It was one of those days that seemed to be extremely busy at the ward…and extremely dull for us. Very few kids were ready for our program when we arrived. Manjari and I went about talking to the staff, parents and children, trying to gather them for some activities and lessons. We did manage to gather about twenty children, many of whom were newly admitted.
14 year old Deepa (name changed) has just started the tenth grade. I asked her if she had her textbooks and schoolwork with her, and she told me that, since she had been diagnosed and moved to the hospital, she was not going to school.
Manjari and I are not exactly well-versed in Kannada or Telugu, which were the most commonly spoken languages in the ward. We were fortunate to find 12 year old Naveen, who spoke these languages, as well as English, fluently. Every time we went, he gladly helped us communicate with the other children and their parents. He soon became our translator.
Our school kits consisted of a plain drawing book with good quality watercolour paper, a set of crayons, a set of colour pencils and a set of watercolours with a brush. Along with this, we provided two ruled books of one hundred pages each, a writing pencil, an eraser, a drawing pencil, a sharpener and a pen. The older children (above sixth grade) were given a geometry box as well. All this was gathered up in an eco-friendly bag made of recycled cloth in beautiful colours.
