We are so proud of the videos the girls have produced this semester. Aside from all the work that went into writing, directing, shooting, and planning these video projects, many of our students also engaged in service learning projects that taught them how to become change-makers in their communities. It was truly inspiring to see this realization take hold in them. I look forward to hearing about the progress of these different projects — the TMS garden and clean-up project and the efforts of the girls at MGM to bring attention to the dismal conditions of the roads and hazards to pedestrians in front of their school.

Samantha’s Railway Class: Our Environment

Sultan Bazar: Our Time in TMS

Our Time in TMS from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

MGM School: On the Road

On the Road: Traffic in Hyderabad from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

Great job, girls! Your teachers are so proud of you!

On the Road: Traffic in Hyderabad from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

TMS Final Celebration! from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

Reflecting on the last five months is a daunting task.  While we’ve accomplished a lot, Stella and I have discussed the mutual feeling that we could have done so much more.  Such is the nature of most work that comes with a definite end date — you are always left with the nagging reminder of all the ideas that didn’t materialize and realizations that things could have been done better or more efficiently.  With some time to process everything that’s gone on in the last month, I’m sure we all will come to see a clearer picture of our time here, and gain a sense of the impact of this truly unique and incredible experience that has been the last five months.  Right now though,  it just feels like a whirlwind.

That being said, the event itself was a great end-note to our semester.  For the first time we had students from all five TMS schools — Sultan Bazar, MGM, New Nallaguta, Audiah Memorial, and Railway — together in one room to share in the celebration.  We arrived and hour before the ceremony to find the auditorium filled with hyper, buzzing students who had just finished setting up the seating.  They were clearly glowing with excitement to showcase their work, and there was the tangible feeling that they were lingering after they had finished their work so that they could spend every possible moment together as a group before TMS came to an end.   My girls played dress up with me and stuffed me into a very bright, glittery saree to mark the momentous occasion.

The film screening was a huge success.  The students who have participated in the program produced videos on a wide variety of topics, from the future of our environment, to examining identity and gender roles, to the consequences of political agitation.  Not only did students discuss and examine these thought-provoking and important topics, but they had to approach them from unique angles and consider how they could present their views to an audience.  The results were truly inspiring.

We closed the ceremony by presenting each student with a certificate, individual evaluation, class photo, and (most importantly) American Halloween candy.  As Pabhaker closed out the ceremony and invited all the guests to a reception in the computer lab, it was clear that neither students nor teachers were ready to say goodbye.  We lingered awkwardly with the visiting schools, beaming at the students and repeatedly praising their work.  They smiled back almost pityingly, trying to reassure us that it would be ok.  It was clear that neither group wanted to leave.  Once we finally tore ourselves away from the auditorium, it took us nearly another hour to say farewell to the Railway students and the grounds that have come to feel like our second home.   All in all, it was a lovely end to what has been a tremendous experience and learning process for all those involved — both students and teachers alike.

Before we completely finished our jobs as teachers here, I did want to share a few thoughts on a topic that has repeatedly come up in our classrooms, our conversations, and our blog posts – language. India has 22 official languages listed its Constitution, and many more dialects. And language, as our students tell us, is a huge representation of identity. The language that each person speaks is a statement of their regional and/or religious and/or ethnic identity. The official language of Andhra Pradesh is Telugu but Muslims in Andhra Pradesh speak mostly Urdu and then ethnic Tulu people in Andhra Pradesh speak Tulu while many highly educated people only speak English with a native fluency. And each state has its own list of distinct languages that match its own unique make up of identities. So naturally, this becomes a problem for education, particularly in big cities where all of these different identity groups with their distinct mother tongues live side by side in the same school districts. Schools must ask, in what language should we teach? The solution in most areas is that government schools teach in different mediums. In Hyderabad, most schools will have each grade split into Telugu Medium, Urdu Medium, and English Medium sections. So then it is the students and families that must ask, in what language should we learn? Many choose English. Families hope that if their kid is studying in English from a young age, they will become fluent. And this is in a sense the most concrete effort they can make towards a bigger future for their kid. For one, English, possibly more than Hindi, is transferrable throughout India and definitely around the world. Knowing English gives students access to the world in a way that most of our students’ parents do not have. Additionally, most schools only teach 11th and 12th grade in English and college is almost exclusively taught in English, so if you hope to study beyond 10th grade, you would be well-advised to start Kindergarten in English.

So what’s the problem? Well, we have been teaching 8th and 9th grade students, many of whom have supposedly been studying in English medium for many years, and they all hover within a range of non-fluency in English. It leaves us wondering how they learn in their other classes. In my classes at AIF, which I teach in Telugu, I have a mixture of Telugu and English Medium students. I have often noticed a far better command of subject matter and sometimes even a higher level of confidence expressing ideas among the Telugu Medium students. After all, school and learning are tough, so naturally the students who get to go through it in their mother tongue would have a leg up. The English medium students just don’t get it all the time because they don’t understand the language the teacher is speaking. So this means that to some degree, students are having to choose between a better education in a language that limits their opportunities, and a better command of English with a quality of education that limits their opportunities. How frustrating that must be! I absolutely think students should learn English and become good at it. But in the long term, I think it should become possible and mainstream for students to study and become experts in any subject in their local language – if a kid is born in Andhra Pradesh to a family that only speaks Telugu and can’t afford private school, wants to attend school and study really hard and become expert in a subject, start a business in Hyderabad that deals only in this area and become successful, shouldn’t that be a possibility? Shouldn’t they be able to live their lives and be great in Telugu if they want to? After all, they do live in a place where Telugu is the official language, and the only language they ever hear. The British are responsible for many higher education institutions in India, which is partly why there is a widespread tradition of learning in English. But rather than being content with thinking this is appropriate in the modern world, I wonder if regional governments now have a responsibility to make a change?

Queueing up at Railway for the Google buses.

I asked the girls to write down questions about Google for homework. They came back with “Who invented the internet?” and “Is Google a person or a company?”

“The girls just don’t understand what the internet is,” I complained to Sam. “I mean, not what it is, but what it really is.”

“Well, yeah, but…”  Sam looked at me. “Do you?”

Anyone for whom the loss of internet access would be only slightly less disorienting than watching zombies take over the world, but who cannot construct a coherent sentence explaining what the internet really is, should consult the following Barney-level introduction to the world wide web: http://www.20thingsilearned.com/en-US.

The day began with a long journey from Lallaguda to Hi-Tech City. Google sent three cushy buses to whisk us off. For me that meant gently dozing to the futile honkings of Hyderabad morning traffic and occasionally being awoken by an “Are we there yet?” Sam’s bus experienced three distinct phases: the group-karaoke-and-dance-in-your-seat-to-your-favorite-song phase, the vomit-out-the-window phase, and the final exhaust-yourself-until-you-fall-into-comatose-slumber phase. Srilekha, on the other hand, taught the students on her bus a Telugu song and they sung it all perfectly, memorized, in unison.

Tee hee.

This bus is about to break into song.

The girls were struck with wonder when we arrived. They lingered at the wide-paneled glass windows, the glossy elevators, the hot-and-cold water dispensers. Some were also struck with a case of nerves. “Ma’am, I’m getting afraid,” Navaneetha shivered to me in the elevator, inducing a circle of vigorous nods around her. Fortunately, we immediately split off into small groups for lunch with Google employees, who allayed the girls’ fears with a glorious spread of curries, soups, sambar, dal, exquisite pulihora, lassi, cakes, unlimited kulfis and chocobars—ahem. Right. Blog post.

Waiting in the lobby for Google to name-tag all 60 girls, 6 Railway teachers, 3 TMS fellows, 2 TAs, and Piya. Nice work, Google.

At lunch, the students had the awesome opportunity to chat with employees from the advertising, sales, and engineering departments about how exactly they’d gotten to Google and the kinds of projects they’re working on now. Plus, the girls had the awesome opportunity to brag about their own achievements—Heena’s a superstar runner, Hemalatha’s good at math—and to tell the Googlers about the trials of learning videography and Final Cut Express in TMS class.

Gazing tenderly at lunch.

The chocobar--a national pastime.

We trooped to the meeting room after lunch, half-eaten ice cream bars in hand, for an internet workshop. We began with the heart of Google, its search function, and learned how to upload photos into image search to identify pictures (confession: I didn’t know you could do that). We played with Google Maps, looking up directions to our favorite restaurant on RTC Cross Road and marveling at satellite views of Sam’s house in D.C. and Srilekha’s and my alma mater in New York.

The girls had a chance to pitch some of their tough questions directly to the Googlers—“What is the internet?” and “Who is answering when I ask questions on Google?”—and some less tough but equally vital ones, like “What does the word ‘google’ mean?” (Two graduate students name their company ‘Googol,’ after the really big number; man writes check to company but spells the name ‘Google’; students panic about convincing man to re-write check; students change name of company to ‘Google.’)

Sachin explains how to use Google Maps.

Sunitha filming the internet literacy workshop.

"Just...explain the internet to us real quick, will you?"

The highlights of the afternoon were the interviews. First, Mounika and Harika sat down with Mukesh, a software engineer, who grew up wanting to be a mathematician or a scientist, but was ultimately drawn to computer science for both its intellectual challenge and the fun of being able to see the immediate results of your work.

He urged the students never to be disheartened by one’s background or by others who seem better educated, because there will always be those who know more. “Whatever is past is past, but always try to do better,” he insisted, encouraging the girls to give themselves as much exposure to new ideas as possible and to constantly aim for one step higher.

The students asked Mukesh whether he believed the same opportunities were available to girls and boys in modern India, and although he was optimistic, he acknowledged the social factors contributing to a continuing gender gap. “In my village,” he said, “some parents feel that if girls are educated too much, it will be very difficult for marriage, because you won’t find an equal match…it is totally wrong.”

Mukesh also addressed the focus on test scores and academic rankings in the Indian education system, arguing that test scores often have little to do with how well one understands the essential concepts of a subject. “Now, I interview a lot [for Google]. I also see what their J.E. [junior engineering] ranking is. It doesn’t mean anything. If their J.E. ranking is top, I still reject, because they are not able to answer my questions. Fine, you got marks, or some ranking. But at the end of the day, what matters is—do you know your stuff?” He urges his own younger brothers never “to go mad for marks. If you aim for it, fine. But understand your subject. If you understand, then I am proud. If you just mark it and pass, I don’t care.”

He left the girls with an important message: “It’s about confidence. There are two things required. You should know your stuff. As a student, you should have knowledge about your subject. And you should be confident. It’s easy to say. It’s tough, I know that. But I can tell you—be confident. You are as good as anybody else.”

Mounika, Mukesh, and Harika.

 Ramya and Sai Durga interviewed Suryanarayana, an online sales and operations senior manager, who offered a different take on the necessary steps for achievement. “There is absolutely no substitute for hard work,” Suri emphasized. “My professor told me that life has three parts for success. One part is luck. Two parts is your intelligence. And four parts is hard work.”

Suri wasn’t merely repeating a formula. He’d learned the hard way. He recounted his years in high school, when he’d do just enough work to pass his courses. “I could do more, but I didn’t…I wanted to go and watch all the movies, do all the nights out with my friends, do whatever…roam around. But when I went to IIM [Indian Institute of Management], it was a different world altogether.”

After his initial shock of nearly failing in his first semester at IIM, he imposed on himself a rigid regime. He woke up at six a.m. every morning and studied for his required subjects before and after class, following this schedule “religiously” for six months until he rose to the top. “In a set of brilliant people—people who are more capable than you—doing just the bare minimum and then trying to get away doesn’t work, especially if you have the potential to do more. So just put some discipline into it.”

Mukesh advised the girls to aim high and be confident; Suri added another essential element to the mix—an inner fire and drive to push forward. “Everybody comes from a lot of constraints. It’s up to your passion—what do you want to do? Some of you want to become painters, artists, you want to go act in movies, or you want direct movies, or you want to do business, or run a shop—you can do all of that. But I’m just thinking that you should want it badly enough. Do you want to do something badly enough?”

Suri also asked the girls not to remain complacent with the institutions regarded highly in India, like Google, but always to keep thinking about ways to improve the system and change the status quo. Rather than solely aiming for top positions currently available in a career path, this generation of students “should actually think about creating something better than what is there now,” he said, spotlighting those values of creativity and innovation that we’ve placed so much emphasis on in the TMS curriculum but are neglected in the pedagogy of many Indian government schools.

Suryanarayana, Sai Durga, and Ramya.

Neha filming the interviews.

Because the students are completing their final fimmaking unit, we thought it’d be fitting to end the day with an introduction to the magical functions of video on the internet. We started a group video chat on Google+ Hangouts with some of the Googlers we’d met throughout the day, and taught the girls how to create Gmail accounts to access these features. Krishna showed the girls how to get to YouTube, where they can search for video explanations of difficult concepts for school, or listen to their ever-present Bollywood favorites (currently “Chammak Challo” and “Sheila Ki Jawaani,” in case you’re curious), or—!—upload their own videos from TMS class.

Railway-Google field trip 2011!

Hey Thanks, Google! from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

What could be more empowering and instructional than designing a project to ameliorate the social and environmental problems we learn about in school? What is a more pertinent example of the purpose of education to create an informed and active citizenry which will act on their knowledge in the best interest of the community? The applications for service learning are endless. I was first drawn to The Modern Story because of the emphasis on service learning, teaching the students to “become change makers in their community.” I watched videos created by previous fellows where students had partnered with community organizations to bring attention to issues that they wanted to change and felt inspired. I set a goal for myself to complete a similar project if selected, and I am proud to be writing nearly six months later about service learning projects that we are wrapping up at two different schools.

Railway Environment Project:

When we first began the semester we tossed around the idea of doing a final video project about the environment. Living in Hyderabad, a rapidly developing city, in rapidly developing India, it does not take a scientist to notice the impact of this development on the environment. The sheer number of people flocking to the economic opportunities in the city, combined with weak infrastructure and the further complications of corruption, create a prime environment for the build-up of waste, unequal and unreliable distribution of water, and staggering emissions from vehicles.

Having finished our first video project about Telangana (see below), we were ready to decide on the topic for the final video.

Speak Up!: How We Can Make Our Voices Heard from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

I knew that I wanted to approach it from the angle of service learning. The first step in this process was to have the students identify problems in their community that they would like to address, and, as I suspected, the vast majority wrote about environmental concerns. I was surprised however, when a student, Sai Durga, questioned the purpose of the assignment, asking me, “M’am, what’s the point of writing about these problems when there is nothing we can do to change them?” Sai is one of the brightest, most confident students in the class, with an uncanny ability to think critically and come up with original ideas, so it goes without saying that I was shocked by her pessimism. I told her that we do have the power to change the things in our communities and that I would prove her wrong by the end of the term. On that note we began our environment project.

First, I asked the students to brainstorm projects that we could do together as a class to impact the environment. This took a lot of explaining, and questioning to help them arrive at a place where they could think of actions that we could undertake to change the environment around them. The adaptive instinct seems to be so engrained in people here, particularly those who are not well-off, as to affect their ability to even think critically about changing the world around them. Countless times we’ve met people who are dissatisfied with the social and environmental ills they see around them, but their response is to shrug their shoulders and get on with their business.

Finally, the girls voted to complete two projects – raising awareness and access to dustbins to combat litter around the school and on the roads, and planting a garden to help do our part to clean the air and beautify the school yard.

Once we had decided to act, the course moving forward was clear. Thankfully in India you can plant a pretty nice garden for $20, so I haggled in my pathetic Telugu with the woman at the local nursery by the side of the road and loaded our various plants and trees into an auto. Unknowingly, I picked up three mango trees, so future TMS fellows should remember to give credit where credit is due when they are eating fresh fruit before class in a couple of seasons!

The girls were so excited work to complete a hands-on project to make a difference. Even on Children’s Day when they all came to school in their new, fancy outfits they pleaded with me to go and work in the garden. Once we gave them shovels and um, big heavy metal poles that people jam in the ground to dig holes (?), the original ideas did not stop flowing. Everyone had an opinion on how the garden should look, where a certain plant should go, and one girl even suggested that we spell out “TMS” in the middle with the methi seeds. We are all so proud of the finished product and the signs the girls designed and produced (with recycled materials) to teach the other students to keep the grounds clean and enjoy the garden without picking the flowers.

MGM Road Survey

We went through a similar process with the students at MGM, asking them to write about a problem they wanted to solve in their community. We initially gave the assignment in conjunction with their first video project on how youth can stand up and make their voices heard. Check out the completed video here:

Speak Up!: How We Can Make Our Voices Heard from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

We noticed that a couple students wrote about the poor road conditions which affected the safety of both drivers and pedestrians, and low and behold a couple weeks later Piya introduced us to Kanthi Kanan, a woman who started an organization to advocate for pedestrian rights, who had worked with previous fellows. We met with Kanthi to get some guidance on how concerned citizens can help to put pressure on lawmakers to act on this issue. We actually helped The Right to Walk foundation complete their own survey on the condition of footpaths and were inspired to conduct our own survey with the girls.

Kanthi visited the school to share how the students can act to change this issue and afterwards all students agreed that they felt inspired to act. We hope to present our findings about the road in front of the school and the obstacles the girls face on their commutes to the corporator of the local government district before the fellowship ends, teaching the girls a valuable lesson about the inner workings of government and their rights as citizens. We are very excited to wrap up this project with the girls and show them that if they speak up, people in power can listen and act.

Most newcomers to Hyderabad would agree that one of the most daunting things about the city is its traffic. In fact, even locals, who have become thoroughly accustomed to the chaotic streets, agree that it is one of the things the city really needs to improve. In this photo story, the boys show us some of the perils of traffic in Hyderabad and express their hope for change.

Traffic Hazards from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

Chewing tobacco has historically been a favorite among substances used by men, and even women, in India. As our boys slowly transition into men, they have increasingly begun to see their friends pick up this habit. And many of them have already felt the pressure to pick it up themselves. But the students of Nallagutta show us why using this form of tobacco, known here as Gutkhas, is an absolute no-no for them.

Say No To Gutkhas from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

And here are new versions of the photo stories produced by the students of Audiah Memorial.

Discovering the Troubles of Telangana Bandhs

Discovering the Troubles of Telangana Bandhs from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

City vs. Village

City vs. Village from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

The Bonal Festival

The Bonal Festival from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

The tsunami hit southeast Asia right around Christmas. The images from the wave’s aftermath disturbed me deeply and put a damper on my holiday. I couldn’t shake the numbers from my head, and found myself haunted even after I returned to college at the University of Michigan. I felt unfulfilled with giving to aid organizations and day dreamed about what it would be like to work on relief efforts on the ground. I hatched a plan to spend my savings to travel to India the summer after my freshman year and volunteer in a village that was affected by the tragedy.

The conditions I encountered in my first trip to a developing country were staggering, and they left an impression that would be burned into my mind for years to come. This was also one of my first encounters with leading my own classroom without the support of a tutoring program or curriculum. Although I had volunteered as a tutor in high school, I was at a loss as to how to teach a group of 7 – 9 year-olds English, being just barely an adult myself. I was in awe of Julia, a fellow volunteer a few years older than me, who was not so paralyzed by fear and ignorance as to freeze completely in front of the students.

Photo taken on my trip to India in 2005.

While I struggled to make sense of my experience in India at the time, in the years that passed, the experience crystallized in my mind as a defining moment. Even now I’m at a loss for words to articulate exactly how and why it changed me, but the point is that it did — and I believe for the better.

Travel helps us grow. Yet this is far from a universal experience. Unfortunately, it is an opportunity for growth and exposure that only people with means get to experience. I have been blessed to travel, but in these experiences I have encountered countless people who have never left the places where they were born and raised.
When I was teaching in Brooklyn, I received a grant to take students to Washington DC on an overnight trip. At the Radisson by the airport a student confessed to me with a look of rapture on her face, that she had never stayed in a hotel before, and that it was even nicer than she’d imagined. She was 18 years old.

In front of the capitol on our class trip to DC,

Traveling is one of the things I enjoy and value more than anything else, but I cannot help but feel a pang of guilt, knowing that these luxuries come at a price that so many cannot afford. I would love to create more opportunities for students — regardless of socioeconomic background — to reap the benefits of travel. I am even more committed in my desire to do so after this experience with TMS. The first step is in exposing students to the vast and exciting world that there is to explore.

To this end, I’ve tried to involve my former students in Brooklyn in my fellowship experience. While it took a little while to get the ball rolling, the students have begun contacting one another through email, and this small gesture, this small step toward broadening horizons has me so inspired to continue with my goal to create real opportunities for students like these to one day meet and experience the worlds that they have so innocently described to one another in their correspondence.

We now start class each day with the routine of checking our email. The girls are thrilled to see a new message in the class account’s inbox. We are sending pictures of Indian traditional dress and contemporary fashion to students in New York. They respond with questions and updates about Occupy Wall Street. We hope to share videos shortly. If you’d like to send a message to the girls of Class 8A (and you’ve read this far on the blog post!) then please write to

railwaygirlsclass8a@gmail.com

Check out the video of the girls checking their email account:

Railway Girls Check Their Class Email from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

The Railway Times

To get the girls thinking about topics for their final video project they wrote a newspaper article about problems they would like to change in their communities. The girls worked in small groups to type these assignments into a newsletter and format the document in Word. A photography team went out to document the community problems through photographs. The result is The Railway Times.

railwaytimes

Where I’m From Poem

The girls also all wrote poems that describe their identity as it relates to their origins. The inspiration for this lesson was a poem by George Ella Lyons, “Where I’m From.”

I am from clothespins,
from Clorox and carbon-tetrachloride.
I am from the dirt under the back porch.
(Black, glistening,
it tasted like beets.)
I am from the forsythia bush
the Dutch elm
whose long-gone limbs I remember
as if they were my own.

I’m from fudge and eyeglasses,
from Imogene and Alafair.
I’m from the know-it-alls
and the pass-it-ons,
from Perk up! and Pipe down!
I’m from He restoreth my soul
with a cottonball lamb
and ten verses I can say myself.

I’m from Artemus and Billie’s Branch,
fried corn and strong coffee.
From the finger my grandfather lost
to the auger,
the eye my father shut to keep his sight.

Under my bed was a dress box
spilling old pictures,
a sift of lost faces
to drift beneath my dreams.
I am from those moments–
snapped before I budded –
leaf-fall from the family tree

– George Ella Lyons

We made a short video with selections from several of the girls reading their poems aloud.

Where I’m From from The Modern Story on Vimeo.

What I failed to mention in the previous post was how in-adept the girls were at actually playing the sports that they so eagerly planned to describe in the video. While virtually the entire class agreed to make a video about women in sports, rather than discuss women’s education, teach the audience Tamil or present their school environment to a foreign audience, when it came time to film action sequences, the girls struggled endlessly to get a single competent shot. Because of time constraints and an unanticipated holiday that caused the girls to leave school and return to their home villages, we were unable to dedicate time to re-shooting a number of scenes and voice-overs that are inadequate.

I am not one to beat myself up for falling victim to circumstance, and I don’t dwell on the fact that the resulting video is not up to my standards. However, what I keep thinking about is what the film reveals about the half-baked nature of the girl’s education here. I am dwelling on the fact that the girls clearly have a desire to compete and participate in athletics, yet this interest is unfulfilled by their schooling.

I grew up in public schools in one of the worst school districts in the nation in Washington DC. Gym class was always an excellent example of the under-resourced status of the DCPS system, evidenced by crumbling, smelly, dank locker rooms, old and inadequate equipment and an overall unimaginative approach to teaching physical education. I will also be the first to admit that I was not always present in gym class, and when I was, I was not entirely engaged. However, I possess the basic skills and knowledge to demonstrate a volleyball serve, catch a fly ball in the air, make contact at bat, or kick a soccer ball. The girls of Analadi did not.

Their lack of skills was not for lack of trying. While one of my students looked lost, confused and somewhat terrified, the other three all exhibited signs of intense concentration and eagerness to please while we shot the footage of them playing basketball, volleyball and soccer. They were trying so hard, but their exposure to the rules and technique of formal sports had clearly been neglected.  The HM of the primary school tried to help supply them with information about the basics of these games, but her own knowledge was confused and incorrect (as I found out only too late while translating the footage after the fact).  A combination of rigid gender roles and a very near-sighted, tunnel vision approach to teaching focused on standardized testing are surely to blame for this ignorance.

Some people might not find this compelling.  So they’re not good at sports — what’s the big deal?  Aren’t academics more important? But for many students back home, athletics are the reason they come to school.  Kids push themselves in class because they have to keep up grades to play on a school team.  I’ve seen students at my former school turn their lives completely around because of the impact of sports.  Last June, I watched teary eyed as a student I’d known for three years accepted his diploma.  When I first had him in class in 2009, I asked him why he showed up only once every three weeks and he responded that he was always getting “locked up.”  Rugby came into his life one year later and I had the pleasure of having him in class last May for his final English credit.  Where once he had put his head down and fallen asleep or simply walked out of the class when bored, he now sat in the front row, focusing on the text we were reading with lazer concentration, always the first student to raise his hand to respond to my questions.  I can’t think of sports without thinking of Reverly.  But I digress…

I hadn’t realized how important athletics were to me personally until I came here to India.  When I couldn’t run outside because of the traffic and cultural norms, I realized that it was an essential part of my life that I am not willing to compromise.  I can’t imagine living without athletics, and it seems that many girls here have the desire to develop these skills too, but nowhere to help them in their efforts. If they aren’t introduced to sports through physical education at school, they won’t be able on their own to seek out the very few girls sports teams that exist — generally for upper class, westernized girls who attend private schools.

Analadi girls (and Stella) show off their ups

As is often the case, I see hope and an exception to the rule at Railway. When asked to write about their proudest moment for homework, a number of girls recounted experiences winning medals in track competitions.  Girls can be seen out on the grounds, skipping rope and running during their PE period.  So I conclude with an idea for next year’s fellows — TMS soccer team?