When our Artisans at CSA were celebrating Lohri, our kids also decided to hold their own celebration. We got gazak, peanuts, popcorn and revari but surprisingly, didn't get the time to open those packets till the end. When we asked what they wanted to do, someone suggested playing the Truth and Dare game. It was beautiful to see kids at times cross-checking with each other if a question was appropriate or not or brainstorming to ask something more challenging. While playing this game, so many dares turned into lessons for the kids. E.g. Singing a song in English for the first time while reading its lyrics, sharing about their best moments and worst moments, speaking about each other for a minute, etc. We talked about ourselves, and slowly opened up, bit by bit, as flowers blossom at their own pace.
We believe it's important to focus on Team bonding with new groups. When individuals come together, there should be things that connect them as a team. That's what this entire festivity was about for us. Next, we played the Common Ground game. Kids shared so many things where others resonated with them. A few kids who were usually shy were very active in this game. A few who used to talk a lot also took a backseat at times to listen to others. Some interesting moments were when we found out that many kids had listened to Jungle book theme song "Jungle Jungle baat chali hai", some of them were interested in the latest Avengers: End game movie, some talked about their fondness of their native place and some shared their personality traits. We played for an hour and yet ended this segment with high energy as the food also needed a bit of attention.
How can a celebration be complete without music? One prerequisite for the next part was to choose songs with good meanings. The idea was to show we can have fun without being disrespectful to a specific gender or a community. Some of the kids who had never danced before couldn't stay untouched by that joyful ambience. Soon, there was conscious and subconscious little hand movement, followed by swing dance steps lost in the beat of music. Some kids encouraged others by teaching them simple movements and making them feel included. It was beautiful to see the non-judgemental space that we were able to create where kids could be who they were without feeling judged. Those moments reflected the true spirit of this festivity.
It was a non-teaching session - as kids had initially requested - and yet it involved so much learning, while having fun with food, photographs, music and dancing! That's how our Lohri Celebration ended.