Daily Report -- Day 5

5.6.14

We woke up in the morning at around 6:30 am and were served nice Bed tea by the camping staff. We all got ready. Excellent Italian food was served in breakfast. After having breakfast we went to school for a short welcome ceremony. A very motivational speech was delivered by Mr. Saom Namchu of GFF. He introduced NER group and EKIN to the teachers, students and the villagers present there. We distributed 33 set Desk and benches, 1 set library books with one steel library cupboard, 2 sets water filters, 1 set teaching learning materials, 150 Wp Solar light system, four ply wood partitions for classrooms. NER group also sponsored full floor repair in the school. The students presented a very nice cultural programme. The EKIN India volunteers too performed a dance for the kids which they really enjoyed. Mr. Johnson, the director of the school, extended his gratitude to us. After this short programme we started the day’s activity. Earlier this school was in a bad shape with no floors and all the classes were run in a single room. We can imagine how difficult it used to be for teachers as well as students to study different subjects and in a single room and how distracting that would have been. NER and EDI got wooden partitions made to separate all the classes. EKIN and GFF volunteers painted the school. It was indeed a great experience whitewashing and painting the school. We all were really excited and enthusiastic. In fact we were playfully fighting with each other to get a chance to do more. The kids were so happy to see their school building getting painted. We worked till afternoon and it took us nearly 4 hours to finish the day’s work. We were helped by the GFF volunteers. Then we took our lunch which was delectable. After that all the male members of our team went for a bath in a stream which was quite far and it took them nearly two hours to reach and another two to come back. But the experience was indeed great. In the meantime the girls interacted with the local villagers and learnt their traditional tribal Lepcha dance. In the evening we all got together for dinner. After the dinner we spent some time chatting, singing, dancing and of course enjoying the mesmerizing beauty of the place. We then went to sleep.