HALLI SUMMER CAMP- THE FINALE`

The preparations:

A closing ceremony was probably never in our agenda when we started the summer camp. But after the first few days, looking the enormous amount of talent and zeal in the kids of Hadinaru and considering the fact that the volunteers were all game for something much bigger, we decided to have a grand function on the last day. As told in the previous entry, preparations for the event had begun long back and just a few final arrangements were left. The ceremony was scheduled to start at 10 am and we reached there as early as 8.00 !! Setting up the stage, the mikes and the generator, one final practice for all, costumes for the dance-participants, and it was soon 10:00! We were actually surprised and pleased to see that almost all the guests had arrived on time. The list of guests included some prominent personalities of the village who were mostly politicians.

The inauguration:

The program, anchored by Satish and Vidya, kick-started with an invocation song by one of the girls who attended the summer camp. Our Ramesh Sir then welcomed all the guests and soon the event was inaugurated by the Chief Guest by lighting the lamp. My report was next, where I was supposed to talk about AF in general and about the summer camp in particular. I was all set with a ppt that I'd prepared, containing some selected photos of all the activities that we had during the camp. But unfortunately, due to lack of sufficient light near the stage, it was hardly visible so I had to manage the report without it. But the guests were happy to know the kinds of activities we had, and the kind of response we got from the kids.

The speeches and the feedback:

The report was followed by a series of short speeches by all the dignitaries on the dais (they were probably 6-7 of them). In between them, we had another very interesting episode. As I said in the previous entry, we had asked all the kids to write their opinion about the camp and after reading them, we were so happy that we wanted few of them to speak it out on stage during the closing event. So we had 5-6 of them coming on stage and telling their experiences of the camp. Well, experience is a small word, as they actually shared their emotions, telling us how we became a part of their lives during those 3 weeks, how they learnt so much from us, how they got inspired from us, and how they would miss us after the camp got over. It was truly an emotional and memorable moment for all of us and I regard it as the peak of achievement of AF Mysore so far!

The prizes and the mementos:

Mementos were given away to all the children who had attended a considerable part of the camp, which included a pen-stand and few pens and pencils. Special prizes were given to the winners of the painting competition that was held on Day2, which included a few books. At the end of it, we also gave a special memento to the school, which was a huge wall clock with the name of Aashayein Foundation imprinted on it. This was our way of expressing gratitude to the school authorities for all their co-operation and also our way of leaving behind something permanent for the school in our memory. The clock was immediately put up inside one of the rooms in the school, and I guess it will stay there for a long time to come.

The "THANK YOUs":

The vote-of-thanks was presented by my mother, Mrs. Asha Manohar, who was incidentally born in Hadinaru and who was the reason behind we choosing that place for our summer camp. She thanked all the guests who'd taken time to attend the function. She also thanked all the non-AF members who'd taken so much interest to take various classes for during the course of the camp. In the end, she also thanked all of us volunteers (in spite of me strictly asking her to remove that part) and it turned out to be quite a happy moment for all of us.

The cultural events:

Finally the most awaited part of the program. We started off with the group song and as I said earlier, we almost had the whole musical band for it. Me playing the keyboard was probably a surprise element, even for the volunteers. Mr. Chandrappa was on the guitar, Vidyadhar on congo and Abdul on drums. Around 7-8 girls from the camp had come up for this and they sang "Hachchevu Kannadada Deepa", which is a beautiful song written by Kuvempu.

The song was soon followed by a group dance by around 15 girls who danced to "Dhim tha dare" from Thakshak and "Araluva hoovugale" from a Kannada movie "My Autograph". The dance was cheered with a loud applause by the audience and it was really heartening to see the girls dancing so well, having had so less time to practice for it, all thanks to Harshini and Seetha, their dance instructors.

If the girls had completely stolen the show with their song and the dance, it was now turn of the boys. Directed by Ramesh Sir, the boys first presented a short skit which was based on a story of Tenali Rama. It was very well enacted by the little boys and left the audience in stitches.

The final act was the pyramid formations. Headed by Mac, the boys displayed some unique formations on the ground and were again treated with a loud applause. Thus ended the exciting and eventful cultural program.

And finally ...

As usual, lunch was served by us after the program ended, but this time, not just for the kids of the camp but for everyone who attended the function. And soon it was time to say goodbye. It was a pleasant surprise when the children started taking our autographs and even took our phone numbers so that they could keep in touch with us. The words of gratitude that they expressed while leaving were seriously priceless and it actually turned out to be a pretty emotional moment for all of us. At the same time, it was also a moment of celebration with a sense of achievement. The summer camp was the first big event that AF Mysore had taken up and I take pride in saying that it turned out to be much more successful than expected.

With more challenges to face and more important projects to be taken up, the summer camp was a huge morale booster for all of us and certainly a feather in the cap of AF Mysore. Hoping to have many such events in future. As Jay always keeps saying, the Aashayein caravan shall go on.

Click here to see all the pics of the closing ceremony !!

To know more about Aashayein Foundation, visit our official blog.

HALLI SUMMER CAMP- A Detailed Report- Part 3

Day 5: 8th May '10

By the end of the 2nd week, we had decided to have a closing ceremony on Day 7, where we would invite a lot of people from the village and make the kids exhibit their talents. So this formed the major part of the schedule for Day 5 and 6- giving practice to the children for these events.

Day 5 started off with yet another useful session, by Mr. Raghu, who again happened to be a renowned speaker who spoke to the village kids about personality development. The kids were given some basic tips about how to improve concentration while studying, how meditation helps, etc. He also gave them a live demo of meditation and asked them to repeat it and advised them to follow the same throughout their lives. He also divided the children into various groups where each of them was asked to share his/her achievements to the group, no matter how small the achievements were. We volunteers were also divided to monitor each of these groups and applaud the achievements of the kids. It was a highly unique activity intended to make the kids realize their own potential and work towards it.
This was followed by a brief but useful session on cleanliness and hygiene by Seetha and Vidya where they were told about the hazards of unhealthy environment and the importance of cleanliness in their village. At the end of it, the children were asked to clean up their school premises and they willingly did it with a lot of interest. As a reward, they were served with some yummy food as usual.
After lunch, it was time for practice! The children were divided into 4 groups based on the their choices of events- Group Dance, Group Song, Skit and Pyramid. Ms. Harshini, a dance teacher by passion, was called in, and aided by Seetha and a few others, she quickly struck a chord with the kids and thus began the dance practice. I was given the responsibility of training the kids for the group song and fortunately and unexpectedly, I got the help of a few professional musicians from LnT who came to Hadinaru with all their instruments(drums, guitar) and thus began an exciting and challenging song practice. Similarly, Ramesh Sir took up skit and Mac took up pyramid and very soon, all of us were immersed in practicing for the big event. In the meantime, the other volunteers started making all sorts of planning and arrangements for the event and finally at around 2.30 pm, we chose to call it a day.

Day 6: 9th May '10

Well, technically this was the last day of the summer camp and we tried to fit in as much as possible. Jayanth started off with another session on computers, but this time mainly centered on the internet. He spoke briefly about the history of internet and how it has gained importance in the recent past. The children also learnt how to send mails and also generally about how they can use the net for some of their needs.

On the previous day, all the children who attended the camp were compulsorily asked to write a short feedback, giving us their opinion about the summer camp. So the next half an hour went in collecting the feedback from them and we reading them. This was by far THE BEST part of the summer camp for us as we had certainly not expected the kids to write it so beautifully. It was really hard to choose the best among them as all of them had written it wonderfully and it was really touching for all of us to hear such nice words written about us. Those feedbacks will be treasured by AF Mysore for a very long time to come.

After this, for the very last session of the summer camp, we had few volunteers from Columbia Asia Hospital, who had come all the way to the village to educate the kids on First Aid. they were happy to see that the kids already knew most of what they were trying to teach them.

Finally, it was practice time again! The fact that this was the last day they could get for practice kept everyone on their toes and we were all game for 2 hours of rigorous practice. Meanwhile, few of us went around the village, inviting some important personalities and politicians for the closing ceremony. Most of them had already heard about the summer camp, as word spreads very quickly in villages, and were more than willing to attend the function.

Finally, after ensuring everything was in place, we left the place hoping for a grand and successful closing ceremony. I'll be back with another post entirely about the closing ceremony and trust me, it's gonna be real interesting!

To see pics of Weekend 3, click here.

To visit our official AF Mysore blog, click here.