Today marks the start of our journey to India! All of us were excited and in high spirits. 3 pm was the time by which we have to be at Changi airport Terminal 1. Fortunately, none of us were late.
After having our plane tickets distributed to us, we checked in our luggage. The time of our departure was at 5 pm. Having 1/2hr before we checked in, most of us spent this time with our parents.
We boarded the plane at 5 pm. The airline in which we are flying with is Thai Airway. The less said about this the better, anyway.
The flight to Bangkok took 1hr 30 min. After that, we had our second flight to Delhi which is around 3hr 30 min; it was an ardous journey, mark you. (haha) We touched down in India at around 12.30am India time. Indira Gandhi International Airport had no ceiling for some parts, so the airport was not exactly great, but run-down. Most of us were exhausted and lethargic.It was a 2hr drive to our hotel. Our hotel was located in the market area of Ghaziabad and sadly not up-market. We were quite disappointed but none of us complained. After checking into our hotel, we did a quick wash-up before our headed for bed. We had to assemble at the hotel lobby at 8.30am and we needed to catch some sleep. Most of us slept at 4 am. We were extremely tired and thus slept rather easily. It was a mere 4 hr sleep before we had to get up and continue on the second day of our adventure. No complaints there!
Stampede at the airport.
Day 2
We are all geared up and ready to meet our hosts! All of us woke up early in the morning to dress up and took great care in grooming ourselves. In blazer, tie and all, we set off after a rushed breakfast on the school bus to USG. Upon arrival, we were greeted quite enthusiastically. We received a traditional welcome from the school, in the form of three cute girls putting a red dot on our hea, another giving us a handful of scented flowers and a garland of flowers. I t was rather interesting. After all the "formalities", we went to the school auditorium for a cultural tryst with SPIC MACAY.
SPIC MACAY is a group whose mission is to spread the influence of Indian classical music to the world, regardless of race. We listened to the performance of a professional "cero" player (or something spelled like that). It was rather like an Indian version of the guitar. The special thing about Indian classical music is that at different times of the day, only specific melodies was to be played. Also, music is very individualistic, different players play music in their all styles, quite differently. They sometimes are even unable to recreate a piece they just played, so music was a very free expression. At first, I did not really enjoy the experience, as the mood of the music was hard to place. But as I listened on to the climax, it was actually very good, giving the feeling as if I had reached sudden clarity. That feeling is almost inexplicable.
Lunch with stars.
The performance was graced by the spokesperson for the Daniel Pearl foundation. This foundation believed in harmony in all humanity, achieved especially through music. The late Daniel Pearl died in violence while trying to spread the message of peace. His primary message was to let people understand the similarities between different races, rather than to scrutinise at the differences.
The music was rather long, so when it ended, it was time for lunch! We at South Indian cuisine, but it was somewhat different from the one wwe had in Singapore. Most of us was not used to it as it was very spicy and curry as pratically redefined to something we did not know at all! To the Indians, curry was like any sauce eaten with the main meal, there was even red bean curry. A few other odd dishes included sweetened rice vermicelli with coconut flakes. That's pudding for you in India, haha!
Does it look good?
After lunch, we had a really, really fun workshop for us. In preparation for an international community service started in California called Project Citizen, we learned how to identify problems in society and steps to overcome them. Through some genuinely fun activities, we learnt lessons that I am sure I will remember for a long time as we learnt in a interesting way. We had the workshop together with the girls and their English standard was very good. Us Hwachongians said things, not unintenlligently, but in dull, meagre vocabulary, whereas they spoke in a variety. I thought, "So much for being a top school in Singapore!"
USG
Following the workshop, we had sports games like golf, basketball and tennis. We were literally thrashed in basketball, as the girls in the basketball team were really good. We did not dare to block them, if you know what I mean. Personally, I took up tennis. It was a short but fun game as we got the basics right. The games only took half an hour to around 40 minutes before we were off to dinner. I could not remember exactly what we ate, but I remembered something sour. After that, we retired for the day in the hotel. That was Day 2.
No comments:
Post a Comment