3 of 6

CIEE organized that the students would visit MVF on Saturday. MVF (M. Venkatarangaiya Foundation) is an organization that is committed to abolishing child labor through the principle that every child has the right to an education. The foundation has several institutions throughout Andhra Pradesh and has put 25,000 adolescent girls in schools, stopped 8,000 child marriages, and has mainstreamed 50,000 children into formal schools. The establishment we went to was two hours away, but we went through nice wide farming lands to get there, something I haven’t gotten to see much of within the Hyderabadi congestion.

During our visit there, we observed students learning Telugu and also played with them. We organized games like “down by the river” and “simon says” etc. and when we weren’t playing a game I knew of, the students would be singing or dancing something they would usually use to enjoy themselves. I learned some of their dances but can’t remember them anymore. Although I couldn’t understand any of their Telugu, I loved the melodies that they’d use in the music, so different from what I’m used to and beautiful in a whole different way.

To my ears there seems to be a lot of fluttering around important notes to the scale which not only emphasizes these notes but also conserves a common home tone throughout the piece. The prominence of this conserved home tone seems to be equivalent in prominence/importance to harmonic chord arrangement and progression in western music. I’ll probably have more to say once I’ve started learning instruments. I remember standing in our circle of 22 CIEE students and 20-30 school girls and listening to three of them sing from one of their notebooks. The line of music they sang combined with how they pronounced the words affected me in such a distinct way. The song was arranged like a rondo with a repeating refrain, and after each small section, the rest of the school would respond with the same. It was so simple because the refrain was repeated so many times and held constant throughout the song, but at the same time so complicated because of how foreign it was to my ears. Somehow I got a feeling of playfulness but at the same time a feeling of matter-of-factness after each refrain that led me to not label the song as “happy” or “sad” but just the way it was, plain and pure in its own way. Solid but not strong. Subdued but not weak. I don’t quite know how else to put my finger on it. The reason I try though is because of how it churned at my emotions. I really could have let myself go if I had chosen to. I restrained, but not without a few tears down my cheeks. Prashanthi told everyone after the song was finished that it had been about the struggles the girls had faced before coming to the foundation. I introduced myself to one of the girls who sang and asked her what her name was in Telugu. It took her a while to respond; she had a shy smile and seemed to want to run back to the comfort of her friends. Funny how she was fine with singing in front of 50+ people but was nearly too shy to respond to just one. Her name was Anita; I had one of the CIEE directors tell her that I greatly enjoyed her song (I only knew how to ask simple questions in Telugu). She nodded at me and grinned before returning to her games with the other girls.

They really enjoyed hand games; they’d play theirs with us and we’d teach them ours. I knew ‘Miss Mary Mack,’ and after showing it to them they couldn’t get enough of it. I’d have to kindof squat down to play it with them and there was at one point a crowd of at least half a dozen girls who were all clamoring to play it with me, one would push into the front after the previous had finished playing; the girl who had finished would go to the back of the crowd and excitedly wait until she got another chance. That lasted for a while but was lots of fun.

I met a girl (from an English college) from Dubai who was reporting about MVF. She explained how in Dubai it can be easy to make a ton of money by investing in the oil reserves there and also how pretty it was, kindof like an oasis with desert all around. She also explained how there is a huge gap between the rich and poor (common theme I guess) but that the poor workers had even less hour/working condition regulations than in India; many die during the hot season due to unreasonable working conditions.

Before long it was time to head back to our motorcoach (obnoxiously large amongst the one-room shanty school buildings). The girls of course swarmed us and crowded around the bus as we boarded. I spotted my new ‘Miss Mary Mack’ friends, Divya and Supria, amongst all of the commotion. They were grinning as they too looked back at me on the bus and had their hands pressed together, meaning namaste. I slept the whole bus ride back.

That evening I went to another soccer game with about a dozen SIP students and also my Indian friends, I kindof introduced them all. It took a while to amass everyone together; first some SIPs had to go back to the guest house to get their IDs, then Money bought chai and fried vegetables that we leisurely ate, then I spotted Anu and Sumedha in Gops and convinced them to come with us, then they had to go back to the ladies hostels to get their bikes.

I loved that though, more than anything it took be back to being at home; there’s Colin, Thom, Matt and the other people from our grade, then there’s Drew and all of his grade, then there’s Eric and Alexei etc., some people are available, some aren’t, some want to do this, some don’t, some want to go with these people, other’s don’t, by the time we all figure out what we’re doing, it’s about midnight. I guess my friends know a little about being Indian by not really adhering to a strict schedule :)

Anyway fortunately we could amass ourselves before midnight and all made it to the game only a few minutes after it started. That game was North Korea vs. Afghanistan. Yes North Korea has a soccer team; it was pretty shocking, I had never predicted that I would see a North Korean in my lifetime. But of course I paid less attention to the game and more to the people around me. I found my Hindi guru again (the one who offered coffee last time)…everyone raised an eyebrow at me to see me walk over to a man sitting in the stands and act immediately like we were old friends. They weren’t incredibly surprised though, giggling and shaking it off as just “something Matt *would* do.” My SIP friends left early, but I stayed back with Satish, Money, Anu, Sumedha, and some Ethiopians we had met. North Korea won (a lot of people were cheering for them actually). By the end of the game there were some monsoon-quality rains upon us which we had to wait through for a while; we didn’t get back to campus for another hour probably. Sumedha, Anu, and I met up with Vippin, ‘B.C.’ (Vikram), and Ankush for dinner at Gops. The paneer and roti there is delicious but may get old fast…I think I’m going to eat at the guest house for another month before ending my meal plan to eat totally on campus.

Gops was a lot of fun, but maybe or maybe not as interesting as what the other SIP students did (who left early from the soccer game). They had all gone to a club in the city; they said that American music was played mainly, along with select Bollywood hits. You have to dance in couples or you’ll be bounced, especially men, women can really do what they want; I think the reason is to keep enough women on the dance floor. The dance floor was as small as a table and no one was really dancing until the Americans arrived. Same story at the clubs in Europe! The drinks were extremely expensive but free vouchers were handed out at the end to encourage us to come back.