Manjula is a teacher’s trainer (I understood) in the govt college for teachers. She spoke in perfect and pure kannada with such confidence and clarity that we were all left open mouthed at the recital. She covered the entire chronology of Gandhi’s life, year wise, from his Sabarmathi days to South Africa, upto the Freedom struggle and Satyagraha movement.  The children sat listening to her intently and wide eyed. The mothers in the ward who usually just sit and watch their kids do their activities kept nodding in agreement and appreciation. Everyone was eager to answer the questions we put to them and wanted more information. Manjula’s son is 3 years old undergoing treatment for a tumor on his kidneys. He clung on to her while she spoke to the group and when he cried for attention, she gave him a quick look and continued very seriously saying, ” just one more minute. Let me also tell them about the other great leader whose birthday is today and we should not forget”.. She went on to talk about Lal Bahadur Shastri.

We are very grateful to Manjula for her eager participation. Her extensive knowledge retention is admirable. More so, her ability to speak in public and teach is truly inspiring. I hope that Manjula will continue to be part of our learning program at the Kapur ward. We will be grateful to her if she continues to share her knowledge with us and our children.

Thank you Manjula!

We request those who have recently expressed interest in the Foundation’s work to come and be a part of the celebration. We will also be distributing our next round of school kits on this day.

We would greatly appreciate sponsorships for this event as well as our other upcoming birthday celebrations.

Following the orientation on the 31st of March, we have interns both working on our research projects and teaching hands-on at Kidwai Hospital.

From the 1st of April, we have had two permanent staff working with us: Mrs. Vidyawathi and Ms. Parvati are our qualified librarians and early childhood education specialists.

We are now at Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology the entire day, three days a week. This decision was made after a year of research and working there and receiving feedback from caregivers and medical staff. This is turning out to be a good arrangement for the children, and they love it.

We invite you to be a part of our summer activities. Please contact us, by calling:

Sandhya – 98452 31106
Manjari – 98451 98983
Vijaya – 98454 53696

or sending us an email at:

happinessquotient[at]gmail.com
manjari[at]samikshafoundation.com

We have have been working for almost a year now with the children at the hospital. Swami Yogaratna, our Yoga teacher and consultant, has been working on a  very unique module to help the kids with cancer, which involves creative visualisation techniques towards self-healing and happiness.

Many of us have been observers or volunteers at some of her classes. We at the foundation now  feel that this should be the methodology that  we should adopt in some way in our individual modules, in order to achieve our common goal of giving the children the necessary spiritual and educational support during their treatment.

In order to develop a better structure to our working methodology there, we wish to conduct an orientation program for our core team and all our volunteers who work  hands on with the children and their caregivers. This would be the primary item for discussion at this orientation.

RSVP to Shobhana – drskiyer@gmail.com, Manjari – manjari@samikshafoundation.com, or Sandhya – sandhya@samikshafoundation.com.

Mr.Rajesh Kurien helped us set up a music system with World Space Radio, in November last year, for our kids at the ward. This was such a big hit and everyone there was thrilled about having Music in the ward.

This is what he had to say after the installation.

“Music system installed!” I got the radio+amp system  built. The system sounds good and powerful.It is made with a car audio system  and a separate subwoofer amplifier. As you have indicated there is some user friendly issue with it. (No remote and doesn’t lock FM stations on power failure! ). I am working to integrate radio and amplifier together, that operation is simpler. I hope we can install by 14th ( on Children’s day).

World space radio looks a climb (Rs 6k+ for a decent system with remote).I am planning to do some ground work . Finally we need this, as the regular free-FM content is with lot of commercial angle. I feel the content should have soothing & soft effect . I am confronting ‘no-time’ syndrome; but not want to yield easily, this time.

I got system fixed. I will send you the pics, you can publish in the web site. Social Work Officer ( of the hospital) asked of the box to house the amplifier & players. May be you can see how the box you told will fit.  This was a great fulfilling experience and need to see the system is well utilized and maintained.

Sandhya, Thank you for all the support, without which I wouldn’t have got this opportunity. We will work together to see the mission is fulfilled and can grow bigger.

Unfortunately, world space seems to have ditched us…how inconsiderate. Bah! Any more ideas on this one, anyone? Our children are missing the music!

Thank you, Rajesh. Your project was definitely a very meaningful one for the children. Hopefully we will be able to find some other solution to keep the music flowing.

It’s been a great year for all of us at the Samiksha Foundation. A lot of learning has taken place, both for us and for the children. Our Foundation has grown from an idea to reality, and we have been joined by a whole lot of creative and talented people.

We are grateful for everyone who contributed to our work this year: our fabulous trustees, volunteers and core team, everyone we met who decided to support us and spread the word to others, and the children, who, in fact, seem to have taught us far more than we have taught them.

We look forward to seeing you again next year (or, rather, next week). Here’s hoping that the year (and folder) named 2010 will be filled with joy, contentment, prosperity, humour and positive learning experiences!

- The Samiksha Foundation Team

I am an Australian visiting Bangalore to meet with old students and devotees of Swami Muktananda, who taught yoga in Bangalore from 1978 to 1985.  Together with Swami Buddhananda she established the Atma Darshan Yogashram which still provides yoga programs to this day.

My friend Sw. Yogaratna explained to me that she had offered to take yoga classes with the children at a cancer hospital after learning about them from her friend Sandhya, who runs an NGO providing educational services to the children (Samiksha Foundation).

Swami Yogaratna offered to take me to the ward and I was very happy to accompany her.  She is very proficient at using the Bangalore public transport system, jumping on and off buses and in and out of autorickshaws with the ease of an old Bangalore wallah, a sometimes hair raising experience for an Australian.

The Children’s Ward is in a separate building in the extensive hospital grounds.  The ward impressed as it was spacious, airy and clean with high quality tiling on the floors: in Australia we don’t have such excellent quality tiling as you have in Bangalore.  Sandhya told us that eighty percent of the children in this ward have blood cancers.

Sw. Yogaratna gathered the children by going through the wards singing a simple song.  She has found that this is the most successful technique of attracting the children away from the TV and other diversions, a bit like a Yogi Pied Piper.

After 20 minutes or so she had collected a group of up to 17 children, together with some mothers.  Some of the smaller children were coming and going: as well as being very sick they are easily distracted like all small children are.  However the door watchman helped by shepherding errant children back into the group.

Sw. Yogaratna started the class by getting them to chant Om and sing a couple of simple songs .  Next she took them through the Pawanmuktasana series of simple yoga exercises, to warm them up and improve their flexibility. This was followed by a short talk introducing the next part of the class, the Yoga Nidra (yogic relaxation).

Sw. Yogaratna commenced this by asking the children to lie down on the floor in a radial pattern, with their feet in the centre.  After much wriggling and giggling the children managed this.  She then instructed them to feel into the sensation of their body lying on the floor, and to feel inside the body, looking for any sensations such as the breath.  Some children reported being aware of their blood circulation.

The visualisation part came next.  The children were asked to visualise their white blood cells fighting and killing the cancer cells, and the red blood cells recovering in huge numbers, both together driving away the ‘bad guys’, the cancer cells.  Each child was asked to visualise this in their own particular way.

After the yoga nidra was finished, the children were asked to draw a picture of their visualisation experience.  These were very varied.  One little girl drew a big shark, the white blood cells, chasing two small fish, the cancer cells.  Another girl drew circles of equal size, happy ones (the whites) and sad ones (cancers).  One boy drew a crocodile chasing a turtle, two other boys had tigers attacking deer and rabbits, A third girl drew some ducks eating small insects.  Sw. Yogaratna complimented the children for their efforts and offered some suggestions as to how to improve and clarify the images that the children had so beautifully created.  The yoga session was completed with Om chanting, some of the children demonstrating great flexibility by sitting in Padmasana, one of the most difficult yoga poses.

Sw. Yogaratna explained to me afterwards that she was incorporating techniques of ‘art therapy’ into the yoga nidra visualisation.  The reference she uses is ‘Getting Well Again’ by Carl Simonton.  Her feedback to the children was based on the research described in his book.

At the end the children jostled each other to have their photos taken, checking my photography technique after each photo to make sure I got them looking their best!  Then we reluctantly said goodbye.  All in all it was a delightful experience, or as we say in Australia, ‘awesome’.  If you have a chance please think of joining the Samiksha Foundation with Sw. Yogaratna in this very worthwhile project.

John Ransley

Someone mentioned to me that this means we have to start all over again with a new lot of kids… new books, new supplies, new friendships … then Thishya reminded us that it  is  a GOOD thing and a relief to see  so few faces here.. Its a paediatric oncology ward for crying out loud! We should be happy for those who have gone home… And so we are. We wish them the best.

Sandhya

Children’s Day was another landmark day for the Foundation and for the children at Samiksha.

We are now in collaboration with a Theatre in Education group named Script People’s Theatre. We had a wonderful afternoon of playback theatre with them during which they heard personal experiences or favourite stories of the children and enacted them on stage. Among the most hilarious and engaging themes played back were the story of the Hare and the Tortoise and actor Ramya’s visit to a child at the hospital ward.

As always, the dramatists were rewarded with lots of laughter and applause, and the children told them to come back every week.

We are grateful to Rajesh, Venkatesh and the moderator Umesh, as well as their team for the wonderful performance. Their website can be found at http://playbacktheatre.wordpress.com.