2025 Student Blog
January 10, 2025
School Lunch
Growing up in the Seattle Public Schools system, a common lunch conversation would be that “the pizza tastes like cardboard”. We left the hostel bright and early at 5:30 AM to go see Akshaya Patra, an NGO that prepares school lunches. No matter how tired us GCILers are, everybody is always excited for our activities…
Akshaya Patra
Today we woke up at the crack of dawn and took a bus to Akshaya Patra, an NGO dedicated to providing healthy and hygienic food to schoolchildren throughout India. This NGO treats the grand challenge of food for all- as well as education, as providing healthy meals at school encourages attendance. Akshaya Patra sources produce…
Success and Distress
Impressed, inspired, reassured are all words I can use to describe my experience at Rise Bionics today. We began our afternoon walking through the wooden doors that led us into Rise. From just looking at the logo and the design of the door, I could tell that a lot of thought was put into the…
January 9, 2025
Finding Trust in Community
After a hardy meal and good company, we venture back onto the bus. We’ve been told to make observations with a clear and open mind. I see buildings with vibrant colors. I see streets lined with motorbikes, and motorbikes, and again, more motorbikes. I see chili peppers sitting on the steps of people’s homes. I…
Cultivating a Community with the Green Foundation
After days in Bangalore, where car horns pierced through my bedroom walls, Kanakapura seemed as quiet as a library. The long bus ride from Bangalore to Kanakapura felt like the crevices between buildings gradually extending into grasslands and lakes, with storefronts scattered along the way. Eventually, the bus stopped in front of a small store…
January 8, 2025
A Tale of Two Encounters: From the Gita to the Goat
As I walked along Kumarakrupa Road for the first time in all of my existence, I experienced many things familiar, and not. I believe this is the crucial balance required of an enriching experience, and as fits my personality, I place the highest importance on the perspectives gained through conversations with strangers. The most striking…
The Questions of Day-to-Day Life
I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect when coming to India, I am not sure any of us did. But I found some things shockingly familiar personally. The tendency to put Ganesha statues everywhere was something many Thai people did that was comforting to me. The markets, haggling, and all the street carts were mildly…
Comfort and Normality
In reflecting on these past few days, these days abroad in India as GCIL have felt like a dream. After the first few days, I felt that culture shock but stuck with these emotions long enough to see them go and be replaced with new ones. Leading up to my coming to India, I have…
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