Words fail me ....... almost.

This morning's visit was to Bal Kalyan school in Balaju, twinned with Hook Norton school in Oxfordshire. Pupils are from the shanty town community along the river banks at Balaju which means these children are living in tin roofed shacks with the chickens, ducks, goats and pigs. The photo here is from above the township but doesn't do it justice. The next time I visit after the Tihar festival some of the community have invited us for a full tour which we were very pleased to receive, and to accept.
The school building was provided by a combination of funding from the township people themselves, the Municipality, and the Coca Cola corporation who have a bottling plant close by. Our sponsored teacher here is KKrishna Thapa, a civil engineering graduate who is from the township but who wants to teach. We had a very thorough meeting with the Head teacher (Mahdav), Krishna as well as four members of the management committee and we will report on our findings later as a summary with the other schools.
Once we had finished the meeting we were given a tour of the school to each of the year groups where we were given flower garlands, drawings and personally created poems and songs which told of the children's gratitude for our support. It was quite overcoming really and "got worse" when Krishna decided to tell each class about Champa being at one time the most educated woman from Nepal and the first Nepali woman to gain a PhD. The effect was remarkable and the teachers have no doubt that this will be a real inspiration to these children.
As a parting shot we encouraged Krishna to work with Bashu in creating a UK studies syllabus so, Hook Norton ......... you may get some questions and requests by email!
Must dash as we have 30 mins before our meeting with two people from Ministry of Education. Champa is worried I'll blow my stack .... more later today.