English vocabulary, Chinese football and Indian roads

When we got back from the trip to Ooty and Mysore, I still didn’t know what I was going to do for Blessing Kids. Bhanu took me to a village to meet a lady who has a trust that takes care of the physically disabled. She asked me if I could conduct some sort of summer camp for children, where I would teach them English and play games with them. I told Bhanu this wasn’t exactly what I had come to do, and that I wasn’t really qualified to do it. But since there was nothing else to do – because of the summer holidays, her own projects weren’t running – I agreed to give it a try for two weeks. This humble engineer had to convert himself into a merciless English teacher. I was going to have to take care of 15 healthy and 15 disabled children, on my own, starting the next day. With hindsight, I realize this was madness; luckily, it never got to this point.

The next day, without any preparation, I took care of 11 children, only one of which was slightly disabled. I improvised, testing their basic reading, writing and language skills and letting them play their own games. That was on Friday; the next Monday I went back to the same village, better prepared this time. A couple of children had been added to the group, so, flexible as I am, I tested their knowledge too and let them join in. The differences in education were big, ranging from almost illiterate to a good knowledge of basic English vocabulary and spelling. It wasn’t easy, but I managed to play some language games and I started to really get to know the children. You can imagine my frustration when the next morning, an hour before leaving for work, I was told I would go to another village. That’s where I spent the rest of the two weeks. I taught English, literally under a tree, with nothing more than a chair and a tiny blackboard. I had to start remembering names and testing knowledge all over again. The group of children, apart from a couple of faithful followers, changed a lot; almost every day, children would leave or join the group. Again, there were big differences in education level, and also in age – the youngest kid was 7 years old, the oldest one 14.

The biggest problem was that I had no translator. Luckily, the oldest children had a reasonable level of English. They learn it at school, 45 minutes every day, and some of the children had just completed their 5th year. No need to explain them what a cucumber or a helicopter is, or to tell them how to write those words. But the teachers in Tamil Nadu seem to overlook some crucial points. Try to ask these children a question – or anyone Tamil Nadu, for that matter – and you will most likely end up in a mad house. They don’t seem to ever even have heard words like “why”, “where” or “who”. What’s more, some basic verbs, like “to know”, “to mean” or “to understand”, seem to be unknown to them as well. What makes communicating even more difficult, is that people here have a very hard time admitting they don’t understand a single word of what you’re trying to tell them. They usually say “okay”, or “yes”, or just repeat part of what you said. So imagine conversations like:

Me: Who took the ball yesterday?
Children: …
Me: Who, which person? Don’t you know what “who” means?
Children: …
Me: Who knows what “who” means?
Children: …
Me: (slowly) Who knows what “who” means?
Children: (in chorus, at the same speed) Oo no what oo min.
Me: No no, I’m asking you, question: who knows what “who” means?
Children: …
Me: Anand, do you know what “who” means?
Anand: Okay, sir.
Me: (sigh) Do…you, Anand (pointing at Anand)…know (pointing at my head)…what…who, the word who, means?
Anand: (staring blankly)
Me: The meaning of the word who. Meaning, to mean, don’t you know what “to mean” means?
Children: …

Sometimes I did want them to repeat after me, for instance when I was teaching them a song:

Me: Okay, so repeat after me. If you’re happy…
Children: …
Me: Repeat…after…me, okay? So I say (pointing at myself)… you say (pointing at the children).
Children: (enthusiastically, in chorus) I say (pointing at themselves), you say (pointing at me)!
Me: (sigh) Okay, let’s try this. If you’re happy…
Children: …and you know it…
Me: No! Repeat…after…me! Repeat! Don’t you know what “to repeat” means?
Etc…

The biggest challenge came when one day, all of a sudden, a severely disabled boy, both physically and mentally, was dropped between the other children – they were all non-disabled (except for one kid, who proudly showed me his 12 fingers and 12 toes). I tried to explain that it would be really hard to manage, but they told me he was only there for one day and that I didn’t have to take care of him, he would just sit there and observe the others. He ended up staying until the last day, being relatively discrete but claiming my attention every once in a while. And just imagine having the type of conversations I described earlier, with in the background a kid that is literally crawling around and uttering incoherent sounds. Unfortunately, I’m still waiting for those nerves of steel I ordered a couple of months ago.

Luckily, the number of children rarely exceeded 15, and I worked only from 10am to 3pm (with lunch break). I still had two challenging weeks, though. It was no doubt the most difficult part of my trip until now; I felt lonely, discouraged by the many problems, and I missed the careless life of a backpacker. But I dealt with it the only way I could: trying to be the best darn English teacher I could. Every day I spent several hours preparing games and exercises; luckily, I had some reference material from someone who did something similar before. When I taught them vocabulary, things usually went well. We had a lot of fun playing games like Memory and Pictionary; it was rewarding to hear them enthusiastically cry out words I had taught them. During the breaks, we played games I remembered from my childhood – the biggest hit was Chinese football. “Sir, sir, Chinese football, sir!”, I can still here them call out every five minutes. So I managed, but I still felt reluctant to go to work, and I was relieved every time that part of the day was over.

(Me with some of the children, under the tree where I taught them English)

In the weekends, I usually went to Pondicherry, where thanks to the Danish girl I knew some other volunteers. Before going to Cuddalore, I had this romantic idea of being completely isolated in some Indian village; but when you have to face big challenges every day in an unfamiliar environment, it’s such a relief to have a beer and talk to people you can actually communicate with, that it’s hard to renounce. On weekdays, my favorite way of escaping reality was my scooter. After that first time I rented a moped in Pondy, I decided the fun it gave me was worth taking the risk of facing Indian traffic – as a compromise, I wore a helmet, contrary to 99.9% of local drivers. It was interesting to become an active part of the crazy traffic I had been observing for several months. It was exhausting at first, but once I got the hang of it – left thumb on the horn, the rest of the fingers on the brake, and following the most important (and only) priority rule: “I always have priority, except if you’re big enough to kill me”– I enjoyed it a lot. It was a way to feel free, and to explore the surroundings. Around Cuddalore like in all of India, I love the roads. I drove among many motorbikes – a lot of them with women sitting sideways –, cars, noisy autorickshaws, rusty bicycles, bullock carts, and unreasonably fast trucks and buses with their loud horns, all overtaking each other from both sides, honking frantically. The dusty roadside is populated by women in their colorful sarees, sometimes carrying things on their heads, men adjusting their lunghis (traditional skirts), kids in their school uniforms, and various animals like cows, goats and dogs, who have the great habit of crossing the road at the most random moments – quite unusual obstacles. Sometimes, when there was not too much traffic around, I would pick up speed and enjoy the green landscape flashing by, feeling free as a bird.

(A couple of random pictures of roads)

After two weeks, as the relative comfort of routine was slowly setting in, my task of English teaching came to an end. I was still wondering what I was going to do next, when one night Bhanu suggested me to go traveling for two weeks and come back in June. Because of the holidays, there was no work for me, and I could take the opportunity to do some tourism before the monsoon came. Even though that sounded like a good plan, and in spite of the tough time I had had, I didn’t feel like leaving; I really started to feel at home in Melpattambakkam, and I would miss cruising around on my scooter and sitting on my terrace, gazing at the fields and palm trees that surrounded me. I would get bored if I stayed, though, so I decided to leave. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the start of a new adventure; I will tell you all about it in my next story.