One of my earliest memories of conducting or assisting a children’s summer workshop was way back in 1996 when I was interning in Ahmedabad with architects and academicians Miki and Madhavi Desai in Ahmedabad. At that time, summer camps or workshops were unheard of here in Goa. So it was a unique experience and more so because it was basically an introduction to architecture for young school students! It was such an amazing and interesting exercise. There were lots of outdoor activities – sketching, mapping a market street with vegetable vendors, a walk in a heritage precinct, etc. The other sit down exercises were held in a lovely semi open facility where children were given exercises of drawing and observation of objects like a ball floating in a bucket of water, etc. There was even a traditional toy making session by Sudarshan Khanna. What left a lasting impression on me was the interactive experiences the participants had on the outdoor sessions where they engaged with people on the street. This could be seen in the way they had mapped the market street replete with vendors and buyers in the drawings.
On my return to Goa while I had hoped to try out a similar exercise, the opportunity never came or more like I didn’t make any efforts to pursue it and I was perhaps more excited about practising design and build architecture, than conducting workshops or camps. My tryst with teaching in the last decade has been the most enriching and I am thankful to my mentors and collaborators for all the opportunities to experiment with new methods and ideas of teaching and learning. Chenelle came along and her curiosity and passion for working with mud led us to pursue our interest to promote mud as the most sustainable building material. Titus and his keen interest in planning led us to participate in city centric design competitions and experiment with walkability and pedestrian friendly interventions. Richa Narvekar’s passion for Goa was apparent during all our meetings and we would often find ourselves reminiscing about our ancestral home back in Canacona. With our common interest in urban issues and the need for people friendly urban spaces, we would be often found dreaming of reclaiming public spaces, clearing pavements of encroachments with interactive art, the works. We dreamed up ‘the Reclaimer’ that would be set up in an unused or dead space in the city where citizens would take over and claim ownership of it as a public space. The Reclaimer kept haunting me long after Richa had to move to Canada.
And then finally the Reclaimer metamorphosed into this beautiful portable structure and the travelling dome took shape. And this was the outcome of one of my best collaborations by far with Vishal Rawlley, his red boat and the travelling dome. The dome itself was meticulously made by the best trio of interns I’ve ever had met Patel, Aishwarya Chakor and Vaishnavi Vernekar adeptly guided by Vishal. On completion we tested it out at various locations including the beach and some of our work sites. We even experimented during one of our outings to the beach where children put it together with ease! And so we were set! Having explored different ecosystems and observed many gems of Goa’s local biodiversity, we simply wanted to share these experiences. And the Travelling dome seemed like the perfect pop up community space to share these learnings.
So we launched our first of its kind, an outdoor camp like workshop on ecology and engagement with the local community in the first week of April. And a model which is tailored to both children and adults allowing them to bond especially if the adults are parents or grandparents. Besides its focus on sensitizing children and adults to ecology or nature, what was important for us was the fact that we wanted to give back to community in a more tangible way. And having worked on community and art projects with children and local people over the years, it seemed like a positive progression to continue with the same intent. So what did we do? The first camp was conducted over 5 days as a half-day session between Monday to Friday. We had a reasonable number of signups. Our larger number of participants were the children from our community work areas who participated for free. And the exchange, bonding and learnings from the interaction and engagement of this mixed group of children was absolutely enriching.
For the first workshop, our camp site was the Carambolim lake. The forest department Wildlife and EcoTourism division leant support. We travelled with many of our little friends from Camrabhat, St Inez along with Suhani, Dhruv, Varun, Arnav, Mysha, Tarun and Aaron all studying in different schools in Panjim. Prathavya and Aarushi from Carambolim were our local participants from Carambolim. They were here to share their experiences of growing up in Carambolim and also show how the zero pollution magic toilets (dry toilet-ecoloo) in their homes are addressing the issue of water pollution in their village.
On each day we walked to different areas around and near the lake. The walk around the lake, in the fields, along the mangroves and past the sluice gates was super with darters, ibisis, egrets, swamphens, kingfishers, etc making an appearance to greet the children. Besides birds, a handsome crocodile and an otter made an appearance too! The children set up the dome, huddled under its geometric frame and jotted down their stories and memories in beautiful illustrations. They made a floating perch for birds, rowed a tin boat and swam in the backwaters like pros! They also had natural refreshments like watermelon, bananas, baked sweet potatoes, etc that didn’t generate any packaging waste and kept them hydrated in the summer heat!
They also visited the homes of the local children and became friends forever. Join us, if you too wish to connect to ecology and the local community. More so if you wish to give back to your community. The travelling dome awaits you, as it moves to our next spot, the mangroves of Panjim!
Tallulah D’Silva is a practicing architect in Goa.
