Weekend shenanagins

This past weekend was amazing! Living in a small village means that on the weekend i get to venture out to the closest touristy town Manali, which is roughly about 40 minutes away. My host parents own a large hotel/restaurant there that their daughter Piya runs. She has three kids all of which are studying elsewhere. Her oldest son Dhruv (22) however, is home for a few months after finishing college and he has become one of our good friends! he is super outgoing and friendly so its great for us to have our own personal tour guide. Piya has been running the hotel for the last 14 years now and has converted the top level into a home, it is so cool getting to chill there on weekends. This past weekend eight of Dhruv's college friends came upto Manali for a holiday so Winta (my volunteer partner) and i went and spent the weekend there as well. On Saturday Dhruv took us all snowboarding in the Solang Valley about half an our out of Manali. We borrowed my host mums mini van and all went up the mountain together. The road we drove up to get there was by far the deadliest road i have ever seen! Pot holes galore! no railings on the edge and attempting to pass buses and falling rocks/snow was not comforting! Luckily Dhruv is a very good driver.

Arriving at the slopes was amazingly overwhelming, it was unlike anything I've ever seen before. Basically there was one large slope with a million things happening at once! People skiing, snowboarding, hang-gliding, zorbing (a giant plastic ball a person goes inside and is literally pushed down the mountain), people randomly dressed in fur coats chanting with massive sticks, men with snow bunnies and women paying $2 to wear traditional dress for a photograph. My snowboarding experience here in India was unlike any past snow holiday! There are no chair lifts so you spend about 30 minutes walking up the mountain and five minutes coming back down (depending on how steep a slope you want), so it is seriously tiring exercise but such good fun. The other difference is the organisation of the businesses on the mountain. We thought we'd hired all the right gear in advance however upon arrival we were greeted with about half the gear we thought we had hired. No goggles no gloves no waterproof pants and no helmet (sorry Mum). I literally just had a snow-board. You should have seen my attire! I wore jeans, a jacket, i shared one glove off Dhruv as he sprained his wrist and only needed one so yes i looked rather underdressed for the snow!

I can't explain how chilled it is! During snow breaks locals would just sit around tables drink chai and smoke Charis (local hash) then hit the slopes again it's crazy!. We finished around 4pm then all sat and had a hot curry and coffee on the slope. At night we made a bonfire in the outside bar area at the hotel twas nice.

Dhruv and his friends are all studying/studied really interesting courses, animation, design or film. They are so talented at what they do it's crazy! The standard of their work here is so much better than most things I've seen in Australia. For example Dhruv is incredible at animation and art! Yet here he would earn way less for his awesome work in comparison with someone in Australia who would earn a lot more for a lower standard of work! They are all seriously talented and working on really cool projects. I've never met a group of people that are all equally creative and studying such interesting courses.

Life here is so relaxed! Everyone is so welcoming and the people I've made friends with so far i feel like i have known them forever! Everyone shares everything and unlike back home age really doesn't matter everyone is friends with everyone, I'm 17 hanging out with a bunch of 23 year olds and you wouldn't know the difference because everyone is so inclusive and friendly. It is going to be so hard coming home after getting a taste of this amazingly chilled and simple life style or the hill-billy lifestyle as Dhruv would call it. Driving up the mountain in a van going for a snowboard, living in a hotel, having friends over whenever you want, buying a good coffee for 20 cents, having 100 family members, wearing cool local woollen beanies, socks and textiles that one buys for next to nothing in the village. I really can't explain it my photographs don't do this place justice! Most people when they picture India see the stereotypical hot, over-crowded cities, curry and markets etc etc However where I'm living currently is the complete opposite! Big beautiful valleys, snowy mountains and streams, it's unreal!

Back to school today with a terrible cold! Note to self don't wear jeans snowboarding...

Solang Valley - Manali

Dhruvy

It's all happening..

Dhruv and moi

Neha

Paying money to get manually pushed down a mountain in a confined plastic ball...

Chai break

Sleepovers at the hotel

Bonfire time

Checking out Manali

Buying ice-cream despite the cold

Teaching full time

Today was my fourth day of teaching and i can honestly say that i feel like i have been teaching forever and already have a teaching degree, with the responsibilities i have in the school. I am already organising and teaching classes by myself. Most would assume a volunteer would just assist another teacher which we do do, however we also take classes by ourselves on a daily basis, which requires a lot of planning and preparation in advance. I can finally respect and understand the effort my teachers put in for me in and out of the classroom, because after school we spend time making activities or planning the classes for the next day which is time consuming. The two factors that make teaching here so tiring is the fact that the children are young and the fact that they don't speak English well enough to explain something once!

My first class every morning for two hours with a local teacher Anu, is UKG English (6 year olds) a class of 17. This is the cutest class! however the most preparation is needed as they are so young. They are currently learning the alphabet and counting 1-40. English songs/poems/words are also taught. They already knew "Twinkle twinkle little star" and "1,2,3,4,5 first i caught a fish alive" I taught them Insy Winsy spider which is now their new morning song. The thing i have noticed with this class in particular is the need for extension work as some students finish writing the alphabet in five minutes and some take half an hour to write the date and their name. The need to always have a back up plan and games/activities in your head can be stressful, however over time I'm sure we will be pulling them out of our ears! I have finally learnt the names of this class as i have them every day at the same time, where as all the other classes after them change daily.

The classes i am currently assisting are UKG English, year 1, 3, 4 and 7 sport and the little bubs (LKG 4/5 year olds) in games. The classes i am taking by myself are Craft for various years and Drama and reading for various years. Drama is the busiest as we are currently teaching them a small poem/play and introduce new warm ups/ games every class. It is so surreal teaching the kids a small drama game that we would not be enticed by as we do it so often, however their eyes light up and everyone wants to join in.

School starts at 9am and finishes at 3:15 and we walk to and from everyday. The youngest classes UKG and LKG (4 to 6 year olds) however, leave at lunch time.

Lunch time at school is the funnest! The other local staff here are super friendly and fun! They have about 10 female teachers and 3 male staff and even the principle is cool. At lunch we have formed a little group with 3 of the female teachers, where we sit and all share the lunch we bring, it is really cute. Our host family packs us something different everyday, either rice and Dal/ spinach and chapati/roti etc. They don't however pack cutlery so unlike at home we eat with our hands, which is a massive struggle. We also teach every second Saturday so our proper day off is always Sunday.

In summary school here is so much fun! The staff are so welcoming it feels like we have been here for ages! Every morning the children line up and sing the national anthem and a national song. The year 7's read a quote of the day e.g "honesty is the best policy" and every morning they also do general knowledge questions e.g this morning it was "who is the prime minister of India", "how many planets in the solar system" "what does USA stand for" I think every school should do it!