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When we have busy days I tend to get a bit behind on this blog so I am currently writing this whilst sitting on a boat heading back around the edge of Tiger Bay, which leaders to the Bay of Bengal after a day in the jungle, but more of that tomorrow.
Having negotiated a lie in for our students on Friday morning our driver, Denish's car got a puncture so he was even later picking us up than planned. Eventually we all made it to the school in time for our Bengali lesson. The teacher is still withholding the months beyond April so I can't yet say my birthday but Sairul tells me that generally even if people can't speak English they know their birthday in English. Our Tabla teacher was Ronadip one of the older students, with Madhushudanhe, looking on and coaching. He pushed us hard teaching us both the second half of Ge Na Go Ge Na, as well as the first rhythm that required us to hit the drums with both hands at the same time, known as Tin Tal. This level of coordination was proving quite a challenge for most of us but we all gave it a fair attempt.
After lunch we had a long orchestra practice with Anup drilling the strings hard particularly on the Bach Brandenburg concerto - I still can't believe I can get my fingers around any of the first violin part but I guess that's what comes of rehearsing.
Some of the children made mud pies to put around the plants which John had sneakily arranged the younger children to plant whilst we had been in Kolkata. Ivy did some printing with some of the children using foam, rollers and paints.
I was asked to lead a short time of evening prayer so I chose to try something a little different, simpler and less formal which was mostly well received although I gather Bikash fell asleep during it - at least he didn't snore
After dinner we headed back to accommodation for an extremely early night as the alarms needed to be set for 3am.
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