Watch: Kids Play on their Playground for the First Time

Kids Play on New Playground for First Time! from Leela International on Vimeo.

Playing on their NEW PLAYGROUND!!!!

It has finally happened….. Last sunday the kids at KM played on their new playgrounds for the first time. The boys played in the pouring rain, which had absolutely zero effect on their fun! We had a surreal moment watching the children playing, realizing the project had finally come to fruition. Our playground opening party […]

KM’s Photo Program!!

All the pics below were taken by the children at Operation Shanti. The photo program has been incredible so far. The kids immediate love of photography shows in their photos. We were amazed at how great some of the pictures were with only a few photo sessions! Seeing what they have created so far, we […]

All has begun…

The construction of the playground has begun!! Thanks to the hard work of some local construction workers and the monsoon gods sparing us, we are underway. We filmed the KM kids answering the questions they had prepared from the previous week (name, age, and their favorite thing to play with at the playground). They also wanted to […]

First Sunday at KM

Last Sunday was fantastic! We were so fortunate to have Vinod write out a translation so the children could understand what we were saying. Our new friend Bhavya helped with all of the translating in person that day. (not all the kids are fluent in English….yet!). Bhavya was a student at the Engineering University (congrats […]

Visiting Shanti

The first day that we met with the kids at KM (another name for Operation Shanti shelter) was Indian Independence Day. We had the chance to visit one of the schools some of the KM kids attend. They were having a celebration and an exceptional performance was put on by the students. After the performance […]

Made it to Mysore….

After settling in Mysore… We met with Tracy Kunichika, the special woman from San Francisco who started Operation Shanti, to go over details of our project. We also went along with her while she made a trip to a slum in Mysore that some of the kids at Shanti are from. Tracy was going to […]

Arrival

We made it to India! What an adventure, San Francisco, Korea, Singapore, Bangalore. 30 hours later….. After a day of adjusting and jet lag, we visited Vinyaas Play Systems, the company that is providing the equipment for the Shanti Starseeds Playground Project. After a crazy rickshaw drive through Bangalore, we met with the warm husband […]

Off to India!

    We are off to INDIA!!! We thank you all for your donations and support in making this project happen. Our first stop is Bangalore. There we will be meeting with our playground equipment vendor VINYAAS PLAYSYSTEMS. We will tour their local manufacturing plant  and see where the orphanage’s playground is being made. Thanks […]