World Sangam Day

First of all, I need to start off by saying a big "HAPPY WORLD SANGAM DAY!" to everyone out there! Today is Sangam's 45th Birthday, and what a day it's been!! I'll tell you all about it later, but first I'll catch you up from where I left off last time!

So on Friday, I was meant to have the day off, but I ended up working, which is fair enough given my sick days! I spent the morning doing bits and pieces with Philippa, sorting out some posters for World Sangam Day, and basically faffing a lot! It was hard to refocus after a few days off, but it was good to be back doing something at least! The afternoon was Indian afternoon, so I was back in my beautiful sari (which I must remember to get washed very soon!), and I also helped Jessica and Philippa learn how to tie their own saris - the fun process of putting it on, and taking it off, and putting it on, and taking it off, until you know EXACTLY how to do it the next time! I had to do this during my first event too, and it's really annoying at the time, but I can tie my sari in super fast time, so it's definitely worth it!

After that, we had Maharastrian dinner, the traditional wedding feast for the state (not that there was a wedding!) and then we packed up and went to bed!

Saturday morning was lots more prepping for Worlda Sangam Day, finalising our posters, and checking things with people and tidying the whole of Sangam - Jessica and I had the highly exciting job of stacking the inflatables in the storage area! It was a really enjoyable morning though, lots to do, and lots to achieve :) The afternoon found us doing Indian crafts, so I was doing Warli Art, which is a very relaxing session!

Straight after that was dinner, and the Jubilee Garden movie, which was going to be in... the Jubilee Garden. BUT then it got moved to the pool due to technical difficulties... BUT THEN it got moved to the hall due to the amount of rain coming down! Lots of people came, and we had snacks and drinks for everyone, and I think it was a success - although I wrote down the wrong time on the invitations to the local staff, so we had to start an hour later than we were meant to - whoops!

Also on Saturday night, the highlight of the night... THE ELEPHANT ARRIVED! The staff were all sitting on the front steps waiting for over an hour for this elephant to arrive! It was SO exciting! I never thought I would see an elephant walk through the gates of Sangam. We took it to the campsite, fed it some bananas and it went to sleep. All good :) I was going to camp in the campsite that night, but I decided that because I still wasn't back to 100%, and I needed all my strength for the next day, it probably wasn't a good plan! Hopefully I will get the chance in the future.

Today (World Sangam Day, don't know if I'd mentioned!) was incredible. It started with both mine and Ellen's alarms going off at 6am to get ready for a water tower climb that didn't happen as it was too wet. We did however go and watch the elephant have it's morning bath! really really cool. I will try and get photos up - I have a day off on Wednesday, I will try and put lots of photos on my blog then! Eventually, the elephant was ready for the day, and Claire, Saga (a guest for the weekend) and I climbed on (literally, we put our knee onto the elephants hip, and pulled ourselves up!) and went for a ride!

Straight after this, it was time for me to prepare for the WAGGGS quiz! This is just a fun quiz where we test the participants knowledge, and hopefully teach them a few new things as well! Once this was finished, the participants had chai, and then headed off to the campsite to create some memories with Sophie. They made some clay tiles, which will form part of a new decorative piece going to go in behind the laundry. Should be good! Philippa and I wandered around with Jen for a while and made sure everything was looking fantastic for this afternoon. We quickly sorted out the last few things for Jen, and I even had plenty of time to do my meal duty! Sayali and Aarti (our volunteers-in-training) also followed me around for a while practicing their speeches for tonight's ceremony. OH and Ellen and I actually climbed the water tower to put up a big banner.

After lunch, it was time for the party to start! But of course, there's always time for a short lunch time nap, which I duly took. Then I had to sit and wait for the puppet man, to set him up. We all had one thing we were in charge of throughout the day to make sure that things got sorted properly. The puppet man was mine. He arrived, in true Indian style, nearly 50 minutes late. He also couldn't speak a word of English. So I quickly borrowed Priya and Sayali to be my translators, and got him everything he needed. As well as the puppet show, there was also a tabla (drums) player, laughter yoga, a potter, a tarot card reader, and of course, the elephant and camel!

Then I wandered around taking some photos, trying to put the cat on the elephant (it didn't want to ride!) and generally enjoying the party. I was also on reception for a while, and then at 5.50pm I had to run up the water tower with the sangam camera to take a bit group photo! It was lots of fun being up there, lots of people waving - I felt famous, which of course I want to be :P I then ran down the water tower (or at least might as well have done) and got down in plenty of time to hear Sayali and Aarti give their speeches. They were amazing. I am so proud of those girls.

We also had a cake cutting and announced some very exciting things for Sangam - they're getting a new building! AND also, the volunteer in training program now has an official sponsor which is awesome!

After that, there was some dancing, some dinner and this evening we had a lovely community partner forum, where members of 7 of Sangam's community partners came along, and we could ask them any questions we liked. tt was very good!

Right now though I am falling asleep whilst writing this, so I think it's time I actually went to bed! Luckily I have a bit of a lie in tomorrow - 8.25 Flag ceremony! No problem :P

Today has been awesome, and I am so lucky to be here, working in this environment, with the fantastic people I work with!