Helen grew up in Ames, Iowa. She graduated from Syracuse University in 2008 with a Bachelor of Science in Child and Family Studies and worked as a Lead Teacher at an early childhood education center following graduation. She is a third year dual Medical Doctorate (MD) and Master of Public Health (MPH) student. During her year of MPH training, Helen is working as a Graduate Research Assistant for the Master of Public Health Program. Helen is enjoying learning about all areas of public health and is particularly interested in the fields of pediatrics, maternal and child health and health policy. She serves as Co-President of the Pediatrics Interest Group and as a VP for the American Medical Association-Iowa Medical Society Student Organization at the Carver College of Medicine. She has recently begun volunteering for the Mobile Clinic. Helen enjoys cooking, spin classes, listening to public radio and traveling to visit family and friends around the country.
We are very busy here and always running around. For this reason I am working on blogs when I can but they may not be uploaded until a few days later. Also, I have less time to edit them here so please excuse my typos. India is a fascinating country and I am really enjoying my time here, having experiences that I can tell I truly learning and growing from.
Happy New Year! Or in Tamil, “Putthaandu Vaazhthukkal” (I hope I got that correct and I will change it if I find that I didn't It is the morning of New Year’s Day here but all of my family and friends back home are probably just having dinner on New Year’s Eve now. We have done so much since my last post it will be hard to tell it all but I've put a brief recap below – this may read like one of those “three perfect days” articles in the United magazines. Because it is a holiday here the meetings and tours for our class do not start until tomorrow (Jan. 2nd). In the meantime though we have gotten very lucky because we are sharing our hotel with a dance and music class and so we have joined them in hearing speakers and attending concerts.
Happy New Year! Or in Tamil, “Putthaandu Vaazhthukkal” (I hope I got that correct and I will change it if I find that I didn't It is the morning of New Year’s Day here but all of my family and friends back home are probably just having dinner on New Year’s Eve now. We have done so much since my last post it will be hard to tell it all but I've put a brief recap below – this may read like one of those “three perfect days” articles in the United magazines. Because it is a holiday here the meetings and tours for our class do not start until tomorrow (Jan. 2nd). In the meantime though we have gotten very lucky because we are sharing our hotel with a dance and music class and so we have joined them in hearing speakers and attending concerts.
Our first night we had a welcome event with an immersion program at a place called Global Adjustments – we learned about Indian cooking,
dance, religious traditions and we got to try on Saris.
Yesterday morning started with a breakfast buffet at our
hotel. A main breakfast item is called
idli, a rice cake that is very bland and then you dip that in more flavorful
things.
At 11 am the two classes met with a local
traditional Indian dancer named Bala Devi Chandrashekar, we are attending her
concert tonight. All of these concerts
are part of a wintertime music and dance festival in Tamil. In the afternoon we had a similar event with an Indian
violinist. We also explored the shopping
district, which is where our hotel is and we did a lot of shopping yesterday to
get some clothing for our New Year’s Eve party put on by our hosts.
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| Listening to the Violin in India |
In the afternoon we did some sight-seeing; we
went to St. Thomas Cathedral and to the Beach at the Bay of Bengal of the
Indian Ocean. Seeing the ocean was
amazing. It is a holiday on the 1st
here as well so many families were there and the children were running around
and swimming. They also had a lot of fun
coming to us to shake our hands and tell us “happy new year!” This was a lot of fun for us too.
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| St. Thomas Cathedral |
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| At The Indian Ocean ! |
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