Report of Children's Camp at Orphanage

On the 9^th and 10^th of July, 2011, Swadhyaya organized a 2 Day Children’s Yoga Camp over the weekend at an orphanage called Manav Sava Sangh in Sion, Mumbai. The camp was held from 10:30- 4:00 pm and included children of varying ages.

Many teachers from the Yoga Institute, Santacruz volunteered in this camp and together, they made it a great success. Given below is some of the sharing the teachers have done about their experience during the camp:-

“Soulful puppy dog eyes, the ability to trust a stranger who gives more than 2 minutess of attention and affection and complete open-mindedness. These words pretty much sum up the orphans Swadhyaya visited on 9 & 10 July, 2011.

The age of the children ranged from 5yrs to 15yrs. We had tried to make them play such games that can be played by all together irrespective of their age. Games like following the action, passing a table tennis ball to one another with a straw, organizing a dance teacher (which was a big hit, by the way)!!

The moment we announced that we were going to do some asanas there were some loud groans."Hum asana se bahut bore hote hain," to quote them. But they did not yet have an experience with the dynamic teachers of The Yoga Institute. All the girls and boys were giggling and walking around on their toes like palm trees, acting like they were becoming chairs for us to sit on and hissing like snakes and in between two activities playing catch and kook with the volunteers!

When they asked and were told that we were going to come the next day to play with them, some of the volunteers had the smaller kids jumping up onto their backs and hugging them and holding hands too !! It was an overwhelming experience, especially for me as even though I see and feel unconditional love in my own children every day, I am, after all their mother. But these children, for whom we were mere strangers, who had come to give them only 12 hours out of 48, they were absolutely trusting, accepting with a 100-watt smile whatever we gave them and crying because it was time for us to leave.

I had tears in my eyes, bidding them goodbye. I wished that I could take as many children home with me as I could. It greatly changed the way I see my kids...they are fortunate that they were born and are brought up with parents who are there to see to their every need...BUT I feel we, as parents, are even more lucky to be blessed with these angelic and innocent forms of God...children.

Thank You Swadhyaya for giving me this opportunity.

And I greatly appreciate the efforts by Manav Seva Sangh to provide these children with the basic comforts that can keep them happy.” 

- Vyoma Chauhan

“We take people and things for granted in our life. Inspite of having everything we continue to complain about what we don’t have. Like the children at Manav Seva Sangh were taken such good care, unlike other orphanages where there is not enough place for all the inmates. They had all the material things around, but still their eyes looked around for someone, whom they can call their ....family. That emptiness was there but still they were lively, happy and had an enthusiastic approach towards life. They wanted to study, earn a living and make their lives worthwhile. They all were from different backgrounds, some used to live on roads, for some this was a day care centre, some were picked up from garbage bins. But there was tremendous faith. Faith that they are taken care of, their talents encouraged. It wasn’t like any other orphanage that I have seen. Even hygiene was taken care of, which in Mumbai itself is a rare site. 

A question that would strike all is... how much faith do we have? In the higher self, in ourselves? Most of us inspite of having knowledge of Yoga, inspite of teaching Yoga Philosophy, get shaken easily by the ups and downs in life. Our Faith is shaken, rather lost. The answer to this, is within us. We need to see where and why our faith is lacking.

We have to make the best of whatever life offers us instead of complaining. We don't value this because we are overprotected by our loved ones, our family. Wheredo these children have that much. They are such a large group, still they are so happy. Above all God is there, he is taking care of them. They could have wasted their life but he got them here, showed them the right path and is taking care of them.”

- Geeta Udasi

“Teachers from the Institute should go to such places much often where there is lots to learn. For us, we feel we are down to earth but it’s not easy. When these kids hug you, don't want to leave you, you feel like taking them home but you can't. You can’t do anything. They will be attached to us. We spent just a few hours with them and they were so attached to us that they wanted us to come everyday. We should teach them Yoga in such a way that they know the difference between attachment and being dispassionate. Someone or the other should visit such places regularly. It is a good learning for us.”

                              -  Agnes D’Souza & Leena Nanjiani

“Even though I am not a member of ‘Swadhyaya’, I got the opportunity to accompany their team to an orphanage run by ‘Manav Seva Sangh’ on one rainy Saturday. I was intending to do some selfless work and in the process impart valuable knowledge to socially challenged kids. But now in retrospect, it was me who returned enriched.

Firstly we were all surprised to see clean and contented kids of all ages simply enjoying themselves on a school holiday. We exclaimed, “They don’t even look like orphans!” because we had expected to see a bunch of sorry looking, deprived, agonized kids, in whose lives we intended to bring some brightness and happiness. But doesn’t yoga say that the situations around us are neutral – but they affect us differently depending on how we react to them? These innocent kids were happy because they chose to be so even in an orphanage.


One particular girl who touched a chord in my heart was a ten year old who brought a set of brand new crayons and sketch pens from her possessions for an activity. Everyone used them and in the end, all pens and crayons were with different kids. I got worried about what I would tell this girl when she would come to reclaim her set. Surprisingly, she never asked for it again. Can we even imagine to expect any of our ‘rich’ spoilt kids to do this? Wasn’t she already practicing Maitri, Karuna, Mudita, Aprigraha, Acceptance, Sharing and many more concepts we were wracking our brains to introduce to them in interesting ways?

Most importantly, I felt all of them were practicing Ishwar Pranidhan as they were happy and content, probably because they did not have the bondage of one family. They know they are God’s children, just as we all are but they seem blissfully nonchalant about their ‘orphan’ tag because when all doors of so-called civilized society were closed on them, God has blessed them with one door opening into a universal world devoid of caste, creed, religion and even family. They all belong to ONE BIG FAMILY – the Family of God.

- Ushma Shah

“There are two main things I learnt from our visit to the children at Manav Seva Sangh:

1. We need regular reminders of how lucky we are to have whatever need and not take it for granted.
2. Spending some time with children is essential for good health.

It was an energetic, active and ultimately tiring but satisfying day. The biggest challenge was to keep the kids’ attention on current activities and improvising in the last minute, depending on the crowd’s mood. When working with kids, you cannot keep a fixed plan. Keep a general idea of activities to be done, lots of back-up plans and finally, go with the flow.

One needs to be the children’s friend more than a teacher to keep the interest alive. It is the only way to connect with kids, especially teenagers. No one likes a sermon. But when both sides share something, interact, have fun while learning, it makes it worth the while.

The kids, like any other kids, were reluctant to learn yoga, expecting it to be boring. It is one of the biggest challenges any teacher faces – breaking the prejudices towards yoga. There were many children who were willing to do certain activities but refused to do others. I think that if that is the case, we can find out what they like and work around that. Yoga lives in everything we do. I think we can explain yogic concepts through almost any activity; we just need to use our creativity.”

- Ankita Shah