India 2-16August!
Went to Cochin for my OCIP, on sanitation. our main role is to build toilets to benefit the mannan tribe people. as much as we helped them, i believed that we all learnt alot from this experience.

1. roughing it out. toilets are squat toilets with no flush. fill up a bucket of water and DIY flush. no more water? refill the bucket again. having to use toilets without sinks meant that brushing teeth, washing face, etc are all done over a toilet bowl. so if DIY flushing isnt effective, bear with it. raining? too bad, no shelter to the bathing toilet. no shelter when u go out to refill the water bucket too. tough luck. cold weather? it gets even colder when you bathe in cold water from the stream. going to toilet at night? bring a powerful torchlight (and try not to drop it into the toilet bowl ! )
2. insects! my greatest bugbear. they give you nasty bites, they are scary, and at night, they swam over to light source (which means they get too close for comfort) and they are huge!
3, food. having curry 3 meals a day, every day, isnt the worst part. try having vegetarian curry on top of it. after those 2 weeks, i swear i see slabs of meat floating around whenever an animal comes near me.
4. construction. heavy stuff to carry! try carrying rocks on ur head. i was like literally aching from head to toe. add that to me not eating much (food sucks) and u can imagine.
5. rooming. mattresses are present, but they are rather thin, you can feel the hard floor still. having 8 in a room means that if your roommates are dirty, you are dirty too. cramped living conditions, even if it is "luxurious" by rural village standards

6. name: we were all given a tribal name, to be used in the village. what struck me was that the villagers remember our names much faster than we remembering their names. even up to the end of the trip, i didnt know names of alot of villagers
7. they always treated us very well, fed us alot of food, and even offered me fried fish! yumyum. i always get nice brunch at the construction site.
8. they are very warm and friendly! i think dancing/campfire night is really interesting
9. the slow pace of life there allowed me time to read, rest, and reflect.
10. the absence of technology is more of a blessing in disguise! no need to constantly check email inbox, no news, no TV programme to watch, no phone, no msn. no mad rush. just the sound of nature, when you wake up at 7am, sip a cup of hot tea, look towards the horizon, and smell the fresh air. bliss.

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there's tiger reserve too! a weekend getaway from the boredom of construction. went for a performance, then a full-day trekking in the forest (which made me very proud to say that i survived it!). it is also made me realise how much i appreciate the little things that we took for granted in SG. i remember the first time after 1 week when i had a hot bath (although its still with bucket and scoop) i was literally in bliss.

eventually, the last day came. although i was all eager to go back to comfortable singapore, i was struck by how the villagers cried when they bid us goodbye. so warm, so friendly. Although i may never go back to india, i know that i will miss this place. i will miss the villagers, and i will miss our construction team, talking rubbish and etc to make construction more interesting.