Anyways, its almost a month since we started mentoring these kids in our office canteen on Saturday afternoons and frankly speaking I get shit tired and pissed off traveling for about 4-5 hours in the traffic, but those 2 hours that we spend with the kids is absolutely worth it.
Some of them are so bright, so confident, so enthusiastic that I cannot help imagining what heights they can reach if given proper backing and support.
Some of them are struggling so badly in their English, that I can't even imagine what kind if schooling they're going thru'.
They are all 9th and 10th standard kids. They go to school and Akanksha centre as well where they are taught mainly Maths and English. But what they lack and what is our aim is to help them identify their goals, a direction to move in, the motivation, strength and backing to move on in that direction.
The first session back in June was quite amazing. As mentors, it was on us to break the ice, but the kids were so enthusiastic that we really didnt have to do anything. They were more comfortable with us than we were with them. We played dumb charades and a couple of more fun games. At the end of the session, they didnt want to leave at all :-) That was quite a sight.
Then in the next 2-3 sessions, we played a few games which brought out the importance of team work, co-ordination and delegation. We gave them a few quotes about team work, which they had to apply in their day-to-day activities. And in the last session, we prepared skits to demonstrate these activities.
On my group was this bright young fellow Selva Kumar. He is really the star of the group and everyone in the group looks up to him as well. Given the right exposure, he can do wonders. And he proved that well that day. After we collated the experiences of the 4 mentees on our group, Selva put them all together to form a story and started writing the script as well. All I had to do was say 'And then... And then...'. Selva: 'Kya bhaiya, sab main hi likhun kya. Now you write'. The kids address us mentors as bhaiyas and didis :-) 'Bhaiya, during the act, you don't laugh and spoil it haan'. He was quite serious. It was his directorial debut :-) But I did spoil the show, Selva himself was playing the bus conductor and was to say, 'tumne ghanti kyun bajai' and he said 'tumne meri ghanti kyun bajai' and I burst out laughing and got the angry look from him :-P
Anyways, he was laughing too after a while. We all were having fun after all :-) In one of the sessions before, we had played Scavenger hunt and at the end of it, it was he who highlighted the learning that in whatever we do, irrespective of whether we win or lose, we should enjoy doing it :-)
So thats for now, more about the other kids in the posts to follow. For now, I am really having fun on Saturdays, look forward to them. Hopefully the roads of Powai will be done soon, and lessen my traveling woes. So long then till my next post.....
