Wednesday, May 23, 2018

Working on projects at the Indian Social Institute (ISI) and new foods!

Waking up early is not unusual in this trip, but today I got to wake up a little bit later, for which I am grateful! We got to try a new dish for breakfast called puri. A puri is a puff flour that is eaten together with aloo curry (potato stir fry), chutney (Indian spicy sauce), and a boiled egg. Today’s agenda consists of mostly staying in Indian Social Institute (ISI) doing our own project.
Waking up early is not unusual in this trip, but today I got to wake up a little bit later, for which I am grateful! We got to try a new dish for breakfast called puri. A puri is a puff flour that is eaten together with aloo curry (potato stir fry), chutney (Indian spicy sauce), and a boiled egg. Today’s agenda consists of mostly staying in Indian Social Institute (ISI) doing our own project.



At 8:30 a.m., we congregated in our classroom, where Fred showed us a video about “If you never failed, you’ve never lived” before starting the lecture. It was a great way to start the morning and also a nice reminder for us that it is okay to fail.

We also had a discussion about yesterday’s tour to the waste management side, which was managed by Hasiru Dala. Hasiru Dala is an organization of waste workers whose responsibility is to improve the livelihood and quality life of waste pickers. We learned a lot about the waste management and how waste is sorted. I was still amazed on how little the amount of dry waste Indian people produced.


Moreover, we talked about value preposition design and how to create a problem statement to start our project. I believe that often times when faced by a problem, I jump straight into finding out the solution before truly understanding the underlying problem. I learned that by knowing and understanding the problem, finding the correct solution will be much more efficient. There are three groups each working on one of three different topics: water management for farmers, a path to less waste in urban area, and water sourcing.

My group and I got the path to less waste in urban area. Today we got to talk to a scrap dealer. He was a really nice person, I was surprised how willing he was to tell his story. He collected big plastic bottle, metal, and newspaper. He took these items from people and sold them in the city market in order to be recycled.

Dinner was prepared by the canteen at ISI and we had a group workout before we went to bed. I enjoy every second of my time in India, and I am grateful to be given the opportunity to work with great, ambitious people.

-Juan M.