2025 Student Blog
February 11, 2025
Work Hard, Play Hard, Work Harder
As other blog posts have described, the entire GCIL group spent the past weekend in Hampi. It was quite a magical time that I know for others was a welcomed break and for me personally was literal rejuvenation for my soul. But I’m not here to talk about what happened in Hampi: I’m here to…
February 10, 2025
Don’t Worry Be Hampi
After visiting the Virupaksha Temple on Saturday afternoon, we walk down a path, led by our tour guide, who shouts to us at the front, “we’ll pass two tigers on the way.” Looking ominously at one another we continue forward and we’re welcomed by beautiful rock formations and the Tungabhadra River. We’re not welcomed by…
Culture Breathing Life in Crevices
The past two weeks have been nothing short of overwhelming, as I’ve been combatting exhaustion with bursts of excitement. As the weekend approached, everyone was in desperate need of some rest. However, GCIL plucked us from our rooms and shipped us six hours northwest to Hampi, Karnataka. Once the capital of the Vijayanagara Empire, Hampi…
February 7, 2025
Nostalgia
As I get to know my GCIL peers and occasionally scroll through our old pictures to show each other, I am reminded of my first year of living at the UW dorms. Not just the aspect of sharing a living space with fellow students or waking up at the very last minute for school breakfast…
A Love Letter to Messing Up
I hate messing up. I hate being wrong. It’s human nature, I know, but that doesn’t make it any less annoying. For the past two weeks, my team and I have been dutifully stationed behind computer screens, researching public spaces in far-off lands; reading about high tech transport hubs in Indonesia and sleek bus stop…
February 6, 2025
Lessons from Yoga for Solving Grand Challenges
On Tuesday, I started my morning at yoga to celebrate Ratha Saptami. This festival honors the Sun God, Lord Surya. The god is seen as a source of light, energy, and life. At the yoga studio they celebrated by performing the same flow pose 108 times. Twice. So, by the end of the hour, you…
Power of Parikrma
Last week, Parirkma asked us to interview 60 children in first and second grade. They wanted us to create student profiles for donors, a picture of the student smiling – followed by two paragraphs about their lives, favorite things, and what they like about school formulated a game plan for nervous children- playing jazz music…
February 5, 2025
Farming in MP
This past week, the Green foundation team travelled to madhya pradesh to interview farmers for a case study. We woke up early in the morning that day to catch our red-eye flight to the Nagpur airport, and when we landed, we were graciously picked up by a green foundation driver who drove us to our…
Roots Across Borders
The past week in Madhya Pradesh will be one I hold close to my heart for the rest of my life. From sunrise to sunset, my team and I collected data from farmers’ experiences with regenerative agriculture. We walked amongst orchards, fields of mustard, fenugreek, cotton, wheat, and maize; forests of banyans and teak; amidst…
February 4, 2025
Public Transport and Connection
People often complain about seattle public transportation, both the busses and the light rail. Sometimes the busses don’t show up on time, and the light rail only travels along north and south, but I love it. I love arriving at the airport and being able to sit on the light rail for the entire ride…
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