Blogs from Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu, India, Asia - page 4

Seeing a lot of Elephants near the Tempel in Pondycherry and Thanjavur our trip is going to the big city of Madurai. ... read more

Next stop after Pondi was Thanjuvar. Another temple town that looks like every other town in Tamil Nadu. We ended up arriving very later having been told that the bus took 4 hours when it actually took about 6. Luckily the bus dumped us in the middle of town right next to a comfortable guest house that didn't mind opening up and making some beds at half past midnight. Our only reason for coming here was to see a big, old temple. This was really good and woth the effort to see. It is huge and wonderfully carved. No one quite knows how the stone on top of the main tower got there as in wieghs and aufll lot. Some people recon a 6 kilometer ram got it up there. Anyway the thing is very impressive ... read more

The queues outside the house have been getting longer as we’re getting closer to the official start of school. Parents from all the local villages are desperate to get their kids into Shikshayan school thanks to the success Aruna and Raghavan have made of it and the children who attend. The parents don’t seem to understand that no matter how many people they pressgang and how many people they try to pay off and how much money they offer Aruna and Raghavan - if the child’s name’s not on the list they’re not getting in… A&R have one rule – the children they accept are underpriveledged with little chance of education elsewhere. The parents queuing outside the house each day are priveledged enough to be able to bribe their way into other schools. It’s an interesting ... read more

Aruna’s fight continues. She has been explaing the ‘reservation policy’ to me. Here in India, the cast system is alive and well. It is visible in the way some children won’t play with or hold hands with others and it is visible in the number of unversity palces awarded to students of different backgrounds. Aruna addresses the former in here school simply. Everyone is expected to perform the same rituals as everybody else (normally only a ‘brahmin’ would be allowed to peform the dialy hindy temple rite of ‘puja’) and everyone plays with everyone else. Discrimination within the school is tackled head on by getting the children to reflect on their words and deeds. The government however is dealing with the caste division differently. It has introduced quotas so that universities have to take certain percentages ... read more

Hi All! Once again, thanks for your comments and notes...they are such a joy right now. I cannot even begin to tell you how much. Oh, and I won't be getting any belly button rings soon...sorry! ;) Last night and tonight we are staying in a hotel in the city of Thanjavur. While I love the host family experience, the hotel has been a welcome relief...reliable hot water in and of itself is so wonderful. While I don't have my own room, it is still a welcome night off from being "on" all the time. I did, however, have the requisite "American families are distant and shallow, we have too much divorce and all of that is seeping in and hurting our culture" conversation (aka lecture) at lunch yet again. I must say that topic, along ... read more