Raksha Bandhan

Today was the first day of school here at Woodstock. We thought about making a post reflecting on the new beginnings and lonely students, but we thought we'd share a bit about a festival that took place today. Every year during the Hindu month of Shraavana, there is a celebration of Raksha Bandhan (the bond of protection). This festival is marked by girls tying rakhi, or holy threads, on the wrists of their brothers.

After the brothers (or cousins, friends, etc.) have their rakhi, they pledge to protect their sisters. The sisters then give their brothers a sweet to eat. There are several different origin stories for this festival involving Hindu gods and goddesses, but it was a nice sight to see little boys getting their threads tied on by their little sisters or cousins.

And in case you're wondering, the first day of school went well.

Dave and Beth

Party Time

One big change for Dave this semester is the arrival of a student teacher. Matt comes from Minnesota and just graduated from St Olaf College. Woodstock has a long-standing relationship with St Olaf and usually has one or two student teachers come for a couple of months each year. We found out yesterday that it was Matt's birthday and we used that as an excuse to have a small party. Beth, of course, felt the need to make a cake in Matt's likeness.

We also had plenty of old and new staff members over to help us eat the tasty cakes that Beth made.

Now this all proves either that we have friends, or that we know a dozen people that like cake enough to put up with us for a couple hours. Hopefully it's the former...

Dave and Beth

The Danger of Monsoons

As mentioned earlier today, there are beautiful and wonderful things about the monsoon season. There are also some less than desirable aspects. We've mentioned the mold, mildew, and generally constant dampness that pervades all aspects of life during this time. There are also some physical dangers associated with the ever-present rain. Beth went for a walk yesterday morning on one of our favorite trails and saw that the rains had uprooted a tree and caused some rock to fall off a cliff. We weren't in any danger because we don't generally hike during torrential downpours, but it is good to remember that the monsoons are not all pretty green valleys.

The monsoons have been unusually light this year. We've had a couple days in a row where it has not rained at all. Everyone always tells us that the first monsoon is the worst, but we're pretty sure that ours actually was worse than everyone else's first monsoon.

Dave and Beth

The Beauty of Monsoons

Having safely navigated one Indian monsoon season, we are feeling comfortable as we settle into our second. There are things that get very annoying about constant rain (more on that later), but it is good to periodically step back and remember the great things about monsoon. Naturally, there is a lot more water around, so things get very green. The trails and valleys are absolutely bursting with life and color and that is the best part of the season in our opinion.

It is exciting to go through this season with a more definite understanding of when it will be over, but we will certainly miss parts of it when it passes.

Dave and Beth

Welcome to Woodstock

Not being new to the school ourselves this year has helped us to appreciate the situation of our incoming new students. We are again serving as advisor teachers, having followed our advisees up to grade seven. The new students arrived this afternoon and were greeted by a big shamiana.

This tent is integral for any outdoor event happening at this time of the year. The students will spend the night in dorms this evening and then arrive bright and early for lots of meetings tomorrow morning. We're looking forward to helping our seven new advisees figure out what their supposed to do while comforting their parents that we'll take care of them as best we can.

Dave and Beth

Indian Jimmy

When we visited our nephew in California over the summer we left him a nice little kurta pajama outift to wear. It was still too big for him when we were there, but Mike and Amy suited him up this weekend to see how it fit. We think it looks pretty good.

We'll have to pick up a few more pieces before we leave India next year.

Dave and Beth

Welcome Back

Our internet connection at home has been fickle since we returned to India. In an effort to keep our readership happy, we wanted to make a quick post about one of the things that welcomed us on our return. This little guy ran across Dave's foot the other morning.

He almost got smashed, but Beth intervened and caught him so that he could be safely released back into the wild. Naturally, the science teacher in her wanted to document the capture before she let him go. We did not think to put a scale on here, but his legs were probably about 5 inches across. We've been assured that the spiders here are more frightened of us than we are of them.

Dave and Beth