Es 'trots off' again....

It had rained all night – again the heaviest rain I have ever seen/heard. Up at 7am to meet with most of the Chennai kids who were up with adrenalin pumping!! You have to know that kids like this travelling outside their state and going to a camp such as Avalanche is very very rare. In fact for many this was their first time away from home.

Late morning and the rain stopped and the sun came out. Turn out really nice. Had breakfast of cereal. We had brought our own as the rest of the guys have stonking curry fir breakfast (after sleeping on the ground and waking at 7am!!)

Es is having REALLY bad diarrhea (as was I). Don’t want to go into all the details but both of us woke last night having had loads of diarrhea without even knowing! That’s how in control we were of our bowls!! Don’t want to be graphic and don’t let your imagination run too far but if you want to really know what it was like……? Imagine that happening about 2am in the morning in the middle of the jungle in a tent with no lights, toilet paper etc. And my big brave girl just got ion with it (as did I), sorted ourselves out and slept. You know this is no holiday at times and this was one of the low spots. We really did wonder what we were doing there…..

Having said that at 9am the kids had to get into their teams (Josh and Es in different ones which turned out well). Again just imagine the kids in the middle of the jungle with 50 odd kids they have never met before about to join in teams with them and go out on scary adventures. More on the kids phenomenal spirit later but, yet again, I was staggered by their attitude and strength of character all the time we were there and the rest of our time out here. Talk about proud of them or what!

9.30am and they were off to their tasks for the day. Es went abseiling and gorge walking and Josh went to ‘team challenges’ and river crossing. Couldn’t stay with both of them as they were going to different parts of the jungle so I stayed with Es (as she was pretty ropey) and grabbed hold of one of the leaders of the other group and gave strict instructions to look after Josh. He looked at me very strange and said (in broken English) “I will do that as he is my son too….” It’s an incredible culture that still has a deep seated philosophy that ‘your kids are my kids and vice versa’. All families are just extended really and this has a massive impact when it comes to juggling care for you kids in this kind of situation. The whole week I hardly saw the kids as they were looked after in a massive extended family. I can’t explain it really – you have to experience it. We have lost so much of that in the UK guys haven’t we. Anyone that looks at caring for me kids has to be police checked and treated with suspicion until they have proved themselves eh???? No bad thing I guess but what I experienced was amazing all week with the care given to my kids……

So, yes, sorry for the ramble!! Josh went to his activities and more on him later. Es went abseiling. 1st time for her and something she has wanted to do for ages. She had ‘crocks’ on so had to abseil down a significant drop in bare feet!! Did really well on both speed but also technically did brilliantly. Nandu (Raj’s first staff member) was the instructor – very skilled and a real asset to the Trust.

Got a report back after Es had abseiled to saw Josh was having great fun and was the first volunteer to cross the river which involved walking on a rope and holding onto another above his head (he could only just reach it!!) with a harness and rope for safety. He wanted to go first and Raj said he shot across it and then stood the other side helping people out of their harnesses and cheering them on….that’s my boy!! It was a real challenge and the (pics) don’t really give a sense of how high off the ground he was.

Es and I then went off to the gorge walk. I wasn’t part of her team and wanted to give her some space as by this time she was really connecting with the India kids. They all just held her hand and put their arms round her (a very normal things for girls to do with girls and boys with boys). I stayed with her and as the squits kept coming and going still…..

We ended up doing a gorge walk which (for the uniciated) is a walk up a pretty sharp incline following the line of a gorge (stream/waterfall) with massive rocks and tress and all sorts to find your way through – a real challenge I can tell you what with the heat (and the potential squits etc)

Es and I an the team had a great time (pics) and got to the ‘turn around’ point where we had some team challenges to do and then were asked if we wanted to go back the same way (about 1 ½ hours) or go a different way (about and hour). Most chose to go a different way – I hasten to add I didn’t!!!! We ended up trekking through the waterfalls (by this time 100% soaked) for about another hour before realising that the rains that had come had felled lots of trees and there was no way up this different route and we had to then all go back the same way as we had come. In total about 3½ hours trekking through the jungle gorge!! Exhausted but fantastic fun I can tell you. Esme exhausted as no energy due to previous incidents!!

Back to camp for tea…..I spoke to the group in the evening which, considering the normal culture gap and the fact that I had never met the kids before and the fact that I had none of my normal props (those of you who know me will know I’m lost without power point!!!) and I was challenged to say the least!! It went really well though….

Bed at 9pm at the request of the kids who were falling asleep on me (literally) and asking for bed!

A few more pics of the day: