Walking home

Walking home in the dark is a nice way to end a long day, be it after rehearsals, study hall, meetings or music practice. It’s peaceful and the town is lit up along the hillside, with the backdrop of Dehradun in the background.

Most unfortunately, my camera fails at taking good photos of this, so you’ll just have to use you imaginations.

The weather in Mussoorie is officially beautiful. Monsoon season is over, the heat is on, and the sun shines brightly all day.

Today in drama rehearsal we had our first full run-through of the production. I love it so so so so SO much.

Stage fighting is officially the coolest thing in the freaking world. As young Siward, I have a fabulous sword scene with Macbeth.

It goes some thing like this: I rush Macbeth with broadsword, deflected, I lunge, get hit in the back with hilt of M. sword, Macbeth sends sword skittering across the stage, I hobble over to fallen sword, M. hits it out of my hand, I back up trembling onto the stairs (I’ll have a blood bag under my arm) GET STABBED! I curl my body in on the sword, and Shalaka (aka Macbeth) stage whispers to me “thou wast born of woman” and pushes me off her sword. I lie sprawled on the stairs panting as she examines her blood-smeared blade. “But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn. For none can harm me of a woman…” and on BORN she kicks me off the stairs. I then lie sprawled onstage for the next two scenes.

According to Milo (Siward aka dad) I’m very good at being a dead body. He has the luxury of transporting me offstage before the last scene. Teehee…

It’s a little unfortunate that Milo is cradling my head for about 5 minutes. He’s the kind of guy that loves to crack jokes, but as the dead body, I can’t laugh!!!

News flash: for those I have not informed, I am also playing Fleance, son of Banquo. This part requires no lines, but I get to do some fun falling and running during Banquo’s murder scene. To be honest, I’m happy with the small parts of the play. Poor Shalaka is kind of going nuts as the title character and a gr. 12 AP student.

In terms of studies, I am actually doing fairly well, though I could be doing better. My best subject by far is Algebra (???), followed closely by French, English, Music and the sciences. I am not doing as well in the sciences as I had hoped, but I’m developing a much better understanding of all the principles. I just need to get a lot better at doing labs. Parents: be aware of an impending report card!

I am also a member of the writing center at Woodstock. This basically means I get to sit around for 3 hours a week in the hopes that someone will need help with their essay. Usually, I’m left to my own devices for the hour I’m there, but today, for the first time, someone actually knew where it was, what it was for, and required my assistance! I’m pretty pumped about that, actually.

I have signed up for the IAYP  (international award for young people) program, formerly called the Duke of Edinburgh award. I’m going for my silver level, meaning I will complete it in about a year. This requires 3 aspects, as well as an adventurous journey: skill, service, and physical activity. Skill: Dance and German. Service: tutoring and Amnesty international (PS email me if you want to sign my petition! EmilySteers@woodstock.ac.in). Physical activity: Climbing and strength training. Pretty much all of these can carry over to home, where I’ll finish the award next October.

A warning to all those at home: you have no choice, none whatsoever; we are going to watch Lagaan. It’s this amazing Hindi movie that Devika introduced to Annabelle, and me, and it’s my new favourite thing in the world.

Some clips you need to see:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9dnRFyGQzg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmC86-uX7JE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqxpGOHUH9k

 

Tomorrow I’m leaving on the quarter break expedition to Darwa pass and Lake Dodital. I’m packed and ready to go!

Risk factors: dehydration, hypothermia, hyperthermia, altitude sickness, twisted ankles, trench foot, falling objects, and (white people problems) sunburn.

Food for the week: lots of GORP (good ol’ raisins and peanuts), dark chocolate, honey and oatmeal, bananas, paneer, rice & dahl, potatoes, pasta, tuna, and PB. I had a last slice of chocolate cake to say goodbye to naughty foods  :P.

 

Finally, happy birthday to my dearest and most wonderful mother!!!

And of course, happy early 14th birthday to my beloved brother! I hope it’s amazing and that you ace your geography test!!!


Love, kisses and amazingness from afar,
Emily
PS sorry for the lack of photos. Internet wan't letting me put them up last night so I'm doing this on a school computer in studay hall.

PPS THANK YOU to Patricia and Dahlia, who went to the nightwish concert last week, got me a t-shirt and apparently had the best time of their lives! Keep metal-ing, ladies!

His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Her it is, at long last!!!

Last Sunday, Woodstock received a visit from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. To represent Woodstock’s cultural diversity, we all had to wear our cultural dress. This time, instead of wearing Indian dress, I went all out Canadian in my ceinture fleché and Le Château skirt.

After being frisked by four sets of security, we went in and sat in the gym.  We waited for about ½ hour, and then his holiness arrived.

His Holiness said some amazing things. He spoke of being just another person, not some mystic being capable of amazing things.

The Dalai Lama told us that on a human level, we are all fundamentally the same. Even when things happen to other people, other groups, we can still feel empathy and compassion towards them.

This empathy and compassion, this affection, is not found ion religion, but biologically. We are already equipped with everything we need to help others. Religiously, we are given more tools in order to help people, but anyone is capable of empathy and compassion, be they atheist, Buddhist, Christian or Muslim. People should not be treated based on religion, caste, or race, but on shared humanity.

He told us the secret of staying healthy. Constant fear, constant anger, it eats away at us. We need to take care of ourselves emotionally, spiritually, and physically. Getting enough sleep, staying peaceful with others and in your own mind, living in community where you are depended upon and can depend upon others. This is a healthy human state. We need to erase our jealousy, anger, and suspicion. We need to project positivity instead of constant negativity.

He told us that it is not possible to be religious in spite of corruption. How can you cheat and bully others and still call yourself a man of God? You must follow ethics first, then religious creed.

He told us that external beauty is important, but not nearly as important as inner beauty. A marriage based on the love of a person's INNER beauty is one that has promise and potential, where both parties are respected and happy. Their beauty, warm-heartedness, action and affection are their true attraction.

He told us that with a sense of compassion should be a sense of ecological compassion. We have to think not only of our present and ourselves but also of the coming generation, and what we are leaving our children. What are we going to leave them with? Hopefully not some kind of spoiled, rotten version of what we ourselves have inherited. If we think about everyone, globally, we will leave a better future for the world behind us. In Tibet, you can drink out of most rivers. Most of the world would regard this as folly, but it is safe. This planet is our ONLY home.

Peace will be attained, not through force, but by inner peace within yourself, your nation, and your community. Smarter people are generally more peaceful people; therefore everyone should have equal access to education. Education reduces the gap between appearance and reality.

Thank you to His Holiness for these words of wisdom, and for sharing our common humanity.

GAAAHH INTERNET/Amnesty

I'm so so so so sorry about the wait, I have a post ready to publish, but internet is refusing to connect to my computer. I PROMISE I will have the Dalai Lama post up as soon as is humanly possible!

In the meantime, please enjoy what I have to say about Amnesty international.

Yesterday we began a project as part of the Amnesty international group at Woodstock school. Our project for an indefinite amount of time is going to be working in the slums of Mussoorie. These families work as rag-pickers, going over the waste and garbage of the town and selling it wherever they can. They live in 1-room shacks with tin roofs. We are going to talk to the governemtn and petition to get these people the BPL (below poverty line) cards they need, so that they can get discounts on necessary foods.
It is estimated that approximately 70% of BPL cards holders actually live above the poverty line, the cards going to people who can afford bribes or who have government connections. We are going to try and fight this corruption, and get the cards to the ones that so desperately need it.

Yesterday, I met a girl called Sungita. She is in grade 9, and is the oldest of four siblings (the rest are boys). Her father works at the local police academy. Sungita hopes to become a police officer when she grows up.
Her family has to pay about 17 000 rupees per month for a 10-10 room, with 1 bed and a dresser.
Annabelle and I left the room after a while, because it was getting too hot with our whole group there. We went outside and had an intesresting "conversation" with Sungita's younger brother whoses name has unfortunatley slipped my memory. We exchanged a few words, but he managed to understand why we were there and we understood that he liked to play football (soccer) and is in grade 8 at the local school, for 7 rupees a month. It was actually a lot of fun trying to puzzle out what the other was saying! We had a couple of small misunderstandings but it was all in fun.

When we left we were cheerfully waved off by all the children living in the slum. They seemed very optimistic about our invlovment in their little community.
We are going to make a difference in our community.
I think this is the most important thing I could do at Woodstock.

I'm the big spoooon!!!!

That's what happens when you get a whole bunch of 16-year-old girls hopped up on unlimited coke, pizza, and ice cream. We get CRAZYYY!!!

Grade 11 pod night for the midlands girls was the most fun I've had all week, hands down. After having paid the meager sum of 120 RS we went to Deodar for, as mentioned above, unlimited pizza, coke and ice cream. We remained in this state of hyperness until about 12:30 am, whereupon we all simutaneously crashed, and I got to be the big spoon! (Love ya, Tanu).

Today I went to Buzz with Annabelle and Devika. So much fun, I spent an obscene amount of money ;)
But on the plus side, people back home now have presents!

Coming up this week is a whole buch of stuff. We have the Dalai Lama visiting tomorrow (EEE!), Mussoorie writer's festival this week, interschool c, and another Advisor night!
This time we're going out for lunch/dinner at Char Dukhan, visiting Mr Steve's house for dessert, and going to the gym for free rein on the gymnastics room and watching Rush Hour 1 (or LOTR, we haven't decided yet).

So, that's all for now folks! I will write about the Dalai Lama tomorrow!

Emily

5 days and then BAM!

Yes, 5 days of clear sunny, warm days, then 4 am rolls around and BAM!
Thundeeerrrr!!!!
Lightniiiing!!!

Which unfortunately resulted in my waking up at 7:30 am this morning after a rather fitful night. Devika and I both woke up sleepily, then we saw the time and simultaneously LEAPED out of bed.
We still made it to school on time, so yay us!

In other news, Tanya is RIDICULOUSLY hyper, and has been for the past few weeks. Reason being, her sister-in-law is having a baby today. To hear Tanya talk though, you'd think the baby was hers!
Congratulations to the Lohias!!!

I have also been writing poerty like a maniac. :)
30 watchers on DeviantART!

Finally, Tanuvee and I, for various reasons, have decided to take each other as dates to Sadie Hawkins.
Thank you to Devika for letting me borrow her dress!

That is all for now,
Stay awesome, readers.
Emily

Untitled

Hello all,

Photo blast!

Well it’s been an exciting few days at Woodstock!

On Wednesday, we had inter-house cross-country (16^th place, 20:47, 3.7 km). I was running for the Merlin’s (vs. Eagles and Condors). Go red!

I’m not exactly sure how everyone did, but a whole bunch of Merlins did really well, and Kalki is going to inter-school. Good job everyone!

Photo cred to Mr Steve:

Back from the races!

Go Merlins!

Thursday was Music Day, meaning that there was a conjunction of Thursday and day 4. This means that I have vocal lessons, and Acapella twice, within the space of 4 hours. We’re singing “Viva la Vida”, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”, “Livin’ In A Holy City”, and “Ave Maria”. All really really really fun songs! (Although the soprano part in Viva la Vida leaves something to be desired).

Also on Thursday, I got info about the quarter break trek to the Himalayas. I am so ridiculously excited about this. All my friends are completely mystified as to why I WANT to go trekking for a week in the mountains. I’m not completely sure myself, but I’m certain that this will be awesome!!!

Uh huh. I’m going THERE.

Friday, I managed to fall spectacularly down the stairs, bruising my arm and tailbone, meaning I couldn’t go hiking on Saturday.

Sigh...

Next week, it will happen.

Today we had Chapel; I got to take a taxi up to school with Uma because of my tailbone and her ankle. I got to use a seatbelt!!! It made me unreasonably happy.

One thing I don’t understand about Chapel: why do so many girls wear heels to walk up? I’m always baffled by the number of girls teetering their way up the mountain in stilettos. I really don’t understand my gender sometimes.

Off to a new week!

Emily

PS this time next week the Dalai Lama will be here. I'm not excited at all...

I'm also terrible at lying.

EEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What is so complicated about envelopes?

Sending mail from Woodstock is not a terribly complicated process. The post office is an on-campus site, they provide the stamps, and collection is once every day. To send a letter to Canada is really quite cheap: only 25 RS for a standard-sized letter.

The process of acquiring envelopes, however, is becoming more complicated with each attempt.

The first time I tried to send a letter home, I went to the post office and asked to send a letter home to Canada. I gave them my folded sheet of Cambridge paper, only to be met with a look of confusion. This was another one of those times where I wish I spoke Hindi. Through the man’s (very) thick Hindi accent, I managed to understand that I needed to provide my own envelopes, which could be acquired at the senior school office.

“Ok, not hard” I thought to myself. I walked up the ramp to the office and asked for an envelope, went back down, paid 25 RS and sent my first letter.

About a week later, I wanted to send another letter. I went to the senior school office, where they seemed mighty surprised to see me again. I asked for another envelope, which they handed over somewhat reluctantly. I asked if I needed to pay for all these envelopes I kept using, but the question was ignored. I went down and paid my 25 RS, and the letter was sent off.

“All right, free envelopes!” was the sentiment for that afternoon.

Not so, my friends, not so.

Today I tried to send my third letter. I marched right into the senior school office and requested another envelope. They seemed a little more on the ball today, and they asked me “Why are you using all these envelopes?”

“I’m sending letters home”

“You can’t do that. These are for college use.”

“Oh. Ok.”

Now what?

After school I go down to dorm store, and have a friend ask (in Hindi) the man there if they stocked envelopes.

Nope

Now what?

This is the part where I get to go on an adventure to the deep recesses behind the school cafeteria to the vey well-hidden supply store. They also seemed mighty confused about my request for some envelopes. I managed to persuade them to part with two, also without having to pay a single rupee.

I go back to the post office and send the letter without any further issues.

I’m not exactly sure what to do about this situation. I’m not keen on robbing the school but at the same time no one here seems to understand my desire to correspond via snail mail. Whenever I ask where I can get envelopes I’m met with a blank stare.

Help?

In other news, I’ve finally cracked the two songs Mr. Okie has me working on!

Woot woot, musical proficiency!

Extinguish my eyes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9tAUwqeqxg&feature=related

When my soul touches yours: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AP1MAYb3p8A

Finally, actually right about now, everyone back home is getting up and going to school.

As Mr. Steve said “hate to say it, but we’re already 34 days smarter than you”!

Have a blast, everyone,

Emily

PS thank you to the Kibbutz for the wishboat! That really made my day!

Just a general update (with photos: yay!)

Holy thunder and lightning batman!!! I have never witnessed a storm like the one last night. The storm started at about 10 pm, with far-off lighting in the distance. At about 1:45 am, I was rudely awakened by a massive “BOOOOM”! That rattled the windows (and we have some pretty big windows). This continued pretty much incessantly for I-don’t-know-how-long, but I got back to sleep about 3 ish, I’m not exactly sure.

Great way to get ready for a chem. test, isn’t it?

So anyway, I haven’t written an OFFICIAL update for a while now.

Photos  I have taken recently that are awesome:

Some fantastic rain, which nonetheless pales in comparison to last night.

A nice shot of quad

Because I can never take too many photos of the hill station

On advisor morning, Mr Steve decided to take advantage of the fabulous sunshine. We jumpd out the windows in the health room onto the balcony outside. This is a shot of the quad from above!

I’ll start on Thursday, the day of the RE (religious ed.) retreat to Rajpur. That was reeeaaaaallly fun; the center was absolutely beautiful. I stayed in the red bungalow with Nina, Subin, Yeshin, Eein and Devika. It was a bit weird not to have Kalki there, to be honest.

The facilities included bucket showers, geckoes and sporadic electricity, which was surprisingly nice. It was actually quite restful.

The red bungalow!

Here's a photo of mine and Devika's room

This photo is actually quite deceptive, as it leads you to believe the electricity was functional at the time.

Not so. This was our only source of light!

This is our bathroom!

Now with flash ;)

Friday, we went on our missions. I wrote about that in the previous post, so go check that out! It was a superb experience for me, and the rest of the group.

ZOMG SEAT BELT!

(In the taxi on the way to Herbertpur)

Mine didn't work :(

The view from the center I visited

I couldn't tell what fruit these were. Does anyone know?

Friday night was completely social. There was an epic truth-or-dare game which included Kalki singing gospel to the teachers, Setse awkwardly sitting beside a couple for 1 minute exactly, and (my favourite) Nina having to dance “Gagnam style” on the table the next day at breakfast (http://satwcomic.com/gangnam-style

 Once it has been seen it cannot be unseen).

This resulted in a hilarious dance lesson for Nina that evening in the bungalow, at the hands of our ever-so-patient Eein.

Left right left left, right left right right, cowboy lasso, hip rotation… Eein, you taught us well.

Some pics of the retreat center:

Dining hall

Some really pretty archways

Worship center

Playing football!

A gecko totally invaded our room, you know, no biggie...

On Saturday, which started off with the awesome dance show, we had a worship service with the Woodstock chaplain; Jubin spoke to us about her program (Anugrah) and we had a time of quiet reflection. I definitely learned a lot this weekend, and I am really happy to have gone on this trip!

Here are some photos of the trip home that I really liked:

Saturday night, I watched my first Hindi movie: Cocktail! It’s a movie about an elaborate love triangle (therefore fairly easy to follow, even with the lack of subtitles). It was actually really fun (even if my friends would rather I’d seen a better one as my first).

On to Sunday, we were rudely awakened by monkeys that decided to jump around on the roof for about 3 hours. I was highly amused. Devika was not.

Aside from tha, we relaxed all day. We ate a rather sad amount of junk food (thank-you, Tanuvee), played jungle speed, ordered in, and studied for chem.

Cinnabon...

Momos are my new favourite thing :D

We also helped Ms Maya finish up the "movie reels" of photos: every girl in grade 11 is featured somewhere along the wall. These are just the ones that we put up yesterday:

About the chem test: I TOTALLY DIDN’T FAIL!!! I don’t know what mark I got yet, but I am really confident about my chances. Yay Internet for teaching me AP chemistry!

That’s been my awesome week so far. Can you believe I’ve already been in India for a month and 5 days? I can’t…

Have fun at school tomorrow, everyone! >:D

Lots of love,

Emily

Anugrah

Who are we as Christians? What does being a Christian really mean?

It’s not just about singing the songs; it’s not just about saying you believe in Jesus. 

It’s what we do and how we live that shows our faith and our way of life.

That is my demonstration of faith.

This weekend, we had the opportunity to go on a Christian retreat to Rajpur. We left on Thursday after school and drove two hours to the retreat center.

When we arrived, we went to worship and chose our mission activities. I joined a group of 5 girls to go to the Herbertpur hospital in Dehradun, specifically to visit their day centers for handicapped children.

The Anugrah program (named after the boy that started the program) is remarkable. With very limited resources these people, mostly parent volunteers, come together and offer rehabilitation and support for parents and children alike. They do extensive work in the villages where the child comes from, so that not only the child is treated, but the community and the family are educated about the child, and taught how to help the child deal with their differences.

After learning about the history of the program, we divided into two groups: Hindi speakers and English speakers. I, as an English speaker, went with our leader Suja, Aya and Ms Fabi to the center in Dehradun.

We met 5 children (names omitted) there: 3 boys with cerebral palsy, one boy with autism, and a girl with an undiagnosed mental handicap. We arrived during “activity time” where the kids would sit and do things with their hands. They seemed very excited when we got there, greeting us with “Namaste” and huge smiles. The mother volunteering there for the day got one of the boys to demonstrate how he had just learned to walk. He stood up proudly and walked around the room.

Another one of the boys, the only one with a wheelchair (but not the only one in need of one) was really fun. He kept showing off, popping wheelies in his chair out in the hall. Ms Suja told us they are trying to send him to school, because he has the capacity for it. She told us a story about how he had mastered the ability to put a pen cap on a pen: his arms were so out of control, he straps down his arm holding the pen and moves his other arm towards it. It took him almost a year and a half to master this ability.

Boxes of stuff to do!

Legos: no matter where you go in the world, they will find the sole of your foot.

After the activity time, we all played a game, a bit like “hot potato”. Ms Suja played some music on her phone, and we passed around a stuffed animal. If the music stopped while you were holding the toy, you had to get up and dance in the circle. Lots of fun, and all the kids got really into it. 

After that, we cleaned up the playroom and went on a tour of the facilities. They had a couple of different rooms suited to different purposes. One room was empty but for a few mats on the floor and walls: this was for the boys with cerebral palsy to play around in without fear of getting hurt. 

There was also a darkened room with a fiber-optics cable ball and different textures taped on the wall. This was for autistic children, different things to help entertain them. 

Finally, we got to see the activity room, where there were a variety of different things. There was an exercise ball for the kids to practice sitting and balancing. There were plastic cricket bats. There were checkerboards, and stuffed animals. There was an exercise machine for the boys with cerebral palsy to stretch out there arms. The boy in the wheelchair counted up to 100 of these, in English too!

This is the "Choice board". Because the kids are mostly illiterate, and have a lot of difficulty communicating, they can simply go up to the board in the activity room and choose the image of something they would like to do. They then put the image next to their assigned slot and a worker will get out the activity for them.

This is Aya and one of the boys with cerebral palsy. He's in the "standing-up machine", a relatively simple device, two planks joined together with cushions on the inside to help him stay upright for long periods of time. Here, he and Aya are playing on a checkerboard

After this, we went back to Herbertpur center for some debriefing with Jubin. She explained a little more about the details of the program, how they do village visits. I am totally amazed at the resilience of these women, dealing with enormous difficulties in rural India. They have to deal with some crazy superstitions, age-old prejudice, and misunderstandings widespread in the community.

This is a very admirable group, doing as much as they can with the little they have.

If you are interested in helping out the Anugrah program in any way, please contact me at emilysteers@woodstock.ac.in, and I can put you in touch with the lovely ladies that we met last weekend.