Visit to old age home 4

"Why does it take a second to connect to someone and forever to say goodbye?"

I am in a confused state today because I am really happy that I met my Nanis and spend the most wonderful time with them but at the same time it was our last official visit to old age home. Today the day was great because I didn’t planned anything and just wanted to be with them and share my feelings and enjoy with them. We reached there and I started chatting with one of the Nanis. She was making greeting cards by threading over a piece of paper. I was extremely amazed to see the technique she was using. I asked her to try and got a chance to do. Hyunju and I were enjoying it and were also learning new skill. It was easy and a new idea struck to my mind. I got an idea of making it a big production and can be use to sell in market, the royalty income of all this will be use for the improvement of old age home and their living standards. This idea can be put globally and can be used for the betterment of old aged ones. While coming back I promised her to come back to meet her.

Republic Day and Sports Day...

Once again my heart was filled with fun and excitement after 2 years. It was D Y Patil International School’s annual sports day on the same day of Indian Republic Day i.e. 26^th of January. I am crazy for sports but last year didn’t get any chance. I received title of best athlete in 10^th standard but due to less sport events I was not in position to participate in any sports meets. Day started with basket ball game because we had time for the program to start. After national anthem we all went to ground to help out in arrangements and to have everything in position. All were distributed different works and duties. My job was to give signals to start the race after checking the tracks and the positions of the athletes. Just after each race my next duty was to transfer the list of winners from the finish line to medal stand where teachers were writing names on certificates. It was really tiring for me and I was not getting any rest in between. From this I learnt the working of a system and the management of conduction of an event like this. In between we had a fun race in which Aditi Shah came on first position and Nishad came on second position (by unethical means). He was disqualified which was evident after watching the video of the race but I think if any person is disqualified than there is no point of getting the position. Again the events began and my job too. At last our race came where I was the king of track (hyperbolically). It was 4x100 m relay where I was running with my team Mukul, Aditi and Dasom. Mukul started the race and took a approximate 10 m lead and passed the batten to Aditi. Aditi continued and increased the lead with more 15 m. Dasom was in third position and ran very well and passed it to me. I ran and won the race which I felt like an amazing race because when I completed it was near about 50 meter lead. I was happy after winning and congratulated my opponents for the try. It was amazing and one of the most memorable moments of my life.

Helping in the annual function

As we are the seiner most students in the school, we were not allowed to participate in the annual function but after a lot request we got into prop group. I was in wing B side of the stage and after practicing the sun 4 times and indoor 4 times we were ready to show on stage. From this activity I learnt the coordinate, the importance of time, and new skills like arranging props as per the requirement. Everything was planned and supervised by Mr. Pandey. This activity is an amazing example of team work where all the team members were helping each other and doing their own jobs also. The sweat and the red eyes can easily show the dedicated effort I put in the arrangement of the props. I learnt an important point to talk as soft as possible on stage. This was the mistake we made while arranging the props.

Fun in Walk-a-thon

After planning all started working on the works allotted, banners were prepared by school but rest of the things were taken care by all the DP students who were part of preparation. We were the first to start the race of approx 7 km. pre-primary classes had a lap of 3 km the roads were decided by me and Nishad and calculated by a car which was 6.7km. We decided the teacher’s duty on the way and to make walk-a-thon a fare for all and no one can cheat. Before starting our preparation I inquired about the conditions of roads and the security purposes. We exchanged our ideas with each other. Nishad and I made two plans and tracks but then we worked together as a team and got the final track. Our physical education teacher helped us by making the no. tags for all the participants. The participation was fun because we started very slow but after completing 300-500 meters everyone’s athlete started spouting out. All DP students started to walk like professionals. Mukul took lead in the beginning but 1km I covered the distance and in next 500 meters took lead ahead of Mukul. I learnt new technique or I should say invented a new way of relaxation. While walking when I got tired, my calf muscles started acing. I turned my face and started moving backward. My muscles started relaxing and I felt good after it. I came first and took rest for 5 minutes. After which I waited for junior students to come, I gave them glucose and water. Asked them to stretch a little and then rest. I took care if someone was hurt or something. I appreciated all those who were coming to finish the walk. It was fun, full of action, struggle, enthusiasm, the thirst of winning. I loved and enjoyed each and every moment of it. I am looking forward for few more such events.

Visit to old age home 3

Today the day was really a fun day. As last time I was with grandfathers (Nanas) I promised them to show the movie they asked for but unfortunately this time I was selected for Nani ward. As I had planned for a movie I started to setup. It was amazing experience to see all grandmothers (Nanis) to see them so happy. Their faces were literally glowing up when I took out my laptop and asked them to sit around and be comfortable. I asked them which movie they want to see and one of the grandmothers asked me which movie I have and will be showing to them. I told them that as I have came in Nani ward (section of grandmothers) first time I have the latest movie “Ajab Prem Ki Gajab Kahani”. They asked me about the background and the actors. I answered all their questions and started the movie. I asked them if there was any problem in watching or sound system but there was no problem. They were so interested that they didn’t even distract for a second. Sometimes they were unable to make out the word spoken in movie so I helped them and told them the script. Few new terms and things which were spoken and shown in movie were new to them so I helped them in understanding it. If happiness is considered as the global issue and is really necessary for all then I think I was successful.

Preparation of walkathon

While discussing about the best athletes of the world, it came in our mind that we should also conduct some athletic events. First, we all agreed to mini-marathon of 5-6 km but then we concluded that it will be very difficult for children of junior classes. We decided to plan for a walkathon. After consulting with our supervisor, Mukul became the in charge of the distributing the responsibilities. He made list as follows:

Task	Students, who will arrange for the things
Fliers	Kaustubh
First aid box (3 sets)	From school
Ambulance
Glucose	Agam, Mukul
Water	Agam, Mukul (From school)
Juice
Doctors	Trisha
Disposable glasses	Agam, Mukul (From school)
Tables	Agam, Mukul (From school)
Circular	Kaustubh
Signals for direction	Chinmay, Nishad
Volunteers (teachers)	Dasom, Hyunju
Judges (teachers)	Dasom, Hyunju
Route map	Chinmay, Nishad
Tissue papers	Aditi (From school)
Cameraman (teachers)	Agam, Mukul

My first job was to make route for walkathon and Nishad was with me. I went to Google maps and started searching for our school. It was very difficult for me to search because of low network and I was not getting proper internet signals. After trying for a long time I succeeded in getting it. With the help of screen snap shot I took its snap and found the route around school.

Gardening 3

Wow! Each time I come here and these incredible plants amaze me more and more. This time when we came here they were full of vegetables and flowers. There were chilies and lady fingers hanging in the branches. It really felt great watching them grow. Now, I can imagine what a mother feels watching her child grow. We all worked as a team and the result of our hard work and idea was in front of us. Mihan is a developing area and here we have very less trees, this was our small try to reduce the deforestation problem and pollution problem. This will not end and soon I will be starting a new project. May be on under CAS but it’s for life long.

Visit to old age home 2

“Happiness spreads happiness” this statement is true because if one is happy then he/she radiates positive energy which makes all happy. We went to Old age home where we were divided into 2 groups. One was Nishad, Mukul, Agam, Hyunju and and the other was me (Chinmay), Kaustubh, and Dasom. 1^st group went to ladies section and we went to gents. We started with introduction and found that very few were interested in interacting with us. I found difficulty when Raja Babu (one of the old) was chatting but was not as involved as I wanted him to be. He was playing card with his mate and was not paying any attention on me. I tried many times with many people but maximum times failed. I helped Dasom in interacting with many as she was finding a little difficult to communicate in Hindi. In all 48 males only 1 was there who knew English. Dasom started interacting with him. I found a group of 4 who were really interested in talking about their life and knowing about mine. We started chatting about their favorite movies and I found few like “SEEMA, DO AANKHE BARAH HANTH, and many more”. I promised them to bring my laptop and show them 1 of the movies they want. I learnt many new things and understood that life is not as easy as it seems. Way of chatting with them was really important; it should be non-aggressive and non-comic as it can hurt someone’s sentiments. I found that my personal problems were nothing in front of their. This activity is a way to encourage them to come up with new things and make them happy. I am trying to give them happiness so that they show interested in doing new things and have fun.

Gardening 2

Amazing!! The growth rate of plants is really very high than human growth rate. Within a short period of time all the plants came out of the buried seeds. All the plants were near about the 3-4 inches tall. All were happy to see that because it was the result of collective effort put by all of us. Our supervisor is really knowledgeable about the plants and their growth. I learnt many new techniques of planting and taking their care. I also learnt new important details of planting. We watered the plants after loosening the soil around the plant so that water easily seeps into it and can be absorbed by roots easily. I dug around the plants and also pour some the manure so that plant can grow well.

Gardening 1

From the beginning of my life I had a special interest in gardening that may be because of my mother because she is very much interested in plants and flowers. When, while talking the idea of gardening came forward and after a long discussion we decided to take this challenge. It was an amazing idea to show up and prove many things. We proposed this and started working on garden. Our first job was to make a place where we can work and most important that it should contain path in between to work. We all got together designed a garden and started our work. I was really tiring to keep big stones in place and built a fence. Our supervisor Miss. Vijyalakshmi brought seeds and equipments for us to work. I got to dig and make space for seeds in ground. After putting seeds in ground and covering them back we all were seeking permission to sprinkle water over them and I was one of them.

Visit to old age home 1

It is funny how everyone wants to live long but no one wants to grow old. Old age is viewed as an unavoidable, undesirable, problem-ridden phase of life that we all are compelled to live, marking time until our final exit from life itself. Parents work throughout our lives hoping that our later age will be good. They sacrifice our numerous things from their lives and many a times they also shatter their dreams just for the sake of their child’s well. Life shows them many bad and good days which count as their experience of life.

Human is a social creature and obviously a bit selfish. Each and every person thinks for himself first and then about the people or society. But, parents are exceptions. They never think for anything in return from their children. They only want that their children should be happy but, at least they deserve to live happily and peacefully. They also want someone to take care of them or at least they can enjoy their last days with their children and grandchildren.

This is true that all are not so lucky that they get whatever they deserve. Sometimes they were pushed out of the house by their own children just her/his husband/wife doesn’t want them to live with them. Sometimes when they beg their own children to take them back or they refuse to go. They are brutally beaten and thrown out of the house.

Today we started on our new plan of taking care and making happy to handicap and old age people. We visited an active old age home for old and handicap. Their sister Maria discussed all the details of the old age home. We met many people including old men, small children, and old women. We had little chat with many of them; we introduced ourselves to them and promised them that we will be back soon. There was a man named Narendra Roy. He was tailor in his youth and is now also making cloths for x-mas for under privileged ones. He started his work from 1977 (in Bombay) and shifted to Nagpur 3 years back. He came here because he doesn’t have anybody in his life now. His wife and son died and he was alone in this world. As, I told you earlier human is a social animal and wants someone to hear him. So, he came here and new friends and is happily living here. Due to time bondage we were unable to spend more time but we made them happy in such a small period.

After, seeing small children in that position I was speechless and learnt life is not as easy as it seems. Now, I have started to plan for my next visit. This new task is real and I hope to be successful in it. In this activity we all will be helping each other and try to make maximum people aware about the situation.

Ground development and fitness of students

“You can't make a great play unless you do it first in practice.”—Chuck Noll
and when I was reading this it struck me that “practice makes a man perfect” and for a good practice in sports we want good equipments and grounds. Equipments are not a big deal because our school is providing it all. Second was the ground, we planed and asked for the permission from school authority and  put up our proposals of cleaning and developing the ground. we started with cleaning 1st ground and cleaned two patches of land to make volley-ball courts. using image from trusted site which we used to make measurements. We measured the court but it was not correct. We had a very difficult time during making the courts. First difficulty faced was the straight line. We were not able to make straight line as we were not sure of any specific technique to do that. All were helping each other in solving it. All of a sudden we got an idea of using the rope as a compose.We tried the simple construction method which was taught to us in junior classes. With the help of rope we did a fabulous job and completed the task. The shape of the court was a rectangular. Where, length was 18 m and breadth was 9m. It was then divided into 2 halves. We sketch the center line and then leaving 3 m on each side drew another lines.   

Next task was to put the poles in right position. we measured the length of the pole and and the required length and accordingly dug the hole. The poles are adjustable so we set it for men and which was in other way was for women. It was 2.43 m which was really high and then the final touch of tying the net. I felt very good after doing it because it was the thing which will be useful to many people. We tied net and marked the court with white lime.

The most amazing feeling was when I saw children of junior classes playing and enjoying the volley-ball game.

Reflection on the forth newsletter (August issue)

“He who fails to plan, plans to fail”

Planning is very important for everyone in everything. I also believe that it’s very important to have a plan in hand before going for task. Sometimes it’s ok; when we get second chance but few times life doesn’t give you second chance. We were 9 people, and working on same newsletter was not a good idea because in that case all can’t show their real capability. So, we decided to divide ourselves into two groups.

1^st group was consist of me (Chinmay Toriya), Mukul Vaswani, Agam Bhatia, Hyunju Baek and Trisha Gupta.

And 2^nd group was Nishad Potdar, Kaustubh Chahhande, Dasom Chun, and Aalya Bhatt.

Using luck of chance we went for chit draw for the selection of months to publish news letter. We got first and started discussing and distributing jobs among ourselves. We decided that:

Mukul Vaswani (Editor and Designer)

Hyunju Baek (Writer)

Trisha Gupta (Writer)

Agam Bhatia (Fun corner and photographer)

Chinmay Toriya (Photographer and reporter)

This month we were having our Independence Day, Talent show and some minor activities of school. My job was to collect information from different teachers about minor activities and taking photographs. On 15^th august I was photographer because I knew it will not be possible on 27^th because I will be the MC (master of ceremony). I tried to take maximum possible photographs. I faced many problems because many a time’s people were coming in between. Many a time’s photograph was coming a bit shaky. Now, I can say “I did my job pretty well because the pictures are good and many people appreciated it. I learnt new techniques of taking pictures. I also got a practical experience of it on one of the big celebration of our school.

I collected the information written over it and passed it to editor. Actually, it was fun but at the same time full of difficulties because collecting minor thing takes a lot of time. This time I enjoyed a lot while making the news letter, let’s hope for the best for the next time.

Talent Show

Sometimes life gives only one opportunity to show up your talent and here in our school this opportunity is given. When I was going through our yearly time table of school I found talent show to be scheduled on 27^th August. After seeing this, my first reaction was “Yes! I got what I wanted.” I took permission from activity in charge Miss. Chloe to take me as a master of ceremony (MC) and asked her to take me as a participant. This was life time first experience to stand in public and speak this improve my confidence, speaking skills, and also the body language. I asked the participants list, arranged (planned) them in sequence and wrote few lines for each of them. I practiced a lot and tried to be fluent. As said “no one can judge you better than yourself” I personally like each and every line I said. I also asked teachers to help me in learning new ways of presenting in front of mob. I also prepared for my participation. The show was great all were happy, everyone was praising the show. And I really learnt a lot from this activity.

Rapping Classes

Its really a great fun having students, I feel responsible now when I see myself in mirror. It feels delighted when each time they greet me by saying "Good Evening Sir". In this task I learnt many things, skills, handling the situation etc. Being new thing every one here was amazed but was not getting response I needed. After 7 days of trials, 2 boys contacted Mr. Ketan Goyal (M.D. Goyal Coaching Classes) for rap classes. He called me and I started my work from 14th June. Now, its half a month and I have concluded many points like:

• Cheering up students time to time.
• Every new thing takes time to popularize.
• I taught them history of rap and it’s origin.
• Their difficulties in rapping.
• All the difficulties in pronunciation.

I taught them basics starting from Akon's "Smack that" and then Linkin Park's "In the end". Both of my students Druv and Parth are showing progress and are very interested in learning more. They do it on regular basis and are very hardworking. I am helping both of them in improving English with rap. I am planning to use new methods to simplify their work. This task is improving my English and also helping my students in same way. They will develop a new skill and my trying my best to do that. I planned this many days ago and got the knowledge of history of rap and also many more important things. So that they know how rap was originated. I was very time conscious and got many appreciation from Mr. Ketan. This activity increased my and my student's knowledge about a different community and a different genre of singing.

Interaction with the village folks

It was a beautiful day, we trekked for many kilometers. Enjoyed songs on way, observing new things and plants in jungles of Manali. Pleasant weather, cool breeze and friend along singing song, I can't forget that. We reached there in 1hr 30 min. I along with my team reached a house. We started with our introduction and asked many questions. We discussed about many things including weather, problems, facilities, area, people, tradition etc. She told us many things like her family has 20 acres of apple farm, she also do cloth work and much more. She was not calling this as a problem but I felt it because due to snow fall they are unable to go market for 6 months. They have access to technologies like mobile, TVs, geezer etc. It was new and interesting task which helped me to evolve my listening, speaking and friendly skills. I was facing little difficulty in understanding her accent but she was very happy as that was clearly visible in her eyes and tone of her voice. She asked me "Would you like to live here?" I said yes but truly speaking "I don't want to because for 6 months they cannot go any out easily". We also got chance to work on machine, by which clothes like shawls are produced. My mates and I felt very good because the lady was so gentle and she was very good. Then I took permission from her and took 1 shawl to wrap myself. She told us about the beauty of Manali and hills, which was really impressive.

Rafiting for 14 kms a wonderful experience

It was a totally new experience for me. It took duration of 1 hr 30 min for approx 14 kms. It was totally new challenge for me because I was doing it for the first time and it was really adventurous. We were 12 boys in 1 raft and we kept on exchanging our places. It was important part because everyone was getting tired very soon. Biggest problem was the time when we were changing our places. We rowed it with great passion and power. I, Jerry and Mukul did it for the longest duration of 9 km. This was possible for me because my background is athletics. During this activity I focused mostly on my stamina. It was tiring but I gave full of mine to it. It was an awesome experience for me of struggling in water waves. Due, to lack in co-ordination between us it was becoming difficult when big waves were striking against raft. This experience will be very beneficial to me as well as to others in many ways, as in a condition of emergency to save someone's life and also in many unfavorable conditions in which survival is though. Our guide allowed us 2 times to jump in the river. When we jumped in the river, I didn't know that the water was so chilled. When we jumped 2nd time, a boy's life jacket opened and he was struggling in water to come up. I quickly jumped into river and started push me upward. Then, I was helped by other boys by pulling him in the raft. I learnt techniques of rafting and most important increased my skills of co-ordination.

Rappelling

The feeling I experienced during rappelling was priceless. As it was a bit challenging when I started, but when I reached the edge of the rock. It was 30ft down. Wow! it was amazing feeling collabration with fear. After 2-3 sec it became very easy. This will be very beneficial for me and society, as in the case of emergency I can safe myself and others too. Take a case of a biulding on fire and i m in it, the lessons I learnt from this activity will surly help me to help others in evacuating from the biulding. It made me physically and mentally confident than before. I learnt many lessons including rope knotting, rope holding, necessary gadgets required and many more. It was fun and I did it with full confidence and the important lesson I learnt "it's not your less affort which brings us down but it's the fear, and it should be under our control".

Learning to plot the tent

Sometimes life carries us to way apart from world where we ourselves become world of our. I agree to it because life unpredictable where each and every second we live is new, each and every thing we see and feel is first time because time changes. In modern world parents want their children to be the best and also want that they should be ready to tackle every problem in their life.

When we heard about this activity, I got very excited and my excitement doubled when I was chosen as the leader of the group. It was new because I never did it before. It is very important to listen first because one may miss important points. Teacher’s each and every instruction is very important. He was explaining the procedure and techniques of plotting the tent. We started it, we placed the tent and started as fast as we can. We completed it in 15-20 min. I was the in charge of my team and distributed works. I was so happy because all were working very well. I improved my leader quality. This will be beneficial in any condition or an emergency and in the end proper packing of tent. This all is very important for a human to learn because it can be useful in any part of life, not only for me but useful for many other people. As, in any case shelter I can help and support other people. I can use this knowledge to teach or guide slum people or people those who don't have any knowledge about it.

Field cooking

I realy love to cook or I should say help my mother in cooking. But I never dreamt of cooking in field. It was a real and new task for me. We came across many difficulties because we were only provided by 2 potatos, 1 tomato, 2 onions, salt, sugar, meida powder, and 2 carrot. We were not familier with buring grass or sticks, which cost us as waste of time during the crutial time of cooking. It was realy though to cook without any utensils. We used stons and tin can to cook and made a number of dishes. We helped each other and tried very hard to make it delicius and tasty. We had our individual jobs, where I was cooking and was also bringing sticks to burn. I ran 10 times or more to bring it. I learnt that its not easy to cook and also that its very difficult to survive out in alone. This training helped me to encourge me to learn more about it.