The luxury launchpad

We're now all on Sri Lankan soil and are staying in the very swanky Covanro hotel near Veyangoda, just outside Colombo (inset). Karen mentioned 'the calm before the storm', but we have been making the most of our day of relaxation before we hit the first pre-school tomorrow in Yatiyanthota. We've been swimming in the hotel pool and have eaten hotel buffet meals for breakfast, lunch and supper (all very nice!). Philip and Stephen hired bikes from the hotel and cycled down to Veyangoda, where they got a flavour of lively, colourful Sri Lankan life.

On a group reflection this evening, just before a musical number from the Le Fanus, we all concluded it is great not only to be in the country but to be here with a purpose. Karen has known Dilanee for forty years and this is her first trip to Sri Lanka! Ruth, Pam, Dan and Julie are looking forward to forming deep personal connections with those whom we meet.

Our wakeup phonecall tomorrow: 5.30 AM

Below are, clockwise from top left: a) the second half of the team arriving v) the first half of the team arriving, c) Calthorpe Park school preparing to leave from the U.K. and d) Team two have their first meeting in Sri Lanka





(The blog will be written by a different member, or members, of the team each day.  Today's was written by Phil)

Packing evening

The trip is almost here!  With just one or two sleeps to go (the groups are flying out on either Monday evening or Tuesday morning), we met at Dilanee's house to pack up all of the educational resources that we will be taking with us to Sri Lanka.

With a luggage allowance of 47kg per person, there was a lot of packing to do.  Dilanee's garage was piled high with pre-packed bags full of toiletries, glue sticks, scissors, paper, tissue, glitter, crayons, pens and books.

The sitting room was also a hive of activity.  In all there was around 700 teddies to be packed, hand knitted by dedicated people around the country and vacuum packed to save space.  We are aiming to bring enough arts and crafts for each school that we visit and a toothbrush, toothpaste and a teddy for each child. 

The second picture (Above Right) is the Le Fanu family's luggage and a small sample of the overall trip's capacity.

Most of the resources that we packed were donated from schools and churches so a special thank you to everyone who donated or made something.  Our next blog post will be from Sri Lanka so stay tuned!

Calthorpe Park School, Fleet

A group of 21 students and 4 members of staff from Calthorpe Park School Fleet will also be travelling to Sri Lanka in October 2018. Please follow this link to se how they have been preparing for the trip.

You can follow their blog here - https://oceanstars.org.uk/blog/latest

September (and final!) team meeting

On the 18th September, the team met for the last time before our packing evening.  I think it's fair to say that everyone was pretty excited!

We went through the updated itinerary for the trip and Julie went through the plan she kindly made for the teacher training morning we will be conducting; we will be using 'megablocks' (basically large lego brinks) to show the teachers how they can use them as tools to tell stories and to teach maths.

We then went through the detailed (but important) visa application process.

Here are the reflections from the team from September:

Julie

I’m really excited now with 4 weeks to go. I can’t wait to get there and see everyone. It will be great to get stuck in and have lots of fun; playing games, singing, telling stories and making things.

Stephen

It seems very real now, but thanks to Dilanee and the teams’ organisation and forward thinking I feel comfortable. It was good to go through the activities again so that we all know what we are doing. Especially looking forward to the variety show and getting to know the communities on church days. Not so much the long journeys. Very excited. It’s time to rush up on my cricket rules!

Pam

Bit apprehensive about the amount of organisation needed but excited at the prospect of visiting preschools, working with children and getting to know teachers.

Phil

It only seems like yesterday when we had our first meeting about this trip! I’m very much looking forward to it and I am not feeling so nervous about our sessions with the children any more.

Ruth

Getting close now – feeling excited and just “going with the new”!! T-shirts and hoodie arrived. Feels good. No real concerns.

Phil and Stephen's Coast to Coast cycle for Ocean Stars Trust

As part of our trip to Sri Lanka, we have been asked to fundraise some money to help fund the good work on the ground that Ocean Stars Trust is doing.  Phil and Stephen decided that they would cycle the 420 miles from Penzance in Cornwall, to Margate in Kent over the course of seven days. They were joined by two friends, Barney and Liam, who also helped to raise money for the charity.  The trip had its ups and downs - being equally gruelling, fun, beautiful and exhilarating and exhausting.

We got off to a slow start in Cornwall, due to a few hitches involving equipment and maps, and were getting a bit worried by about day two or three, that we would be too far behind schedule to reach Margate in time.  As it happened we actually made up lots of time on the route after Dorchester, once the hills that had been slowing us down, and tiring us out, flattened out.  However, this is where we saw arguably some of our most beautiful scenery, such as the beach scene below.

Throughout the trip we mostly camped in wild places or fields that we found, which varied from extremely beautiful (such as the clearing on the River Dart pictured below) to fairly challenging shall we say (such as an old cow field on a fairly steep gradient).  On day four Phil hit a bit of a wall and suddenly fell ill, and so took the train for a day to recuperate and to keep pace with the remaining cyclists. However, he rallied and joined us for the rest of the expedition.  Partly as a result of this, and partly because of our dire need for a shower, we decided to book a B'n'B in Bournemouth where we were put up by the very hospitable Selda.  Many thanks to you - your food, biscuits and stories were much appreciated!

The following night we were lucky enough to be put up again by the family of one of Stephen's university friends in Brighton, where we again enjoyed a delicious home cooked meal and a warm bed.  Many thanks again Fiona and family for your kindness and interesting conversation.

We arrived in Margate in Kent at around 1pm on our last day which meant that we could spend the afternoon relaxing, which felt like the best feeling in the world at the time.   We celebrated by going for a dip in the sea, and then dining at the largest Wetherspoons pub in the country in Ramsgate.

Thank you to all those who supported us and who have donated to OST.  If you still wish to donate the link is below.  At the time of writing the cycling team had raised £1418

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/oceantooceanforoceanstars

June planning morning

The team met again on the 30th June for a full morning of planning for our trip.  This was the first occasion that we spend a long time learning songs and practising the activities that we would be doing with the children in Sri Lanka.

We arrived at Dilanee's house in Fleet for around 8am and started off (after a quick cuppa and biscuits) by practising a 'circle time' as we would in a school on our trip. We learned from Maureen, the Chair of Ocean Stars Trust and seasoned Sri Lankan tripper, that the main purpose of circle time is to make the children feel comfortable, relax and focus them, and to introduce ourselves to them.  Games that we played may be familiar to some readers from their school days and included Ring 'o' Roses, Duck Duck Goose and 'Bug in the Rug' (where one child closes their eyes and another child goes under a rug in the middle of the circle, and the first child has to guess who is under the rug). The exercise was great fun, although Hugh was dismayed to find that he had difficulty in crossing his legs fully and contemplated starting up yoga before the trip...

After this we practised reading our story book - 'Wow said the Owl' - as we would to a class of children and we discussed how we could use the book as a tool for teaching.




Above: Kathy (L) and Maureen (R) talk through 'wow said the owl'

The next two sessions that we went through were to practise cutting out, and decorating the owl hats that we will be doing with the children (see pictures below of the variety that was produced) and the collages that each school group will be making as a group.




The final sessions we did involved singing some of the songs that we will be doing with the children (hopefully with ukulele accompaniment from Ruth or Stephen) such as Five Little Ducks.

We rounded off the day with a buffet lunch with delicious English and Sri Lankan food and lots of chatting.  We were joined by Dimithri and Dinesh, two Sri Lankan born graduates who started off the  charity... which is looking to collaborate with Ocean Stars in the future.

May meeting!

The team got together for our third meeting in May where the mood was enthusiastic and happy.

We reviewed our itinerary again in added some more detail to it.  Briefly, our route will be as follows:  We will fly into Colombo and from there travel to Yatiyanthota to visit a preschool.  We will then visit schools in Kilinochichi (with a possible visit to Jaffna), Batticaloa, Thriukkovil/Chenkalady, Naripulthotam, Pattipalai, Ampalanthurai, Kurumanvely, Kirankulam, Karavetty, Soruwamunai, Thevilamunai, Kanchirankuda, Mandoor. 

Many of these visits will be conducted by groups within the team rather than the whole team.  What these groups will be is also something we discussed.  For those who have not been on previous volunteering trips to Sri Lanka, we will be thrown in the deep end somewhat by being without a team member who has been before!

We also talked about all of the arts and crafts, toys, instruments and toiletries that we will be bringing with us and how we will go about getting them.  Some of us will be doing box collections at schools and churches. Finally we talked about our fundraising ideas - promise auctions, a cross country cycle ride and a triathlon.


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Reflections from our May meeting

Phil
Stephen and I are going to try to cycle west to east coast of England as our fundraiser for Ocean Stars. At the moment this seems daunting! I’m still looking forward to going to Sri Lanka, I’m sure it will be epic!

Kathy
More details on what we will be actually doing with the children at the meeting today. Circle time songs, crafts, outdoor activities. Very important – the hat( or other objects) which the children will make for themselves to take home! Opportunities to meet some of the families afterwards in their own homes. So many experiences to come!

Hugh
Feeling a bit apprehensive being in a group comprising a lot of teachers talking about engaging young children etc. looking forward to visiting a childs home and family after pre school if possible. I am thinking about what I used to do at nursery school, as much as I can remember.

Karen
Biggest nervousness is still the flights, everything else is exciting

Stephen
Having not done anything really like this before, I am still learning more about working in a classroom than perhaps the others are. However, this also means I am really excited about the opportunity. I just hope that I am as useful as I can be. I think I will have to go in with an open mind, open to healthy about of chaos.

Ruth
Feeling very positive- hope I can make the cut out puppet! Looking forward to meeting the families,
teachers and children- ‘good to put …

Julie
I remember this time last year feeling like the trip was a long way off but now I know it will be October before we know it. Plans are coming together well with lots of great ideas for crafts and activities.

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In order to raise some sponsorship money for Ocean Stars, a curry evening was held on the 12th May at the Fleet Methodist Church which was a huge success and raised £... for Ocean stars!  Attendees were invited to eat and be merry, as well as try their hand at some Sri Lankan recipes