Photo's !

School

so yesterday was my first day visiting the school.

It's in a little rural village about a 40 minute bus journey away. But the bus journey is really pretty so it makes up for the long sweaty hustle and bustle of being in the bus. We pass rice padi fields, and a gawjus lake, & lots of colourful houses.

The kids are all different ages in the class, they range from 14 to 20. which is a little awkward for me, because I'm younger than a lot of them.

Today was kinda scary at first... because i was chucked in the deep end and asked to teach a whole class !(30-40 kids) which was a little intimidating , especially because all they do is stare, giggle and whisper to each other.

But i found the English teacher john ,sitting in the teachers lounge drinking a cuppa and having some snacks, and explained that i was only there to assist not actually take over their job... I ended up with 7 kids , who eagerly listened to every word i said.... I'm pretty sure they didn't understand most of it, but hey.

so tomorrow hopefully i will be a little more relaxed with them, as they will me :).

overall it was a good day. I'm happy :)

*flower market stall in Panjim.

*cows chilling on the beach

* At the beach in Anjuna

I had a lovely first weekend in Goa. Friday night ,i went out with some of the other guys and gals to Baga (to party). It was reli fun apart from on the way back in the taxi. I had to sit in the boot with no seat just a metal lump to sit on... and Indian roads are very bumpy! Sat, we went to Anjuna beach for a few hours. Anjuna is very cool, lots of hippies and colours... and it constantly smells of pot .

Today laura (a fellow volunteer) and i went into Panjim. We went to see another bollywood film and also checked out the famous flower, fish and fruit market... where we ought some ripped dvd's :s .

Tomorrow i start work, but i'm not very happy with what they have arranged for me to do. I will be at a village High school, working with ages up to 17 . I signed up to work with little kids in bangalore, yet im working with teenagers in Goa .

Well, anyway let's see how it goes.

so i've started to settle in now, it was abit difficult at first because all the plans where changed and i had no idea what was going on + i had barely had any sleep for the past few days. And also everybody doing the projects at my youth hostel is a lot older than me, so i feel a little lonely . But on the bright side, I've done some cool things so far...
This morning i was woken up at 6am , we had to go to the main room and do 1 hour of yoga. Of course we had a teacher, who taught us all sorts of funny breathing exercises to "cleanse your body of all its toxins" . We have to do the same tomorrow .
At lunch time i helped the cook make chapatis , she made it look so easy ... i was a bit rubbish at rolling them into perfect circles :s.
Below is a picture of a Temple Elephant , they go around a few days in the year and wonder through the local village's . People chant and sing and dance and feed it lots of treats.
Tomorrow we are going to a Temple to learn more about the Hindu lifestyle and religion. I'm looking forward to that.
After we are going to go and watch a 4 hour Bollywood movie. Should be fun.

So i have finally found a little shed in Goa where they have a computer ! Yippee! so now i can tell you all that I've gone through so far ...
New years eve mum and i stayed at the Hilton terminal 4 hotel. Where i relaxed and tried to calm my nerves, ready to go the next morning.
7am i had to check my bags in, which was all fine apart from the fact there was a 40 minute cue ! every Indian person there had at least 2 massive suitcase's ! So after i finally checked in there was no time to have breaky so i said a very emotional "goodbye" to mum and that was it... the start of my adventure.
The first thing i realised about India is, its all just go with the flow. Lots of last minute changes going on and not many people wanting to inform you ... so that was slightly scary, made me a little homesick :( .
So originally i was supposed to be in Bangalore, but i was informed as i got on the bus (literally) "By the way your going to Goa " ,"WHAT!? No-one told me ! whats going on?!" . so ofcourse that shook me up a little. Anyway i'm in Goa now...
Goa is very westernised as it used to be controlled by the Portuguise . We are staying in a small youth hostel which is run by one of the event orginisers. There are 5 girls in my room , i've only met one so far. She was on the bus with me . She is very nice and i dont feel so nervouse now that i know she is going through more or less the same thing as me.
Tomorrow we start our training week, i will give you more updates when i can. Probably on the weekend . :) . missing everyone and general civilisation .