G'day!

I'm back, this time with fascinating tales of working with 'children with special needs' and teaching 18-19 year old Indian girls how to use Word, Excel, and Paint! :-)

Every morning I wake up in a very small room. We're 22 people in my group, 18 girls and 4 guys. The four of us share the tiniest room ever, but luckily we're moving to a bigger one today. Even getting out of bed is a problem; there's a fan right next to and 'ind over' my bed, so every morning is a hazardous game of 'Chicken' - will my head be chopped of, or will I live another day.

Anyway, from 'Silver Oaks' (the house we live in) we're driven to HQ at 8 o'clock. I usually walk the first kilometer and let the bus catch me up. It's great to stretch your legs, AND! - since we're 22 in a house without doors, privacy and "alone time" is a rare luxury. Walking down the road I've got tea gardens on my right, amazing mountain ranges behind me, and school children on every corner, screaming 'Good morning, how are you? What is your name? How are you?!". Great!

I started my projects yesterday. I've chosen two very different 'jobs', both of which I'd never dreamt of doing: in the morning, from 10.30-12.30 I go to the 'Mentally Challenged School'. When I get there, Anuj is waiting; he's got Down's Syndrome and is extremely shy. I've never done anything like this, so yesterday (my first day on the job) was really a challenge. I couldn't really get through to him, and I don't know whether he speaks only Hindi, a mix of Hindi and English, or something intirely different that I'll never get to understand. BUT! It's a bloody good challenge, and I've decided to learn a good bit of Hindi on this trip - hopefully I'll then be able to help the poor bugger. ;o)

Anyway, in the afternoons I teach Indian girls how to do PowerPoint shows, fill in spreadsheets, and basically do all the things that'll help them get a job, rather than just getting married and then staying at home, cooking and doing whatever their husbands want them to. The girls are ever so sweet. They've all been there for a month or two, and their WordsPerMinute-count is abysmal - the highest score yesterday was 21 WPM. I tried one of their programs and got a score of 47 on my first try. I don't know whether my score is good or not, but if I can help them to get up to around about 35-45 WPM, that'd be great. ;)

I actually wanted to teach you all a bit of Hindi, but I think I'll leave that for some other day.

Keep writing! :o)

Simon-ji

P.S. The weather here is not at all as good as you guys may think. We have showers several times each day, and yesterday evening we had a lightning storm. What's the World coming to, eh?!