That's SO 1972...

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Monday:

Half way down folks.. Hard to believe that as I write this we are around 3/4 of the way to the finish line! Anyway, Monday. Our first day just us two (and of course the teacher, but she just sits there and slaps the kids now and then when they misbehave or piss themselves. Oh, and she cooks the lunch.) and in all honesty, it went very well. A little to well actually, it doesn't make for very interesting bloggage, so I'll keep it short and sweet. Monday's craft was the letter Q for Queen, so we had the kids make (and for the most part immediately discard) little paper crowns. A few of the kids (most surprisingly to me the oldest boy who is by my guess around 7) absolutely loved them though and wouldn't take them off. Kids eh?

Tuesday:

I told you Monday would be short and sweet.

Tuesday we left the house in a monsoon. It was pretty shit. Actually no, scratch that, that's just me being british and complaining for the sake of it. I like the rain. Especially the rain here. There's no wind, and it's still really quite warm and pleasant. Trapseing about in soppy shoes however is pretty shit, but other than that it was lovely. The locals seemed to disagree. Tuesday we had 1 kid. One. Ek. Ek is Hindi for One. *pats self on back*. Anyway, we counted with him, sang, read a story and made a craft project as per. We covered T for Teddy Bear. We made a little bear mask with him which he abolutely loved. Although, when you see the pictures i'm sure you'll agree that we did infact just make a budget Pedo Bear mask.. Poor kid..

We also saw about 20 monkeys screaming rushing past/over/around the school (to give you an idea, the "school" is a one room hut with a porch just big enough to house 10 kids and 3 adults) and to the nearby government school (picture a meduim scale prison, only painted yellow). I got excited 'cause I love monkeys =].

Then, we headed to Macleod Ganj, home of the Dalai Lama when he's in town. Beautiful place. We go lost a few times, ended up walking up a mountain... Was a sod of a hike but the views were breathtaking! We saw the Tibetan temple and the prayer wheels and all that jazz, as well as a museum on Tibets history. The place nearly reduced me to tears... I always say the whole "Free Tibet" thing as a cause for hippies in the 70's, I had no idea the Tibetans were still being tortured to this day! It's worth googling if you care, I'm not going to preach here... The story of the kid - somewhere in line for the Dalai Lama throne - being kidnapped by the Chinese at 7 years old and is still in their custody at 21 broke my heart through. The other thing that really -really- struck a chord with me was quite a simple thing, they have as an exhibit a shirt worn by a tibetan prisoner in a Chinese torture camp covered in blood stains... It doesn't sound like much, but it's such an eye opener.. Years of watching action films with the help up to his tits in blood but there's something haunting when you know it's real. Not in the same way as when you burst your nose, or when you cut yourself chopping carrots... This shirt was originally white, but it was almost completely dyed dark brown from the dried in blood stains of some poor fucker locked in cell, beaten and tortured daily for little more than believing we should all get along.. Brings to mind something George Carlin said - (forgive me if I paraphrase a little) "the only people who end up being 'assassinated' are people who try tell us to all get along and live peacefully together." Or was it Bill Hicks? No, it was definitely George Carlin. Google it and check if you care enough to. Then we ate Italian food =], from Nick's Italian Restaurant. Not going to lie here, after a week of curry a good pizza was an absolute treat! Then, offski home.

When we go back Jacqueline's sari (it's not actually a sari, it's trousers and a top with a scarf, whereas a sari is a dress, but I don't know what else to refer to is as, so I'm going with sari!) was ready. I can't tell you how beautiful she looks in it, there will be pictures uploaded when we get home and you can see for yourself, but in short, wow. =].

That's really about it. Sorry about getting a little jumped up and preachy, but what I saw really did touch me. FREE TIBET!

Love Love
Hubby McP
xx

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