Rainbow Primary School

Here is what I gave the collector last night: Here is what happened: The DC's office went on tour of a far, far away part of the district, so the usual Thursday 11:00 AM hearing in the conference hall never happened. I came back at 5:00 PM, sat my usual seat in the waiting area, and chatted with the usual sweet-natured, competent front office staff. There was a crowd by the front door, which is not unusual. I spoke with SSA staff waiting to discuss the latest with the DC, then I made a new friend who is a bureaucrat with a tax office. At 5:05, the union boss for the office workers showed up. He demanded the front-office staff leave! As per their union rules, the work is 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM, but the DC works his staff until 9:00/10:00 PM. The union boss 1) either thinks this makes the rest of the office look bad or 2) thinks someone is actually unhappy at the DC's office. The little fellows of the front office shuffled all the paperwork into bundles for the overnight safe...

We have enjoyed 2008 very much. There is one - big - item left on our to-do list. There is a plot of land, 182 sq yards, we received permission to build on in April 2007. We even got money for the construction (from the government). We've waited 10 months for permission to build. Why? This land is next door to land that belongs to a State ministry (tourism). Our district collector may solve the paperwork stalemate tomorrow. Keep your fingers crossed! Here is the video on the whole story.

2008 is "The Year of Enormous Change" for the school. The building will be ready on 1 February 2008. We're a moving on uppp, to the sky.... to a deluxe school building in the skyyyyy!!! Many, many, many, many, many thanks to our new contractor, Vijay Kumar (Usha Madam's brother-in-law). Here he is with the Naandi team, including Bhartee, our Naandi engineer. We are only one month behind our original schedule. (Our old contractor walked off the job in October 2007, long story and it wasn't really anyone's fault.) THANK YOU VIJAY! THANK YOU VIJAY! THANK YOU VIJAY! THANK YOU VIJAY! THANK YOU VIJAY! Classes moved into the first floor already. The poojas took place on 2 January 2008: a "Christian Pooja" and the "Hindu Pooja." Prayers were said in many languages and coconuts were cracked to scare all evil spirits away Here is Kalpana teacher cracking her coconut at the Hindu pooja. That same day, the Naandi Foundation started delivery of...

The International School of Business, lower school, visited the Rainbow School and brought GOODIES! Thank you, Carole Farrand and family, for arranging this!!

Please click below for a wonderful Financial Times article on our main partner organization, the Naandi Foundation. Naandi is headquartered here in Hyderabad. Financial Times Article