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Let’s read the story and find out why going to school was a big occasion for Chuskit.

SDG 10 reduced inequality SDG 4 quality education
Chuskit woke up early that morning. It was a very special day and she was too excited to

sleep. She eagerly looked out of the room through the window next to her bed.

It was spring time in Ladakh and the apricot trees were in full
bloom. Two magpies had already begun their
day and were busy looking for insects to eat.
Her Ama-ley was awake too. She could
1
hear her in the kitchen making
gur-gur tea .
2

Chuskit had been awake for the last hour.
This was a day she was going to remember
for a long time. Can you guess why?

No, it was not Losar, the New Year festival.
That was many months away. Nor was
it any special day in her village, like the

Gonpa festival , or a wedding day.
3
Today was going to be Chuskit’s first day
at school. At nine years, she had waited a
long, long time for this.

The school was not very far away from her
home. To get there, you had to walk up to the main road. Just
before the prayer wheel, you took the path to the left of the • Does it seem

road that ran along a narrow stream. Near the poplar trees strange to you that
you crossed the stream by jumping over the big rocks. Chuskit should be
Just a Minute!
excited about going to
Once you got to the other side, a short walk up a slope took school at the age of nine?
you to the school. All the children of Skitpo Yul, Chuskit’s • Why do you think she had
village, walked to school every day and with ease. But not never been to school?
little Chuskit. She had a disability and could not walk.

Chuskit was born with legs that did not work like everyone else’s. Her father had taken

her to the village amchi and then to the doctors in Leh. But no amount of medicine had
4
helped her walk.

1 ‘Mother’ in Ladakhi
2 butter tea that is made in a long cylindrical wooden vessel. The tea is churned with butter, salt and milk in this
vessel. A low gur-gur noise is produced during churning.
3 a Buddhist festival
4 a local doctor who has been trained in Tibetan medicine
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