The last few days

We've had some Internet trouble (it is rural India), but I'm on now and I want to share an update of my first few days in India, hopefully before I lose power. I arrived in the middle of the night on Sunday and took a shower, since I felt like I needed one after 30 hours of travel time. I was staying in the Marriot, so they had a western-style shower. Also, I wanted to savor my last real shower. On Monday morning, I ate at the Marriot breakfast buffet. I had Indian breakfast, and it was good, especially a stuffed bread called a Paratha. It is made to order with things mixed into the dough and then baked on a stone in a brick oven. Then, at 11 am, we left in a bumpy bus through the city of Chennai for Rising Star. It was fun to see the interesting sights out the window, especially the cows wandering on the side of the city streets. When we arrived at Rising Star, I got to see the exciting Indian toilets and bucket showers, as well as the room where I'll be staying, the courtyard, the grove of mango trees, and so on. Then we all headed over to play with the Rising Star children during "playtime." Playtime was exhausting! That evening I learned that in addition to teacher training, I would be taking over four classes starting the next day - 1st grade phonics, 1st grade writing, 7th grade English, and 8th grade English. They call grades "standards" here. On Tuesday, I observed the teachers of these classes to find out what was going on, as well as running a teacher training on lesson planning. The training went really well. Although I only had a half an hour, and I could have talked much more about lesson planning, the teachers responded really well. I've since had a number of teachers tell me that they thought that what I taught was really useful and they plan to use it. Also, it allowed me to get to know the teachers a little bit better. I told them that it was really hot here (it is - I think I'm melting), and they laughed. I told them that it snowed not that long ago in Cody, and one looked at the other with a confused expression and said "snow?". The other one explained that it was cold from the sky. Today I taught for the first time. Mostly, it went really well, but my first class with the third grade group (phonics) was tough. It is clear that the young kids think that Americans are playmates, and so when I showed up to teach, they figured it was playtime. This made managing the class difficult, but I got through it, and when I came back to teach the same group writing after lunch, I was better prepared and the class went much, much better. I have high hopes that tomorrow will go well. One of the wonderful things that is happening is that the children are starting to know my name. They call me "ma'am" or "auntie" or "Heather ma'am." They run up to me and climb on me like kittens. I have a couple of boys in my "family" - I'm assigned to a group at the boy's hostel - who find me in school and remind me to come during "family time" and help them with their maths. They tell me about what they're doing and are excited for me to get there. I have to say, kids are pretty similar all over the world, whether they are in class or playing, whether they are teasing, or getting into trouble, or showing love. These kids absolutely love cameras - they want to take pictures and have their pictures taken all day. They like to dance in front of the camera and make funny faces. They also love to tease their "auntie" and "uncle" volunteers. Today, some boys made a lasso with a rope and covered it with sand and then tried to get volunteers to stand in the middle of it so that they could pull it tight and catch them. They are a good group of kids - some are better, more motivated students and others are more challenging, but they all have great potential. I am enjoying my time here and I am excited to see what the next weeks will bring.
I miss you all, and I hope to be able to tell you more soon. Hopefully the Internet, and the power, will hold out. We have quite a few power outages every day, but they usually don't last too long. I hope that all is well with you!