Anita

Anita, one of the young girls in the home, studies at Grade 2. Generally, the girls in the home are still very young, aged around 8 to 9 years old, hence they can be quite in need for care and concern, which they do not get normally.

Anita is one interesting girl, in 2 aspects. One moment, she can be extremely mischievous and jovial, dancing her soul out performing for you, or trying her very best to convey her message to you in English. Another moment, she can be very quiet, sitting down just to help the girls hold anchor while they made a friendship band. On the other (worrying) side, her mood can sometimes swing to a rock bottom in less than a minute. She will lay down restlessly on the floor, with tears in her eyes. Unknown cause for her mood swings.

Anita carries this big bag to school everyday. But for her, it works in a slightly different way. She and Sunita goes to the same class, and hence they share the same big bag, which they take turns to carry to school everyday.

We look forward to watching you dance, Anita!

Gibon

Gibon (English name: John) aged 6. In fact, none of us really know how to spell his name, maybe apart from the Home staff. I think Gibon just came to the Home not long before us.

He is the youngest boy there, and is quite evident that he is still adapting to the environment in the Home. Not sure of his background, I know that Gibon speaks a mixture of Hindi and Nepali language, which is quite unusual as the local kids there mostly speaks pure Nepali language. This could unveil much about Gibon’s family background.

Naturally as a newcomer to the family, he is still trying to adjust to this environment. He is always sitting at one corner, singing Hindi songs to himself or watching others play. Sometimes, he has difficulty conveying his ideas even to the Nepali boys, and not to mention speaking English to us.

Gibon does not go to school. When all the kids go to school in the morning, Gibon stays at the home and hangs out with the Cooking Man. The reason he doesn’t go schooling is because the staff already owes the school 5 months of school fee (for the rest of the kids) and with that mountain of debt owing to the school, the school doesn’t allow the home to register another new student. Also, the home staff had difficulty in finding a sponsor for Gibon’s school fees.

*Explanation: There were a lot of our friends who were confused. To clarify, the school and the Home are 2 different, separte organisations. The Orphanage Home sends the kids to one school, just like the public schools you and me attend. The school fees we donate will be paid to the School directly.

Being young and small, he sometimes gets teased and bullied by the Staff’s kid – Babu (Yes the big bully in the house). Luckily, the other boys in the home will stand up for Gibon when this happens. Unity – we call it.

Gibon has 3 good friends Keshav, Niraj and Subas. Also, Gibon takes good care of the dog at the Home called Puppy.

Gibon does have a problem of scaly, dry skin on his arm. There’s when luxurious items such as moisturizer comes into “actual use”. Glad that his hands are so much better by the end of our trip.

Towards the end of our trip, there came a piece of good news - The home staff managed to find one sponsor for Gibon’s school fees.

Thus one morning, the home staff hurriedly rushed to the school and pleaded with the school principal for Gibon’s admission and paid him a sum of money to register Gibon for school. He came home with Gibon’s school uniform! And quickly, Gibon changed into his very first school uniform and left for school with the rest of the kids.

It was definitely very touching and pleasant to see that Gibon can finally go to school like the rest. The chance did not come easy, and education is probably the key to upgrading their standard of living in future.

Needless to say, Gibon has problem adapting to school because he did not know his ABCs at all, and did not had any prior education. He was sent back home, and was asked to practice his ABCs so that he could blend in with the rest of the class.

Needless to fear, because in his environment, help is always there from the bigger boys. They immediately took on the role of tutoring him ABCs. Thanks to Bijay, Surya and Chandra. At the end of the intensive 2 hours, Gibon could recite his ABCs, with confusion still at the M, N, Os.

It was definitely nice to see how Gibon changed during our short stay of 2 weeks there. From the quiet boy who sits at one corner and did not have a chance to go to school, to the boy who was able to blend into the home, laughed and finally got a well-deserved chance to go to school.

It also tells us how our little help could make a big difference to their lives. Thus, the help that was offered – giving them a chance to go school is definitely a priceless gift.

To end this entry with “Gibon’s entry” in my black notebook. Actually none of the words were written by Gibon himself, because he couldn’t write, remember!

His name and age was written by one of the bigger boys, Bijay, who was thinking hard on how Gibon’s name should be written.

And one fine day, there were suddenly more words that were added to my black notebook.

“I like to play carromboard. I like you very much. I like singing listening music like Nepali movies. But I like Chia Yong Koh. Thank you for helping us!"”

I matched the handwriting and asked Kiran if these were his words. He was shy to admit initially, but of course they were because they definitely are not the thoughts of a 6 year-old Gibon’s!

Study your ABCs hard, Gibon! I will definitely be looking forward to listening to it when we get there in October!

Chandraman

Chandraman (English name: Marley), is aged 12 and studying in Class Six.

Interestingly, his English name was “bestowed upon” him by the other kids while trying to write their names in my black notebook as he did not have any English name like the rest yet.

First thing worth noting is that he is rather small-built for his age, thus he had so much self-consciousness that he was asking me if he is too short/ small. (I almost half-jokingly replied to him to avoid taking wintermelon tea, i,e dong gua cha in Mandarin. "No, I used to be like you, you will grow, I replied instead. )

Beneath this petite physique, Chandraman is also one shy character in the house. I have noticed him sitting quietly by the window, using the windows grill as an anchor to do his friendship band. And there was one incident where he drew a lovely picture for the volunteer. Instead of giving straightaway to the volunteer, he held it in his hands, paced up and down the hallway and kept hestitating to give it as a gift. A few times, I would always stop him to ask him what was it he was holding in his hands, and if that was for any of us, and he would always look down, too embarrassed to admit. It was quite a joy to catch him “red-handed” in his shyness.

He has an amazing talent for arts and handicraft. For example, I bought this plain-looking boring black notebook for the kids to write introductions about themselves. On seeing the plain-looking boring black notebook, Chandraman drew a rose for me without hesitation, and offered to help me paste it on my notebook as a decoration. So, the plain-looking boring black notebook had transformed into a beautiful-looking notebook under his creative hands.

The rose has also captured the eyes of my friend, JY, who requested that Chandraman draw her a rose during my next trip...(Price tag for the art?! :p)

In his free time, needless to say, he likes to draw and do handicraft with the minimal resources he has. Usually the bed acts as a table for him to create his masterpieces.

The windows grill and the wooden platform, serves as his very own way of holding anchor to his friendship band.

His determination and passion for Arts shines through without doubt. For example, he learnt how to make a friendship band with his name in less than 1 hour. What had touched me was that he kept practising on his skills and worked towards the goal of perfection to make THE perfect friendship band. It was really inspiring to see his never-give-up attitude and great determination!

Also, worthy of mentioning here, he won several prizes in the school's art competition. Below were some of his masterpieces he drew during his art classes with the limited resources they had:

Some of Chandraman's cute photos. He is truly very photogenic!

During our trip, we brought along wet tissues (seems like quite a necessity in Tourists’ To-Bring checklist) which the kids saw and were fascinated with the smell and texture. We gave one piece of wet tissue to each of them. They were thrilled and repeatedly smell and use it to clean their face. Then, they would fold it nicely and keep it safely in their pockets. Repeated on several occassions, I saw them taking it out to smell and use as a handkerchief. On our last day, they even used the wet tissue to draw pictures and messages for us!

Below was what Chandraman drew on HIS Wet Tissue. Yes, Wet Tissue! The elephant was drawn with great details and it was probably the nicest elephant I had seen on drawing. What made it inspiring was that this delicate elephant came from the works of a 12 years old Kid. And on a wet tissue? Which is probably the last few materials we will choose to draw on.

Lastly, in the beautifully decorated notebook, this was what Chandraman wrote:

"I like to play all games but I like to draw pictures. I like also like English and Nepali, etc. I like to eat pizza. I like to go school everyday. I want to be a painter."

You are the painter, Chandraman! With your talent and good attitude at such a young age, I am sure you will go far!