DEEDS Children's Club Trip to the Tamil Nadu coast - Richard Sleight

The Children's Club at DEEDS consists of all the school-going children in the area above the age of ten. It's a bit like a youth club with games, skills sessions and sports, but it also discusses the environment and children's rights.

The trip was for three days to a coastal region in Tamil Nadu, with staff and children; about 200 people on three buses. I have never been on such a long distance journey that was so cramped. Lots of kids were sleeping on the floor or on top of one another on the seats. I had local volunteer Shivagami's two year old sleeping on top of me for the majority of the journey. The most astounding thing however was that in a 16 hour journey or so the music never stopped at all. Everyone was up dancing in the aisles a lot of the time which was great. Indian music is so fast (the dance music, anyway) and the dancing is manic. All the children are experts from watching the movies, so they put me completely to shame. Bus jolting from side to side I didn't know whether I was dancing or falling over most of the time. No sleep at all.

The first destination was the beach. As soon as we got there all the children ran in, clothes on, clothes off, it didn't matter (for the boys anyway, of course). Most of the children had never seen the sea before. All the staff and volunteers went in as well, going straight under the waves, saris and all.

It would have made a good surfing beach, great sand in a thin strip for miles, palm trees, blue murderous sky, white waves going straight over your head, you get the picture. It was beautiful and more importantly loads of fun. There were of course loads of shacks along the beach selling food of all kinds and behind these a strip of rubbish dump which only spoiled things a bit if you looked in that direction instead of the sea. Even with all the kids there the sea tends to bring out a very calm atmosphere, and everything is all right with the world.

Back on the bus, everyone slept, tired from the beach, except the music still blares out. I was told later that this was more peaceful, and had more space to sleep than most of the children got at home. Luxury for them, roughing it for me! Since the trip I have been house visiting for the Credit Union and some of the houses do not have enough space for an adult to lie down in and 4 people have to sleep there! We eventually got to a large building in the middle of the countryside where we would be staying. This is one of the project areas of FCS. We (the English volunteers) were put in a room with beds, a luxury none of the children nor the other staff got, and I felt a bit embarrassed they were treating us so well.

After a good night's sleep it was back on the bus and off to see a huge and very impressive Hindu temple. It was like the temples I had seen at Hampi but in the middle of a town. One of the kids decided to be my special guide so I got all the history of the place in detail. There was also an elephant there that all the children enjoyed. I'd love to see a free elephant one day. Next we went to another temple where there were huge queues to pray, break coconuts, throw flowers and give gifts.

Back at the building we were staying at it was time for the ‘Cultural Show'. The Cultural Show is about everyone dancing, doing plays, singing and so forth. Everyone! A lot of the kids had organised skits to perform about child rights issues and difficulties in the family. A lot of them had been practising dances and a few songs taken from Tamil films. All these were excellent. All the staff, unbeknown to us had been practising dances as well. All the kids and staff seemed to be amazing dancers and singers. I, on the other hand, know no formal dances, cannot sing, and as for acting… in another language?! So about 300 people (children form the local area as well) were watching all the dancing on stage when someone came up and asked Liza, Elinor and I “just do something English; a skit, a song, a dance, you know, something simple!” Now, these were children but we were way beyond the extent of my talents of ‘I'm a little teapot'. We were going to do the actions to ‘Saturday Night' (Whigfield) song actions to a Jamiroquai track [I'm sure it all made sense at the time. Ed.] but the tape broke and we ended up on stage with a few of the kids (great dancers) prancing about to some Indian music. For over 1 month since the date, teachers, volunteers, kids, would come up to me and say something like “great dance Mr Richard!”. “Thanks”, I'd say, and other things within my mind. I fear any public gathering now.

After a good nights sleep we were back on the bus for the trip back to Bangalore . It had been an eventful few days and I would definitely need a holiday to recover from it!