Hari Om to all.  Below are the updates from Tamaraipakkam – details of the various activities and events, as shared by Priya & Arun.

Harihara Vidyalaya

1. Priya continues the spiritual classes and spoken English classes for 7th and 8th students.

2. Weekly satsang for teachers is being continued. Current text is Guru-ashtakam.

3. Our children celebrated their 7 th annual day on 24 th March. They exhibited their learning, talent and conviction through this cultural program. They gave an inspirational performance on the theme ‘Idu namma bhoomi’ (this is our earth). Through modulations of popular TV shows children addressed relevant social issues like lack of sanitation, substance abuse, water scarcity, chemical farming, pollution, etc in a fun and thought provoking manner. By Gurudev’s grace, this program was a grand success reaching out to more than 500 people in the audience. The very next day, HHV celebrated Kindergarten graduation and award ceremony recognizing and encouraging the talents of children. The tiny tots gave adorable performances stealing the hearts of the audience.

CORD

1. All regular activities such as Mahila Mandal, Self Help Group, Farmers’ Club, Rehabilitation program and Balvihar, Center day meetings, field visits, reporting and other administrative works are going on well.

2. CORD staff continues to promote kitchen garden, organic manure preparation and Azolla fodder cultivation.

3. CORD has enabled 20 landless women to set up poultry in their backyard. Each woman was given a poultry cage with 3 country hens and 1 cock which are one month old and vaccinated. They were trained on how to take care of the poultry as well.

4. Promotion of sanitation and hygiene: CORD Thamaraipakkam started the sanitation project this quarter with special focus on colonies with an aim to change the lifestyle of SC/ST communities into a healthy and clean one so they are in par with the rest of the communities in hygiene and thereby in self-esteem as well. Therefore sanitation kits comprising of bathing soap, tooth brush, tooth paste, nail cutter, comb, detergent, shampoo, sanitary pad, etc worth Rs. 150 were distributed to MM members in colonies where there is lack in personal hygiene. Awareness on waste segregation, individual toilet construction, soakage pit and compost pit is emphasized in every MM meeting.

5. Hari Seva camp: 34 children from Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Virugambakkam, Chennai visited CORD TPKM for a 2-day seva camp from February 7 – 8. The camp facilitated exposure to village lifestyle along with hands-on learning in the fields. Some activities include making azolla ponds (for cattle fodder), vegetable gardening and organic manure preparation. They trained a few village women in artificial jewelry making and also engaged in sanitation activities like constructing soakage and garbage pits and waste segregation.

6. Sea Salt agriculture: Cord staff is providing constant guidance and follow up to 45 farmers on sea salt agriculture which could bring down the expenses of farmers by 60% and yield healthy organic crops.

7. Volunteers:

• Rohith Krishna from Kerala is continuing to serve at CORD TPKM helping with various projects such as kitchen gardening, tree plantations, organic farming and promotion of waste segregation. He played a key role in sea salt agriculture promotion.
• Shankari of YEP 10 also helps out in some field visits and children camps.
• Meenakshi (Thangam) Sridhar from CM New Zealand continues to support and motivate CORD Gurudhara team from remote.

8. Tailoring unit at tpkm is doing well. CORD TPKM Gurudhara continues to stitch bags for various camps of the various Chinmaya Mission centers.

9. CORD activities at Uthandi are going on ok. Monthly meetings are being conducted. CORD staff trained some of them in kitchen gardening and distributed vegetable seeds to the women.

10. Six CHYKS regularly conduct village Balvihar twice a month along with the help of local village volunteers in about 10 centers. They are regularly trained by Priya and are given the curriculum to follow.

11. Women’s day celebrations – Some of the Mahila mandals organized cultural competitions and sports for women, girls and children within their own villages and distributed prizes. Some bought gifts like hotboxes or matching sarees and handbags, cut cake and celebrated women’s day.

Ashram

1. Sunday Balavihar is conducted at the ashram by CHYKs under the guidance of Priya followed by CHYK class by Arunachalam.

2. Arunachalam has started a series of TITI workshop sessions for youth named ‘7 Sundays 7 Transformations’. About 20 CHYKS attend these 3 hour sessions on Sundays which are highly motivational and very lively.

3. Study classes by Arun at Avadi CV and Tada CV are going on well. Kindle Life is the text.

4. Study classes by Priya for the teachers of Vivekananda Vidyalaya, Arani is going on well. Mukundamala is the text.

5. Maha Shivaratri celebrations and worship was very fulfilling at Chinmaya Sarveshwara, Thamaraipakkam. The day started with Ganapathi Homam followed by Rudra-homam with ekadasha rudram chanting. About 300 devotees performed kalasa abhishekam of Lord Sarveshvara. Also about 75 sivan-adiyaargal (Shiva devotees) chanted Tiruvasagam all through the day. In the evening, Harihara Vidyalaya students performed skits and villupaatu on the theme of "symbolism and devotees of Lord Shiva". There was also puja and abhishekam throughout the night. Between the puja, ‘On a quest’ movie was screened and about 120 devotees watched. Finally, CHYKs performed a relay yajna on the “Lingashtakam”;. This helped the speakers as well as listeners to reflect on Lord Shiva. Thus through the participation of school children, parents, CHYKs and many other devotees the celebration was made very memorable.

Miscellaneous

1. Priya along with Brni. Shraddha Chaitanya (Tiruchengode) conducted a two day Personality development camp for 120 fifth grade students of Pushpalatha Matriculation school, Thirunelveli.

2. On February 11 th , Arunachalam and Priya conducted a one day teachers’ orientation program on the theme of ‘Performing to Potential’. About 40 teachers from 4 Vivekananda Vidyalayas in the villages of Kadambattur, Mannur, Tiruvelangadu and Tiruvallur benefitted from the session.

3. A similar workshop was conducted for 45 teachers from Sri Sai and Karunya schools in Vengal on March 4th.