We’re now over half way through the project. The time has gone so quickly. I’ve spent the last two weeks working at Akal boys school as we weren’t allowed to our project area because the kids had exams. It’s a real shame we weren’t allowed to teach the kids who didn’t have any exams. At the boys school we planted trees and wrote slogans on the walls. It was tough writing in Hindi on a bumpy wall with 2ft high letters. Some mistakes were made! Not sure if the kids will take on the messages we wrote, like “boys and girls are the same", and "save water", etc. But I think the teachers appreciated our work. I did a bit of teaching at the boys school, which was really great as the boys are so much better behaved than the girls and are quicker to pick things up and are generally more advanced. I have been missing teaching my girls though.

We went to Jophur, the blue city, at the weekend. We got jeeps there, around 5 hours each way. It was a really good the weekend, the fort was stunning as were some temples we saw. What made it worth while was the “club” we went to in the evening. Jodphur was pretty different to Jaisalmer, much bigger and busier.

We’ve just started back at the girls school now. It was a horrible first day back. We only had 9 kids, and they were being particularly troublesome. It doesn’t help that our current project executive is male, and they get extremely shy around him, but I need him to explain to the kids what I mean in Hindi. When we were walking to catch the bus back I saw a guy walking past with a small body in his arms, wrapped up in a pink blanket. They were going to bury a dead 4 year old girl. She died of diarrhea. Akal village is poor, but they can afford hospital treatment, especially for something as simple as diarrhea, and with subsidized treatment for those under the poverty line. There were no females at the burial. This situation was so shocking and deeply sad. Why did she die? Because she's a girl? Why didn’t her parents get her treatment? Could they not afford it, or was it religious?

We all have to do presentations on global issues each week. Last week I did gender inequality - something which is very prevalent in India. I talked about the differences between the Akal girls and boys school. At our school there are two rooms, one for class 1 and 2, and one for class 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7. This obviously makes teaching a bit more challenging. As well as this the teachers don’t speak much English, the school grounds are a mess and truancy is very common. At the boys school they have spare classrooms, teachers with very good English and better grounds. Apart from these differences you can see inequality everywhere walking around the streets of Jaisalmer. Every shop/business/restaurant is owned and run by men. It's hard for women to even leave their house without a ‘proper’ reason. The more shocking side of this inequality is things you can’t see out in the open, like dowry, bride burning and infanticide.

To end on a lighter note, I don't think I've mentioned the camel safari we went on - it was pretty cool! The dunes were stunning, it was great to sleep under the stars. I enjoyed the camel ride, wasn't the most comfortable, but is definately a interesting way to travel.