Que Sera Sera

"When I was just a little girl
I asked my mother, what will I be?
Will I be pretty?  Will I be rich?
Here's what she said to me

Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be!
The future's not ours, to see
Que Sera, Sera
What will be, will be!"


That was what you would have heard the girls sing, if you came to our communication skills class with the tenth standard girls at Deepa Academy around 4 o’clock today. To help them improve English, we had suggested that they listen to some English songs. Being a new thing for them, we had taken some selected songs for them to the class today. The favorite amongst the ones selected was this song Que sera sera sung by Dorris Day.

Never having sung songs before, it was rather surprising that how I didn’t mind singing for the girls and demonstrating how the song should be sung. It was something that came subconsciously just to make the girls comfortable and help them in whatever way I could.

After singing some songs, we had a session on the telephone etiquettes. To make this interesting we had made the paper cup telephone and taken it to the academy. To make the paper cup telephone, take two large paper cups and punch a tiny hole in the centre of the bottom of each with a sewing needle or something similar. Take a piece of non-stretchable thread and thread each end through each hole. Either knot or tape the string so it cannot go back through the hole when the string is stretched.To use the paper cup telephone let two people have a paper cup each and make them stand apart from each other till the string stretches and is absolutely straight. Now if one person talks into one of the cups while the other listens, the second person should be able to hear what the first person says.
With each girl holding paper cups and standing in different rooms with the string joining the paper cups completely stretched, they spoke to each other and us taking turns as if it was a real telephone. Initially shy to talk to us using the new instrument they got, they took no time getting acquainted with the paper cup telephone and making it their new toy to talk amongst themselves.


In the morning session we covered the basics of internet. The eagerness to learn all that they could, gave us a different sense of contentment. We were glad they were bubbling with excitement and wanted to learn all that they could. While some of them opened Deepa Academy’ s website and then tried navigating through it to reach the gallery and see if there were any photographs with them dancing or singing ,some others were super excited to use the E-mail, make their own E- mail accounts and understand how to send and receive mails.

Time flew by, we wanted to tell them as much as we could. But somewhere we knew learning about the Internet is not easy for them. It is very easy for them to get lost between the numerous buttons, links and options the browser offers. We had to give them time.So we had to stop, even though their eagerness to learn made us want to keep going.

Seeing these girls, Jayasi and I knew we had a lot of homework to do, but that never bogged us down, just pepped us up and raised our spirits to work harder and find out the best possible way for them to access the internet despite the given restrictions.

Happy Hour

After an exciting weekend in Coorg, staying in the luxuries of a hotel with no worries of washing clothes or mopping the room, one would imagine that getting back in routine would take time and would get us cribbing. But just the opposite happened.
As soon as we entered the room, I had the broom in my hand while Shruti did the dusting! We couldn’t wait to get all tidy so that we could work upon our plans with the girls for the following day.

The computer session in the morning went well. We started with Internet and were glad to see the amount of interest the girls showed in learning it. When we asked one of them to take rest since she was unwell, she refused, explaining that she had limited time with us and didn’t want to miss out. It is this spirit of theirs which I truly respect.

At 4 o clock, we were waiting in the usual room eager to finally meet the girls after the weekend.
It was 04 : 07 when we finally heard the pleasing sound of the payal which most of the girls wear. The sound became lesser as they neared the classroom indicating that they were standing outside. It was then, when one of them peeped in and smiled broadly when we asked her to come inside.
The atmosphere of the room suddenly changed as the eight of them came in, greeting us with a warm smile! We talked about their weekend and told them about ours. They happily described how they had had a visit to the temple and had sung songs there.
We went on to discuss the importance of English language, one of the main reasons being that the screen reader which they use for learning computers, speaks out in English. All of them told us that they wanted to learn proper English and even recited a poem for us. Most of them blushed when we told them how good they were with the recitation.
After they promised that they would strictly converse in English from 10 : 30 to 11 : 30 pm, we asked them, on a lighter note, if they knew what a ‘kachori’ was.
It is a north Indian snack, and none of them had even heard of it. When we handed one to each, they seemed shy and even confused about how to eat it. Some broke it and ate, while a few nibbled on it. It was funny to hear their mispronunciation of the word ‘kachori’.
But after they finished it, they thanked us and conveyed that they liked it.

Pallavi, one of the shy ones in class, took out her little hen doll and we had a little puppet play with it. Everyone laughed as we all played with the doll, their pure smiles filling us with emotions indescribable.
The one hour spent with the girls in the evening gets over before I know it, and is my personal *Happy Hour* of the day!

We completed two weeks today, but it seems that I’ve known each one of them since a lifetime. 

Smiles

Sitting in the computer room, on the second floor of Deepa academy, I could hear the leaves rustle, while waiting for the girls to prepare what they would be speaking in class today. The class was unusually silent today. Jayasi and I could sense something missing. Without a second thought we knew what that was. It was the smile on their faces we get to see each evening.

We had a couple of things in mind today which we were planning to cover, but sensing the mood of the girls we decided to let the girls  talk about their favorites. It could be anything which they like, their favorite food, fruit, vegetable, person, singer. Just anything they liked. This activity was carried out in the form of a game. The game was called Fire in the Mountain. The girls were made to stand in a circle, with both of us standing in the centre. As we called out “Fire in the mountain, run run run “, the girls started moving in the circle. When they did so, we called out a number and the girls had to rearrange themselves into groups. The number of the people in the group was the number that was called out by us. Those who didn’t manage to make a group were supposed to speak about their favorites.

The game seemed to lighten up the mood a little, with someone speaking about their brother, someone about their favorite musician, someone about their favorite fruit .Everyone in the class spoke well.
Most of them seemed to have cheered up, but the Smile was still missing somewhere.

Instead of discussing anything further today, we decided to play Antakshari with the kids. Antakshari is a game played between two teams, where each team is suppose to sing a song by the last alphabet (of the last word) of the song sung by the other team. They all seemed thrilled with the idea instantly, but wanted us to allow Kannada songs. When we told them that we didn’t mind, they seemed to be showing a different level of excitement all together.

Like always, the girls didn’t fail to amaze us. All of them turned out to be brilliant singers. Not one, but ALL of them sang so well. One important thing that excited us in class today was that a couple of girls who rarely took part in class activities were happily singing songs with full enthusiasm. We got an idea of the area we need to work on. They were definitely not shy of us, but it was the language that was acting as a barrier. Even though Jayasi and I hadn’t heard the songs or couldn’t even manage understanding what they meant, we surely had a good time! Not only because they were full of melody but also because we could sense the smiles returning.

Antakshari brought about the high point in today’s class. There was this girl who had hurt herself day before  and had been appearing to be very low since then, just something during the game finally got her to smile. Her smile got all the girls excited and soon they all filled the room with their chirpy laughter which was such that even the songs sung by them couldn’t match the magic of their laughter.

Today while walking back to the hostel , Jayasi and I left a little later than usual ,but that didn’t matter, because today we had left the academy with a different feeling , a feeling of contentment , a feeling of satisfaction, something magical.

We had finally seen the girls back with the smiles.  

Changes

When my alarm goes off at 7 o clock in the morning, I feel lazy and try to snooze it as many times as I can. When I do force myself to get up and get ready for the day, I have a zillion thoughts in my mind. I miss my family, I miss Delhi, but then I think about meeting the girls and I feel a little better, in the hope that maybe something good is coming out of our efforts, and that their smiles make everything worth it.

With Computers, I believe we’re moving at a good speed. We’ve finished Microsoft Word, and are hoping to finish Microsoft Excel by Friday. The manual is taking shape day by day and Shruti and I give each other a *hi-5* each time we finish a topic in it!

The communication skills classes are what I look forward to the most.
We try to make it fun, and something that they would want to attend as much as we do. By playing games, we try and come up with indirect observations that they might use in everyday life. Since they don’t interact with the world outside their academy much, they feel nervous when it comes to talking to a stranger. It is this lacking confidence that we want to build up.
Yesterday we came up with a scenario, when Shruti became a shopkeeper and everyone had to come and buy something from her. In the initial round everyone was a little apprehensive, but when we conversed in front of them as an example, they were On-The-Go! We changed the shopkeeper to one of the girls and soon the little room was filled with laughter when everyone started broken-English bargaining for things like ice creams and soaps. They learned about greetings and the importance of asking everything about the product that they intend to buy.
I asked one of the girls to make a conversation to buy a pen; the witty one that she is, she asked to try it out before buying, something that really impressed us. When Shruti handed her the imaginary pen, she pretended to try it and returned it saying that it didn’t work properly and demanded a new piece.
It is an absolute joy to watch these girls open up, laugh and joke with us. When they enter the class, they all look nervous and shy, but within 20 minutes most of them have a bright smile on their faces, something that makes us feel proud.

Once in a while when one or two of them are quiet and don’t interact in class, we get worried. They still get a little afraid when we talk to them individually rather than in a group. We hope that this is something that wouldn’t be bothering us by the time we leave.

As I was climbing the stairs at my hostel yesterday evening, the power went off.  In a moment, there was pitch darkness around me. I tried to find the railing but was just moving about my hands in thin air without any success. I tried climbing the stairs but almost fell off and decided to stay still in the hope that the lights would be back!
When they did come back after a minute I could hear myself thank God as I quickly came back to my room.
That one minute was horrifying. I felt helpless and even scared. But that one minute gave me a tiny taste of the girls’ world.

Today, when my alarm went off for 7 o clock, I was out of my bed within a minute. 

Of Games and Learning

On Friday, Jayasi and I entered Deepa academy (where we will be interning this month), and went straight upstairs to the second floor where we sit and work with the girls for our manual. The girls came in slowly one by one. During this time when we were waiting for the other girls to come, we had interacted so much with this girl who had come early, that we didn’t even come to know for how long we had been waiting there! We had come with the intention of making these children comfortable with us, but here this girl had made us feel completely at home without us even having to realize!
With each passing day, I had noticed the little change there was in these girls, with each day they were a little less conscious upon seeing us and a little more open with us. On the same day during the time we spend for communication skills, we had planned to play the game Chinese whisper and hence explain the importance of proper communication. Chinese whisper is a game in which one person whispers a message to another, which is passed through a line of people until the last player announces the message to the entire group. The player should make as much effort as possible to hear that phrase. During Chinese Whispers, a phrase should not be repeated if it was not heard the first time. This player should now whisper what they think was said to the next player, and so on, until the last player shouts out the phrase so that everybody can hear.The girls seemed to really enjoy the game and even pick up what we were trying to tell them by playing the game. As in the subsequent games the given sentence was hardly distorted, showing how well they had responded to what we were trying to explain. The fact that they understood what we were trying to tell them gave us immense satisfaction.
On the following day, we had reached the academy fifteen minutes prior to the scheduled time of the class, what I saw there really put me into thought. We saw some girls playing carom board sitting in the room inside and they were not just playing carom, they were playing it brilliantly. You had to be there to believe what I am saying. In the meanwhile a tenth standard student came up to us and made the effort to ask us how we were and if we had had our lunch, and so on! I was taken aback the moment that girl held my hand and refused to leave it even after the handshake. Her hand didn’t let go of mine, as if wanting me to guide her, asking for support and comfort.
Today in class, we had to cover basic interactive skills in English, which we decided to teach them in  the form of a game called Passing the parcel.During the game,music is played as the parcel is passed around.Whoever is holding the parcel when the music is stopped is given a task. The only difference being that whenever the music stopped instead of being given a task, the girl had to ask the girl sitting on her left a Basic English question. One could feel the girls really open up with some extremely witty answers coming up.
It went onto a girl saying that her best friend was a dustbin simply because she liked it. By the end of the session, the girls requested us for a game of Chinese whisper (they call it telephone) but with a Kannada word this time. We happily played it and rather really enjoyed. Though we are there to teach them English, these girls teach us some words of Kannada each day. And to see their excitement to tell new words and teach us makes learning the language completely worth it.

The one hour we spend with these tenth standard girls really takes us away from the fact that we are all by ourselves in this new city away from home, learning to live in an entirely new way.

A New Relationship

Day 2, we entered the academy all geared up for the following day. While the girls finished breakfast, Shruti and I sat in the balcony. The Gulmohar tree with its red flowers was swaying in the cool breeze of the morning. The clouds in the sky, giving way to very few rays of sunshine, added on to the beauty. The sight managed to give me a soothing and peaceful feeling which was replaced by a glitch in the throat as I thought about the girls who couldn't experience such a sight.
“Good morning Akka”, came a voice from behind. A girl studying in 10^th standard had just come into the balcony and had a shy smile on her face. Something about these girls is really special; their smiles lift your mood in an instant.

We started with the basics of the computer with 3 girls who had gone through a training of 2 – 5 years for using the keyboard and a screen reader. They seemed to know about the computer hardware and were validating the content for our manual. We were comfortably able to cover the basics and the details of every key on the keyboard in 2 hours.

In the evening we met the 10^th standard girls, all of them having a nervous smile on their faces. We asked each one of them to introduce themselves, tell us about their families, their hobbies, their ambitions etc. Most of them aspired to be lawyers, one of them a doctor and one of them a teacher. Soon enough the atmosphere had lightened up and they were giggling and talking in Kannada, their native language. It was hard to get them to talk in English since they aren't used to that much. But nevertheless, they tried to converse in English and asked us about our families and hobbies too.

Their innocence and the purity with which they spoke gave me such a serene feeling. I never felt more comfortable with anyone who've I known for such a small time. I was surprised at my own self when I agreed to sing when they asked me to.

Before we said good bye for the day, the girls agreed to teach us a few words in Kannada. I was reminded of the initial part of the day when one of the girls had called us ‘Akka’. It means elder sister.
We couldn't have had bigger smiles on our faces when we left for the day.

Finding the Way

Coming all the way from Delhi to contribute at Deepa academy and help the girls in whatever way we can, I was living under this huge heap of unclassified emotions. I was excited to meet the girls but was worried about how open will they be with us, I was thrilled to teach them but was not able to help but wonder if language could act as a barrier in the teaching process. Thinking, talking, preparing, everything during the past month had built in so much anxiety inside me that I wanted to meet the kids as soon as possible!

And yes finally the day came, 20th June, when we first found our way to the academy!
Standing outside, looking up and around Deepa academy , we couldn't understand where we should enter the academy from. A girl wearing her brown uniform looked down at us, Jayasi went ahead and asked her "Andar kahan se aana hai?”, soon realizing people in this city aren't familiar with Hindi, she corrected herself and asked her the same question in English, "Where do we enter from? ". The girl standing up pointed towards a gate and showed us our way into the academy.

Jayasi and I entered the academy and were welcomed by Mr. Shantaram (Principal, Deepa Academy) and Mr. Murali (our coordinator) and other staff members of the academy. Following a nice interactive session with the staff and Mr. Murali briefing us further about Deepa academy and what our work would be like, we were taken around the academy. We met girls studying in their classrooms , where they were learning Hindi using Braille , on seeing us they all collectively wished us good morning and one by one gave us an introduction of themselves. Some spoke softly while some were loud. Some were hiding and shying away from us whereas some were interactive and told us to not be shy. But they all put in the effort of introducing themselves in English (which really brought a smile on our faces).We interacted with some girls, they spoke to us about our hobbies and how we found the Bangalore weather, and whether or not we have been to Bangalore before.

Later part of the day was filled with a detailed discussion with Mr. Murali about our project and how will we be working on it, the contents and various other aspects of working with the girls.

It is rightly said that one doesn’t come to know of the time when one seems to be enjoying and liking what one is doing. The girls at Deepa academy seemed to do the trick for us. On the walk back to the hostel we were amazed how fast our time flew by!

On my first visit to the academy, I realized that the girls not only found their own way but one of them even showed us our way into the academy.
The children studying here are really special.
 
I look forward to helping them in whatever best possible way I can.