Update...4?

Helloooo all,

its been a week or so since my last blog, so this might be another long one! then again, im not doing huge amounts of work so prob not too long! last week continued teaching the jacobs well girls, and on friday instead of maths we have to teach a hobbies lesson. our chosen 'hobby' was drawing, because we couldnt think of anything else better to do! i ended up taking the class and drawing a very pirate looking luke on the white board, and a scarily accurate one of one of the oasis staff. after teaching, we visited KK Pettai, the rag picking community supported etc by oasis. rag pickers, as im sure ive mentioned before, are the lowest on the indian caste system. they are seriously poor! what we were doing this time was teaching them numbers, as most dont go to school etc. each has a book, and for about an hour we (luke and myself) sat with them and taught and watched them copy numbers written in thier book. the floor is some kind of very flat stone covered by lots of dirty grey sand, and the community is located north of chennai in a big shipping harbour. rag pickers earn a living by picking bits of rubbish from huge heaps of it, sorting it, and selling it through a middle man, who probably takes most of the profits. they will earn maximum 100 rupees per day if they are lucky, which is about (80ish rupees to one pound) 1pound something.....they are really dirty, and decided to sit on me as i helped them with thier work, leaving my clothes just as dirty! slowly they began to loose interest and chase each other about and play. i decided to join in, and ended up swinging them, lifting them and all sorts messing around with them when they were probably supposed to be working. they love being lifted up high about your head or swing around by thier arms, and once you do it for one, then the other 20 all want a go aswell! quickly i discovered though that by tickling them you can stop them jumping all over you trying to get you to pick them up. andy matheson, who visited us on friday and saturday, then turned up with the rest of the oasis staff to show him about. had cool conversation with him about the kids and how their hair turns brown when they are malnourished- most kids had black/brown hair, they have only one meal a day usually.

saturday visited the new community we are working in and will be doing the summer camp in for the next month (starting tomorow!) with andy m, and then in the evening went to a great fruit chop which becky the co-ordinator had taken us to on friday. this place sells amazing fruit juices and smoothies, and is so good! been there another 3 times since saturday and are slowly working our way through the huge menu.

watched the cricket world cup final at swamy's house, and got back to the flat at 5 in the morning! saw a person sleeping on the street in a brand new mosquito net, all set up very nicely! on the subject of cricket, bought myself a cheap cricket bat on tuesday, and today lost the free tennis ball i got with it in the next door house 5 minutes into us playing outside our flat for the first time.

this week we are have been preparing for a summer camp we are running for 2 hours a day everyday for a month, starting tomorow, but no teaching as our jacobs well class are now on holiday! it has been a little frustrating over the last 2 weeks, as we havent had as much work to do as we had expected to do, and have had lots of time simply to prepare for teaching and this summer camp. getting to know the guys in the office well now, though finding the language hard to learn!

getting used to the heat now and getting used to the city. chennai is the place where thomas, of the 12 discples came, and it is amazxing just how much christian scripture and things are written on the walls and peoples houses. im told that in chennai, 18% are christians, though most of them catholics. loads of houses in the community around us have bible verses painted on the wall, and on one corner near to us, there is a huge painting of jesus! lots of catholic shrines also. steve thinks that maybe catholicism is popular here due to the fact indians are used to a much more visible religion, like they do in hinduism.

as it has been quite a while since my last blog, have forgotten all the cool stuf i was going to talk about, which is why this blog might be a bit dull! hopefully next update will arrive within a few days, and i can talk in more detail about interesting stuff instead of just listing events!

thanks to everyone who has been commenting on the blogs, great to know your reading and that i have not been forgotten! if you have any questions then ask and i will try and remember to answer them in my next update.

laters..

josh