Ten days in a village school

After my final trimester exam I had plans of going on a pan India tour. But then I saw an email from the social responsibility forum of my college, the mail was from an NGO looking for a volunteer to teach computer at a school near Lonavala for a week. For the last 9 years I have lived in big cities, I always wanted to see the rural life in India. So I decided to take up this opportunity. I cut short my trip by 8 days and mailed them confirming my participation as a volunteer.
The school is run by an NGO named SAMPARC, providing education to around 300 students from Std V to Std X. It is also the only school till Std X for the neighboring 10-15 villages. It is a completely residential school for both boys and girls. The school is located in a village named Bhambarde about a 35 kms from Lonavala. Only 4-5 buses go there in day, there is no other means of transport. The school is in a valley surrounded by hills on four sides, making it an extremely beautiful place but the hills also obstructed mobile signals. After reaching there I realized I will not have any mobile connectivity during my stay here.
Teaching there was an amazing experience, I was training the teachers on MS-Office, internet and few other basic things. Most of the teachers were quite elder than me, the school had only two computers donated by students of IIT but that didn’t stop them from learning. They would always pose me with questions regarding the problems which they faced while using computer and my solutions would make them happy like a child. Their joy on sending their first email made me immensely satisfied.
I was given accommodation in their school guest house; the room was twice the size of bedroom in Mumbai. The food at their hostel mess was quite good. Every evening after teaching I would go out to explore the area, I discovered a small hill where I could get little cell phone signal. So every evening I would climb that small hill to get in touch with the outer world. I also went to the villages along with one teacher, the villagers are extremely poor, most of them are farmers but due to lack of irrigation facilities they can grow crop only once a year. The NGO is doing amazing work over there; they have provided a health centre which is the only one in that area, they have provided tube wells. The education, hostel facility, food, books, clothes everything is provided for free by them. The school has hundred percent pass record, the students regularly win prizes in sports and science exhibitions. It is regarded as a model school in that district. Without this school most of the children would have ended up as child labour. The NGO has few more schools like this in different parts of India and all the expenses of running them are raised by donation every year.
On my last day I was given a shawl and a letter of appreciation for my small contribution. While leaving I felt sad as I would miss their love and hospitality, I would miss the kinds who were my company in that one week, I decided to come back again later this year.

Journey of two years

Today with the last exam I completed my two years of MBA. It seems just like yesterday when I had shifted to Mumbai on a rainy evening, and before I could realise the two years are over. These two years were worth all the sacrifice and hardship. When I joined MBA I was confident and ready for any kind of challenge but I was tested in very different ways, it grounded my confidence and built it all over again from the scratch to a height taller than ever before. And now I feel I am ready to take on the world.

Another thing which contributed a lot to my learning was the city of Mumbai. I came to Mumbai with lot of apprehensions, as I had heard different versions about this city from different sources. I had lived in Bangalore, Chennai and had traveled to other metros like Hyderabad, Delhi, Kolkata etc. Its needless to say that each city has its own characteristics and is different from the other. But Mumbai is perhaps the most different from the rest, unlike other cities it doesn't leave you alone, it takes you in its folds and before you can release you turn into a Mumbaikar. It is perhaps the most civilised among all the other Indian cities, among all the chaos there is a discipline which keeps the city running. From local trains to the queues for movie tickets there is an order followed by everyone, without which the city would have come down crumbling. This city hardens you and makes a man out of a boy. This city and its spirit is addictive, once you get a hang of it you will never be able to leave it.

I always wanted to go back to Bangalore again or some other city like Pune but now I am glad that I am placed in a company based in Mumbai. I am now really excited about coming back to Mumbai after the two months break for a new beginning...

Random thought

I am returning to my own blog after a long time(I also blog in ADvent). The last three months have been the busiest of my life. Exams, competitions, events and not to mention three trips to Hyderabad kept me really busy. It's not that I didn't try to blog in the mean time, infact there are two unfinished posts saved as draft; I couldn't finish them later as I was not in the same frame of mind in which I started.
For the first time in the last 3 months I am free, our business fest Paragana got over last week and now I have some time before our placement process starts. This period of inactivity is killing me, I had realised before also that I need some work to occupy myself and keep my brain cells excited. Sherlock Holmes used to take morphine injections to keep his brain active when he had no case to solve, for me I guess it is blogging which is helping me right now. May be I should utilize this time to learn the new video making software which I had isatlled last month but couldn't learn it due to time constraints!

The Genius of Charles Bukowski

Charles Bukowski is one of my favourite poets. A genius and maverick, he is perhaps the most loved poet of our time. Below is the youtube link to my favourite poem The Genius of Crowd by Bukowski:

Pictures of Tripura - 2

The biggest advantage of being a student is that you get those long summer & winter vacations. This was the longest break I had in last 4 years. So I tried to use to the fullest by lot of traveling and clicking pics my new found obsession. I clicked some really nice pics in Trichy and lot of pics in Tripura but unfortunately the hard disk of my laptop crashed and I lost almost all my pics. Luckily I had few pics saved in my pen drive, which I am uploading here. I really miss the pics I clicked in Udaipur, the pics of the ruins of the old palace had come out really well, the pictures of river Gomati flowing in its full force was mesmerizing. There is no way I can get them back again :(

King of Bandra

How about going to college/office in an Auto rickshaw which has a TV where you can catch the morning news, read the morning newspaper with the option of reading from 3 different languages, a phone from where you can make local & std calls, charge your mobile phone. No I am not high on anything while I am writing this post. If you are doing any of the above things while traveling in an auto, you are probably traveling in Sandeep Bacche's auto.

Today while returning from college I took a ride in his wonder auto. His auto also has the daily currency conversion rates, mineral water, candies and what not.

The man who calls himself "The king of Bandra" is also king of heart. Every Sunday he goes to an old age home and distributes food, he offers discount to physically disabled people, he doesn't charge anything from visually impaired travellers.

When quizzed what prompted him to do all this, his simple reply was "Aadmi agar Chahe to Kya nehi kar sakta hai? Iye to bahut mamuli cheez hai."

Summer vaccation in Chennai

Chennai is definitely not the ideal place where you would like to spend the summer, but I am here again back to Chennai, the place where I did my engineering. Last time when I had come here to collect my Degree certificate I bade good bye to the city without knowing that I will be back here in a year’s time. Chennai is not among my most favorite cities but there are few things here that you will miss in other cities: the wide variety of non-veg foods, juice shop in every corner of the road, the smooth roads etc. The city has changed a lot since I left it in 2006. New buildings and companies have sprung up in outskirts of the city, the traffic has increased, things have become costlier the same juice which used to cost Rs. 10, now costs Rs. 25 and the autowallahs seem to have become little sober(though I still prefer bus over the overpriced autos). One thing that has not changed is that you need to have some knowledge of the local language to manage on your own, the Hindi speaking population is still very little, and of course you will find people who speak English more often that in any other city in India. This gives me another opportunity to enhance my Tamil speaking prowess.
climate is as hot as ever though the summer is still on the side but with every passing day the temperature is soaring and its promising to be a very hot hot summer.