Travells with Cynthia

Domkhar with Health, Inc.

After 7+ hours on a local bus with playground equipment, assistive devices, and our packs and supplies for 11 days we arrived at the Domkhar Government School. The school was on summer holiday so we were able to stay in a small dorm (hostal) that housed boys from other villages. From Health Inc. was Cynthia (Sintia), Stamba, Dorje, a,and a. From Omprakash was Will, Lily, and Gordon. Then there was Greta from Friends of Lingshed Austria and myself, the Traveling Librarian.


















Cynthia’s home was somewhere up in the mountains. The rest of us slept on the roof, bathed in stream water, and the guys took turns making tea and meals. The night skies brought me to my knees – shooting stars every night and an array like I have never seen before.
The purpose of our visit was to paint, decorate and set-up three learning stations for a Mella (fair) that would take place at the end of our hard work. The fair was to demonstrate to local and regional officials, and the teaching staff at Domkhar how to set-up and use special areas for working with children using hands-on, student centered and body centered learning. The playground equipment which was designed by a previous group working with Health, Inc. was the first playground to be established in a Ladakhi Government School and boy did the kids love that. There was a large slide, swings, seesaw, and various other stations to assist with physical fitness, working together & sharing activities.




































































































My job, among other things, was to take a dreary room with mishandled books (mostly textbooks) and turn it into a temporary library while the new library room was being built. Both Willy & I had brought a pile of wonderful DK books for science and ancient cultures which ended up being used in the lessons I gave and added some useful books to their very small collection. Cynthia & I removed all the classroom desks, sorted and bundled the textbooks and non-library books and put them aside and then I worked on making some sense out of what was remaining. Meanwhile Cynthia drew her
wonderful pictures of children reading around the outside door of the library while Greta and some village children painted them in with color.
Simultaneous to the library, staff members were painting and working on two other dismal rooms. One as a pre-primary room with a weather center, cozy reading corner shelves of activity or discovery boxes and books. The other a primary room with activity areas e.g. a play kitchen, cozy reading area, play classroom and more. I took a lot of time out of the library to make activity/discovery boxes, collect and stuff empty chip wrappers, candy wrappers, Maggi soup wrappers, etc. with foam for the little kitchen cupboards and filled in painting occasionally. Each room and activity had an accompanying poster listing the activity, motor skills development, cognitive development, socio-emotional development, and benefits for special learners.













































































The Omprakash team, being a strong young group moved rocks, dug holes for playground equipment, brought in huge bags of heavy sand, and cemented everything in place. Hard work but they played hard, and read a lot as well.
We covered such things as a positive & inviting library environment that would capture children’s imagination through color, special displays, and clean interesting books. We discussed proper shelving and handling of books, how to teach the students to respect books and their care. Also how to integrate the library into their teaching – they followed three groups of students through a model library lesson (grade 5, middle school & high school students) for 45 minutes each. The projects were examples of how to start with a simple research process, related to classroom work, using the library. They have invited me back to assist in the new library next year and to provide more training. In the process of all this I have also been asked by Cynthia Hunt of Health Inc. to jointly (with another librarian) conduct a research project with results presented to the Kashmir & Jammu Government. We will take three diverse schools: the Siddhartha School which is private, The Domkhar Government School which is remote and a primary Government school. These schools will be given a three year infusion of books and intervention by a professional librarian (not only myself) in training how to use a library and they will be compared to comparable schools where no infusion of resources or outside intervention. Although this will be a qualitative study I have suggested that we also maintain a five year record of National Exam scores and dropout rates in the six schools to see if any link reflects back on having a well supplied functioning library that is actually used. I would love to think that we could pull in a couple of young, healthy library types to work on and continue this work and possibly a longitudinal study. I’m looking for contacts at some of the major Library Science Schools that might be interested in this research. Results would certainly be an important tool for other developing countries struggling with literacy & education.
Cynthia Hunt is writing & illustrating a book on how to handle and care for library books based on a chart I developed for remote library users. Her characters “the Hens” which I affectionately call “the girls” are willing to take on the chore. I will also be scripting short training modules which will be filmed next summer in the various schools - they will include how to set up a school library, how to establish rules & discipline, how to develop a core collection reflecting the text & syllabi, and how to integrate the use of the library resources into the class work.
Domkhar Dho area is one of the main regions for growing apricots and they are currently ripe (August). The villagers are drying them, making apricot oil, and other products. Needless to say I was given a continuous supply of fresh apricots right off the tree. There are two types one with a white pit and one with dark brown. The seeds or nut inside the pits are delicious – almost like a hazelnut. Here are some pictures of them drying – probably not up to western sanitary standards but definitely sun dried.



We also had the experience of going to Hanu where the Dards live (Dards also inhabit India in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Shina speaking populations are predominant in Tehsil Gurez, Drass and Dah Hanu areas of Ladakh. The Brokpa who follow the Bon religion are also a Dard group who speak an archiac variety of Shina called Brokpa. The Kashmiri people of the Kashmir valley are also considered a Dardic people. – Wikipedia). We all rode on the top of the local bus and had to duck often to avoid getting whacked of decapitated by Willow & apricot branches. Cynthia & Health Inc. were delivering a special mobile chair that was designed by the previous team working with Health for a girl with brittle bone disease. The Dards are an intact tribe that has basically interbred over and over. They have a very high percentage of disabilities both physical & mental. Health Inc. is the only organization working with them and has gained their trust household by household. We were going to do some work at the school which was on summer holiday but the school had recently been broken into and we were not able to pursue our goals. After two nights we returned to Domkhar for the final two days to ready for the Mella.
Of course the Mella went well – everyone had a fabulous time and the big “guys” came from the Hill Council, Government, etc. so they got to see some model teaching and ideas. This is a good thing as a seed has been planted with those in power that might assist in changing some of the ways classroom instruction happens. I’ll be fundraising this winter with a goal of $2,500.00+ to purchase a core collection of books to go into their library next summer.
The other day I bought a metal trunk and a lock and have filled it up with my books, textbooks, Syllabi, school supplies, clothing, sleeping bag, water containers, and other gear that I only need here in Ladakh. I’ll leave the trunk here at the Oriental and have all the stuff ready to go for another (hopefully next) summer.