Amazing but Ordinary
The days since my last post have been especially exciting, and only today, Thursday, have I had a few moments at the local internet cafe (where access is just 50 cents an hour) for a post. So getting to it...
One of my primary goals in coming to New Delhi was to get an inside perspective on how children are educated here. Teaching English in Munirka offers one perspective, and a visit to Room to Read's New Delhi's office offered another.
Room to Read (RTR), like many non-profit organizations, has a lovely genesis story that I'll summarize this way: a former Microsoft techie John Wood trekked through Nepal and came upon a school without a library. Through donations from friends in the United States, he later supplied the school with 3,000 books. Room to Read is the formal structure that assists NGOs in several Asian nations in creating and sustaining libraries and other facilities to enhance children's learning and economic opportunities. India has RTR sites in several states, and the capitol region of New Delhi. Last Friday, I joined RTR staff and two other American visitors on a visit to sites in South and East Delhi.
What I was both ordinary and amazing. If you were to walk into a school library, and saw bright red ribbons atop heads buried in books, would you be amazed? Would you not expect to see students studiously engaged in their reading? The darily bibliophiles interrupted their work to recite poems and sing songs in Hindi and English. I especially appreciated their performance of "Baa Baa Black Sheep." Enthusiasm and pride fueled a few girls to perform five or six times. With the aid of staff translating, they told me they loved reading, and often read when they were bored.
The amazing element? Well, more like astounding. Without the school library, the children would not have access to books. No books! Many government school libraries do not have books, and book shops, I've noticed, are not widely accessible. As well, Nita explained Hindu culture is primarily an oral culture, and while reading and writing are not discouraged, there has been an active movement to make the practice more widespread. I thought of a similar campaign in the states some ten years ago. Campaigns posters that hung in my elementary school library (some are still at DC's antiquated MLK Library) and celebrities, like Whoopi Goldberg and Phyllicia Rashad, cradled books and smiled lovingly in testament to the joys of reading.
An ordinary, rudimentary element of the America student's school day, the trip to the school library, is a tremendous accomplishment for a school that serves many children who are the first in their families to attend school.
But this is not a Western-country to the rescue story. Recall that RTR partners with local NGOs to create and sustain the libraries. RTR India, like all RTR sites, is staffed entirely by native Indians, not foreign nationals. Within three years, and after several hundreds of books donated, the local NGO takes over library maintenance entirely. Also, RTR does not host international volunteers. So while in the states, check out your local chapter of RTR. There is one in DC.
Now off to dinner, and then to dessert in Khan Market. A volunteer returns to the States tomorrow, and that calls for massive amounts of delicious Indian ice cream, rumoured to be made with buffalo milk. I'll return and detail my whimsy romance with Jaipur and the Taj Majal.
One of my primary goals in coming to New Delhi was to get an inside perspective on how children are educated here. Teaching English in Munirka offers one perspective, and a visit to Room to Read's New Delhi's office offered another.
Room to Read (RTR), like many non-profit organizations, has a lovely genesis story that I'll summarize this way: a former Microsoft techie John Wood trekked through Nepal and came upon a school without a library. Through donations from friends in the United States, he later supplied the school with 3,000 books. Room to Read is the formal structure that assists NGOs in several Asian nations in creating and sustaining libraries and other facilities to enhance children's learning and economic opportunities. India has RTR sites in several states, and the capitol region of New Delhi. Last Friday, I joined RTR staff and two other American visitors on a visit to sites in South and East Delhi.
What I was both ordinary and amazing. If you were to walk into a school library, and saw bright red ribbons atop heads buried in books, would you be amazed? Would you not expect to see students studiously engaged in their reading? The darily bibliophiles interrupted their work to recite poems and sing songs in Hindi and English. I especially appreciated their performance of "Baa Baa Black Sheep." Enthusiasm and pride fueled a few girls to perform five or six times. With the aid of staff translating, they told me they loved reading, and often read when they were bored.
The amazing element? Well, more like astounding. Without the school library, the children would not have access to books. No books! Many government school libraries do not have books, and book shops, I've noticed, are not widely accessible. As well, Nita explained Hindu culture is primarily an oral culture, and while reading and writing are not discouraged, there has been an active movement to make the practice more widespread. I thought of a similar campaign in the states some ten years ago. Campaigns posters that hung in my elementary school library (some are still at DC's antiquated MLK Library) and celebrities, like Whoopi Goldberg and Phyllicia Rashad, cradled books and smiled lovingly in testament to the joys of reading.
An ordinary, rudimentary element of the America student's school day, the trip to the school library, is a tremendous accomplishment for a school that serves many children who are the first in their families to attend school.
But this is not a Western-country to the rescue story. Recall that RTR partners with local NGOs to create and sustain the libraries. RTR India, like all RTR sites, is staffed entirely by native Indians, not foreign nationals. Within three years, and after several hundreds of books donated, the local NGO takes over library maintenance entirely. Also, RTR does not host international volunteers. So while in the states, check out your local chapter of RTR. There is one in DC.
Now off to dinner, and then to dessert in Khan Market. A volunteer returns to the States tomorrow, and that calls for massive amounts of delicious Indian ice cream, rumoured to be made with buffalo milk. I'll return and detail my whimsy romance with Jaipur and the Taj Majal.
posted by Rhonda Henderson at 8:12 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home