jadanschool

Our artists

2011-12-16T03:11:00.000-08:00

The students who participated in children's day celebrations in the competitions for art, mehendi, rangoli and handwriting received their awards today. Congratulations to all!!!!!!!!!!

Dance, song and colour. Celebrating children's day.

2011-11-17T07:07:00.000-08:00

Children's day was a day of art, decoration, colour, dancing and roleplaying. The children of 1st and 2nd class dressed up as characters from Indian history and mythology. Their lives were celebrated with song and dance. The boy is dressed as Jawaharlal Nehru, who's birthday is on the day of Children's day. At his behest India celebrates it's future, the children, on this day.

Mehendi (henna) art on Children's day

2011-11-17T07:01:00.000-08:00

All of the girls seem to be experts at doing henna designs. Consider that in this program they have a maximum of 30 minutes to do both hands. They are pretty good!! Sorry about the quality of photos, you can't really see the intricate detail.

More Rangoli

2011-11-17T06:53:00.000-08:00

Children's day Rangoli

2011-11-17T06:50:00.000-08:00

Rangoli - a celebration of colour. Rangoli's are made with anything that is available. In the top one you can see they have also used stones, flower petals and dhal as part of the design

Primary school art works

2011-11-17T06:46:00.000-08:00

Here are a few samples of the art works done by the young students on children's day

View of the school

2011-11-12T20:18:00.000-08:00

This is a view of the school as at September 2011. For those interested Google Earth has updated their images of Jadan Ashram to photos from 2010. It is interesting to see the Om Ashram, Hospital and School. Enjoy.

Anahat nada

2011-11-12T20:14:00.000-08:00

For those who were in Strilky and were listening to the satsang about meditating on the sound of one stick. These are the sticks.

King of Cool

2011-11-12T20:11:00.000-08:00

The look with the glasses, fantastic

Back at school

2011-09-25T02:10:00.003-07:00

I was back in school yesterday after two months in Europe. It is so beautiful to listen to the children sing again.
Hari Om to everyone in Europe and to all the kids who were in Strilky.

First day out

2011-09-25T02:10:00.001-07:00

Siddhi, our new foal, enjoying her first run out of the stable with her mum Ganga. Beautiful.

Siddhi's first day out

2011-09-18T01:14:00.000-07:00

The latest addition to our horse stable is Siddhi. Today was her first day out running around and boy can she run.

Smiling faces

2011-09-18T01:06:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was in school for the first time since going to Europe for two months. It is so beautiful to hear the children singing and see their smiling faces again.

Examination results part 4 - 10th Class

2011-06-21T23:01:00.000-07:00

In tenth class we had a huge batch of 101 students. Of those students 95 passed. Three of the students scored above 85% which is a huge mark in the 10th board, up in the merit rankings for our district. Interestingly the 10th class is often the most difficult for the students to pass. The maths is difficult and those who don't have a "maths brain" have trouble. Once they get through tenth there isn't any compulsion to take maths so those students breath easy.

A mind boggling fact about the Rajasthan board 10th examinations. One million twelve thousand students sat the 10th class examinations!!!!!!!! That is only in Rajasthan state. The overall result was that 73.7% of students passed. Our students have done much better than that average. Well done once again.

Examination results part 3 - 12th Arts

2011-06-21T22:37:00.000-07:00

The students of 12th Arts have outdone themselves. 51 students and all have passed with flying colours. The top student is Prakash with a mark of 77.5%. Well done to all.

Examination results part 2 - Science

2011-06-03T01:46:00.000-07:00

The science results for 12th class have come. Out of a total of 39 we had 18 in 1st division, 19 in 2nd and two failed :(((((((( better luck next time boys). One of the girls, Manisha, managed to score 86.15% which puts her 11th place in the district. Outstanding. She scored 93% in Physics which is truly excellent.
Congratulations to all. Now we are waiting for the Arts students results to come.

Exam Results part 1 - Commerce

2011-05-21T05:04:00.001-07:00

The 12th class results are coming one by one. Today was the results of students who studied in the commerce stream. Of our 36 students 20 scored First Division and 16 in Second Division. Excellent work!!! Congratulations to students and teachers for the reward for their hard work

End of year "Report Card"

2011-05-11T00:48:00.000-07:00

Another year at our school has passed in the blink of an eye.

The year ended on a high note with our Principal, Shree SL Ojha, receiving the “Dronacharya” award for outstanding educational work from Udaipur University. It is a big award with people from all over Rajasthan being nominated and more than 30, 000 people at the awards day. It is just reward for his dedication to teaching throughout his whole life. Perhaps the greatest sign of his success is that he was nominated by students of his from 10-15 years ago who still remember his work. Congratulations Principal Sahab!!!

The highlights of the year have been many. Science students winning competitions, sports success, students getting in the merit lists in exams, our 12^th class students getting admission into highly prized courses such as medicine and engineering, Sanskrit students winning prizes…. The list goes on. But the real highlights were the harmony between the students, the concentration, unity and dedication of the staff and the joy of the primary students as the proudly showed everyone who had time to look just how much they had progressed throughout the year.

And, as my grandfather used to say, “in my book” the top highlight was a small but significant one. The other day I saw one girl from third class who had quite a severe hair lip, which was stopping her from being able to speak and eat properly. She had had two operations which had failed on it and was now eight years old, her family having given up. This year after a lot of talking we convinced the family to try again and found a great doctor, Dr Aagvani from Jodhpur, an expert in hair lip surgery, who did the job. Why I write about it is because when I saw her two days ago I couldn’t see the scar and immediately thought “ the success of that operation has to be the highlight of the year.”

Another favourite from the year was when Yashoda taught Avatarpuri and Rajendra Puri knitting. They loved it and a few days later I saw Avatarpuri gliding past on his “rip stick” – a funny modern skateboard – whilst knitting a scarf at the same time – THAT is multitasking!!

To all those who supported us during the year from all over the world thank you endlessly. We had sponsors for school buses, furniture, computers, library books and somehow the miracle workers who run the Gyan Putra scheme managed to find enough sponsors for the 548 students who have scholarships in the scheme. For the statisticians amongst you we had 1263 students in school this year, 357 of them girls and 105 boys in the hostel. In College we had 96 students, 49 girls and 47 boys.

We were lucky to have some great volunteer teachers during the year. Thanks to Yashoda and Mark who contribute so much not just to the students but also to educating the teachers, bringing colour and joy to the classroom. Lorena from Chile gave the girls a chance to practice speaking English even when the school day ended, Rodney taught the kids how to speak proper ‘stralian slang English pronunciashun and my Mum who I hardly saw when she was in Jadan because she was always in primary school giving stickers and checking notebooks!!

In the coming weeks we look forward to getting the results of our first batch of Commerce students, who finished 12th class this year. The results of all the students are eagerly awaited by the end of May. We are also starting up a new course in College ( Bachelor of Computer Applications) which will cater to the demand of students throughout the area and double the number of students in the first year of College. And in school we already have the daily line of parents and students coming for admission, which will go on now until July!

Once again thanks to all for your continuing support and looking forward to see all the students again on the 27^th June for another year of joyous learning opportunities.

Mahashivratri celebrations

2011-03-12T07:37:00.000-08:00

Mahashivratri in school was a great event this year. We had a wonderful function at school followed by the boys dancing and doing puja all night. Such a great energy, full of intensity. You may notice that the Shiv linga was actually made by hand by the hostel boys from dirt and cow dung. They were working on it until four in the morning.

Brothers in learning

2010-12-16T03:21:00.000-08:00

Thanks

2010-12-16T01:30:00.000-08:00

To all those in Europe, Australia and throughout the world who help to support the school and the children's education many, many thanks. Yesterday we received a donation from the Verein zum Aufbau und zur Unterstuetzung von Erziehungs- und Forschungsprojekte in Indien e.V. (don't ask me to translate that!!) in Hamburg, Germany to help with sponsoring the Gyan Putra students this year. Once again thanks to all for the continued support.

Jai Hanuman

2010-12-16T01:19:00.000-08:00

A 72 feet high statue of Hanuman Ji was just completed in Pali. The hostel boys and I went for the opening. Hanuman Ji, the embodiment of devotion and loyalty looked particularly imposing against the night sky.

Weaving artworks

2010-12-16T01:11:00.000-08:00

Learning about colours, getting creative and having fun.

Sticking to it

2010-12-16T01:04:00.000-08:00

Last week was sticker week. I had a lot of stickers that smell like bananas and strawberries when you scratch them and spent three days seeing all of the Primary school student's books. Everyone got a sticker and were
extremely happy. Lots of fun and lots of smiling faces

Happy Dewali and New Year

2010-11-08T18:50:00.001-08:00

From everyone in school and college we wish a happy Dewali and New Year to all throughout the world. May your new year be full of love, joy, compassion and success.

Enjoy!!

Practical Science

2010-10-30T06:51:00.000-07:00

Our school students have just entered their models into the district Science competition and come back with first prize. The winning entry was an idea for stopping train accidents. Each train has a north pole attached to the front of the train so that if they come head to head they will not actually clash. The second idea was a flood warning system for the village. As you can see in the photos Swamiji is asking a lot of questions about the way that the models work.

Parikrama

2010-08-18T04:19:00.000-07:00

Our horses have developed the habit of spending an hour or two per day walking continuously around the Bhakti Sagar, the hall where we have our spiritual programs, yoga,, meditation and prayers. They are free to walk around the ashram, which thanks to the monsoon rains is full of green grass, but they choose to spend their time .............................circling round and round the meditation hall. Special.

Nature

2010-08-18T03:36:00.000-07:00

On the day of Gurupurnima one of our mares foaled a beautiful filly called Divya. Her mother was also born here in the Ashram so somehow she is "home grown". At present there are 700 cows, 9 horses and inumerable wildlife living within the Ashram campus. If you look further down the blog you will find Divya's father, he is the horse that carries the milk man.

The helper

2010-08-18T02:48:00.000-07:00

This photo is a little old, it is from April this year. After the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar all of the things which we had there for our camp came back in three very big and very full trucks. It was an unloading marathon and Shiv Prem (Callum) was an unstoppable force, pulling far more than his weight. We call it karma yoga in India, in Australia it is getting in and giving a hand. Thanks Cal.

Yoga Asana

2010-08-18T02:42:00.000-07:00

On 15th August our students celebrated independence day with dancing, drama, parades, singing and speeches. The yoga display was a highlight this year, especially Kundan, the boy in the top photo who has incredible flexibility. Kundan's story is interesting. He was previously studying in Haryana which is the state north of Rajasthan. I don't know how but he heard of our school but he and his brother Pradeep decided they wanted to study school and yoga here so they enrolled and took a "room" on rent in the local village. The room isn't so good and they don't have electricity, the two brothers cook for themselves and spend the early morning and evening getting water, firewood etc. Yesterday he came quite innocently asking if we can help him to get electricity so he can study. One can't help but be inspired when young boys will go through so much just to get a proper education.

They are back!

2010-07-03T21:52:00.000-07:00

The hostel is open, the boys are full of energy, evening satsang is full. The boys are back in town.

Nice one

2010-07-03T04:34:00.001-07:00

Sometimes a story comes along that is really touching and makes one feel that something is going right in the school. There is a group of students from a village about 90km from our Ashram. They just passed 10th class and want to continue to study. They have all got together with their parents and arranged to rent and stay in a house in the nearby town of Sojat so that they can have the chance to study 11th class in our school. I guess they could have chosen many places to do their study but the fact that they chose Jadan speaks volumes for the hard work which the teachers are doing.

Today was the first day of the new school year. It is great to have the school come alive again with so many bright young faces.

Books, books, books

2010-06-19T22:52:00.000-07:00

Those in Australia probably already know we are having "book week" this week. In our centers throughout Australia people are donating a coin for a book. (Here a library book for the primary school costs on average 80 rupees which is $2). Next week we will see how much is collected and then send the staff shopping.

Enjoy

Even better news than the last blog!!!

2010-05-28T04:04:00.000-07:00

The 12th Board Science results have been announced. Our students all passed easily. Three students came in the top 100 in Rajasthan and 16 in the top 100 in Pali district. Enough said, many many congratulations to all of them. It is great to see their hard work and the dedication of the Principal and staff get rewarded. It seems that our 12th class students are leaving with a bright future.

Good news

2010-04-19T21:08:00.001-07:00

Great news from school. The results of the 8^th Class Government Board examinations have come. From our batch of 81 students 79 obtained First Division marks, 1 in Second Division and one failed. Even better was that 13 students came in the top 100 merit in the district – not bad for a “village school”. The top student was Pushpa Boyal who scored 90.1% and came 18^th in the District merit. Congratulations to all!!!!

2010-03-25T22:44:00.000-07:00

Hari Om,

sorry it has been a while between blogs. The last few months have been busy with events at Maha Kumbh Mela in Haridwar. There somehow my life had an ....................incredible change of direction, but that is another story.

Anyway right now I have the chance to spend 3 days here in Jadan and again enjoy seeing the smiling faces of our students. All are nervously in exam mode. Tenth class started their Board examinations yesterday, 12th are already half way through their exams and the primary students also started yesterday. There is an air of confidence about them, it seems that they have prepared well.

The new school building is getting the final touches of flooring and plastering and will be ready for the new session in July. It has become a fantastic facillity for education.

If anyone has some inspiration to help us continue the development of the school please be in touch. There are still plenty of opportunities to be a part of the project for the development of the sports and play grounds, computers and for the continued support of our girl students who are all attending the school under the Gyan Putra scheme which allows them to study for free. We are also in the process of planning rainwater harvesting tanks to provide sweet rainwater for drinking to the students. It is frustrating to see what salty and over flourided water does to children's development.

Enjoy and thanks to everyone for their support.

Swami Jasraj Puri

The new hockey team

2010-01-08T22:05:00.000-08:00

The boys have started to learn how to play hockey. The field is pretty rough but they love it.

Milkman

2010-01-08T22:02:00.000-08:00

What a way to transport milk from our animal shelter to the kitchen!!

Traditional solutions, modern problems

2009-12-16T02:54:00.000-08:00

Our school hall suffered from the most severe echo issues, having a tin roof and large bare walls. We looked at many soundproofing options but they were all beyond our budget. Then Swamiji came up with the insipiration to use traditional grass thatched roofing inside the tin sheet roofing that already exists. What a success! It reduced the sound completely, the hall is noticeably warmer in winter and will also be cooler in summer. It was all done by local labour and materials and within a week!

Our meditation hall is made with the same grass and even when exposed directly to the elements it lasts 12 years before needing any repairing. The vibration inside is also completely different to under a cement or steel roof.

Asshirvad

2009-12-16T02:42:00.000-08:00

Whilst Swamiji was in Jadan this month He gave blessing to our college girls who won the University Badminton championships. Comsider that our college has 90 students, of which 45 are girls and the College they beat in the final who haven't lost in 10 years have 1800 girls studying there. Great stuff, the whole college was in celebration mode for two days and welcomed the team back at the main road, escorting them into the Ashram. As you can see the trophy is big and although it is a perpetual trophy Swamiji's mood seemed to be that it should find a permanent home in our College!

College tour

2009-12-15T20:44:00.000-08:00

Our College students spent three days on tour going to Mount Abu and other tourist places in southern Rajasthan. A lot of fun had by all.

Aids Awareness Lectures

2009-12-15T20:40:00.000-08:00

Our college was having an aids awareness day this week, with expert guest lecturers.

Drought relief

2009-11-16T04:11:00.000-08:00

Hari Om,

You may know that Swamiji has started a rather large project to support the villages during the current drought in Rajasthan. To stay in touch with what is happening please see www.rajasthan-drought.blogspot.com

Thanks for the support

Durgastau and Chapra

2009-11-16T03:37:00.000-08:00

These photos were taken in early November on a trip to the places in Nagaur District, about 20km from Khatu Ashram, where we are delivering water. On this day I visited the villages of Durgastau, Chapra,Rotoo, Dhanani and Setudau. The area where these villages are located has severe problems with the groundwater. It is so salty that animals that drink it immediately get sick. The tankers are putting in various places in and around the mentioned villages in the pre constructed watering troughs.

Oh dear

2009-11-08T21:13:00.000-08:00

Oh no, it can't be true. In Rajasthan the English text books are not famous for the quality of proof reading. There are usually a lot of spelling mistakes inside. But the first word! On the cover. Of an English Grammar textbook! That is the work of a GENIOUS!

Swamiji with Swetmani

2009-11-08T21:03:00.000-08:00

Whilst in Jadan in October Gurudeva was checking the new addition to the horse stable, Swetmani (the white jewel). Swetmani is 7 months old and has a temperament that has won many hearts.

Janmasthmi

2009-11-08T20:58:00.000-08:00

It is a little after the event (it was in September) but I didn't get time to update the blog. Janmasthmi is the joyous celebration of Lord Krishna's birthday. It is celebrated with a lot of dancing and acting out lovingly the events of Krishna's notoriously naughty childhood.

The little boy who played the infant Krishna won everybody's hearts as he patiently sat as the girls danced for him.

The celebration culminated with the making of a huge pyramid to help "our Krishna" (the boy at the top of the third photo get to a pitcher of butter hanging from the roof (also in the photo). The story is that Krishna was extremely fond of butter and whatever butter his mother made he would find and eat. To try to save it she hung it from the roof where he couldn't reach. However in order to reach it Krishna would get all of his friends to "help him up" to the butter and then bring it all down so that they could eat it.

Lots of fun.

Ganesh Chaturti

2009-08-23T07:41:00.000-07:00

The boys from the hostel were celebrating today the special day of Lord Ganesha, the remover of obstacles. They are a great bunch of kids this year. Really really special.

Starting young and enjoying it

2009-08-05T02:18:00.000-07:00

For some of these kids it is probably the first time they actually saw a computer, let alone used one. It is awesome to watch the computer world unfold before them.

Riding school

2009-08-05T02:12:00.000-07:00

The boys who are staying in our Ashram get to go for horse riding in the mornings. Last Sunday they received some extra knowledge about horses, how to handle them and how to treat their ailments from Dr Naveen Parihar, who is a well known vetinary doctor in our area who specialises in horses.

New Year Chaos

2009-07-19T03:45:00.000-07:00

We started the new school year on July the first and it has been quite chaotic since. The building works did not get finished as planned and we have been stuck with a few more classes than classrooms (maybe more than a few). There are classes going on in the verandhas, in the hall there are two classes and in some rooms we put two classes inside and faced them in opposite directions. All in all we now have around 1400 students in the school! A fantastic response. Similar to last year it has been very hard to refuse people admission as we are just too full. I think we must have turned away more than 800 people this time.

Now slowly we have adjusted the timings of the school so that we can fit everyone comfortably until the rooms are ready. The school has been split into two shorter school days, one for senior classes and one for primary classes. It isn't a perfect solution but it will do for now.

Meanwhile construction work is going on for the building of the extra rooms. We have had a lot of visitors from overseas here in the last weeks and they have been helping get things going by transporting the bricks on the site. It's inspiring to get such help especially in the heat of the monsoon.

Enjoy
Swami Jasraj Puri

Great interview answers

2009-06-12T08:48:00.000-07:00

In the last days we have been having interviews for school teachers. There is always a mix of excellent candidates and people that make you wonder how they got through Uni. This time there were some candidates for our pending book of greatest interview answers. Consider these in the light of the qualifications that the candidate has somehow attained.

1. Candidate having a Masters Degree in Botany

Our Principal: Please explain how does a plant take water from the ground up to it's branches.
Candidate: That is very difficult to explain.
Principal: Please try, I am a layman and I would really like to understand the concept. ( Our Principal is from the Science faculty)
Candidate: (with all seriousness) You see, inside the plant there are hundreds of small plastic buckets, they are connected with strings and there is a wheel at the top of the plant that pulls up the buckets.
WOW

2. Candidate having a Masters Degree in English Literature.

Myself: What was your favorite paper in your Masters Degree?
Candidate: American Poets from 1850-1947
Myself: OK, who was your favorite American Poet?
Candidate: Shakespeare
Oh dear

3. Candidate applying for a job as a Primary School teacher

Panel Member: Can you tell me the vowels of the Hindi alphabet?
Candidate: A, Aa .......................I can't remember
Panel member: OK, what about the consonants?
Candidate: Ka, Kha, ..........I don't know
Oh deary deary me.

In all fairness, allowing for a few doosies like the above, in general the applicants this year were the best we have ever had. Although it was a long grind ( we interviewed more than 200 applicants over 3 days) the reward was that it seems that we will have a really excellent and vibrant group of teachers joining our team for the coming session.

Our school year starts on July the First so the rush is starting to build up.

Enjoy
Sw Jasraj Puri

Mother nature's power

2009-05-29T18:22:00.000-07:00

This morning a severe storm blew through the Ashram. The photo shows what happened to our parking shed which is about 50 m away from the scene of the photo. With the storm came rain meaning that today may be the first day with a temperature below 40 since 23rd of April.

12th Class Results

2009-05-26T09:37:00.000-07:00

Today we received the results from our 12th class science students. They did excellently, all but one have passed and one girl has come in the top 14 students in the District. It was the first "batch" to sit the 12th class science examinations and they have outshone all expectations.

Breakfast in the cow shelter

2009-05-18T20:35:00.000-07:00

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Thanks to Greygum Software

2009-05-17T09:15:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I was looking for educational software for installing in our school computers. We have some good programs and one of my favorites was called Maths Circus from Greygum Software. I was looking on their site and wishing that we could get everything what they offer but...........it was out of our budget. The Maths Circus which we had originally was sent over by my Mum. Of course Mum is great and always supporting the school but this time I thought it isn't really appropriate to ask her to send over 1000 dollars worth of games software.

What to do? I thought we might try our luck and write to the company . The response was immediate and wonderful. Greygum sent over our order charging only the cost of the blank CDs and the postage, at the same time apologising that normally they would pay the postage themselves but due to the economic downturn things were too tight to offer that.

To Steve and all the team at Greygum thanks a lot. The programs were already installed last week and our students are joyfully discussing the best way to land a hot air balloon, mow the lawn and creating their own worlds in the Land of Um.

The fleet

2009-05-17T09:07:00.000-07:00

As it is now holidays for the first time all of the buses in our fleet are together for some weeks. Once again thanks to all who helped us get them.

The long hot summer

2009-05-17T08:58:00.000-07:00

School finished for the 2008-09 session on Saturday and the students now have 6 weeks break. It was anyhow getting to hot to expect them to think. We haven’t had a summer like this one for a few years. The last time that the temperature was less than 40 was a month ago and the last five days have been 45 degrees and above. What a corker! The average temperature in the last month is above 43!

We finished the year for our hostel boys with an ice cream party and a game of night volleyball (there wasn’t much light but it’s cooler than playing in the day!)

The enthusiasm of the public continues towards getting admission. In the last two weeks we have had more than 500 applications. Considering that the real “season” for admissions will be in late June it has been surprising to have so many people come so early.

Having purchased two new buses this year we are able to add some more villages on our routes. So far we have added two isolated villages called Surayata and Talka. It takes some planning to take on a village and depends on the enthusiasm of the people, the distances involved and the roads. A big issue is whether the buses will be able to go to the village during the 3 months of the monsoon rains as some roads are not sealed or cut by watercourses in heavy rains.

At present we have a list of 19 villages that have requested that they be included in the Ashram school all within a radius of 20km from the Ashram. For each village that we consider we go first and talk to the villagers, check the roads, get an idea of how many students are interested and explain to the villagers our expectations regarding the studies of the students. It’s a beautiful process involving a lot of sitting, talking, drinking chai and taking in the unique scene that is life in the small Indian village.

Enjoy

It is a long way from home

2009-04-17T07:46:00.000-07:00

I was driving along the other day on the way to purchase the buses and saw this sign on a country road. As a Sydneyiite it was appreciated fully.
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School Building Progress Report

2009-04-17T06:45:00.000-07:00

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Great Results

2009-04-15T07:42:00.000-07:00

Today the board examination results for 8th class were announced. All of the students did well with a lot of them suprising themselves. In total in our District 37176 8th class students sat the examination from more than 5000 schools (it's not a typo - thirty seven thousand students). From our 43 students who sat the examination 5 of them have come in the top 100 students in the district!! I think that they can all take a bow. Really really awesome. We are looking forward to seeing them when they come for their report cards tomorrow.

Nice thought

2009-04-14T04:52:00.000-07:00

I read this quote today and enjoyed;

"Do your work where your greatest joy and the world's greatest hunger meet"

Animations on the net

2009-04-11T03:05:00.000-07:00

Previously i have blogged about the program of Twin Vision team in our school in January. The animations that the students made during their visit are now up on the web at www.blip.tv on the Twin Vision page. There are four animations and the links and names of all four are given below. Enjoy.

Lila Amrit
http://blip.tv/file/1765845/

Cravat Story
http://blip.tv/file/1765830

Indian in London
http://blip.tv/file/1765854

Water is Life
http://blip.tv/file/1765876

Two gems

2009-04-11T02:41:00.000-07:00

Two great stories for the week.

There is one small boy in the hostel studying in 3rd class, Yogesh. As quite a few students have now finished their exams and gone for holidays we were moving the remaining students together to make it easier to watch. We moved young Yogesh from his room three times but he kept moving back to his old room each evening even though there was noone else in that area. Finally we called him and asked why did he keep moving back.

He replied that he wanted to stay in his room because it is the room that faces towards the Bhakti Sagar and as a result when Swamiji is in Jadan and giving satsang it is the best room for listening to what Swamiji is saying. What an awesome reply!

The second story came to me via the husband of one of the ladies who is a cleaner/helper in our school. His wife is illiterate. She can (could) only understand the local Marwari dialect and subsequently can't understand the Hindi that is spoken on the radio etc. He was suprised when she started discussing with him the program that was just on the radio and asked how did she understand the Hindi. She had picked up Hindi from the classes going on in school as she is always working in the hallways outside as the classes are going on. Next day he was suprised that she had got up at three oclock and was sitting with the light on. He checked what she was doing ..........homework! One of our teachers had given her a book and taught her how to write the Hindi alphabet after school and she was "secretly" practicing. Last news she was starting to practice reading. I find that simply beautiful.

New Buses and new enrolments

2009-04-07T02:18:00.000-07:00

Hari Om to all,

yesterday I was in a place called Nathdwara about 150kms from Jadan, searching for new school buses. A couple of members of the Ashram were already there since the day before exploring the area which houses the biggest bus industry in the state. It was a great day and we came back from there having purchased two buses for the school. They are in excellent condition and were quite a bargain. All in all it seemed that Guruji's blessings were with us throughout the day as it all went so smoothly. Awesome.

Spare a thought for our young students in Primary School who are doing their examinations this week.

Enjoy

Harvesting time

2009-03-27T07:18:00.000-07:00

In the past week we have been harvesting our wheat crop. In the Ashram we grow organic wheat which is used throughout the year in our kitchen and in the school hostel.

Happy New Year

2009-03-27T07:11:00.000-07:00

Today is New Years Day in India. So our students are wishing everyone a happy new year for the year 2066 in the Vikram Samvat calendar.

Independence Day Celebrations 2009

2009-01-31T23:24:00.000-08:00

This year the school celebrated Independence Day with Swamiji in the Ashram's garden area. It was a beautiful setting on a winter's day. Preparations had been going on for weeks with the students preparing dramas, dances, speeches, bhajans, patriotic songs, pyramids, march pasts, yoga displays and a comedy. There was even a special camel race with the students dressing themselves up as camels. It was a beautiful function full of emotion, passion and humour which was topped off by Swamiji giving a beautiful discourse about Indian culture and the importance of the youth maintaining their contact with the wonderful heritage of India.

There are a lot of photos uploaded onto the web album at the following link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jadanschool/IndependenceDayFunction2009?feat=directlink

Enjoy, we did!

Wedding in the Ashram

2009-01-31T04:20:00.000-08:00

In December the school played host to a wedding of epic proportions. In order to let the poorer members of their community get married in style the "Soni Samaj" (goldsmith community) of Pali got together and organised a group wedding for people from all over India. There were 22 couples married on the day and they all had gifts donated by the community (for everyone of them exactly the same- ie if you wanted to give something you had to give 22 pieces). The wealthy members of the community paid for the eating expenses and for the arrangements such as the elephants which brought the brides to the wedding area. All in all the heroes pictured from the kitchen produced 16000 meals for the guests which each had at least 10 different items (that is a lot of work!! especially in a kitchen put up in a tent in the middle of our fields). At the height of the function there was probably about 10000 people there at one time. It was...........epic. More photos will be put up in an album onto the net if people want to see, these are just a sample.

To see more see the webalbum at the following link:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jadanschool/CommunityWeddingInJadanAshramSchool?feat=directlink

Animation part 4

2009-01-31T02:42:00.000-08:00

In the last phase of production of the animations the filming and editing was done, all coming together to make 4 short animations of 3-5 minutes each.

See below in the blog for the other steps in the animation process. Enjoy

Animation part 3

2009-01-31T02:39:00.000-08:00

The process of preparation nears completion and preparations for filming the scenes were undertaken. Then it was time to look to the results on the computer.

Animation part 2

2009-01-31T02:36:00.000-08:00

After the planning and storyboards it was time to create the plasticine characters and to put the sets together ready for filming. Meanwhile others were working on the scripts and the audio.

Sorry that the sequence is upside down on the blog i can't figure out how to move the blogs around.

Future Animation Stars

2009-01-31T02:27:00.000-08:00

For one week the team from Twin Vision was here in Jadan teaching our students how to do animation. It was an intense week. The students were involved in everything from planning the story, making the script, painting and constructing the background sets, making the plasticine models which were the characters in the story and then shooting and editing the animation. It was an absolutely wonderful week culminating in a function where the students showed their work to the rest of the school. Amazing stuff and thanks to the Twin Vision team for giving our students such a wonderful opportunity.

If you want to know more about Twin Vision their address is www.twinvisionphoto.co.uk . They do projects in countries throughout the world and I can only say if you are a teacher and you get the chance to pull them to your school - DO IT!! Teachers enjoy the project as much and the students!

The photos in this blog show the initial stages of planning the script, making the layouts, storyboards and then the sets.

In a few days the animations will be up on the internet. Stay tuned.

Guruji's blessing

2009-01-16T21:22:00.000-08:00

I know it is not the greatest photo of Swamiji that has been taken however the circumstances of the moment make it significant for me. At that moment I was sitting on a chariot with Swamiji as He was being welcomed to a small village in the south of Rajasthan. Having some time to spare I thought I would try and take a photo of Him with a mobile phone and put it onto the blog. To my wonder within two minutes the photo was there to see on the blog via an EDGE signal (how they had that signal in that village i really don't know) !! Perhaps that is normal for some people but here in Jadan we only need to take our memories back 10 years to reach a stage where we had to drive 20 kilometres in order to make an international call or a fax!! It is only four years since we could reliably use email and even then for messages less than 200kb! Times have changed in India, very fast indeed. The logistics of maintaining this blog from Jadan would have been impossible only 1 year ago. In the beginning I used to only update it when visiting to Jaipur. Now......from the mobile phone.

Sent from BlackBerry® on Airtel

College Rangoli competition

2009-01-16T18:54:00.000-08:00

Our College students have been having culture week. Part of the program is making these decorations out of coloured powder. These two girls won for their design which was really beautiful.
Sent from BlackBerry® on Airtel

Volleyball "International"

2009-01-11T09:14:00.000-08:00

Today Swamiji organised a volleyball match between our hostel boys and a team from our visitors from throughout the world. It was a pretty good match and in the end to much excitement the hostel boys won in four sets.

A great story

2009-01-08T20:31:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we had a small function in school to celebrate a great story. Thomas is a 12 year old boy from Austria who decided he wanted to help the school. He collects chestnuts and then sells them by the roadside. The money that he collects is used to sponsor students in our school under the Gyan Putra scheme.

As if that wasn't enough Thomas got his family together and they decided that instead of giving Christmas presents that the money they would spend on each others gifts they would donate to the school. Incredible.

Such acts are just inspiring. It was a wet eye day for me when I was telling the assembly about Thomas' efforts.

The pictures are of Thomas and his family and some of the 417 students who are sponsored for their studies under the Gyan Putra scheme. Under the scheme students are given free education, books and uniforms. All of the girls studying in our school are in the Gyan Putra scheme as are boys who are unable to pay the nominal fees that are charged in school.

Thanks to Thomas, his family and everyone around the world with equally inspiring stories. If the future generation's all think like Thomas we are in good hands.

New Year in Jadan

2009-01-03T22:03:00.000-08:00

Hari Om,

Welcome to the New Year. School has started again here after a short winter “break”. The inverted commas are because our students went on a tour for five days taking in the sights of Ajmer, Pushkar, Jaipur and Agra. They were pretty excited to have seen the Taj Mahal and the big cities of Jaipur and Agra. All in all it was a super adventure with 140 students and 10 teachers setting out in 3 buses. We sent cooks and cooking equipment with so that they could prepare meals at any moment. It was a lot of fun and they all arrived back in Jadan exhausted but extremely satisfied. For a lot of students it is their first time away from home and definitely their first time so far away from home ( Agra is 700 kilometres from here).

The next weeks will be busy in school. The Twin Vision team is coming from England to give a project on animation with clay models. At the end of their program we will have a celebration day with an art competition for all of the school students and also have the students of the Jodhpur school for the Deaf and Dumb as guests for the day. The Twin Vision team is also doing a project with the Jodhpur students before they come here.

The inspiration for the art competition mentioned above is from a Hindi movie called “Tare Jamin Par” – which translates as Stars on the Earth. It is a beautiful movie about dyslexia which, if you can get it with a translation is really worth seeing. A tears of joy movie.

Then the 26th January is India’s national day and we will have a large celebration with parades, yoga demonstrations, plays, singing, dancing and speeches from the students. Swamiji Maharaj will be here and giving His blessings to all the students which is always a cause for excitement for them. Swamiji has an amazing way of conveying His message to the students by having them constantly laughing and enjoying.

The building works are also going on at full speed. At the rate that the work is going on it could be finished by April but………… we don’t actually have funding to pay for the work to go on! If anybody has any ideas of how to help with funding for the building they are most welcome to put them forward. If you know anyone who would be interested in being part of this special experience please let them know.

As January goes on the students will start to get serious as the yearly examinations rapidly approach. The first exams will be for 10th and 12th class in March and early April. They are just getting the results of their half yearly exams which were quite good. There is an air of confidence and excitement about their preparation. In general they will all finish their courses by the end of January and then revise and have practice examinations during February.

Happy New Year

2009-01-01T06:15:00.000-08:00

Wishing everyone a happy new year and all the best for the year ahead. May there be peace in the world and in everyone's hearts and .........................enjoy!

With Love
Swami Jasraj Puri

Examination time again

2008-12-11T20:36:00.000-08:00

Our examinations are on again and the cooler winter weather makes the best place to study in the sun. Our school has 1/2 yearly exams in December and the yearly exams are in March and April.

Building progress report 2

2008-12-11T20:32:00.000-08:00

It's not the best photo however you can see that the new part of the school building is coming up quite fast. There is quite a lot of difference compared to the post of 22nd October.

Yoga in the Garden

2008-12-09T20:16:00.000-08:00

A few days ago the school children all came together in the garden to do Yoga. I don't know who this boy was saluting to but the photo is priceless.

Animation is coming to school

2008-10-22T21:28:00.000-07:00

One of the exciting projects that has run in our school in the past is a collaboration with Twin Vision, a charitable group that teaches multimedia skills between cultures. We have enjoyed watching the students learn photography, video, mime acting and mosaic art from experts who come from England to share their knowledge.

One of the highlights was the students learning how to make cameras (that really work!) out of an empty soft drink can (see the top left photo).

The next project will run in January/February 2009 with a team coming to teach animation to the students. Some photos from past projects are here for you to enjoy.

If you want to know more about Twin Vision see the site at www.twinvisionphoto.co.uk

Building progress

2008-10-22T21:16:00.000-07:00

As you can see in the photo the foundations of the new school rooms are coming out of the ground.This is one side of the building work that is going on at a terrific speed.

Thanks to everyone in Sydney and Perth who supported the building works with donations whilst i was there visiting.

Hoping that everyone enjoys seeing this project come "out of the ground".

Exciting News

2008-10-02T17:51:00.000-07:00

Great news from Jadan is that construction started on the next phase of the school building. The building will have an extra 32 classrooms which means that the school will eventually be able to cater for over 1700 students!! As the school building will be completed the construction of a college building will start just next to it. That building will cater to 700 students who will study up until the Bachelors and Masters Degree level. It means that the students of our area will have the chance to complete a full, quality education in a secure environment. It is a chance which many, especially the girls, would never otherwise dream of having.
Shree Paramhans Swami Madhavanand College is already running, with 35 students presently in first year of their Bachelor of Arts course. Their lectures are in some of the rooms of the school building at present and will continue to be there until the college building will be ready. It is cramped and sometimes confusing to fit them all in but nobody is complaining because their dreams are coming true.

Our Biology Pioneers

2008-09-07T05:05:00.000-07:00

The students in year 12 science are our first batch that will sit the final examinations in the subject. In the Rajasthan Education system students who study Science must study Chemistry and Physics and then choose for their third subject either Mathematics or Biology.
These photos are of our biology students. The girl in the middle of the second photo is a most brilliant student who has won several scholarships from the Government due to her results in the last two years.
What amazes me about these students is their focus on their studies. For the whole of 11th and 12th class our science students have been studying day and night. We constantly have to go to the hostel in the evenings and explain to them that there is a long way to go and that they need to keep a balance and get some sleep as well. This is their chance to take a step in life, the students largely being first generation learners, and perhaps because of that they appreciate even more the chance that lies before them.

Computer classes

2008-09-07T04:56:00.000-07:00

Our computer lab is one of the busiest parts of the school/college with students continuously in the class from 830am until 530pm. The computer teacher is absolutely run off his feet but he is still loving it.
Thanks to the people of Bremmer Tafe in Queensland and the Ipswich Multi Cultural Society who together are arranging for the supply of 10 computers for the school which will come in October, the first one having arrived last month.
By next year we hope to open a second computer lab in the school so that students can have more lab time. If you are upgrading your computer or your laptop keep in mind that there may be a happy home for your old computer in our school!! Anyone who wishes to help with this please contact my email.

Also thanks to the Yoga In Daily Life Ashram in Queensland who have upgraded their multimedia projector and made sure that our school got the old one. It is awesome and opens a new dimension of teaching which hasn't been seen in this area before.

View of the school from the mountain

2008-09-07T04:44:00.000-07:00

These photos of the school are taken from "the mountain". For those not familiar with the Ashram in Jadan one of the projects already undertaken was a rainwater harvesting project in which a dam 120m x 140m x 10 m deep was constructed in the Ashram for the purposes of catching rainwater. The earth and rock that was excavated from the dam was used to make a mountain of 45 metres height in the south west corner of the Ashram. Swamiji Maharaj's idea of making a mountain was practical as well as beautiful. It saved money on diesel which would have been used transporting the earth out of the Ashram, the mountain is a place of beauty and has become a tourist attraction in it's own right and according to the ancient science of Vastu Shastra the highest and heaviest point in a property should be in the South West corner.
The future construction of the school and college which is now starting will make the present building into a quadrangular shape extending the two sides forward and then joining across the front of the school. After that is completed a seperate college building will be constructed to the left of the school as you look in the photos.
In the distance of the top photo you can see Shree Paramhans Swami Madhavanand Hospital, built by Swamiji Maharaj and the "Austrian Hospital in India" Society from Vienna Austria. It is a beautiful building which will house a 90 bed allopathic hospital for the people of the local area. At present the building work is complete and the work of furnishing and equiping the hospital is underway so that the hospital can start in the next months.

Morning prayers

2008-09-07T04:31:00.000-07:00

Full house for morning prayers and assembly. When the students are singing their morning prayers and national anthem in the morning the sound goes through the whole Ashram, reaching more than 2 km away. It is a really special part of the morning.

School scenes August 2008

2008-09-07T04:24:00.000-07:00

Classes are on and concentration is high.

Some first class students were also lucky enough to have Swamiji teach them for a short while.

The fleet

2008-09-07T04:18:00.000-07:00

To everyone who helped, once again thanks. This is our fleet outside the school building. Hopefully for next year we can add one or two buses more to the photo.

Update from August and September

2008-09-07T03:40:00.001-07:00

It has been an interesting month in school. A lot of new students settling in and learning to work together. This week the district sports tournaments are on and a lot of students are away competing. They are competing in the badminton, tennis, cricket, handball and judo tournaments.

In Judo 9 of the girls and 4 of the boys won their divisions. The girls u/17 tennis team is in the finals today and the u/19s lost in the semis. The boys came third in the handball and in the senior cricket, the juniors are yet to play.

On the 4th of September the ground breaking ceremony was done for extensions of the school and college building. There will be construction of 30 more rooms which will then cover the needs of the school way into the future. At present the situation in the building that we have, which seemed soooooo big just 8 months ago, is really really really tight.

The real news of the last month is that broad band reached to our village! So now i hope that in the future we can get some more interesting photos and items onto this webpage for everybody to enjoy.

New school year, new buses, new students

2008-07-06T03:39:00.000-07:00

Hari Om and welcome to the new school year!!!

It has been a most intense fortnight here in Jadan. We have been taking admissions for school and college which both started on 01^st July. There has also been a huge increase in the number of students in our hostel for this session.

The number of students has crossed 900. On top of that there have been more than 500 families come with hope and expectation to which we have had to say sorry, the school is full. Till date they are still coming.

This year with Swamiji Maharaj’s blessing we also started College courses in Bachelor of Arts and the response was beyond expectation. 30 students have enrolled in the course. The students are from the villages and are mainly those that wouldn’t have gone to a regular college but would have studied by correspondence. There has been a special interest from parents who wouldn’t send their girls to a government college because of security issues. It is gratifying to see them happily send their children to the college in the Ashram.

We ended up purchasing the third bus in early June. After much deliberation the decision was taken to get a new bus rather than second hand. Although it proved much more expensive the decisive issue was fuel consumption, which is nearly half in the new bus. Considering the environment and the cost of diesel it seemed a prudent option. Of course, as is the norm in Indian culture, there were many issues with getting the bus here on time etc and in the end the bus was delivered in the Ashram at 3am on the 1^st of July. After a quick sleep the driver set off at 0630am to pick the students up for school!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So we have set off into the new school year with 900 students, 26
classes, 5 buses and 109 boys staying here in the ashram in our hostel. Full house!!

Thanks to everyone who joined us in reaching this point and enjoy being with us for the year ahead.

News and new admissions

2008-04-25T02:58:00.000-07:00

It is new year in the education world here. Lots of people coming for admissions, enquiries, interviews for new staff. It seems that there will easily be 900 in the school come the 01^st of July.

The 8^th class students had a great result. One of the boys came 15^th in the district (out of 32000 who sat the exam) and one of the girls came 44^th in the district. It sent the whole of Pali into confusion as to how a school of village students can produce such good results (there is a mindset that city children are more intelligent). It is great to see the fruits of the teacher’s labor come so quickly.

For those who are part of the journey on the bus thought you might like to know the current position. Up till now donations for the buses amount to 1, 713, 962 rupees!!!! At the average rate of the dollar during the period that people have been giving (say 34 rupees) it comes to 50, 410 Australian dollars!! Fantastic, unbelievable, how can one express enough thanks for all the support??

We have utilized that money so far as follows:

566, 000 went on the purchase and repairing (to get it on the road) of the first bus which we took last year after starting the fundraising.
395000 was spent buying the second bus and by the time it is ready (it is under full repairing where we stripped it back to the frame to remove rust, put insulation in the roof and sides to protect from the heat, new wiring, seating, painting, tires etc etc) we plan that it will cost a total of 500000 rupees ( that’s about 14000 aud). ( there is a photo attached of the bus at it’s most naked point)

That leaves us with nearly 650, 000 rupees left.

At present we are looking for one more big bus. If we manage to get it on road for less than 500, 000 then I plan to look for one more small bus with the rest of the funds. I hope to find one for 200-250000 (there will still be a few seats left if someone can help out to reach that target). Then we are really in position to pick up all of the students and get them home without too much waiting.

It is quite complicated to fit in all of the villages (now we have 14) and also to deal with extra villages which are constantly requesting that they also be included on the bus routes (Last night I was invited to one village where the whole village turned up to convince us that their children should also be allowed to come).

Anyhow, I have to go. Tonight we have a meeting with the parents in one of the bigger villages on our route. They have arranged the whole meeting area and all parents are coming. It is impossible to describe just how unique that is in our area where parents normally try to avoid thinking that education is anything other than the schools responsibility.

Enjoy and please keep checking the site as we try and make it a little more interesting.

Ps: Last night we had the meeting and the highlight was one parent who was all teary eyed in gratitude. His daughter had just done the eighth class exams having joined the school this year. When she joined he was quite sure that she wouldn’t pass 8^th class as she had only just scraped through seventh. She passed, actually she scored 76% which is more than double the pass mark of 36% and a super mark by any standards. Now she is starting to dream of going beyond 12^th and even to college – in the college which is also starting in the Ashram this year!! You have to love it when things like that happen.

Enjoy!!

Swami Jasraj Puri

Results of the exams for 8th class for 2007-08

2008-04-15T20:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday they released the results of the Year 8 Government examination which are conducted at the district level. All of the students passed well with our best students coming 15th and 46th in the whole district. It is a fantastic effort considering that more than 32000 students sat the examination!! The students are feeling quite proud of themselves today and rightly so.

The other students also did really well. From 24 students 15 of them got 70% or above and only one student scored below 60%. The pass mark here in exams is 38% so there wasn't anyone coming close to failing.

Colours of Holi

2008-03-25T04:52:00.000-07:00

Holi is the festival of colours. Most of the students had gone for holidays but those who stayed had a lot of fun. putting colour on whoever they could find. In the picture they have just got their mathematics teacher after a lot of chasing him around. You can see in the fourth photo that they got me too.

Holi

India is a land of fairs and festivals. The Hindus, the Muslims and the Christians have their own festivals. The Holi is an important festival of Hindus. It is a festival of joy and happiness.

It is celebrated every year in the month of March in the spring season. In India spring is the best of all seasons of the year.

The festival of Holi is celebrated in the memory of devotee Prahlad, who had great faith in God. Hiranyakashyap, who was the king and also Prahlad’s father, tortured him but he did not give up his faith in God. Hiranyakashyap’s ego had become so big that he thought that only he himself should be worshipped. Hiranyakashyap asked his sister, Holika, who possessed a shawl that protected her from fire to sit in a burning fire with Prahlad in arms. As they sat in the flames wind swept away the shawl and Holika was burnt to ashes but Prahlad remained untouched by the flames.

On the day of Holi a bonfire is burnt representing the burning of Holi and Prahlad, who is represented by a coconut is pulled out of the flames unscathed. Men, women and children sing folk songs. They sprinkle coloured water and coloured powder on each other. Even the old people enjoy this festival of colour.

This festival removes social inequality. The rich and the poor, the high and the low, the weak and the strong enjoy this festival together. It creates the feelings of friendliness and mutual relationship among the people and celebrates the victory of humbleness and devotion over rampant ego.

Dinesh Tiwari, class 8th

The New Science Laboratories

2008-03-19T22:01:00.000-07:00

A view of our new Science Laboratories. A wonderful facillity.

Exams exams exams

2007-12-19T20:28:00.000-08:00

It is exam time in our school

Examination time

2007-12-19T20:10:00.000-08:00

Beautiful morning

2007-12-19T20:03:00.000-08:00

These are some early morning shots near the ashram. Beautiful local wildlife.