Hi all,
Its been an interesting few weeks. Lock-down continues but a few exceptions are now being allowed. Shops are opening but social distancing is being strictly enforced. Masks are compulsory but like other countries we have the stupid few who don't seem to care who they infect.
Our greatest fear is a second serious wave in July or August.
Monsoon is coming soon. the rain clouds are drifting across the sky with the occasional burst of rain. The humidity combined with the high temperature makes life so tiring for everyone.
We have had a major project in the garden.(1)
We have also donated to replenishing the county with trees.(2)
Kris has had a real rough couple of months. (3)
Assorted Geeta (4)
But first, Comments from Kris.
Comment
As lockdown
continues across the world due to Covid 19, we are seeing more posts on social
media about how children are missing out on their education and parents
frustrations of having the children around 24/7, and wishing they could return
the kids to school. Worryingly some parents, some I even know are pushing for
schools to reopen despite the huge risks not only to their children but to the
teachers and school staff and the wider community.
As a
retired nurse you might be expecting me to comment on social distancing and
control of the disease, I am not going to do that, so much has already been
said and in lots of cases ignored.
I wish to
concentrate more on education in a broader sense, I will start with our
experiences here of education for the disabled prior to lockdown. This will be
our experiences related to Geeta who some of you may know was badly burned and
disabled and is now recovering with us here in Udaipur.
As Geeta
had not been able to go to school due to here severe burns, she had missed out
on the basics of education and of interacting with children her own age. In her
village she was shunned by children and adults alike, she was considered to be
cursed. Chris and I and our friends don’t even notice Geeta’s disability and
she can do just about anything other kids can do. Yes she has had to learn to
write left handed as she is naturally right handed, but she has mastered that
and refuses to let people do things for her. With our help especially Chris’s
we come up with ways of overcoming the difficulties.
We have
been home-schooling her to catch up she is way behind in some areas and in
others she far exceeds other kids her age. She is a thoughtful, mischievous and
very happy little girl, well balanced and polite. We don’t have tantrums,
although in the beginning she did with her mother. She has had some private
tuition and we have been trying to enter her into school without success prior
to lockdown. Geeta speaks English, Hindi and her local dialect Mewari, she is
bright and keen to learn.
We
contacted a Christian school we know and went to see them, they politely told
us she needed to go to a special school due to her burns. We were shocked and
we knew the school very well, they said she would be bullied and they could not
stop it.
Stunned we
said Geeta was a bright independent and confident child and no way were we
putting her in a special school. Why aren’t the schools cracking down on
bullying, surely in this day and age more needs to be done, it works elsewhere.
We have since learned this is the general attitude of most schools, maybe if we
had the money for some of the expensive private schools we would have more
success in admission but I’m still not convinced. Disabled are treated
differently in India it’s something to hide away, Geeta was not allowed out
without her arm and head covered to hide her burns even in the full heat of
summer. She does not do that anymore we teach her to be proud of who she is and
commend her bravery of going through treatment and surgery to improve her
situation. We are very honest with her we tell her what will happen and if it’s
going to hurt, she’s braver than most adults I know. I know there are
exceptional schools in parts of India doing amazing work for the disabled
especially Deepti school in the south of India
Our
Solution we are doing home-schooling and we are about to start a small group of
likeminded people who can share our expertise such as we’ll teach English, Art,
Science and a friend will teach Hindi, traditional dance etc. others will teach
as well.
Now we look
at the complaints from parents on social media about what to do with the kids
during lockdown.
Firstly
take responsibility for your own child/children
Appreciate
what the teachers actually do and support them by instilling good manners and
behaviour in your child
Know where
your child is, are they getting into mischief or not
Know your
children’s friends and where they hang out/ play
What are
they good at, some kids are creative and artistic some musical or into science.
If you feel
all they do is hide in their room, what are they doing?
Don’t let
them spend all day or hours on pc/tablet or watching television
Play
football, cricket, bat and ball with them in the garden, if no garden find
games to play indoors
Join in
board games; teach them draughts/checkers or chess if you can.
Why not
teach them to cook, bake cakes and bread. Let them experiment with a few
ingredients; get the kids to clean up the mess they have made. Make it fun.
They can even make their own crisps/potato chips, sweets etc.
Obviously
for young children supervision will be required but take time out to do things
with them.
Teach them
where their food comes from, talk about nature there are literally hundreds of
things you can do, if you’re stuck for ideas do a google search or watch how to
videos on YouTube.
We have
tried to give Geeta a very rounded education, how many children of seven years
understands what ballast is, Geeta does with a simple experiment in water with
a bowl and a ball, be creative.
Teach them
how to sew and yes I mean boys and girls, its important both sexes know how to
cook, keep clean and look after themselves who knows they may need to in the
future. I could go on with lots of examples but that would be boring, all I
wish to say is if your child is rude, bad mannered and won’t work at school
remember they learn how to behave firstly from you not their teachers.
Obviously
not all parents let their kids run wild and unruly but even the best parents
can hit problems with behaviour at different stages in a child’s life it’s how
you deal with it that will mould your child and make them into responsible
adults, children learn from seeing, doing and hearing what happens around them
especially in the home.
During this
time of Covid 19 teach them about compassion, social responsibly and taking
responsibility for one’s own actions.
I wish you
all well during this difficult time, Chris and I are having fun sharing our
knowledge and experience with Geeta and seeing her grow into a lovely caring
young girl. Every day is different and we don’t know what the future holds so
treasure the times you have together and have some fun along the way. The disasters and mistakes we make just add
to the rich tapestry of life.
(1)
Sometimes you have an idea that escalates. Here is such an idea. We wanted a small pond, well that idea didn't last long. One garden make over coming! It got out of hand when I managed to do a deal for some stone incredibly cheaply.
This and the ton of stone that came out of the pond has proved to be enough for the whole job.
The pond is 22' x 17' and 28 to 36" deep.
Lock-down has been very hard on the local workers who depend on daily wages to get by.
We didn't intend to employ anyone at first but it was such a huge project that in all we gave work to five people who would not otherwise have had any money.
The pictures are pretty self explanatory but we will probably make comments as we go.
In our area of Rajasthan we are prone to small earthquakes, the ground is also mostly loose shale. To make sure we could resist the earthquakes we not only concrete built the pond but also lined it. So if the concrete cracks the liner is there as a backup.
The overflow drain being built.
Liners in place, time to fill and go forage for plants!
The local lake got a visit.
Sitting, reflecting.
Building walls
We bought four water lilies from the market and a few other plants.
We have always used Baroda nursery since we came to India. Good plants at very fair prices.
Our first frog.
The mostly finished wall and waterfall.
When you check out the cost of a pond pump and inline filter and your reaction is.....WHAT HOW MUCH? You get inventive,
The pump is a constant run drainage pump, sometimes called a sump pump. Very cheap and comes in lots of sizes. The filter is a barrel, coarse filter material from a desert cooler, gravel, foam layer, charcoal. The water is pumped from the reed end of the pool via this filter to the waterfall. This gives us moving water so no mosquitoes. It also auto back flushes as the barrel drains back when the power drops off...very handy. It will get hidden as we plant around it.
To be honest this is further than we first intended to go, remember we started with, "Lets have a pond". However we will introduce part two of this make over next blog.
Lock down has been amazing, we have all had a great time.
(2)
For over a year now we have been growing fruit trees from seeds we collected from Jamun trees. We have raised 200 small trees. They are good shade trees and give valuable fruit. They were collected this month and will be planted where needed.
A simple but very worthwhile project that we will probably repeat this year if we get the fruit from our own tree. All it cost us was some plastic pot bags and compost. Good deal.
(3)
Poor Kris.........
What a time she has had. Where to start. She was walking across the road here on the colony when a strange bull attacked her. We have several bulls who wander and all are friendly to people here, that is how they get fed! A water buffalo wanders through on the same principle.
This bull though was unknown but Kris never took any notice of it until it got up and charged her from at least 30' away. Poor Kris didn't know until it was really close. It made a deliberate attempt to gut her with its horns and pushed Kris back against a friends gate. Kris had the presence of mind to be calm. She pushed herself close into the bulls head keeping her body so close it couldn't use its horns properly. It barged her against the gate. It was driven off by a good local friend.
Kris was badly bruised but no broken bones thank God.
A very worrying incident that raised the whole colonies anger. The bull was seen a few more times but not for weeks now so fingers crossed its moved on.
So, Kris healed and got on with life as normal, nothing stops her!
Once a while ago she road in and said she had slipped in gravel dust and fallen heavily. She got up, decided she had broken three fingers......so what did she do? Finished the shopping then rode home! Only then did she consider hospital and an X-Ray.
Feeling ok now Kris goes off on her scooter this week...........yeah you got it, splat into a car. Well to be honest it was a 50/50 at an unmarked blind junction. The car knocked her off and she slid along a short bit. The impact scarred her helmet deeply, believe me it takes a lot to put grooves like these in and smash the visor fitting.
Road rash on her hip and arm. embedded a stone in her elbow, pulled a tendon in her shoulder, What does she do....feels guilty for wrecking the scooter!
We have fixed her scooter, Kris is still recovering and in some pain.
Q. How do you get a look that can kill at 50 yards from Kris?
A, Suggest maybe she could think about riding her scooter less.
Well that's not going to happen then is it. Thankfully she had safety kit on. The helmet saved her serious injury. I love this woman but there are times!!!!
(4)
Assorted Geeta.
She has had a great time. working on the project and all the other extra Christmas's birthdays (including the dogs) events and excuses to just have some fun at the weekends so that she doesn't remember this lock down as something horrid.
s
My own garden!
Geeta is always talking about plants and seeds. She understands a lot about gardening so we thought it was time she had her own garden. We will help but it is up to her to care for it.
Time for a rest, thats Moti in the background
Rocking the day away in the garden
Looking through these photo's I realise Geeta's default mode is eating. Interesting but I still cant find pause or mute.
Well that's all from us in Udaipur, the clouds are rolling in and the wind is begining to pick up again. Wont be long now until we are dancing like loonies in the garden.
Take care and God Bless
Love Chris, Kris and Geeta
Udaipur Rajasthan India.
