Tuesday, September 18, 2012


Sharing


“Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love. Love risks degenerating into obsession, friendship is never anything but sharing.”  Elie Wiesel





Benjamin and Darshika are friends from our pre-school.  Bejamin had two pairs of shoes and the only pair Darshika had was broken beyond repair.  They learned the importance of sharing and the next day Bejamin put it to practice!  His little act of kindness is very much appreciated as The Bible says in Proverbs 22:6 " Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it."


Ruth Herath
for Smyrna Mission School

Friday, September 7, 2012



Our Own Carrot Garden

Smyrna Mission School children are introduced to home-gardening.  They will grow vegetables in a piece of land in the Smyrna Mission House.  These vegetables will be used for their lunch and the rest will be sold and profits from it would be put into school projects.





Sasikumar explaining the students the 'how to' of planting carrots



 Removing rocks and pebbles

Carrot seeds

 Learning the techniques of sowing

Orange Tree by the pond

(There are plenty of fruits on the tree and I'm not sure how many will be left at the end of the day :) 


Ruth Herath
for Smyrna Mission School

Wednesday, September 5, 2012





Tea for Two x 20 (Sri Lankan Style) 


Smyrna Mission School started teaching cookery for mission school children and today was their first lesson.  Guess what they learned first? It's TEA..... Making tea is quite simple but you need a bit of practice to master the art of making tea. 




Menike explaining how tea is made


 Boys were keener than the girls to know :)



 "Double,double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble"



 mmm.....a hot cup of tea for all!


Jesumary with her cup of tea

They were so enthusiastic and learning something outside of the classroom is so much fun!

From tomorrow two student will take over making tea for all the kids.  


Coming up....

Growing carrots on our own plot of land



By Ruth Herath

Monday, September 3, 2012

Sponsor children's Kande Ela Forest Garden trip on August Holidays


Goal-The importance of protecting the nature.

The day arrived for us to go on the trip to Kande Ela Forest Garden with the sponsor children. All sponsor children from Nuwara Eliya and Kandapola got together at Smyrna and  at around 8.45am the bus arrived at Smyrna premises. All the children got into the bus with much excitement.


It was bit of a misty day in Nuwara Eliya and quite challenging too. Here are some pictures and more interesting things about our sponsor Children trip.

About Kande Ela forest Garden
Kande Ela forest Garden is located closed to Meepilimana reservoir on Nuwara Eliya-Horton plain road. Kande Ela forest Garden is adjoined to Hakgala Strict forest Reservation and one side bordered by Meelipana Reservoir. Forest Department maintain the Kande Ela forest Garden for educational purpose. There is a nature trail through the forest with many number of examples for Soil conservation methods, Type of plants, Environment pollution,Traditional culture. 4-5km long trail through forest takes about one hour to complete by walk.
The entrance of Kande Ela Forest Garden



At Smyrna on 27th August,2012
Early morning the kitchen was very busy preparing lunch for all the sponsor children and for all the people who were joining us in the trip. Mrs.Manike our cheerful cooking lady who worked hard to support us by preparing lunch and Mrs.Chandralatha,Mrs.Rajeshwary who supported for the work in the kitchen. 

Mrs.Manike preparing lunch packets

Mrs.Chandralatha a bit tried but happy 


Mrs.Rajeshwary   

Welimada Mission School teacher who helped us




Children who were ready for the trip

Our Kandapola children 
Our Manager Mrs.Kumari Moses & Mrs.Shanthy  one of the  cheerful lady who work for  sponsor children lead all the children in pray before the trip

All the children joined us in prayer

We are ready (Gayathri,Pathmalojini)

Anushka  & Daisy on the bus

Jerome & Paul inside the bus

Mrs.Geethika(Forest Department,Nuwara Eliya) who helped us to make this trip a free trip 
Arrived at Kande Ela Forest Garden 



All are discussing of what will be next..

Boys are ready!!

A Misty day around the Kande Ela lake

Arrived at 9.40am at Kande Ela Forest Garden & first all the children had their breakfast

excited!!

Ps.Job who are taking care of the Kandapola children,  person who is always ready  to lend his helping hand

Mr.Sasikumar one of the staff members, He helped us to find a bus to travel and  helped us in the trip in many ways. 

happy too!!

Enjoying the food..
Interesting!!
After Breakfast all the children went to see the exhibits of the things that they can learn about nature.

About bacteria & fungus

Children learning about nature

Leaf blade shapes

Pinnately Compound leaves

Observing..

a structures of nests



A skull  of a female mule deer

A skeleton of a mule deer

An indigenous species that can be seen only in Nuwara Eliya area

A lecture was given to all the children in brief about Forests and  many more important aspects about nature

The lecture from the forest department giving a brief explanation

All the children were listening and some are writing down the important facts too..

Our staff who is enjoying the lecture


Enjoying the game done by the lecturer

Niranjala who is in Zinnia group receiving the first place from Mrs.Geethika by winning the game

Mrs.Shanthy & Mrs.Ruth studying carefully  about fish..




Started the journey though the forest...



differentiated seeds



The lecturer is explaining the important aspects... 
Through the forest...

A structure of an ancient house of a farmer.... 





A chair


Inside the ancient house of the farmer (Area that  they sleep outside)



An endemic plant  
It's demonstration of "how to cut trees"  

Another demonstration of  cutting trees 




All the children enjoyed their journey and our Manager, Mrs.Kumari Moses came personally and thanked all the members who helped us from the Forest department and Kande Ela forest garden staff. We all left Kande ela premises around 1.00pm and we arrived at Smyrna . Then we provided lunch for all the children with a great support  of the staff members.



Mrs.Ruth & Mrs.Shanthy who were so quick to help ...




Enjoying the lunch..






We would like to specially thank our Sis.Margit & Mrs.Kumari Moses who always encourage us to do what is needed to be done and We thank God for being our strength . We would take this opportunity to thank everyone who joined their hand to make this a success..

Thank you,

Social Team