The perfect first experience of India

I've want to go travelling for a good few years now and decided to start my travelling with a month volunteering in Kerala with GVI. I couldn't have made a better decision. The first day I got into India before meeting GVI I was pretty worried I'd made a mistake. I was on my own, knew no one and was completely overwhelmed by the noise, hustle and bustle and general madness all around me that was day to day Indian life!
The next day GVI took me under their wing and over the next month I completely fell in love with India and Fort Kochi, where I was volunteering, in particular. The whole experience gave me a completely different view on Indian life and culture that I wouldn't have been able to experience any other way. You get to know the locals and interact with them as if you've lived there all your life, and they genuinely except you as if you have, once you get over the language barrier!
Getting to watch the different schools football skills progress and their fitness and stamina improve week by week was a real privilege also, as well as watching the vulnerable adults become more and more willing to get involved with activities and I was extremely sad to have to say goodbye to the program. I wish I had a booked on for far longer! All in all by the time I left the program I felt I had grown as a person, become more confident in myself, helped to give back to a community that had immediately accepted and been nothing but kind to me my entire stay and was ready and extraordinarily excited to explore, see, hear and experience as much of India as I could on the rest of my trip.