Project Arrival

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On Saturday we started our volunteering project with GVI. This is a charity which operates all over the world through different specialised projects in certain areas of deprivation. After arriving at the project base, we met the rest of the volunteers and GVI staff. There is a good mix of Cockney's, Northerner's, Aussie's and Yanks in the group however we are the only people volunteering on the construction project.

The last two days have been filled with risk assessments, trying local cuisine and getting to know people. The dorms we are staying in consist of small bunk beds and old dusty fans. The first night there was a 3 hour long thunder storm which caused a power cut. I almost melted to death without the fan on but of course Marc slept through the whole thing.

Yesterday we ate well, the highlight being a mango prawn curry with a side of Carada (quail), which is a small bird. We were told by Jutten, who is a local member of GVI, that if you eat it you get good health. Hopefully that means no dodgy bellies during our stay then?

Today we had further training in the morning then free time. We visited the Indo-Portuguese museum where the only member of staff there taught us about the historical door locks of Kerala. They combine symbols from the religions Christianity, Hinduism, Muslim, Chinese and Judaism and he told us that the people here live by the motto 'accept and respect'. In the evening we got to go to the local orphanage for boys to play basketball and football with them. They were amazed by the giant man (Marc) and kept requesting 'slam dunk!'. It was very very hot so we were thankful when it started to rain. We then rushed to the Kathakali where we saw a classical indian dance/play involving attractive make up with facial and body movement, and then went out for dinner with friends.

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