Leadership activity in Bommasamudra

Most of the time I wish to interact with the children wherever I go. I am very happy to do activity with the children. Same thing happened when I entered the school in Bommasamudra.I asked the in charge of the school did they have any sort of discussion with the girl children regarding Menstrual cycle & importance of hygiene during that period? She told, no;& asked if I can help in that regard it will very great. I selected 6th ,7th ,8th class girl children for the session.
In the beginning I asked their name & what they want to become in their life & listed it on the board .Next question is what is the impotent necessity to achieve this? There were many answers, we came to an end that health is the most important one. Later I related health to personal hygiene specially during menstrual cycle. Initially many put their head down, some starting feeling shy, very few were seeing me. After the ice breaking activity many started asking questions which was very interesting,
· Why the blood will come?
· Mother says it’s bad blood is it true?
· Why we should not touch the one who is in MC?
· Why it is not in boys?
· What is white discharge?
· What are the sanitary napkins?
· In TV they show blue ink flowing in to the napkin what is that?
· Where to get sanitary napkins?
· How to dispose it?
· Which is good one?
& so on…………..
I could answer to their questions. Session went on for nearly 2 hours.We ended the activity by reminding them about their goal with the quotation ”HEALTH IS WEALTH” Teacher felt happy & we felt satisfaction.

Leadership activity

Itwas Saturday 9:00am when we decided to visit a Urdu school to do our leadership activity.We walked around 15 minutes from BVB college ,Vidyanagar.we could see green flag on a small building.My friend told me its the Urdu school.It is one of the oldest school in the Hubli,started in 1932.There we met Mrs.S.A.Kori who is incharge of the school.The school is not having its own building,right now it is running its activity in a Darga.The school building has collapsed few years back & still under construction.Mrs.Kori was happy to recive us,she allowed us to do leadership activity with the children.We could teach them few games & gave tips about personal hyegine through a story.Inchrage told us she could see enthusiasum on the face of the children after playing. We thank the teachers, incharge & children for giving us a chance to be with them. We strted from the school by 12:00pm.

Visit to Kurdikeri village

“We know it is not good ,but we are not having any other alternative for it”told by a village lady when I entered the village KURDIKERI by passing the open defication area.I used to think that villagers do not have much knowledge about cleanliness ,the bais was broken by the village lady.This was the first unlearning for me in the village stay. I have done transect walk with villagers in which I could meet Anganwadi teachers,Nurse, Headmaster of governament school, Chairman of Panchayat, Priest, SHG members, Shopkeepers,farmers & so on.
Let me brief about village KURDIKERE:
LOCATION:Kurdikeri is around 20km from Hubli.It is surrounded by Kardikoppa in south,Kamplikoppa in east,Surshettikoppa in north,Bagekoppa in west.

HISTORY OF VILLAGE:Around 300years back a family came from Unkal to this place to stay,they had a blind women with them.Later this village develop.People started recognising this village with the name of the blind women(in kannada Kurudi means blind) & the village got the name as Kurdikeri.

LIVELIHOOD ACTIVITIES :
• 80% of people have their own land, so agriculture is the main occupation.
• Sheep rareing.
• Brick making.
• Dairy.

CROPS Grown:
• Soya
• Maize
• Cotton
• Vegetables
• Alasandi
• Greengrams & many other finger millets

EDUCATION FECILITIES:
• 2 Anganawadi
• 1Higher primary school

FACILITIES NEEDED:
• Drainage system.
• PHC
• Bank
• Toilets
• School building
• Medical shop

PROJECTS IMPLIMENTED:
• SARVODAYA KHADI GRAMODAYA PROJECT
• BAIF PROJECT
• SUJALA PROJECT
• LEISA(Low external input sustainable agriculture)
PRA tools used:
• Trasect walk
• Social mapping
• Matrix analysis
• Seasonality mapping
• Time line
• Focused group discussion

MATRIX ANALYSIS
CROPS INCOME YIELD MARKETING RESISTENCE STORAGE
SOYA 5 3 5 5 5
MAIZE 4 3 4 3 1
JOWAR 1 2 2 4 3
COTTON 2 1 4 1 4
VEGETABLES 3 3 1 1 0

SEASONALITY MAPPING

MONTH JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JULY AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC
RAIN - - - 1 2 5 5 5 4 2 - -
INCOME 4 - - - - - 2 2 3 3 4 4
EMPLOYMENT 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 3 4 4
MIGRATION 5 5 5 - - - - - - - - 5

CHALLENGES FACED:
• Gathering of people
• Power cut in the evening
• Availability of place for FGD
• Getting people for trasect walk
• Involment of women in mapping

OPPORTUNITY AS A SOCIAL ENTERPRENEUR:
• Markenting for vegetables
• Storage of vegetables
• IG activities for migrating people
• Fecility of toilets

In Balamandir

It was 12:30pm when we reach balakiyara balamandira in Gantikeri. It is a beautiful place. We met Mrs.Kankanur who is the in charge of that balamadira. She explained us about balamandira, it has 130 girl children out of them. Some are orphan, some are Child delinquency. When we told her, we came to teach children some activities and wish to follow up it in following days she felt happy and provided us two classrooms.
we selected 7th, 8th and 9th students for activity that is paper bag making. we started teaching the activity it went for 1hr, children with enthusiasm. Children were happy and asked us to come again. While coming we met Mrs. Kankanur and presented few paper bag made by children’s she felt happy and appreciated our work, asked us to come again and teach many things to children.

In the cradle of Himalayas

It was May (2008) end when we,me & Nitin(my husband) decided to move towards Himalayas.After a long discussions with in us we started on 2nd June to Delhi.The most interesting part of this journey was trucking. we spent around 2 & a 1/2 months in himalayas by walking & some times trucking with least money in our hand.We covered Rishikesh,Haridwar,Gangotri,Gomukh,Yamunotri,Kedarnath,Badrinath,Massuri& Dehradun. One should visit himalayas to see the greatness of Indian culture,the hospitality the villagers show towards a strngers like us was unimmaginable.One interesting thing I wish to share with you all;one day after walking for more than 25 kilometre in the nearby village we wish to take rest(it was late evening),we asked a lady,she welcomed us to her home.When we got up in the morning both the couple(house owners) were getting ready to go to field work,leaving us in their home.We asked them that how they are trusting us so much ? we may run away by stealing their things.The answer was still amazing,they told-if you take anything it was not belonging to us.Such a wonderful people they are.Such experiences are plenty in the journey.We could meet many sanyasis,sadhus,Babas,Ashrams & scholors.We could enjoy the breez of terrific Ganga,soothing Yamuna & guptagamini Saraswati.We spent a day in Gomuk glacier,which was a deadly & unforgetable experience.The air & water their is so pure,we used to feel less hungry unlike in plains .Legends behind each place in himalayas take you to a different world.Whenever i share my journey to himalayas with anybody i go back to the thrilling experiences.I personaly felt that everybody must visit himalayas once in their life time.I have given a very brief introduction about my journey.If anybody wish to visit himalayas by trucking,can contact me for route map.