It seems a little silly that I have been here for over a month now, and had yet to visit the actual village of Davalwadi until very recently. Mahyco is right next to the village, so though we are not actually in it, that is what we consider to be our general location. Most of the time when I am leaving the gates of Mahyco it is to go to Jalna, or occasionally to Aurgabad; up until this weekend it had never been to go to Davalwadi. But for the past few days a group of students from Bombay has been here to help out with Dekhon (the eye-care project Ben has been working on), and one of the first things they got to do was plant some trees in the village.
True, there aren't so many links between blindness prevention and foliage, but it is hard to find things for 20+ seventeen year olds to do just as they arrive. So this way, they at least wouldn't be idle, and they would get a chance to become acquainted with rural India, a place that is almost as alien to them as it was me. We pulled into the village and immediately saw at least twenty children running towards the bus. They mostly play in a field that is right next to the road, so a lot of them were there to begin with, awaiting our arrival. We stepped off the bus and they formed a sort of shell around us, looking on with curious smiles but, at first, never getting too close.
One by one the students brought saplings out, to be planted along the perimeter of the very same field the kids had been playing in. By the time the trees were out, a good deal of the village had come over to watch. Like most rural villages in this area, most of the people in Davalwadi exclusively speak Marathi, the local dialect. Some that are more educated speak Hindi as well, and some of the children said they were learning to read and write in Hindi, but regardless communication could be a bit difficult for our group, who were mostly unfamiliar with the language.
As the planting continued, the kids remained with us, curiously looking on. At first they were extremely shy, but they warmed up quickly, particularly when I asked if I could take their picture and they got to see themselves on a little camera screen. After a while Barkha, a relative of Ben's who has come to help out with the project, and I decided it would be a good time to bring out some toys that we had brought for the kids. We led them over to another clearing near the bus, brought out two loads of old play things, and as I'm sure you can imagine the kids went nuts. After a good five minutes of chaos though, things settled down and everyone had found something they could be happy with.
I spent the remainder of that day playing with the kids and their new finds. Once again, I was amazed at how understand young children can be about language gaps. They were happy to show off their new toys to me, sometimes asking questions but never getting too frustrated when I couldn't give them an answer. More than anything they were just happy to be getting so much attention from a stranger, and eager to show off in any way they could imagine.
After a while, a girl came up to me with a stuffed frog, and began insistently asking me something in Marathi. I smiled at her and nodded my head (though in India that takes the form of more of a waggle) and pointed to her animal happily, but this did not stop her questioning. After a bit, a voice behind me declared in English that she wanted to know what it was, and if it made a sound. I was surprised, as this was the first time I had been spoken to in English today, so I turned around to see a young boy, who I at first took to be much younger than he is. I asked his name and he told me it was Shrikhan.
Shrikhan is fourteen years old, well under five feet tall, and already has a smattering of grey hairs popping up all around his head. I told him his English was very good (and the more he spoke to me the more I found this to be true) and I was curious where he had learned it. Shrikhan has been attending a school in Jalna starting with pre-primary school, where they are educated in Marathi, Hindi, and most of all English. He has lived in Davalwadi his entire life, but because it is such a strenuous school he stays in a hostel in Jalna during the week.
Shrikhan has a fantastic way of speaking, both in his impressive diction and the general feeling of warmth he exudes in conversation. I was amazed at how smooth and clear his accent was, it made him sound so comfortable with the language, almost native. He told me about what school was like in Jalna, and his dream of one day becoming a doctor. He would respond to each question I asked with a huge smile, nodding his head down and away from me, in a motion of honest pleasure and modesty. It seemed like no matter how standard the question, he was always delighted to be able to provide me the answer.
Our afternoon in the village ended with a tour of Davalwadi. All of the students headed off down the narrow streets, many of them bearing cameras with which they curiously clicked away. About half of the kids from the group followed along with us, chattering excitedly amongst themselves. Davalwadi is a pretty well-off village. 700 people live in the village, yet it houses around 120 trucks, their main source of income. Most of the houses, though now all, were concrete and fairly new, and the village even had a complex system of converting waste into energy to power their homes.
The thing that really struck me about Davalwadi was how open and welcoming everyone had been. They were happy to have us there to offer our help, but more than that they were just pleased to have us there as their guests. I think Shrikhan summed it up best when I asked him about how he liked life in Davalwadi- "The whole village is a friend." As the bus headed out of town we were chased through the fields by the same group of kids that had first welcomed us into their home, as if that hospitality needed to be drawn out to the last possible moment. They yearned to show us their excitement because in that way, they were able to tell us that we would always be welcomed back.
Throughout this post you will find some more photos. The first is the original group of kids that met us, straight off the bus, along with myself there in the back. Then you have the group of students from Bombay, as well as some of the men from the village who had come to help. Next are a couple of pictures I took on our tour, as well as another picture two girls wanted me to take just before stepping on the bus. I am thinking of getting a flickr account, or something like that, so I can upload more photos. If I end up doing that I'll let everyone know in a coming post.
True, there aren't so many links between blindness prevention and foliage, but it is hard to find things for 20+ seventeen year olds to do just as they arrive. So this way, they at least wouldn't be idle, and they would get a chance to become acquainted with rural India, a place that is almost as alien to them as it was me. We pulled into the village and immediately saw at least twenty children running towards the bus. They mostly play in a field that is right next to the road, so a lot of them were there to begin with, awaiting our arrival. We stepped off the bus and they formed a sort of shell around us, looking on with curious smiles but, at first, never getting too close.
One by one the students brought saplings out, to be planted along the perimeter of the very same field the kids had been playing in. By the time the trees were out, a good deal of the village had come over to watch. Like most rural villages in this area, most of the people in Davalwadi exclusively speak Marathi, the local dialect. Some that are more educated speak Hindi as well, and some of the children said they were learning to read and write in Hindi, but regardless communication could be a bit difficult for our group, who were mostly unfamiliar with the language. As the planting continued, the kids remained with us, curiously looking on. At first they were extremely shy, but they warmed up quickly, particularly when I asked if I could take their picture and they got to see themselves on a little camera screen. After a while Barkha, a relative of Ben's who has come to help out with the project, and I decided it would be a good time to bring out some toys that we had brought for the kids. We led them over to another clearing near the bus, brought out two loads of old play things, and as I'm sure you can imagine the kids went nuts. After a good five minutes of chaos though, things settled down and everyone had found something they could be happy with.
I spent the remainder of that day playing with the kids and their new finds. Once again, I was amazed at how understand young children can be about language gaps. They were happy to show off their new toys to me, sometimes asking questions but never getting too frustrated when I couldn't give them an answer. More than anything they were just happy to be getting so much attention from a stranger, and eager to show off in any way they could imagine.
After a while, a girl came up to me with a stuffed frog, and began insistently asking me something in Marathi. I smiled at her and nodded my head (though in India that takes the form of more of a waggle) and pointed to her animal happily, but this did not stop her questioning. After a bit, a voice behind me declared in English that she wanted to know what it was, and if it made a sound. I was surprised, as this was the first time I had been spoken to in English today, so I turned around to see a young boy, who I at first took to be much younger than he is. I asked his name and he told me it was Shrikhan.
Shrikhan is fourteen years old, well under five feet tall, and already has a smattering of grey hairs popping up all around his head. I told him his English was very good (and the more he spoke to me the more I found this to be true) and I was curious where he had learned it. Shrikhan has been attending a school in Jalna starting with pre-primary school, where they are educated in Marathi, Hindi, and most of all English. He has lived in Davalwadi his entire life, but because it is such a strenuous school he stays in a hostel in Jalna during the week.
Shrikhan has a fantastic way of speaking, both in his impressive diction and the general feeling of warmth he exudes in conversation. I was amazed at how smooth and clear his accent was, it made him sound so comfortable with the language, almost native. He told me about what school was like in Jalna, and his dream of one day becoming a doctor. He would respond to each question I asked with a huge smile, nodding his head down and away from me, in a motion of honest pleasure and modesty. It seemed like no matter how standard the question, he was always delighted to be able to provide me the answer.
Our afternoon in the village ended with a tour of Davalwadi. All of the students headed off down the narrow streets, many of them bearing cameras with which they curiously clicked away. About half of the kids from the group followed along with us, chattering excitedly amongst themselves. Davalwadi is a pretty well-off village. 700 people live in the village, yet it houses around 120 trucks, their main source of income. Most of the houses, though now all, were concrete and fairly new, and the village even had a complex system of converting waste into energy to power their homes. 
The thing that really struck me about Davalwadi was how open and welcoming everyone had been. They were happy to have us there to offer our help, but more than that they were just pleased to have us there as their guests. I think Shrikhan summed it up best when I asked him about how he liked life in Davalwadi- "The whole village is a friend." As the bus headed out of town we were chased through the fields by the same group of kids that had first welcomed us into their home, as if that hospitality needed to be drawn out to the last possible moment. They yearned to show us their excitement because in that way, they were able to tell us that we would always be welcomed back.
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