residents – can you even imagine??) The purpose of the initiative is twofold – first, so that they can identify where families live and work on developing education plans for each child, on the “micro” level. The GPS allows them both to locate families and to guide families to local resources (e.g., the school is just 5 blocks away, there’s a clinic here, etc.) The second purpose is to allow donors to see precisely where their dollars are going – they regularly e-mail reports to donors with maps attached of the precise areas in which their $$ have been spent. Talk about donor transparency! Wow!

With all the technology we have at our disposal, it is wonderful to see such a dedicated organization using cutting edge tools to make a real difference.

Tonight the kids and other adults are going to the Hindi movie “Jhoom Barabar Jhoom”, which should be highly entertaining for them – even if it is in Hindi with no subtitles. I have stayed behind, and have asked them to perform the best musical dance sequence when they get back. Make sure you ask when you see them, too!

We have seen lots of critters around, but today we added monkey on a leash and elephant trundling down the sidewalk to our list. Woo-hoo!!

Tomorrow, Bollywood!!

In the heart of the slums (and there is indeed heart)

2007-06-24T09:32:00.000-07:00

I am not sure how much I can adequately convey about today’s experience. In short, we penetrated deep into Mumbai’s Nehru Nagar slum district with the Friends of the Humanist Slum Self-Improvers, met with a group of children taking extra teaching in English and then were led to their homes – 5 pairs of us to 5 different homes each. Our mission was given to us by Prof. Parimal Merchant, a professor of business at a local university, who first lectured us this morning on the roots of the slum problems and the psycho-social realities of such an existence. The Brooks kids acquitted themselves well after some prompting in the university setting! Prof. Merchant used clips from the first film in India to take on the theme of the difficult life in the slums to illustrate the many challenges the life presents. He was accompanied by his wife and young daughter, as well as another volunteer for his NGO organization, Mr. Nailesh Dalal.

After our discussion, Prof. Merchant told us we would first have lunch at Mr. Dalal’s home (a gorgeous high-rise), and mentioned that we’d have Domino’s pizza. I’ve never seen such happy faces on a group of kids!

After a lovely lunch during which the Dalal family shared such intimate details of everyday life as their son’s recent wedding album and their private temple (they are Jains), we piled into the bus and headed to our much-anticipated destination – the Nehru Nagar slums.

Prof. Merchant and Mr. Dalal are both intimately involved with Friends of the Humanist Slum Self-Improvers, a movement dedicated to helping those in the slums improve their standard of living through education and through building self-respect and independence. The group does tremendous work, and we began in a small room in the second “floor” of a structure that required a ladder to access it. There some 25 children were taking voluntary lessons (it was Sunday), and after we had chatted with them for a bit we broke up into groups. The kids – with one Humanist adults volunteer to guide the process and translate – took us to their homes. Each pair saw 5 homes, which were more like monastic cubicles and did not exceed 10’x10’ in measurement. The geometry that allowed a family of 6 to live, eat and sleep in these cubes was well beyond me, but the places were immaculate and the families were happy together. All had emigrated from outer states where there is apparently no chance to earn money and no options for education for the kids. Many said they had nice, larger homes in the villages, but sacrificed that for the time being to make some money and give their children opportunities.

Though we were in a place beyond anything any of us had ever seen (see the walking tour footage in the video journal), we never felt physically scared. The people were all welcoming and curious about us, and generally delightful to visit with. Eventually we got back on our air-conditioned bus, and for the rest of the day I found myself automatically thinking, “5 of those houses could fit in my hotel room,” etc.

There are far too many stories to relay here – one that sticks out is the 18-yr-old who lives in a 2-story cube with her 3 siblings and parents, and who is getting her degree in microbiology and has just completed her student pilot training, so s working toward her pilot’s license. When the students asked whether that was a hard situation, she noted first that she could not get funding (loans) for her education as the slum dwellers are technically squatters so have no documentation to show home ownership. She also mentioned that the electricity goes off a lot, so more often than not se studied for exams by candle light. She made a huge impression on all of us – and I hope inspired our students to think next time they felt like complaining about homework!!

I will post some video, but know it will not capture what it was really like to be there. Despite the aesthetic desperation of the place, we met proud people working hard to have constructive lives and better their childrens’ chances. It was in some ways inspiring, though certainly challenging.

PS Did I mention that we had a LOT of rain in a 36-hour span (325 ml, however much that is). It added an extra layer of challenge to the day, as you can see from the pix. As we complained about slogging through it, we looked around us and realized these people's homes were full of water. Always a lesson...

Big day in the city

2007-06-23T05:28:00.000-07:00

We spent 8 hours today in Mumbai seeing in depth 2 very different parts of the city. In a sense, our 2 sets of experiences were symbolic of the very challenging socio-economic dichotomy that exists here.

The first half of the day was spent seeing some major points of interest to tourists - the Gateway to India (built to welcome King George V when he visited in the early 20th cent.), the Victoria Terminus, an amazing piece of Victorian architecture and the only world heritage site still in use (2.5 million people commute through this train station each workday!), the Prince of Wales Museum, the hanging gardens, etc. We also saw some fascinating sites, including the Tower of Silence, where the small (and dwindling) Zoroastrian community leaves its dead to be "disposed of" by predatory birds - we could only see the walls, not inside, thank goodness.

We also had a chance to tour a Jain temple - aesthetically gorgeous and spiritually fascinating. In the pictures you may see temple devotees wearing scarves over their mouths - this is to be sure no insects get in their mouths - not for their own safety, but so that the insects are protected. In Jainism they vow to do no harm, so are strict vegetarians and will not even eat root vegetables, as they believe those rots feed smaller organisms, and if we uproot them we are depriving another critter of food.

We had some interesting discussions of religion here - it is interwoven into the fabric of life at all levels, but there seems to be general respect for all religions. In politics, for example, that one embraces his religion is critical to getting elected ... but once in office one may not show favoritism towards his own group. An interesting twist on the church/state relationship.

Incidentally, only 2% of the Indian population is Christian - such an interesting concept for our kids coming from such a Christo-centric environment.

We saw some firsthand examples of Indian creativity and industry when we visited the area of the laundry men, called dhobis in Hindi. For mere cents they will come collect your laundry, do it all at their own pool in this area, dry it, iron it, fold it and return it. By all accounts it is done as well as you can get anywhere; I hope the males in the group were inspired and will come home with more pride in their abilities to tackle their own laundry! We also saw some dabbawallas - an incredible, extensive network of lunch-box deliverers. In short, for about $10 a month if I were a mom here I could pay the dabbawallas to come to my house, pick up the hot meal I cooked for my kids at school and my husband at work, and deliver it to them correctly and on time. The lunchboxes will pass through 4-6 hands in the network (house to the bike guy to the train guy to the next bike guy to your school - and he waits and collects the box to bring back to mom afterwards!) Though they have no formal education, their organizers have been studied by Wharton and Harvard Business School for their efficiency. Wow!!!

The last stop before lunch was Mani Bhavan, Mahatma Gandhi's residence when he was in Mumbai. It was a good education and all the students who had read Cry, the Beloved Country had some excellent context for the history of Gandhi's time in South Africa fighting apartheid.

After a fantastic lunch at a beautiful restaurant, we headed to Pratham, a non-profit dedicated to rescuing and educating child laborers. We learned about the groups work generally, and then visited a nearby children's shelter housing 44 rescued boys. As it is Saturday the boys were having structured play time, and they sang us some songs and then we had free time to play and talk to them. Most speak little English, so we used our guide Amita as a translator, and in the end resorted to pantomime and playing hand-slapping games to communicate. We also taught them to use our digital cameras ... and they took to it like fish to water!

On Monday we will go back to Pratham and work with some girls in their computer-aided learning center. Really inspiring!!

As educational as all this was our 10-minute walk from our cool, safe bus (driven by some sort of traffic wizard, from what we can see) through one of the most crowded areas of Mumbai. The traffic was otherworldly and we burned more calories avoiding motorcycles and squeezing through crowds than anything we could have cooked up in the gym. Apparently a crowd of men tried to pick Michael Walczak up and carry him over a puddle (for cash), and David Mallen rescued him. I missed that, but would pay money to see the replay. Ah well - there's always tomorrow!

PS Though we saw some rain today, we are not in the area of the bad flooding - not to worry!

Touchdown in India

2007-06-22T08:30:00.000-07:00

Well, we made it to Mumbai after 24 hours of steady travel - no worse for the wear, if a little cramped and shell-shocked for lack of sleep. This is the view of the Arabian Sea from our hotel rooms at the Taj President.

Everything went smoothly - flights, connections, and pick-up at the airport, and though it took nearly 2 hours to traverse the 30 km from aiport to hotel due to the infamous Mumbai traffic, our bus was airconditioned and our guide/escort for the week, Pradeep, had cold water for us, so we were content to sightsee from the bus as we made our way along. (I hope his daughters Sana & Naina appreciate his change in title).

Our first big event was a meeting and dinner tonight with a group of 9 students in 10-12 grade; they arrived at 6 and we chatted and ate a lovely dinner with them.

By the end of the meeting we were chatting like old friends and making plans for them to visit us. We have exchanged e-mail addresses and are grateful for the time they gave us, answering our silly questions and filling us in on all things India.

Tonight, we sleep. Tomorrow, we sightsee.

Countdown to India!

2007-06-17T08:21:00.000-07:00

On June 21, twelve intrepid Brooksians (8 students, 2 fathers, 2 faculty members) will leave for 10 days of travel and service in India. We will see the cities of Mumbai, Chennai and Pondicherry and their environs, and will work in slums, fishing villages still recovering from the tsunami, and schools. We hope to be able to post our thoughts, pictures and maybe even video as we go, so you all at home can see what we are experiencing.

Below is a general outline of our itinerary; please check back after June 22 and watch our progress!

Thu, June 21 DEPART BOSTON

· Depart Boston on British Airways

Fri, June 22 ARRIVE MUMBAI

· Arrive Mumbai at 11.15 a.m.
· Afternoon: Welcome Social Interactions With Local Youth

Sat, June 23 MUMBAI OVERVIEW & VISIT TO PRATHAM PROJECT

· Morning: Visit Gateway of India, Victoria Railway Terminus & related sites – an overview of Mumbai.

· Afternoon: Visit to “Pratham”, a Mumbai slum-based NGO whose mission is to ensure that “every child is in school and learning well”.

Pratham leaders will offer a brief introduction about the NGO’s various programs, and will then escort us to a local shelter for slum children; an initiative is underway to rehabilitate and mainstream the shelter’s resident children, a majority of whom were once child laborers. We’ll observe and offer hands-on service as Pratham leaders request/have the need. For more information on Pratham’s background and mission, please visit http://www.pratham.org/aboutus/aboutus.php.

Sun, June 24 FRIENDS OF THE HUMANIST
SLUM SELF-IMPROVERS

· Morning
Through film and dialogue, we place Mumbai slum life in context. Professor Parimal Merchant joins us this morning to discuss his group’s commitment to encourage slum leaders and residents to uplift themselves through entrepreneurship and other creative endeavors.

· Afternoon
Visit the Humanist Center – and then private homes – with a message of goodwill and an emphasis on the need for education; we’ll serve this community at Prof. Merchant’s request.

Today’s most powerful experience will happen when we are guests in community members’ modest homes. For more information on the Humanist Self-Improvers’ background and mission, please visit http://www.fhssi.org/.

Mon, June 25 COMPUTER-AIDED LEARNING
AT AMCHI SHALA MUNICIPAL SCHOOL

· Morning
Amchi Shala School is an underresourced municipal school serving the children of migrant families. Recently, there has been a push to encourage girls to attend school. This is key; many of this community’s families consider it relatively more important for the girls to do housework and care for younger siblings in the home. Significantly, Amchi Shala has also recently implemented a program of Computer Aided Learning; this is an effort to leverage the use of technology to stimulate both knowledge acquisition and interest in learning.

· Afternoon
After lunch, in a field visit, we’ll take part in an Amchi Shala GPS mapping project.

Tue, June 26 BOLLYWOOD

· Morning Visit to Whistling Woods International

Whistling Woods is a brand-new Bollywood studio at
Goregaon East, Mumbai. It boasts a singular filmmaking school, offering courses on film production, film direction, film editing, and so forth. Its filmmaking process employs cutting-edge technology and state-of-the-art equipment to produce new films for Mumbai’s renowned film industry. Whistling Woods is attracting film talent from all over the world. For more information, visit
http://www.whistlingwoods.net/.

· Afternoon at leisure.

Wed, June 27 MUMBAI to CHENNAI & WELCOME AT
INDIAN PARTNER SCHOOL

· Early breakfast and transfer to Mumbai domestic airport for flight to Chennai.

· Afternoon: Visit Sishya, a school of excellence in Chennai’s Adyar neighborhood. We’ll interact with Sishya peers through various cross-cultural activities. For an overview of Sishya, please visit http://www.sishya.com/.

Thu, June 28 UDAVI SCHOOL, AUROVILLE

· Morning:
After breakfast, we’ll take an overland coach journey from Chennai to Udavi School in Auroville. Udavi leaders, classroom teachers, and students will welcome us, and orient us to their unique learning environment. After initial welcomes, we’ll take a campus tour and pause for lunch.

· Afternoon:
Following lunch, we’ll serve Udavi as Sanjeev Agrawal, school principal, finds useful. Sanjeev will explain the physical-infrastructure and/or instructional needs at this unique rural school, and may break us into smaller groups for the afternoon activities.

· Overnight in Pondicherry.

Fri June 29 SERVICE LEARNING WITH
LOCAL FISHING COMMUNITY

· Early Morning:
Introductions & informal dialogue with local fishermen at Anumandai Kuppam village near Auroville. These gentlemen and their families experienced first-hand the December 2005 tsunami; they continue to rebuild their lives and their community.

· Remainder of Day:
Service learning in the fishermen’s community, where needs continue to center around retaining-wall repair, boat painting & other equipment upgrades, fishing net repair, etc.

· At the hotel, a South Indian cultural event – music, dance, local cuisine.

· Overnight in Pondicherry.

Sat, June 30 COMMUNITY FAREWELLS & VISIT MUDILIPURAKKAM

· Morning farewells in Auroville

· Return Coach Journey to Chennai: After paying respects to our Auroville hosts, we’ll begin our return journey to Chennai. On the way, we’ll pause for a visit to Mudilipurakkam, a site of enormous cultural and historical significance to South India and its people.

· Overnight in Chennai

Sun, July 1 CHENNAI to LONDON to BOSTON

· Early transfer to the airport.
· Depart Chennai on British Airways
· Arrive Boston at 6:40 p.m.