Duration : 11 Dec to 16 Dec 2023

Rural Immersion is a CAS trip where all three, creativity,service,and action are experienced by us. The Rural immersion trip was of total 6 days and 7 nights, including the traveling days. This trip was very interesting as well as full learning. We experienced the daily lifestyle of the villagers who were living there and learned many things. We visited Mokhamal Dang, Gujarat where we interacted with the tribal people and learned new skills such as how to make dal rice, Warli art, basket weaving, crops harvesting, communicating skills with the tribal people because of the language barrier as they speak Dangi language. We visited different places nearby in the village to know the facilities and privileges they are given. The places we visited were their hospital, child care center, milk factory, their farms, their houses, police station, and many more. 

LO 2 : “Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process”

Living in the village with limited resources was challenging for me. Being privileged, the place where we lived for those 6 days was challenging. The food we were given there for 6 days was difficult for us to consume because the food was not just like my home and as it was made from the fresh ingredients which were grown, it felt a little weird from the food I ate everyday at my home. Another challenge I faced was while trekking. Night trekking was challenging for me because it was the first time I experienced it, whereas night trekking in the forest is difficult because of the attention of animals at night. These were challenging for me because I have never experienced anything like this before which made this CAS trip challenging for me. I overcome these challenges by cooperating with the limited resources I was given and by experiencing it for the first time.

LO 4 : “Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences”

The CAS trip as an experience was difficult for me because living in a village for 7 nights was difficult whereas they also spoke the Dangi language, so it was hard to communicate with them. I made a few commitments to overcome the challenges such as even though they speak Dangi language, I can still try to communicate with them in Gujarati, whereas for living there I can get some new experience and need to come out of my comfort zone to enjoy the trip and learn new things. To make a commitment, it was easy for me because to learn new skills and achieve new experiences, I needed to make a commitment.

LO 5 : “Demonstrate the skills and recognize the benefits of working collaboratively”

To achieve new skills and experiences, I needed to collaborate with others. Collaborating or working together is generally easy for me because I think that working with others rather than doing it alone makes your work more easy whereas less time consuming as well as it helps to create bonds with others and help to learn new things from each other. For my CAS trip, working with others was not difficult for me because having people in a group with skill was easy to work with, but sometimes it was difficult to collaborate especially in teaching sessions and cooking. There were some students who were experiencing cooking for the first time which I found difficult but I handled it by helping them learn basic things for cooking as well as learned by the cook chef from the school.

LO 6 : “Demonstrate engagement with issues of global significance”

After visiting the village, I found out that there were many issues in the nearby places which were not considered or not taken seriously. Because it was a small village, there were many poverty issues and lack of resources such as school supplies, filtered water or clean water. As we completed our SDG goals mission, there were some SDGs which were not properly satisfied. To help them, we all students give some part of the money we brought books, crayons, pens, chalks, clothes, and many more resources to donate in the school we visited. We also cleaned the area where they drink water. 

LO 7 : “Recognize and consider the ethics of choices and actions”

When we visited the school, I saw that in the morning, everyday the childrens are ordered to clean the school whereas after that the girls are asked to cook food as well as boys to play sports. According to me, this is considered an ethical issue because they are given the education and health facilities, but they are also asked to do the chores at their learning age.This issue makes me feel unfair for them because even though they are getting the right to education, they still face issues.

In the end, this CAS trip was very enjoyable as well as full of learning for me and new experiences. This CAS trip helped me learn that to have new experiences and learn new things, you need to come out of your comfort zone to experience it. This trip helped me to know how to cook food as well as learn the process of crops harvesting and child health center. Other than that, the visit to their home and seeing their traditional dance was very memorable and the structure of their home was amazing as well as unique.