Nicole Wisler | The Modern Story

14
Jul

Hello all- Nicole here with the two week report! In some ways it feels like I’ve been here much longer than 14 days and in others I still feel incredibly new and disoriented. We spent Monday and Tuesday of this last week finalizing schedules with the remaining schools and had a few more introductory classes on Thursday and Friday: Shivani started herclass at Audiah Memorial High School and Nelle and I started our classes at Sitaphalmandi. Despite a little bit of initial confusion for all of us, the class I taught at Sithphalmandi was wonderful. The students are really willing to be creative and share their ideas and seem super excited about TMS (it’s the first year for us at this school!) Plus, our teaching assistants are incredibly supportive.

We had our second week of classes at Railway where we’re beginning to cover storytelling and camera usage with more depth. A lesson about the story elements of conflict and resolution led to a discussion and creative exercise surrounding issues the students see impacting their communities. The students drew pictures showing water shortages, pollution, gender discrimination, poverty, child labor, and poverty and for homework were asked to draw what they thought the “resolutions” to those issues could be (so more on those Thursday!) I’m really impressed with what critical thinkers the students are and can tell that I’ll be learning as much about Hyderabad from them as they do about digital storytelling from me.

Railway girls on a photo scavenger hunt

On a non work-related note I was lucky enough attend a feminist collective meeting last night and a film screening hosted by a local LGBT organization this afternoon. I was so thrilled to meet such wonderful folks at both events, but more so just incredibly excited to feel like I was joining a community that’s creating such a palpable progressive momentum in what is already such a beautiful, diverse and energetic city.

hyderabad for feminism

a lovely dinner party with some rad new friends

2
Jul

Nicole Wisler

Classroom News, Reflections, The Modern Story Fellowship, TMS Fellow Updates

Landed + welcomed!

Namaste from Hyderabad and the 2013 fellows! We’ve had staggered arrivals (and a grand total of 48 hours of layovers) but we’re finally all together in our lovely new apartment. You can learn more about each of us and how we ended up here over on the Our Team page.

Want to see our adventures? Follow us on Instagram (just search TheModernStory)! It’s the future! Except that everything will look like a 70’s polaroid!

Notes from Nelle – In the car from the airport, I felt like a puppy in a kitchen full of bacon crumbs. One minute I’d be chatting with Remy about his move to Boston with Piya; the next, following an idea I had jotted down last week about assessment; all of a sudden, my eyes would find massive boulders stacked precariously on a mountain ridge, silhouetted against a mild blue sky and a scratchy horizon line of trees. Bacon crumbs everywhere! Delicious morsels of instant friendship, TMS potential, and the backdrop of gorgeous, enveloping Hyderabad overwhelmed my tastebuds and my poor jet-lagged brain. . . but my tail was wagging really fast.

Thanks to the warmth and openhearted guidance of Remy, and my instantly lovable roomies, I am now re-grounded. My tail is still wagging. Yesterday I bought a cherry red kameez, and today I wore it to Railway Girls school, where we met the most unbelievable chorus of “Hello, Teachers!!” We begin teaching this coming Friday – a fact which had been causing some apprehension. But meeting the students and teachers that make this program work instantly melted away my nervous energy. Everyone was welcoming, with a sweet and poking sense of humor. We will be teaching at Railway for at least a week before we start at the other schools. I feel lucky to have the luxury of time to troubleshoot programming in such a friendly place. Also today, I negotiated the fare home with the auto-rickshaw driver, and made it across Mahatma Ghandi Road without giving myself a heart attack. Small victories. Wag wag.
xo! N

Notes from Nicole – The first 40 hours of my journey were completely packed with so much chaos (a flight cancellation, a reroute, a delay that resulted in a missed connection, a 24 hour layover) that I didn’t really even have a stress-free moment to stop and think about or process the adventure I was embarking on. Somewhere between Life of Pi and an episode of Parks and Recreation on my final flight, though, it hit me: I was almost there, I was going to be in Hyderabad until December. I smiled to myself, took a deep breath, and soon enough was walking away from the airport through the hazy early-morning air with Remy. Since then it’s been nonstop sensory overload in the very best of ways.

This city is massive and it’s been hard to orient our friendly little neighborhood within it, but maybe that’s for the best. There are all kinds of stories to investigate just within the few block around our apartment like the elusive moneys in an alley off of Mahatma Gandhi Rd. or the group of primary school boys who’ve formed their own little bicycle gang in our apartment complex’s parking lot. Along with my wonderful co-fellows I’ve started tackling challenges small (figuring out how to shop for salwar suits), medium (hailing the 8A bus during rush hour), and a little bit larger (impromptu teaching a class of 20 eighth graders). Cheers to all that’s to come!

Snippets from Shivani – It has been so great being back in Hyderabad after almost 12 months! However, I return not with the intention to visit family or go sari shopping but to be in the classroom — and what a great first day it has been! After quickly meeting TMS Co-Director Remy and my lovely Co-Fellows Nelle and Nicole we all raced off to hop onto a bus to Secunderabad, a true experience in navigating the idiosyncrasies of Hyderabadi traffic. After finally making our way to Railway Girls School in Lallaguda we met Mr. Prabakher, an enthusiastic teacher who’ll serve as our liaison for the semester. We also got a chance to chat with Waheeda, who will be joining us in the classroom as well. I’m already looking forward to using these two as valuable resources! Then it was off to to meet the 8th class batch of girls we’ll be working with for the next 6 months! All of the gals, ranging in ages from 12 to 14 greeted us quite enthusiastically and my Co-Fellows and I got the ball rolling on introducing ourselves and what we’ll be working with them on. Most of the students were already familiar with TMS from years prior which was great to hear. What started off as a small exchange between us and the students quickly (and unexpectedly!) turned into a flurry of chalk dust on the blackboard and the assigning of their first real piece of homework — impromptu teaching at it’s finest! I can’t wait to return on Friday for our first real class and to see what the girls have come up with. Here’s to a beautiful start to what’s already shaping up to be a great semester!

day number one at railway, super duper “VE-RY NICE!”