Hermitage World Challengers (Part 3) - What a bunch of Stars

Part of the work we were involved in with REWA was to help a 77year old lady whose name sounded like 'Grandpa', to clear, clean, and decorate her dwelling.

This was an enormous challenge for all of us and at first we were overcome by the enormity of the work involved. However, the young people showed great resilience, commitment, effort and emotion to tackle this head on.

With encouragement, hard work and initiative the transformation was huge in such a short time.

I didn't get actively involved but I was watching and encouraging all the young people who helped out.

They were STARS!

While half the students were helping the old lady the other half were at the REWA centre helping the young children to play, sing and talk. Also they had started painting a lovely wall mural on the outside wall of the centre, tidying up the grounds and preparing a puppet show.

We were all very happy with the finished wall painting, as were most of the locals in Leh!

After our project phase was complete, we continued with our acclimatisation phase. This included several 4/5 hour walks in and around Leh to help us prepare for our main trek phase.

The young people were very kind to me and took me with them on all their walks. Each time we reached the highest point they would unroll their banner and pluck me out of their rucksack and hold me up to be photographed with the rest of the team!

I think I must be one of the most photographed sheep! I definitely think I must hold the record for getting to the highest altitude.