Share your talent!

Will children enjoy a Summer Camp which teaches them a set of traditional games and promises them a week of fun?

Asha from Hyderabad thinks kids will.

She was responding to an earlier column of mine which touched on what kids could do this summer.

Asha said that since we were involved with the celebration of the annual ‘Mylapore Festival’ (it would be easy for us to tap our resources and host a camp of traditional games.

I appreciated Asha’s suggestion after I scanned her blog.

A native of Tamil Nadu, she has lived in Bangalore and is now in Hyderabad. Her blog is populated with long posts on traditional food, customs and life of the past.

She hopes that this document may come in handy for her children when they grow up if they decide to take the best out of the old!

Two others responded to my other idea - of a camp by the seaside. One, a trekking enthusiast says he will help organise a long walk on the waterfront and into the scrub jungle.

I particularly appreciated the idea of the ‘Trekking Polama’ concept that the Chennai Trekking Club hosted to mark its anniversary where its members used the occasion to demonstrate to people how to plan and prepare for treks and how a tent is set up and stuff like that.

Another young man has been enthusiastic to demonstrate the art of angling.

When was the last time you really held a large fish or a crab in your hands?

I am sure kids would love the angling experience even if they are not fish-eaters. I am doubly sure that my young friends in the kuppams would be thrilled to demonstrate how to catch crabs in the backwaters!

I must say that most of our Summer Camps for Kids are boring, dull and unimaginative. The fun element is missing in most cases and many host them to spin some extra money.

And we still have parents who send their kids for ‘special classes’ during summer hols

This may well be the time when our talented adults can get imaginative.

In our neighbourhoods, there are people who love gardening or painting, animators and biologists, designers and Frisbee players. You could spare a few hours and offer to share your skills with our kids.

In return you may learn a bit from them and this experience.

We are doing our bit. A Journalism Camp. Info at www.mtjclass.blogspot.com