Day 4:
So sleeping was a fail because I was worried I was going to wake up with spider bites, fleas on my body, lice in my hair, and cockroaches in my mouth.
I got up early and watched the children’s morning routine. They wake up and put on their uniforms (which I was informed were just recently donated and they only wear them for part of the day) and then pour this oil mixture on each others’ heads and use a comb to remove the lice and lice eggs. The children looks so comfortable and normal and at ease as they pick bugs off their friends’ heads… like monkies! A couple rounds of “down by the banks” and patty cake and 10 squirts of hand sanitizer later, we were ready for breakfast… the typical rice and spicy sauce. I feel bad because they completely spoil Teresa and I and give us HUMONGOUS portions, and I always end up trying to give it to the children (who I honestly think are too scared to take it because if the men saw them eating my food, they would get whipped) or have to secretly throw it out. I HATE HATE HATE wasting, especially in an Indian orphanage! After breakfast, I got my first taste of teaching. Basically we were told we can do whatever we want with the children, so we drew pictures of different fruits and wrote the names in English as one of the kids wrote the words in Telugu. Everything was completely disorganized and crazy and the children were everywhere. They are absolutely adorable, but it gets tiring trying to teach as the children stuff their notebooks into my face saying “Ma’am ma’am please!” hoping that ill look at their drawings and spellings and say “Wow good job! Its also just frustrating because I did not imagine I would be spending all six weeks in India drawing fruits on a small chalkboard. I want to make a difference in these kids’ lives, teach them something important, and make them excited about the world – but all of this is hard to do with such a lack of supplies.
After dinner, Teresa and I caught a cab to a hostal. It was kinda far and kinda scary because it was kinda late, but we made it to the hostal safely. And although we did see 1 cockroach, 1 lizard and a few ants, I was a so thankful not to be sleeping in the orphanage once again! At this point, I’m still somewhat disappointed that my internship is not living up to what I expected. It is also annoying because I have no internet access at the orphanage (so I cant speak to my fam who would definitely cheer me up a bit) and we have no phone, which is making it very difficult to get in contact with AIESECers and figure out our situation. But they promised to get the living sitch figured out tomorrow and let us talk to someone in charge, so we shall see how that goes…
Chau!
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Day 5:
Teresa and I took a cab all the way from the center of the city to the orphanage where AIESEC promised they would pick us up at 10am and take us to our new apartment. OBVI the AIESECer who was supposed to scoop us was not there at 10, so we taught the class how to add and subtract. Well some of them kindaaaa understand, others not so much, but now I realize how difficult it is to teach when the students don’t speak the language (erin seester you are amazing)! Thankfully there are a couple of students that speak a little bit of English and if I can’t explain the difference between the + sign and the – sign, the kid “translators” somewhat help. The orphanage looked a little bit cleaner than normal and Nilu, one of the women who works at the orphanage who I absolutely adore, seemed to be cooking a ton of food. Turns out, some of the orphanage sponsors were coming to eat lunch with the kids. And when I say, eat lunch with the kids, I mean they watched the kids eat on the floor, and then at their meal in seats in front of the fan in a separate room. Don’t get me wrong – the sponsors were very nice people – it just rubbed me the wrong way as they have no idea what terrible things go on there and the terrible living conditions. Well anyway, 5 hours and probably 25 telephone calls later, Teresa and I were in a cab on our way to our new humble abode. I was stoked to see we would be living in this big, open apartment that can sleep 9 people, but I was not stoked to see spiders and ants on the floor, hairballs in the corners, orange soda spilled all over the floor, 42 plastic bottles scattered around, and to smell the nastynast kitchen from the front door. The AIESECer who had brought us there said “So how do you like the place?” Honestly, I thought he was kidding. Yes, it COULD be awesome, but at this time is was honestly disgusting. Not on the level of the orphanage, but still gross. But the people I’m living with are cool! I am living with girls from Russia, Vietnam, Malaysia, China, Czech Republic, South Africa, and Finland. Clearly they are slobs, but they are cool. The guy from AIESEC, Arjun, took me and Teresa and Sam (from Russia) out to dinner and I had my first real Indian meal (instead of rice and spicy sauce) of naan and paneer and my!oh!my! it was delish. Although the apartment is really dirty and the electricity is really unreliable and the shower was clogged with hair (etc, etc), I am so thankful to have internet to complain to my parents, and to be in a permanent place finally. And they promised to have the place cleaned tomorrow, so I look forward to that J
namaskarum!
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Day 6:
Are we supposed to go to work, even though its 45 minutes away and we don’t have the money for taxis to and fro, and even though this isn’t even our promised internship? Well the AIESECers promised they would tell us the dealio last night but they didn’t, so we couldn’t go to work today! I know I JUST got here, but after everything I've gone through, this was a nice day off. Teresa, Sam, and I went to the city center (main part of downtown, and by far, the most American-ized) to the mall to check it out and get a few things. We got some lunch, I bought a towel, and paroozed the bookstores. After the mall excursion, Teresa and I went exploring in our new neighborhood – besides some road-side stands and rundown shops, there not much to the “RHC Colony” aka my hood for the next 6 weeks. But we do have a very convenitently located grocery store and our favorite – the mango man. He has a little mango stand right on our street and we bough 4 humongous mangoes for $45 rupees – that’s a little over $1! Later that night, we had an amazing meal of aloo gobi and naan at a restaurant and the portion was so big that we only had to order 1 and it was good enough for all of us, cheap date fo sho. We want to do some touristy Hyderabad stuff tomorrow, then we've been invited to watch some bands play at a local bar, so things are looking better and better everyday!
ta-ta for now,
shannon
hindi designs and a cute indian dog.
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