This week, Arvind and Sunil repaired the climbing wall on the bigger kid’s adventure play equipment, reviving their interest in using it.

The new batch of students sponsored by Nishtha efficiently held a clean up program during their Sunday program. Now the drains and road sides are clear of the masses of garbage that washes down every time it rains. It is a mystery who continues, without thought for the consequences, to throw garbage in the irrigation channels.

During this heaviest part of the monsoon the children bounce between jumping on the trampoline during bright spells and watching movies and playing indoor games when it rains.

Azad and Goodie are expert in making cough linctus from plantain leaf collected in the fields, basunti & bay leaves, along with crushed brown sugar, black pepper and long pepper.

This week the schools went back after their summer break. Our team loaded fruits and vegetables into the car to deliver them to all the schools. Thathri is 11 kilometers from Nishtha, and now because of a landslide they had to walk 2 km to reach the anaganwari and school which serves the laboring families who live in scattered clusters on the hillside.

After 10 months of working with us as an Austrian civil service volunteer we are sad that Ravana is leaving us this week. He has been a huge help on the farm, assisting our team with all kinds of innovative and useful ideas and techniques. Our compost has never been better and the vegetables are loving it. Thank you Ravana for your hard work and inspiration.

This week has been fully packed with workshops for adolescent boys Lead by our guest trainer from Pune Rahoul. These lively sessions have been hugely enjoyed by the boys for whom this is the first opportunity they have had to ask questions about the changes that take place during adolescence. They went away much more thoughtful about their role in society.

We are having a very busy time packing all the workshops for adolescents into the unexpectedly early school summer holidays. Last week 40 girls attended two workshops which, because the girls all came from remote village areas were extended to two days. This allowed our team to not only cover the physical and emotional changes that take place during adolescence and nutrition but also yoga, first aid and discussions about social issues and thinking about their futures. The single women activist from the area stayed with the girls overnight so they had someone familiar with them.

In order to create a recreation pavilion and mushroom growing shed, our staff are clearing all the cut stones from the land. These will be used to build up the base of the pavilion. It will be a wonderful space for children, students and workshop participants to enjoy outdoor activities.

The plot next door to the clinic has been sold and we need to secure our boundary so we are re-aligning our wall. Our brave team are laboriously carrying rocks for a foundation on their heads from the farm across the fields to the clinic. Far from grumbling, they laugh and chatter, enjoying the change of activity and working together.