Monday 27th July

Yesterday I had the opportunity to sit down with Biju and and Secu and talk about my next stint in India and my ideas for developing the teaching. Biju outlined his vision and there are lots of exciting ideas in the pipeline. Improving the teaching of English is one of my main objective whilst I am here and I have the support of Debbie Hepplewhite ( Creator of Phonics international) back in England who has kindly agreed to help me out with ideas and resources for teaching phonics. She has also put me in touch with Don from 'Ray of Hope' who provides new resources and equipment for projects in third world countries. He is kindly sending me over £1000 worth of new teaching resources. Also, we are going to get new workbook printed for the children to use on the buses. These will have pages for English, Maths and Hindi. Once these arrive I will be able to take the staff through how they should be used. Chelsea FC kindly gave me one of last year's academy kits whilst I was in England so I will be hoping to give this out to the street kids who have been part of the football we have started. Unfortunately, many of them are out of Mumbai currently because of the rain. They should be returning shortly.

Some of you will remember the cards that were designed by the children that I was selling back in England. We are looking into producing cards and gifts for Christmas, all design but the street children. I will keep you posted on this, so if you are thinking of buying your Christmas cards, wrapping paper and new calendars please wait!!!

Today I was in Mahim with the bus. There were a few technical problems at the start of the day as the bus developed a gas leak. The teaching had to be put on hold for the day but a van was hired so that the feeding could still take place at each of the locations. Fortunately a mechanic was able to come out and fix the problem so the bus will be back up and running tomorrow. After lunch at the kitchen, I then met up with my friend Amin in Bandra. He was able to meet Rajesh and learn more about the work of Vision Rescue. He is going to arrange for me to look around the orphanage where he grew up and for me to see the good work that is going on there. The rest of the day was spent at the office discussing the printing of the workbooks and the possible Christmas card range. Tomorrow I will be on bus number two giving me a chance to visit the new location. The photos are of children from MMRDA which I took on Saturday.