Busy Bethania Day! Sept 23

Today was non-stop. Kids were here all day because it was an exam holiday, so only the youngest girls had school. It's so wonderful being with all the children, even though it can be overwhelming sometimes, with all the children shouting "sister! I sister! Sister!!!" vying for attention.
Today after breakfast we went for a walk in the mountains with some of the younger boys and older girls. It's incredibly beautiful here. Bethania is right at the bottom of these stone hill mountains. The boys ran ahead while we held hands with the girls and walked down the little paths and through the fields. Some of the older girls had made us bracelets which Big and Little Muthumari kindly tied on our wrist.
We carefully navigated the hard stones and spiny cacti in our sandals while the kids sprinted up the face of the mountain in their bare feet with newly painted toenails. Built into the rock was a small hindu temple where the kids climbed on the roof and filled it with peacock feathers and flowers- or the few that they hadn't given to us anyway! By the time we finished our hike are hands were overflowing with peacock feathers, flowers and ferns. When we reached the top of the mountain Nandini, big Kartick and Pandi gave us spines to carve our names in the cactus with. They carved their names and our names into the Cactus as well, while the other boys sprinted all around the mountain chasing peacocks and screaming 'monkey! Monkey!' Although I'm pretty sure there are no monkeys here. It was really hot up on that stone mountain side and it was a relief to go sit in the guava field while the kids climbed trees and picked fruit.
We returned to Bethania and got out big pieces of paper to trace kids and label body parts. We traced one little girl, Nandini and labeled everything. 'Hand. Nose, fingers' belly button was apparently the funniest thing any little girl had ever heard and was repeated throughout the day to a chorus of giggles. Hopefully that is not wildly inappropriate...oops. The boys carefully traced Sethu. Somehow leaving him with stick legs and a head much smaller than his hands, not to mention marker on his shirt and shorts. He was also labeled and titled " he is a great power ranger" by Setish, our little English scholar. He is very cute and smart. Quieter and more to himself, he loves to read and when you talk with him you realize he is also very excited about speaking English. He was making up English stories about pictures and telling them to me, full of excitement. It was very sweet.
Today when we awoke from our afternoon nap, the rains had thankfully begun, dumping buckets of water for a few hours, turning the play area into an arena of mud. The boys ran around in ponchos while the buckets designed to catch rain water overflowed. We decided to be in charge of snack, making bread with jam that VijayaSarathy bought us in Kodai along with a few packs of biscuits he also packed us. We spent an hour, carefully putting jam on 50 pieces of bread while the little boys crowded around watching. "Who you make for?" Asked Alegasarmy. "We are making toast for everyone!" "For me?" He asked surprised. Hahaa. "Yes." "Good Sister." When we finished he asked to take the jam to the kitchen, but Pandi and Joker later informed us that he and the other boys had just eaten all the rest of the jam. Oh well.
I've been drawing everyone's portrait today which has been pretty fun and exciting. It makes them happy, and it's fun to draw. The best is when other kids can tell who it is without being told. Rosie loved her portrait and was kissing it, while Kelsey says the one of crazy Laksmi looks just like her. Kelsey entertained some girls by cutting out butterfly shapes from colored paper which the girls then decorated. These were Nandhini's favorite, while M+M (little Muthumari) loved the paper outline that it was cut from! Meanwhile, big Muthumari decorated kelsey's whole hand once again with her beautiful gel pen henna decoration.
Before dinner we began English lessons with the younger girls, Priya, Moga, Nitiya, Lakshmi and Naga. We wrote down different words for every letter in the alphabet and then did charades. We had one of the little girls act out the thing while the others had to say it and point out where it was written on each of their papers. The octave at which they screamed the answer seemed to increase exponentially as the game progressed, but everyone seemed to be having fun and learning. After, we sat with the girls individually and helped them sound out the words they didn't know while the other girls played with an alphabet puzzle. Sounding out was more difficult as they tried to just guess rather than read, but everyone seemed to be improving and they were all excited about learning in a very sweet and genuine, if not, crazy loud way. When all else failed, they seemed to love to shout out oxen and dog, even though they weren't anywhere in our alphabet cards!
For dinner we had dosa, masala with egg, rice and each a banana, walampalam, which we end every meal with! It was quite delicious and a nice ending to a busy, fun day.