Playground Fun

Yesterday we had the pleasure of spending the afternoon with the five youngest kids at Shunem who get home from school early. Vamshi, Pooja, Vinkatesh, Kamlakar, and Sangina were too much fun. We played on the playground, watched them climb around, and took lots of great videos of them being goofy.

Vamshi is the acrobat of the group. He was up on the parallel bars doing all sorts of crazy maneuvers, scaring us constantly with his dismounts. He was great to throw the ball with, and in a few minutes mastered the technique for heading it too. He is also quite the fast little runner.

Pooja is the most complex individual among the tiny ones. She can be cute and cuddly, but also can be a terror. She has everyone around here wrapped around her chubby little finger. She doesn’t listen when she doesn’t want to, but her smile can make you not even care. Here Pooja is showing how strong she is. She may be tiny, but she is densely packed.

This is the face Pooja often makes when she doesn’t like the sound of something. Most likely Emily asked her to smile for the picture when she didn’t particularly feel like it. She also makes this face when you tell her to do her homework, which she hasn’t done in probably a month.
Also note Colton using concentration and the practiced angling of his left hand to keep the ball floating perfectly in front of him.

Vinkatesh is everyone’s baby here at Shunem. He falls asleep most nights during evening readings, and gets carried back to his room. Luckily when you are carrying him you don’t even notice because he ways about 20 pounds. In this picture we were lucky enough to catch him sounding out the last “oo” sound in his full name – Vinkateshwarlu. He is a real treat to play with and has some killer dance moves if he is in the mood.

Kamlakar is one of the friendliest kids we’ve ever met. He is perfectly content to just stand and hold your hand, but he also loves playing with the ball. He isn’t as quick as Vamshi, so spinning Vamshi around a couple times to give him a head start in games is not an uncommon practice. He loves climbing and smiling, and also only having one button done on his shirt.

If ever a girl were tiny and cute, Sangina would be that girl. She was the most difficult to get to play with us at first, but she loves it now. She is the type that may not even know she is cute, because she doesn’t try to get away with anything. She doesn’t say very much at all, and loves just sliding and playing in the sand. She and Pooja planted and carefully watered a tree branch under the slide.

So those are the five youngest kids here! They are too much fun, and we are looking forward to spending many more days with them. Emily made some flash cards today to help them learn to recognize some basic words, so we’ll see how that goes.