After a week of being back in the village it feels, in many respects, like we have never been away. We have been greeted affectionately by old friends and new and have of course been made to feel very welcome. The familiar surroundings make it easy to adjust to the Sri Lankan way of life and the curried diet feels nothing but normal. We marked the end of this first week with an afternoon of fun and games on the beach, joined by around forty energetic children and a few parents and youth leaders. We put our cricket and volleyball skills to the test, tired ourselves out chasing children (and being chased!), and splashed around in the Indian ocean until sundown.Unfortunately we have come back to find that numbers in the pre-school have dropped considerably and that the afterschool club that was thriving so well last year had stopped all together between February and May. In addition, integration between Tamil, Muslim and Sinhalese children has not really improved. That said, we remain hopeful that things may yet change as the new youth leaders are keen to organise a varied programme for the children and to maximise involvement. With further input from Sarvodaya, we will be working with them to support this process.We are also aiming to widen our own involvement with members of the community and have started an effort to visit as many households and families as possible – to get to know more people and to ensure that our focus is not entirely around current users of the pre-school/community building. Pelena is a sprawling village with more inhabitants than initially meets the eye and we hope to be able to meet and work with greater numbers of people. This endeavour may of course lead to consumption of copious amounts of tea as we chat with people and our Sinhala is pushed to its limits! English lessons are apparently in demand and though we are keen not to enter into such busy routine of lessons as last year, one or two refresher groups may get underway this coming week. The next five and a half weeks will no doubt pass far too quickly but we are looking forward to the challenge.