Back from the vacation!

Sheel

It’s a new school year, but perhaps the feeling of the vacations is still in the air. Your students may be talking nineteen to the dozen about how they spent their vacations. Why not leverage the opportunity to smoothen the transition into the learning cycle? Particularly if one has been on vacation oneself, one (or more teachers) can use that experience as a talking and learning point over a period or two. Even if not, a geography lesson could be adapted to provide a prospective opportunity. Here’s an example that would work at classes 4 and 5, but which could be adapted to suit a lower or higher level too! Here I’m taking off from my own vacation in Sikkim, the Indian state that’s sandwiched between Nepal and Bhutan, and shares a border with China too!

1. Begin with an incredible fact or experience.
Have you ever seen a river of broken rock? Yes, you heard it right: a river of broken rock. This is exactly what I saw enroute to the Yumthang Valley in Sikkim, a bone-chilling zone where part of a towering mountain came crashing down not very long ago (2015), and where its remains – boulders heaped upon boulders, several larger than the large car my co-travellers and I were touring in – cut a wide swathe right through the middle of an otherwise beautiful mountainous landscape. Tall conifers felled like matchsticks lie broken and withered among the rocks along one section, and along another, a rhododendron forest lists to one side as if someone had pulled the earthy rug under their feet. The road here is just a stone-and-mud path barely wide enough for two vehicles, making it appear as if both the road and the people traversing it are intruders. It is quite clearly full of perils – but wonder of wonders! people continue to live here – warm people, who willingly share what they have with their neighbours, ready to help each other despite their own hard lives. It leads me to wonder: are attitudes conditioned to some extent by our environment?

Activity 1 – Social Studies: Hang up large physical and political maps of India side by side. Get the children to locate Sikkim on a map of India. What can they understand about Sikkim based on the maps? Introduce vocabulary related to the mountainous region: words like mountain, peak, valley, pass, glacier, snow, snowmelt, river, waterfall, landslide, boulder, rock, etc. You could also choose to introduce words and phrases such as neighbouring countries, national boundaries, foreign soil, and so on. Get them to identify the countries that surround Sikkim.

2. Describe what the place and the people are like.
Sikkim, unlike many other states of India, is comprised entirely of mountainous terrain, with twisting and turning roads that seem to fall away into deep valleys on one side, and closely hug steep mountainsides on the other. The southern region lies in the Lower Himalayas, while in the northern region there are tall peaks including Kanchenjunga, the third-highest peak in the world. Streams of snowmelt plummet over cliffs and sometimes flow across the roads, eroding them and exposing their man-made rocky beds. There is danger from falling rocks, and landslides are not uncommon.

The people who live here – mainly Lepchas, Bhutias and Nepalese – know that they can take nothing for granted. Yet they seem to be smiling and happy always, and there is a spring in the step at all times. Their friendly and peace-loving nature is very evident.

Looking at their twinkling eyes, I wonder why, in the high mountains where so much is tentative and provisional, people are by and large more unselfish, polite and principled, while in the plains and plateaus of our country, where the conditions are much more conducive to plentiful living, so much greed and selfishness exists. Do the difficulties of living on edge, literally and figuratively, far from making one fearful or irritable, contribute to making one more serene? Perhaps when we are keenly aware that what we have might be taken away easily, we are more grateful for what we do have, and value our relationships between people more than our possessions, connecting and bonding with others without affectation.

Activity 2 – Language: Give the children ‘What if-‘ situations, asking them to think and speak or write about at least one. E.g.:

3. Bring up other quaint facts or stories about the place.
Another group of people that one can’t help but notice is the soldiers. Sikkim shares a border with China to the north, both China and Bhutan to the east, and Nepal to the west. In fact, Sikkim was an independent kingdom until the early 1970s, ruled by a Buddhist priest-king called the Chogyal. It became India’s 22nd state in 1975. Its borders are now manned by Indian soldiers from various parts of the country. These soldiers live far away from their homes, in difficult conditions. They do not live in houses made of cement and brick, but of wood or metal sheets, and their food comes mostly out of tins. Yet they perform their duties gracefully and are ready to die for their country and people.

Did you know that in Sikkim, there is a temple dedicated to a soldier? In the midst of the mountains, there are passes through which one can enter the surrounding countries. One such pass is the Nathu La pass in North Sikkim, through which one can go to China. Harbhajan Singh was a young soldier from Punjab who was posted in this region. While accompanying a caravan as a sentry, he slipped and fell into a fast-moving stream and drowned. Appearing in a dream to a fellow-soldier he gave the news of his own death, and asked for a memorial to be built for him. The fellow-soldier brushed off the dream as nonsense, but was shocked when Harbhajan Singh’s body was found exactly at the spot he had mentioned in the dream. A small shrine was built for him. It is believed that his spirit continues to patrol the border, and warns other soldiers of events to come and news of movement of soldiers across the border. Harbhajan Singh is now an honorary Captain of the army, and his family receives his salary every month.



Activity 3 – Social Studies: Nathu La is just one of the passes on the old Silk Road through which trade was carried on. If your class is internet-enabled, you could get the children to watch a short animated film about the Silk Road, available at http://ed.ted.com/lessons/the-silk-road-history-s-first-world-wideweb- shannon-harris-castelo. Make sure to go over it beforehand so that you are familiar with the narration, which progresses rapidly. You can also choose to pause the video at relevant times, to give some opportunity for questions and discussion. If not, you could just discuss the historic development of the route, and the developments it paved the way for. You could choose to list the countries and towns through which the road passed, and the items that each of these was famed for. Discuss when and why the Silk Road lost its importance. A number of ideas and images about the Silk Road are available at https://www.pinterest.com/pstohrhu/silk-road/.

4. What is the culture like?
A curious thing I noticed about Sikkim is the rich colours of the temples, both Buddhist and Hindu, but the former in particular. Their interiors offer a distinct contrast to the greens and browns of the mountainsides, and the tall snowy peaks interspersed with heavy clouds in the skies. The vivid colours lend the very walls and ceilings the look of rich tapestry, entrancing the onlooker and providing a warm atmosphere out of which the delicate lines of the painted figures and statues seem to emerge and embrace the visitor.

Most of the Buddhist temples are dedicated to Lord Padmasambhava, or Rinpoche, a Buddhist teacher who visited Sikkim in the 8th century and established Buddhism in the region. The Sikh guru, Guru Nanak, is also said to have travelled through Sikkim. An older legend tells us that Lord Hanuman stopped to take rest on a peak in Sikkim on his way back to Lanka from the Himalayas, when carrying the Sanjeevani herb to cure Lakshman. A temple now stands on this peak, from where Kanchenjunga is visible on clear days.

Both the indoor environment of the temples and the outdoors of Sikkim have something in common – they inspire a meditative attitude! The peaks shining gold as the rising sun’s rays fall upon them, the beds of rivers clearly visible in the cold clear waters, and even the yaks grazing on the mountain sides have a calming effect upon the mind. This attitude seems to be a trait of the lakes of the region as well: large, well-known ones like the Gurudongmar and the Tsomgo appear as prayerful as the pilgrims who come to visit them, while smaller ones like the Elephant Lake lie quietly in the middle of high plateaus. Even the sparkling mountain streams, the milk-white waters falling off the cliffs and the snaking rivers in the valleys, which sing different notes as they tumble down the slopes and rush towards the plains, make one feel joyful more than anything else.

Activity 4 – Art: Share pictures of the natural beauty of Sikkim. Talk about its flora and fauna, as well as its culture – the dress of the people, their festivals, the sports they engage in. Ask the children – If you were to visit Sikkim as a tourist, what would you like most to do? The children could draw or paint a fantasy picture of themselves engaged in their own special fun activity in Sikkim. This should serve as a good way to bring closure to the holidays and usher in the school year on a happy note.

The author is a writer, researcher and editor. She can be reached at sheel.sheel@gmail.com.

Categories: July 2017, Primary Pack