Volunteers in Davangere

NB Since this page was first published Fr Pat Kenna died on 8th July 2005. May he rest in peace! Rachel Wood and Patrick Kerridge are now back in the UK.

At the beginning of 2005 Rachel Wood and Patrick Kerridge, accompanied by Fr Patrick Kenna SDB, left for India, where Rachel and Patrick would be working on a project in Davangere for child labourers, part of the Bangalore Rural Education and Development Society (BREADS).

Rachel had already spent a year working on the youth retreat team at Savio House and Patrick had come to hear of the Salesians through his brother, Michael, who had also worked at Savio House. The placement was arranged by Fr Bob Gardner SDB.

Rachel sent an email shortly after she arrived and you can read some of her story below.

Drinking coconut milk

Fr Kenna, Rachel and Patrick enjoy a refreshing coconut juice

We arrived as planned, safe and sound, on the morning of Monday 17th January in Bangalore Airport and were met by Fr George Mathew SDB, director of BREADS which oversees the project we are working in. He drove us to Bangalore Provincial House where we spent our first night and met the 'who's who' of Salesians in Southern India! I also went shopping to buy appropriate Indian clothes. It is not too hot at the moment - it is their winter, so quite pleasant for us - but it will start to hot up at the end of February.

6am Tuesday morning saw us leaving Bangalore to travel to the project where we are working in a town called Davangere. We arrived at the first centre at about 11.30 to be greeted with songs and dance by the young people who range from about 5 or 6 years old to 15 or 16. They are so lovely and friendly and are fascinated by our white skin and freckles! They are always smiling and cheerful and you would never be able to tell some of the horrors they have been through. After lunch we travelled a further 30 minutes to the other centre which is where we are working and living, about 12 km away from the town and close to a village called Alurhatti. There we were shown to our rooms which are much more luxurious than we expected - quite big and tall, which helps to keep them cool.

Our work is slowly falling into a routine, which is nice. It was a bit disconcerting at first, not knowing what to do or what was expected of us, but we are slowly making friends with the other staff and learning their names! We can just get by with the amount of English they know and I am slowly picking up useful phrases in the local language. I am sure will be fluent by the end of six months... not!

The Volunteers surrounded by children

Getting to know you

The children get up at 6am and wash. At 7, half of them do private studies and the other half do yoga. At 7.45 they switch round. I usually wake up in time to join in the second yoga session! Sudha - the teacher - is very patient with me as I have never done it before! At 8.30 the children clean the centre and do other chores, such as looking after the rabbits and chickens that we keep. At 9am we have breakfast. 10am is prayer, then roll call, then period one. I usually teach Standard 9, the oldest class we have. All the boys are 15 or 16. They have the best English out of all the children and are very good at helping me out and even teaching me Kannada (the language that everyone in Karnataka speaks). After a 15 minute break, period 2 begins at 11, then period 3 at 12noon. During period 3 I teach standard 6, who are a little more challenging! At 12.30 there is half an hour of 'extracurricular activity' - on the first day they got Fr Pat and me to teach them songs.

At 1 pm we have lunch and then play until 2 when it is back to the 'classrooms' (the ends of corridors and verandas with blackboards propped at the end suffice as classrooms in this warm climate!) For period 4, when I have no class, I usually take a snooze, do some washing, and write my journal. Period five begins at 3, and I should have standard 7, but so far the lesson has been taken over by firstly a science teacher who came from outside to give all 100 children a lesson at once, and then by rehearsals of a sketch about Don Bosco's life in preparation for the Don Bosco Day celebrations. Salesian flexibility is alive and well! At 4 the children are given tea (the drink - very sweet and strong and milky - more like hot chocolate in my humble opinion) and then play games until around 5.30. Normally this is free games - football, volleyball, scoreball, coco (a national game, very fast and fun!) - but there have been various competitions and tournaments going on all in prepapration for Don Bosco Day when the prizes wil be given. The young people have been split into four houses which are competing against each other in all sorts of things - football, volleyball, coco and drawing (I had to judge the drawing competition - argh!). A concert is being put together including the sketch; I have been persuaded to play something on the violin and Fr Pat is putting together a Powerpoint presentation.

At around 5.30 the children wash and then settle down at 6.30 for private study, where we supervise and provide assistance if they need help. At 8pm we have supper and then we dance! There are loudspeakers in one of the passageways and the children are teaching me Indian dance moves! At 9pm there is a quick meeting so the children know what is happening the next day, then after prayers a Salesian Goodnight is given - a story about Don Bosco's life. Then some TV programme or film is shown in the dining room for those who don't want to go straight to bed, Tom and Jerry and Asterix cartoons have featured so far, as well as local Kannada films (the fight scenes of which I have to say are hilarious). And that is our day!

I am making friends with the wildlife - the mosquitos and red ants are especially friendly - but the spiders and other bugs are generally taken care of by the 4inch lizards which climb the walls. Very cute!

Our diet is mainly vegetarian (sob) but I am coping! I have tried everything so far and seem to be ok! Anyone who knows me will be amazed at the amount of fruit I've eaten - papaya, passionfruit and coconut from our grounds... yummy!

So that's me! I am well and settling in, and I hope you are all well and happy too...

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