Republic Day Celebrations

Date - 26th January, 2007

Location - Kakaguda Govt. School, Secunderabad.

Team ~Pankhudi - A total of 26 members for 26th Jan Event



Enthusiastic about flag hoisting, excited with a flag pinned up ontheir dress, getting game for the cultural events- this is how therepublic day celebrations started off at govt. primary school,Kakaguda, Secunderabad. It was the volunteers day as well as therewas good attendance of volunteers. So, may be that also added up tothe excitement of the kids in the school.
Flag hoisting was the first event wherein pankhudians helped theteachers of the school arranging the flag and hence hoisting itsuccessfully. It was great to be there at a school as a serviceactivity with a patriotic feel within. Well I am sure all volunteersmust have been nostalgic about good old school days and then the JanaGana Mana..woow that was awesome. I am sure it was worth waking up alittle early compared to other days and rushing to the school.



Dandia, group songs and not to forget the thing “Burra Katha” (whichwas a wonderful performance by one of the students) were allmemorable performances. Cheers to all the volunteers who were thereto get the kids together for practice sessions and made it a greatexperience altogether. The main round of applause goes to Pattu (Mr.Monterio), whois associated with the school and has helped us associate ourselveswith the school, and had given us the pleasure of serving the school.

After the cultural event, our volunteers distributedchocolates; and the kids were game for the sports events. With alittle time gap, we started the sports by dividing the kids intogroups.We had lemon and spoon race, running race and three leggedrace. The competitive spirit in the kids was appreciable, aseverybody was vieing to win when we announced prizes forthe winners. All the Volunteers really need a goodround of applause for the successful completion of the sports events. All of them were key participants in arranging the events.

On an Concluding note, the winners were given away the prizes and the rest were motivated to be more sportive for the coming events.
Putting it in nutshell, it was a great and memorable republicday, cherishable for a long time.Hope to have more of such events ahead and see more active participation of ourvolunteers.

Cheers…

~Pankhudi Team Hyderabad

Visit to St.Teresa’s Tender Loving Care!

Place: St.Teresa’s Tender Loving Care

Date: 18th December, 2005

Team ~Pankhudi : Adept (Praveen), Klueless (Krishnakanth), Sumanth, Shilpa, Divya, Ramesh, Rachna, Nitin & Harini.

This Sunday was our first visit to an orphanage as Team ~Pankhudi…

We arrived at the orphanage, just when the kids were getting ready for their bath. So we were asked by the sister in charge of the place, Sister Teresa, to come over and take a look at the backgrounds of the children in the home.
As the horrific stories of abandonment and bureaucratic battles unfolded…we couldn’t help but feel very sad for the plight of these young and beautiful children. Sister Teresa showed us snaps of kids they had found abandoned in dustbins, empty street ways and desolate corners and told us stories about the long standing battles between the government and the couples willing to adopt. The sad state of affairs really brought tears to our eyes.
Finally after an hour of listening to sister’s heart rending stories we were allowed to meet the children…

We were led into a room full of about smiling and welcoming faces…the average age of the children there was about 5…
It was wonderful to get introduced to all the adorable little kids…they were so excited to introduce themselves to us and so were we. We had taken along chocolates, biscuits and sum toys with us.

There were about 30+ kids in the orphanage…and ironically all were girls. Being a large group we could easily go around and mingle with all the kids…the kids were so excited about telling us their names…they were thrilled when one of us distributed the chocolates to them…each of them tried to get our attention in their own endearing way. It was such a treat to watch them recite A, B, C, D’s and numbers which they had learnt from the sisters. They wanted to play with our watches & mobiles…and told us about what they had done earlier in the day. Soon it was time for their lunch and we had to leave but before that the children sang songs for us.
It was very touching to watch them sing…



Finally it was time to say our good byes and the kids questioned us if we would come and meet them again, some of them even suggested that we come and …it felt really sad to leave them and go meet them the next day home…as for the little time that we were with the kids we had grown as attached to them as they had to us. We promised the kids that we would come back again the next weekend. It’ll be a joy to meet them all again.

Cheers…Team Hyderabad

Krushi Homes - January 1st `07

Attendees- Surya, Sunil, Karthik, Ramesh with 15 of his friends, Vasanth, Prabhanjan, Jyotsna, Revathi, Sadhana and two of her friends.

To start the New Year in style, we visited Krushi homes on January 1st. The start of the year was marked with excitement and celebration, for the kids as well as our team. Reminding us of a previous meet, this time too there were equal number of volunteers as the kids. There were 30 kids and 26 volunteers were inn for the day. We had taken some Stationary like Books, Pens, Pencils, Erasers and Sharpners, Rulers etc. We had also taken some pairs of clothing to distribute among the boys there. Though we got both boys and girls apparel from the drive, we had to sort boy’s clothes here as it was a Home for Boys.

We had four new members from GNITS, the college where we had given a presentation last week. And also, around 15 students, mostly Ramesh’s friends, had turned up from Srinidhi College; the college where we had recently started our Donation Drive. The girls from GNITS had got a cake along with them. This had served a dual purpose for the occassion. It was also one of the boy’s Birthday there, and we could add to his happiness by having a Cake cutting celebration. Also, we gifted him a a car with some special feature of emitting smoke while it drove.. Technology you see.

As known, there was no way we could miss a dance session at Krushi. And this time around, the guys were equipped with a Public Audio System, to satiate their urge for a Dolby effect. To add up some spice, Vasant had given some warm up for his muscles. The kids loved his performance, and some of us actually envied him too..

Tired by the long dancing session, the kids took a break to grab some chocolates and a couple of cake pieces. Rejuvenated soon, they then took onto some Gaming session. As evident to their obsession to music, they choose to play Musical Chairs. Yielding to their pleasing request, we played the game with some volunteers also taking part to test their might with the kids. But as always, the kids proved their upper hand. The Winner and the Runner up were given a Video Game and a Bike as Prizes. The next game was “Dog and the Bone”. The two teams choose their names and the game went on for more than an hour, when we had to conclude the game abruptly and declare both the teams as Winners, as it was getting too late for their lunch.

We then gave the clothes we took and asked the Warden to distribute them according to the sizes. Done with it, we bid Adieu to the kids. The kids invited us to celebrate the coming Sankranthi festival with them with some Kite flying masti sessions. Sure to get back, we left them into their lunch session and made our way back with the Joy of starting the New Year on such a Pleasant note..

To View the pictures, check out http://ph.groups.yahoo.com/group/pankhudi_hyd/photos/browse/94d6

Cheers
Team Hyderabad.