Week 21-22/2025
26th May to 6th June 2025 (Monday to Sunday)
I didn’t want to combine two weekly notes, but there’s no option now—it’s too late. The last two weeks were super happening, but I’ll keep it short here. Sunday is almost gone and too many work tasks are pending.
Let me start with this: I miss BLR. Weather, food, people—everything… I follow specific people on Twitter just to take in Bangalore vibes.
26th & 27th went into office work. We took a flight from Ahmedabad to Bangalore on the 28th morning, reached there by afternoon. Met Thejesh for the first time. It was nice to have a chat with him about life, work, food, and other stuff. When you read a person’s weekly notes, you feel you already know them.
We visited a friend’s place in HSR, freshened up, met another dear friend Jubin, had dinner, and caught the bus for Coonoor. Reached early morning.
We were unprepared for Coonoor’s weather (no sweater, no proper footwear for the rocky terrain). We borrowed a sweater from someone and somehow managed.
Spent 5 days with amazing nature educators who came from all over India & the YouCAN team. It was a mix of feelings—it gave me a sense of belonging to the community that I am an alumni of this fellowship. In some moments it gave me self-doubt, and in other moments it gave me profound inspiration.
We met dear friend Adithi Muralidhar at Coonoor. I did my internship under her at Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education - Design & Technology Education lab, Mumbai.
While coming back, we again halted in BLR, met Ruchir, the Nature Classrooms team, and folks from Nature Conservation Foundation. Visiting Nature Classroom’s office, meeting the all-girls team, and seeing their amazing work gives me happiness, hope, and inspiration. Someday I want to build a space/org like this in my native place.
3rd June - we’re back in town—Ahmedabad. 4th I did work from home. 5th I went to the office.
I got sick on the 6th. Suddenly got fever and loose motions… it was food poisoning. Still recovering. I don’t know how I got it—maybe because of traveling or outside food or heat, don’t know. I’m thankful that it’s not covid. I’m feeling better now.
No reading during the last two weeks.
Music : We sang nice songs during the campfire at the fellowship residency. That night is memorable.
Overall mood is happy but a little stressed because of too many pending tasks at the office and also from other side projects.
Sakha fellowship work is going well. Ashish bhai and Rameshwari ben are leading it very well. Today me and Nidhi attended one team meeting, and we got some new updates.
Sakhas are taking up new projects. One of the groups wants to start a podcast for unsung heroes from daily life, one group wants to visit villages and explore the issues over there. Me and Nidhi are thinking to meet them and help them convert their project into a geo inquiry project. Anyone interested in developing and documenting geo inquiry projects with children, please let me know. Happy to collaborate. We’re also planning to host sessions on financial literacy, gender, and youth-life-related stuff. No motivation or gyan. Real problems of youth and exploration for the same.
Otherwise, everything is going well. I need to catch up with a few friends and do proper planning for the side projects.
Khojbeen Mandali Updates:
Dear friend Siddhartha helped us make the final logo of KBM. It’s a pretty simple and cute logo. Chappal is part of the logo because our central idea is exploration and inquiry, and what’s a better medium to do exploration than ‘walk’!! So the chappal (footwear) :)
We also launched our Instagram handle on 5th June—World Environment Day. Check it out here.
If you are a school, learning center, or group of parents—please let us know if you’re interested in collaborating with us.
Some Photos :
