An Indian Summer :: Wessex Scene Online

An Indian Summer

The lake town of Pushkar in Rajastan province

9th October 2008
Olivia Hayward

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Nov 09 - A Rough Guide to India’s Deep South
Oct 09 - Student Charity Kilimanjaro Climb
Oct 09 - Mission Possible
May 09 - One Student’s Journey to Antarctica
Mar 04 - Southampton Graduate Finds a Gap

Raleigh International explains why their Gap Years are so uniquely special, with support it allows you to do something really different.

I was determined that my Gap Year was going to be amazing. I wanted to go ‘out there’ and do something ‘different’. But unlike many people my age, I had no idea how I was going to live my dream of a brilliant year.

Everyone else seemed to know exactly what they were doing. I was stuck in a tedious office job trying to book activities and flights to places like New Zealand whilst trying to look like I was working. No easy feat, I can tell you. The only thing I had planned was a ten week expedition to India with Raleigh. It was probably the best thing I could have participated in.

Raleigh is a youth and education charity, specialising in overseas expeditions which take adventurous young people out to remote places and gives them the time of their lives. The 10 week expedition is the longest of the different programmes and consisted of three phases with adventure, environmental and community projects, which were totally different from each other and were an incredible amount of fun.

I arrived in Mysore, India with 32 other venturers and about 20 staff members. We all had a great induction at the fieldbase for a few days before being deployed. My first project was the community phase, so I was taken with my small group of 12 and 3 staff members to the remote village of Hosekerasunda, to build ten composting toilets. I hate being a tourist and this definitely wasn’t for tourists. The villagers welcomed us with open arms; they really wanted these toilets ‘like the other village’ a few fields away. We built the brick structures with help from each family. It was a wonderful introduction into Indian culture; we lived in their school, ate the food they cooked for us, swam in the reservoir every day, learned some Kannada (the local language) and had a fantastic time. I had only met a couple of my fellow venturers at an induction weekend arranged by Raleigh before we arrived, but within a day we were all lying out on a tarpaulin every night discussing everything from food to friends. We formed great relationships, especially with the children who were madly keen on cricket and ‘duck, duck, goose’, which we taught them and played endlessly thereafter. After three weeks, leaving was heart-wrenching; they presented us with flower necklaces and there were tears on both sides.

My next project was the adventure phase. We had a ten day trek through beautiful Kerala, two days’ mountain biking and three days’ kayaking in the peaceful back waters. One of the best things about Raleigh is the lessons it teaches you, such as the importance of team work. At one point, one girl collapsed in tears half way up a mountain we were trekking up, protesting that she couldn’t go on. The team emptied her bag, divided her things so she wasn’t carrying anything except a toilet roll, fed her sweets and sang made-up songs about our team to motivate her. She was the first one on the summit that day. Now that’s teamwork. That’s Raleigh.

We went to remote places where whole villages would turn out to watch us have lunch, everyone honked and waved madly when they drove past us on the road, something that made me smile even at the end of the day.

The last project was the environmental phase, which was brilliant. To say that we laughed a lot would be an understatement. We stayed in Nagarhole National Park repairing elephant trenches, which stopped marauding elephants from raiding the sugarcane fields just outside. The work was hard, but so satisfying. I remember sitting at night listening to a herd of elephants calling to each other; one half was stuck on the outside of the park, the other side was inside; the trench we had repaired that day had split them up, showing us the effect of our work instantly. They were reunited later that night, but we had made a lasting impact.

We had fun afternoons with trips out to visit waterfalls, sampling local foods, playing volleyball with the rangers, salsa lessons and yoga amongst other things. I got to know my group so well we became the ‘Nagarhole Family’. One of the highlights was the safari in the forest, where we got to see some wildlife close-up, including wild elephants.

When the 10 weeks had ended I had made some of the best friends I’d ever had, learned so much about India and about myself. I got back and had to get out again. I signed up to another Raleigh expedition, this time to Costa Rica for 5 weeks and set off again. It was totally different to India, but just as exciting. I chose to do an environmental project, and spent three weeks living in the heart of the rainforest; we slept in hammocks, constructed temporary benches, tables and shelters out of branches, swam in a beautiful river every day and had loads of fun doing a really worthwhile project. The last week in Costa Rica was an adventure/survival challenge. We spent four days trekking around Costa Rica’s beautiful countryside, which is a story in itself, and then spent four days living on a deserted old prison island, which had one of the best beaches in Costa Rica. We were given lessons in collecting food, water, shelter building and fire-making, and built camps on the beach. One of my favourite memories was waking up in my hammock in the morning and gazing out at the sea and pearl white beach with the sun shining and thinking that every penny I had worked for in the dingy office had been worth it.

The staff intensified the fun when they dressed up as soldiers with plastic weapons and ambushed my small group. We then spent the rest of the day hiding in the forest trying to avoid them, and being ambushed and taken prisoner. It was a great laugh, and the last challenge we had to face was raft-building with barrels and bamboo. The funniest part was watching the other groups’ rafts falling to pieces in the water when ours stayed intact, while the others clung to pieces of bamboo and swum around dejectedly.

People ask me whether I’d recommend Raleigh, and my answer is always unhesitatingly, ‘definitely’. I left with a wealth of new knowledge, memories that will always make me smile, and I’ve hardly mentioned the whole host of wonderful, crazy, fun-loving friends I will have for the rest of my life.

Raleigh is great for everyone, the 5 week expeditions are ideal for students in summer holidays. Raleigh offers so much support in terms of kit, fundraising, organising and getting everything you need. If you want to take part in some really worthwhile, genuine projects, have an adventure or do something a bit different, Raleigh is for you. It’s time to ‘Get out there’.

Find more infomation at raleighinternational.org