Chinnarangala 4,5,6

Action continues. The children still come to school. They run around.... fight majorly....play or climb trees...... and when tired stop, sit, listen to the teacher - write/paint. Thats children, at their very best!

With each passing saturday, I take out my camera less often. The kids & their actions are no more novelties ;-))

We have had good support from other groups.

Firstly, it was the Reuters gang...they came...they saw...they played.....and left behind a lot of crayons/books/stationaries and hazzar clothes for the kids. This coupled with the cloth collection, we had from other donors was distributed 2 weeks back. Except for a few kids, almost everybody got 1/2 clothes. Somehow, more of girl clothes than boyz.

Texas Instruments had a cloth drive as part of their Annual day. And, passed them to us. Here, we had clothes of all ages, and in the children category have ended up with clothes for very young girls & babies.

Then entered FSL India, and after a good look-around, they were clear 'bout what to do....A medical camp.....and a day of funNGames.

So, last saturday was medical camp. Dr Anand lead. It was over 40 kids .....most of them very diagnoised with some hygine related disorders. Each kid got a toothbrush/paste/soap and some multi-vitamin tablets.....to be given along with their lunch at school........and ofcourse, the prescribed medicine. Lotz of very young girls were crying & totally uncomfortable in seeing a doctor. My job was to talk to them...get their names....and their ages....had to guess majorly. And their sex....had some problems with some kids with long hair. You think...itz a girl...until they announce their names.....and you look startled......then ask the kids around...'Hey, is this a boy!'...YES, they declare....I take their word. The camp went eventless until a 4 year old girl slapped me for pestering for her name!!! The other volunteers took the weight, height, pulse & temperature. And, the enthusiastic doctor did the final honours. Lot of Telugu speaking kids....so one of the teachers had to translate. Pretty good medical camp. The doc came back after a few days with the prescribed medicine & passed them on with neccessary instructions.

And that afternoon, we had one of our expert volunteer joinig us. Meet Mr. Chaitanya, a 12th std student, he was keen on contributing. And, he came up with Charcoal painting. Kids were guided into drawing a house, trees, clouds etc. And, then using charcoal on it. I had never seen such stuff before. The kids got going.....once they get in...itz tough to stop them.....they draw...they paint/color....and then most of them get so carried away they color/draw all over the place ;-)

Today...the FSL gang came carrying in lot of things.....a crayon box/pencil/drawing book for each kid. And, 2 footballs......and hold ur breath....2 cricket bats...stumps...3 tennis balls.....the kids were overjoyed.....they have been pestering me for cricket bats for weeks now.....I had been evasive.....now they were maha-thrilled. They somehow think I am behind it ;-))

So, we started with the painting session....the kids soon settled down to it....and furiously got going.....they crayoned colorfully. Some of the volunteers drew pictures/scenes for them to color up. And, met up with Pooja....a volunteer with FSL...a 2nd year BBM student......she zapped me with her push....asking those searching/uncomfortable questions. She wanted that proactive approach. And, as we parted, she said 'Once, you come to volunteer, you should not stand and laze around......start doing things'......wow! thats volunteerism for me ;-)

Yes...we got the kids to kick the football......the kids chased the ball like mad.

Guyz...thats how Chinnarangalla is progressing, we are seeing a good turn out, after 6 weeks too. And, hope to get them to continue with the regular school. We have a couple of saturdays to go, interested, join us.