INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter,
December, 2006
Karina
Puikkonen- USA - November-December 2006
Teaching
at Children's Resource Center in Nirmal Pokhari, Pokhara
The day after I arrived in Kathmandu, due to my time and
schedule, I went straight to my training village in Duhlikel with
another volunteer, Larissa. We spent four days there and were lucky
enough to be there for the end of the Tihar festival.
We went around with our friend Pashupati and his friends singing at the
houses in the village and were able to participate in the tika ceremony
as well. It was an amazing and shocking introduction to Nepali culture,
I don’t think I knew what to expect. But even by the end of four days
it was sad to go as we had become friends with the family and children.
Within a day Larissa and I were off to Tibet and trekking for the next
two and a half weeks. Asim was kind enough to help organize these trips
for us through a friend of his. And it worked out splendidly. The
scenery left me wanting to see more!
So three weeks after arriving in
Nepal I finally went to my village placement. I was happy to go where I
was needed but plans changed last minute and the day before leaving we
found out that we were going to Pokhara instead of Chitwan. We didn’t
know what to expect but were happy to go. The first experience was the
city bus from Pokhara to the top of the hill and village of Nirmal
Pokhari. We went on the evening bus and it got dark and that road is
the most extreme sport you can experience anywhere in the world. I
thought we were going to tip over and roll down the hill all the way
up! Yet we arrived safely and our host family was absolutely lovely.
The only difficulty was the language. Since this was a new placement
not many people spoke English and my three 2 hour Nepalese lessons three
weeks before wasn’t enough I found. It was difficult as the volunteers
before us were there for 6 weeks and got a grasp for it and it felt
expected that we should know the language as well. That pressure made
it very difficult for me to understand (as they spoke very quickly),
learn and speak. I developed the basics at the end of three weeks but
definitely needed more time for the language. One highlight was that
one of our Nepali sisters got married while we were there and that was
something!! It was so different from an American wedding mainly for the
fact that the bride has to be very sad and crying the whole time. The
happiest day of your life??? But many people were there and the
preparation was amazing with the decorations and food and amount of
each. It was a night wedding too so we stayed up all night.
The teaching at the school needs a
lot of work as teachers expected us to just take a class and talk
English without any structure or help from them. It was very difficult
and I spent all my time there explaining and arguing that we needed a
book and teacher for the class as we were there to assist the teachers
and not do their job. It will take time but hopefully they will begin
learning what we expect.
The children there were absolutely
little angels from heaven. They just loved the library and us
unconditionally from day one. The most enjoyable time was at the
library in the mornings and evenings. I had brought some English
teaching books and was glad I did as I used those for all my lessons the
whole three weeks. The youngest kids were brilliant in that they had
excellent memories of spelling and the name of objects. The middle
class was the most difficult as they had the least understanding. And
the oldest class was great because we could do more complex things with
them (nouns, verbs, questions, synonyms, etc) and they were able to get
a basic understanding of it. They were all eager to learn and classes
went really smoothly until the last few days and then it was all about
drawing and playing. We dedicated one hour a day to play time where
they could actually play with balls, jump ropes, board games and draw.
They loved this time and it was a great release for them at the end of
the day. I learned so much from them about appreciating the simple
things as well as Nepali “love” where actually a lot of hitting is
involved, but it was our inside joke.
My two best little buds were the
next door kids. Pradip was 12 years old and his brother Jiban was 10
years old. We played with their rubber, they read their English
homework to me at night, they made drawings for me and just took the
time to talk to us and spend time with us. I will miss them
terribly!!! All of the children were great and loved the attention that
we could give as volunteers for them.
Lea
Brorsson - England - Dec 2006
Teaching
at Children's Resource Center in Sauraha, Chitwan
Unlike many volunteers,
I was not particularly well traveled before I came to Nepal, so Katmandu
was quiet a hit in the face; the mixture of beautiful temples, hectic
local markets and cows eating off the huge piles of rubbish on the
street was a lot to take in.
I was facing a totally new culture and had so much to learn, and the
first lesson of this big adventure took place at the happy home, where
we all ate Dal’bhat with our right hand for the first time! The
following days were booked up with language classes (with Rama, with
whom we had so much fun), culture classes (where you learn the reason
WHY you will NEVER use the left hand to eat, do’s and don’ts in Nepal
etc) and also so much sightseeing with Bishal, who took us to temples
which you would only reach after 5 million stairs, but it was worth it
once you got there! I was also lucky to be invited to Rama’s lovely
family for Tihar and have never in my life had so much food! There we
had the Tikka ceremony and the day was great.
The training village,
Sanga, is only an hour away from the big city, yet so different. We were
amazed by the view of the mountains, the fields and the quiet and simple
life in the small village. We went with Rajesh, a local teacher, to
observe him teach, and everyday we went hiking up the mountains, where
we had noodles in the local pubs with the inhabitants.
The placement I was
sent to was in Sauraha, Chitwan, south of Nepal. I was surprised to bump
in to three elephants on the little road in front of my house! I became
much attached to the host family, especially because the ‘children’ were
my age. Andi, who was already there showed me around Sauraha; it is a
tropical little village in the jungle where you live amongst elephants,
crocodiles and a few tourists.
The first day of
teaching was such fun; on the way to the library and back you are
greeted by all the children shouting “morning Miss” and they were so
welcoming. In the library we played many games with the children, sang
and danced a lot and even turned the library into a little disco once or
twice. All though the Children enjoy having fun, they are also very keen
to learn; therefore when Andi left, I found that teaching alone was
absolutely fine and I sincerely enjoyed every class. I took the children
out for picnics two Saturday; we were singing, playing football,
swimming in the river and the older girls had prepared SO much food!
Apart from teaching, I
participated in women meetings and cleaning the village projects, which
not only benefits the villages, but also helps you connect with the
inhabitants and set a good example for the children. The last week, I
was invited for Dal’bhat at 5 different students’ houses which was
wonderful, and we had the maddest goodbye party ever, the library was
packed with children and balloons and I got so many flower necklaces I
looked like a Christmas tree!
The placement really
becomes what you make out of it, so get involved, go and talk to the
families, make friends, participate in activities and you will have the
best time ever! Getting back to Katmandu was freezing, but I also found
that all that madness I had experienced my first week, was no longer,
and realized how much I had learned, lived and witnessed all throughout
my time in Nepal. I leave this country as a much more experienced
person, who has been extremely lucky to teach and be part of the
wonderful community in Sauraha and I can’t wait to come back again!
Thankyou Assim and INFO Nepal for this amazing adventure!
Setting
up a new Resource Center in Nirmalpokhari, Pokhara
Ying and
KC Tang - Australia - Dec 2006
 Ying
and I were fortunate enough to be the first volunteers setting up the
library at Maidan, a village about 1 1/2 hours bus ride from Pokhara. We
lived with a host family whose house was a 5 minute walk from the
library. During our stay, we were very lucky to experience the two great
Nepali festivals of Dashain and Tihar. We met our extended family who
were wonderful and treated us like their own. There was a lot of
dancing, singing and eating, we both had a fantastic time.
Besides teaching at the library we
also taught at the nearby secondary school. At first, the students were
shy and it was daunting to walk into a classroom and expected to teach
English with 30+ faces just staring at you. However, gradually the
students got to know us better and became more participative and
enthusiastic about speaking English in class. We really enjoyed teaching
at the school, especially during lunchtime when the students would come
up to talk to us and we would have lunch together.
We both really loved our time in
the village, although it was hard at first to converse with the little
Nepali that we knew, but the people at the village were very friendly
and eager to help us. We miss all the children, friends and family, they
really made our stay unforgettable.
We would like to thank INFO Nepal
for the wonderful experience and for organizing the Nepali lessons and
time spent at the training village prior to our placement, it really
prepared us for living a village life.
INFO
Nepal on the Megazine - Entropy - Australian
This month INFO Nepal was
featured in the University of Southern Australia’s student magazine – Entropy!
Thanks go out to Esther Nimmo for sharing her INFO Nepal volunteer
experience. She came to us not knoCwing what to expect and left with a new
viewpoint on the world.
After a week in Kathmandu
to have some fun, shop, visit temples and learn about the local language and
customs, she went to Chitwan ready to begin her volunteering. Esther spent her
placement at a small library in Amarapuri teaching English to the local village
children. Silvia, an Italian volunteer, joined her for the placement and the
two became great friends. They experienced the challenges of heat without a/c,
language barriers and frequent power outages along with the joys of living with
a Nepali host family, riding elephants and knowing she made a difference in the
lives of rural Nepali children.
Now that Esther is back in
Australia she gives us the following thoughts, “I sit now, after two days back
in cozy Adelaide, at my battery powered Apple Mac in the comfort of my bedroom, kinda wishing that it was powered by electricity, and that the electricity would
fail, giving me an excuse to stop writing and leave my house to visit a nearby
hill-top to escape the heat, with my beautiful family who I left in Nepal, where
a piece of myself will live in the local buses, on the library walls and in the
hearts of the people I met forever.”
Seminar for INFO Nepal Volunteer program in UK
Marina Velez
has taken her INFO Nepal volunteer experience to the next level. After her
return to the UK, she did not forget the lessons learned here, but rather has
chosen to share them with other tourists and volunteers. Marina has developed a
thought-provoking presentation, “Understand the ‘Other’”, in which she details
the concept of ethical tourism. Through a vivid display in PowerPoint, she
demonstrates how unsuspecting travellers affect and are affected by cultural
relativism, climate change, cultural loss and local economies. Tourists do not
have an inherent right to other cultures – it is a privilege. Travellers should
always be mindful of the consequences (both direct and indirect) of their
actions in addition to making the effort to understand local customs rather than
condemn. “Ashirna wa akhabirna” Live with us and then judge us.
We applaud
her efforts to demonstrate the cultural and environmental costs behind package
holidays and supply information about new ways of travelling.
Peace Agreement for Nepal
The 8th November saw the signing of an historic peace
agreement in
Nepal with the Maoist leaders agreeing to join the ruling
alliance of political parties in a transitional government to be
formed this month. Under the terms of the agreement, Maoist
weapons will be put under UN supervision and the future of the
monarchy is to be resolved by a constituent assembly to be
elected next year.
A public holiday was called to celebrate the success of the
peace process and joyous celebrations were held throughout
Nepal. The agreement has been hailed as the start of a new
peaceful future for the country and will hopefully encourage
more people to visit this beautiful Himalayan Kingdom.
November was busy month for INFO Nepal
We had 22 volunteers in Oct and
Nov 2006 and was very busy month for every one at INFO Nepal. The Sitamai Toilet
building project went very well and at the same time making the Flower garden
and painting the Sitamai temple was really nice as it was the festival time and
a lot of people visited the temple. We are very happy to see the use of the
Toilet in Sitamai per day 50 to 80 people.
 We are very happy to see that at
least 50 to 80 people are not going to the river or in to the jungle for toilet.
I hope this is very helpful to build the toilet to keep clean our eco -tourisms
project of Sitamai.
As every year this time also we
are running an informal education class for the lower cast and landless people
who are living on the bank of the Rapti river. There are all total 30 children
who do not attend the school. Providing a lot of fun games and dolls to them we
hope that they will be inspired to join the school next session.
Happy home is going well and by
next week we will put another slap on the second flower.
Our supervision to all the
placement went very well. Volunteers were very happy to see us in their
placements. We had a good chat with our host family, School teachers, Resource
Center's Children and the Orphanage children. All of our local co-ordinator are
doing very well. Specially we would like to thanks to our Chitwan co-ordinator
Sarad Shrestha this months as he already arranged for 12 volunteers Safari
activities and their placements. The Children at Happy Home are fine and
studying hard as they are going to have their 2nd test exam soon.
We would like to thanks to our
volunteer Esther from Australiya who wrote an artical about her Volunteering
experience in the "Entropy" magazine. Our UK co-ordinator Marina has organized a
talk program about Ethical tourism and volunteering in Cambridge University.
Teaching English and
having lots of fun…with the children at the Resource Centre in Sauraha.
Andi's Experience..
November 2006 (Andrea Blair)
I can honestly say that my
experience volunteering in Nepal is one of the major highlights of my life so
far, even though before I was a little apprehensive as I didn't really know what
to expect and had never done any teaching with children before..
All of these concerns
disappeared immediately once I arrived and met these kids, they really are a joy
to be around and are so keen to learn and practice their english on you.. 
The whole INFO Nepal team
were amazing and as soon as I arrived in Kathmandu I realized that their focus
really is to prepare me for the time ahead aswell as making sure that all the
volunteers have an enjoyable time in Nepal and they certainly did that. Living
in the Happy home for the first week and having language and culture training
with Rama was not only educational but also a lot of fun. We worked hard and
played hard and Rama was an excellent teacher, so patient and understanding when
we got confused which was quite often I must add….
Asim, Namratta and Rama
went out of their way to help me with anything I needed, they even took me
shopping for a traditional Nepali Kurta Surwal and had it tailored for me..
I was placed in Sauraha in
Chitwan near the Royal National Park with another volunteer Lea that I met at
Happy Home. We are both English and became really good friends it was good to do
our placement together as we put our heads together and came up with lots of fun
things to do with the children…and it really was fun..
We made the Library
educational but also a really fun place to be and it worked because we had
swarms of children each day from the local village of Maga Toal pile into the
place for their daily dose of English Subjects, games and lots and lots of
singing and dancing.(I used to take in my Ipod and speakers)
I found that because these
children are so musical it was a great way to connect with them, we always spent
the last 10 minutes of the lesson dancing to English Dance tunes (they always
asked for "Drop the Pressure" by Mylo or they taught us Nepali Songs) The
chicken dance also became very popular in our library as we made the children
get up and do it when they got something right or won one of the many word games
we played such as hangman / bingo / pictionary etc
The children became my
best friends for that 3 weeks and they even took me sightseeing to the local
elephant breeding centre..It was really hard to leave them when my placement
finished and I have already vowed to go back and visit them again.
I also had an amazing
experience with my host family, there were 2 Girls of 21 and 25 and a boy of 18
and by the end of my time it felt like they were my sisters and brothers. The
father and mother were very lovely and looked after us, they were very well
respected in the area and we were treated as royalty.
The girls were constantly
cooking for us and it was the best Daal Baat in Nepal, one of them even taught
me to make it. Lea and I repayed the favour one night and cooked them Spaghetti
Bolognese with Garlic Bread, you should have seen their faces when we handed
them all a spoon and fork to eat it with but they gobbled it all up after a bit
of training with the cutlery..
I was also lucky enough to
be with the family at the time of one of their most important Festivals called
Tihar. I helped the girls to prepare for the Bhai Thika ceremony where all their
brothers (13 of them!! Big families in nepal) were given Thikas on their
forehead and gifts of food and drink. I was given a Thika by the oldest brother
and it was a really spiritual and beautiful ceremony followed by, yes you
guessed it lots of singing and dancing.
Overall this has been a
month out of my life that I will never forget it has made me appreciate living
in the moment and also realize that the luxuries we are so accustomed to in our
daily lives do not contribute to putting a big smile on our faces but lovely
friendly people do!! And I had a big smile on my face the whole time I was
around these amazing people in this amazing Village… Thank you Asim for
the good you are bringing to these villages and for giving me the chance
experience it first hand.
Aurelia Margot - Teaching at
Parbatipur CRC - Nov 2006
If you’re thinking about volunteering but aren’t sure… stop
thinking about it and Just Do It! My 6 weeks in Chitwan raced by and has left
me with experiences I’ll remember forever and which have shown me both the deep
and humorous side of life. I hope that it will leave me a more spiritual and
also chilled out person, now adapted to “Nepali time”! Despite hoping for a
medical placement, I ended up teaching English to about 25 students in
Parbatipur. Despite little teaching experience, the children were motivated and
were easy to engage in activities - I also took the opportunity to try and
teach creativity/ imagination, to kids used to a very regimented style of
learning. As I also have a background in Speech-Language Therapy, I was able to
initiate one-on-one sessions with some of the weaker students who were always
keen for the extra help. One of the highlights included the chance to work with
a 16 year boy, born deaf, and who had missed out on any schooling. He
communicated through vague gestures and grunts, so with the use of a small white
board we worked on using drawing as an additional method of communication with
generally quite good results and lots of laughs! Other great memories include
starting a local Ultimate Frisbee team (even if I was only ever allowed to be
the referee!), and of course my family, who were beautiful and who provided me
with a safe, and friendly environment, and lots of chiyaa (Nepali tea…mmmm… mito
chaa!) and beauty therapy treatments!
To anyone who is yet to volunteer, I would really encourage
you to
a)
Fundraise before leaving your country. I did, and was able to initiate a
clothes distribution programme to local poor families; repaint and provide water
supply to the local health clinic; buy much needed medical equipment to replace
archaic versions; and contribute to local roading projects.
b)
Bring a phrasebook – my attempts at conversations in Nepali literally
opened the door to endless offers of chiyaa from friendly locals… for who could
possibly say no to chiya??!
c)
Bring balloons…stickers…pens….etc for the kids
Thanks for everyone from INFO Nepal, and all the great
people I met along the way… it was all ramro thiyo (great)!
Thierry and Gregory – UK and
France - Teaching in Gatlang Children's Resource Center – Sept – Oct 2006
 We both had an amazing time in the remote
Langtang village of Gatlang. The host family that we stayed with was wonderful,
and really made us feel welcome in the community, helping us whenever we needed,
and serving us truly ‘mitto’ (tasty) food. We were fortunate that after
the bumpy 10 hour bus ride to Sybrubesi we were able to get a truck to most of
the way, saving us walking the 4 hours to the village. We were also joined by
our host father from Kathmandu, which made the journey even better. The INFO library in Gatlang is
currently being built, next to the school, so we were using a classroom, as
there was a National holiday for the duration of our stay. Unfortunately,
because of the holiday, it was also difficult to let the children know that the
library was starting, as we had no contact with the children in the school. The
main turnout of the children was quite young, and with the language barrier
(Tamang is their first language, and Nepali isn’t widely spoken by the children)
it was sometimes difficult to get them settled and listening.The standard of English is very
low in the village, so we were only able to teach the basic vocabulary, such as
the alphabet, colours, classroom items, commands, greetings etc.. We were also
able to help out some Lamas who were also teaching in the school during the
holiday. They were supposed to be teaching English as part of their lessons, but
it was decided that it would be better if we taught it to the children. Most of
the children in Gatlang were very well behaved and showed enthusiasm to learn,
even in their holidays. Our experience in Gatlang was
truly amazing and we hope that we were able to help the fantastic village, in
any little way we could. Once the library building is finished and a steady flow
of volunteers are able to go out and teach English in the village, we think that
the children will really benefit from the contact INFO has set-up.
Nawal Ghatas - Egypt - Teaching at Orphanage Home - October 25th – Nov. 23rd 2006
I would like to thank you all for the great time I spent in Nepal. It was really
very good experience to me. Nepal was the first country I visit in Asia and I am
sure I made the right decision. It is an amazing country, its nature is
fascinating. . It was a great time for me, I enjoyed it so much. I enjoyed the
language training and Roma was really great, also I enjoyed the village training
so much and the sightseeing there. My placement was in an orphanage in Saurah,
chitwan and it was the best! The children in Saurah were really unique; each has
his/her own different personality which I liked so much. There in the orphanage
I used to wake up at 6.00am to help them in their homework, then they go to
school and during this time I used to help in planting vegetable and flowers, it
was a nice experience. Children used to come back from school at 4.30pm and I
used to sit with them also to help in their homework. Then they used to pray at
6.00pm and dance, all are very good dancers! Then they have their dinner and
watch TV. I used to sit with them and play with them, we spent really nice time
teaching them Origami and
sodoku. Also we played by skip robe which we made it from elastic rubbers. I
used to accompany them to the church on Saturdays! Actually I was told that
the whole country pray on Saturday! I went with them their school and I taught
Computer lessons for class 5 for two days. People around the area were really
friendly; the neighbor invited me to have dinner with them in their house. The
people were really good and they told me when you come next time you stay at our
home, and they were very happy. I will never forgot this little girl “Alisha”
who was all the time making for me necklace, ring, and bracelet from flower and
come and put them on me. I used to call her “the flower girl” It was really hard
time for me to say goodbye to them. It was a sad day. The funny thing is
wherever I go people think that I am a Nepali person and talk to me in Nepali
language! And I used to say “ma Nepali hoina” but in reality it is honor to me!
I had the chance to go for Safari and the best part was playing with the
elephant in the river. I used my volunteer card in Lumbine and we were able to
visit Bhouda temple free,
also we used it in some places in Pokhra and we got discount as we are
volunteers.
I would like to thank Asim and all his team for this experience; also I would
like to thank my friend Sabina from Bakhtabor who encouraged me to come to Nepal
as a volunteer in INFO Nepal
Info Nepal keep up the good work.
God bless you all.
Wayne Guttridge - England - October
2006
This is my first visit to Asia and it will not be my last. I came for two
things, one was to climb to the Everest Base Camp and two was to volunteer for
INFO Nepal. I can safely say I have just spent a fantastic four weeks in the Chitwan area in a small village called Ganganagar. I went to Ganganagar to paint
a temple and help prepare the temple grounds for the Dashain Festival. Due to
the weather (raining a lot) I didn't get much work done, but instead spent more
time with the people of the area, which in itself was worth the trip here. The
people are poor farmers and they make do with anything they can use. Watching
and talking to these people you cannot help but respect them.
The last two weeks was Dashain and you could not help but get involved
because it was such an experience from the first day to the last. It's very hard
to put into words, how great a time I had, but as I am writing this I have
already made plans to go back to Ganganagar to see everyone before I leave
Nepal. And even though I couldn't get much work done because of the weather etc.
it will be place I will remember for the rest of my life.
INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter,
November, 2006
Happy
Tihar!
We have
some good news to start this month’s
newsletter with! The first floor on the
new Happy Home has been finished and now
work is progressing quickly on the
second floor. We are pleased that we
managed to get so much work done during
the hectic festival period that we
enjoyed celebrating with some of our new
volunteers. We had a wonderful Dashain
and Tihar here in Nepal, our new
volunteers participated in the ceremony
by adorning tikkas and becoming honorary
brothers for the Happy Home! We had
fireworks, divas and firecrackers and
the city of Kathmandu was filled with a
lights and colours during the
festivities! Our Happy Home children
went home for the Dashain and Tihar
festivals so that they could celebrate
the festivals with their own families
and within their own villages. With the
start of school looming the children
will all be back this week to begin the
new school term.
We are
also pleased to announce that the
Resource Library in Goljung now has a
Local Women's community group underway.
This has come about due to the hard work
of our volunteers Emily, Marika and
Panna, who were outraged that the
library was not being used by the
community to it's full potential. There
is now an evening language class at the
library that is run by Marika, who will
be in Goljung over the next two months,
she is supported by a local female
teacher, who also happens to be the
mother of our own little Surita, from
the Happy Home! There is also a weekly
support group, where the women are
taught and encouraged to make local
handicrafts, which we hope that they can
go on and sell. We are so pleased that
the INFO library has found another
purpose in this village and would like
to congratulate our volunteers and the
local people of Goljung for working
together and hopefully sustaining the
libraries new classes.
We have to
send a big thank you to our volunteers
KC and Ying for their hard work in
setting up our newest resource center
just outside of Pokhara. The new center
now attracts over 150 children and has
been warmly welcomed by the local school
teachers. The children have progressed
amazingly and the local teachers have
reported that the students attending the
library have gained masses of confidence
when conversing in English and are
contributing to their classes more. The
girls have worked very hard in making
this library successful and Ying has
been so happy with the whole experience
that she wants to stay in Nepal in the
same village!
Our
volunteers have also been working hard
in Ganganagar, in Chitwan, where they
have been completing building and
maintenance work with the help of the
local community there. Wayne was the
volunteer assigned the task of painting
the local temple ready for the
festivals. After this successful project
he returned to Ganganagar to assist
another volunteer, Antoine to help
build public toilets in the area. They
have reported that the new toilets are
coming along well and the work should be
completed in the next few days! Well
done to Wayne and Antoine and to the
local people of Ganganagar, for their
continued enthusiasm for INFO Nepal's
development projects.
INFO
Nepal on the Megazine The Green Parent
(Oct/Nov 2006 )
 INFO Nepal
was featured in an article in the The
Green Parent magazine this month, thanks
to an informative article by our UK
Coordinator Marina Valez. The article
outlined the benefits of volunteering
abroad with your children and taking
part in a cultural exchange that not
only expands your own experience, but
your child’s as well. Marina bought
along her daughter Almundena during her
placement this year. They both worked in
a school in Dhulikhel, where they
conducted a teacher training programme.
In the article Marina outlines the
precautions that she took when choosing
to bring a young child to Nepal. She
explains how she got Almundena excited
about coming to Nepal, by explaining a
little about the culture and telling her
that she will encounter lots of wild and
wonderful animals. Marina was able to
include Almundena in her classes and
found that the teachers were not fazed
by having a young child present. Both
were warmly received by both their host
families and the other people in the
village. Almundena was able to play with
other children and exchange her culture
with them too. Together they worked
around minor problems with toilets,
laundry and bathing under cold taps, but
it seems that this only added to the
excitement of the whole experience. We
are very grateful that Marina wanted to
share her experience with other parents
who consider taking more meaningful
family holidays, we hope that her
article inspires others to bring their
children along to volunteer with them
too!
Panna's experience of three placements.
When I
started my placement in Kathmandu two
months ago I had no idea how much I
would enjoy my time here or how many
wonderful people I would meet.
 I
began by reading up the many placements
INFO offers and this gave me a better
idea about what I wanted to do with my
time in Nepal. I found the training
period difficult, as I was not prepared
for the lack of organization and I felt that I was not
getting what I wanted from being here.
However after two challenging yet
wonderful days in Dhulikel, I was
beginning to enjoy myself. I was able to
use the Nepali that I had learnt to
interact with my host family and really
enjoyed playing games and singing songs
with my host family’s children. My first
placement was in Chitwan. My family
lived in Sauraha and the resource
library, where I would be teaching was
about a ten minute bike ride away in a
small village. This placement was
perfect for me, my host family was so
friendly and made me feel instantly
welcomed. Their three children, where
around the same age as me and we spent
many a night chatting and watching
dramatic Hindi films. I was also lucky
enough to see how they celebrated Tis,
or the Lady’s festival, where all the
girls fasted for the whole day and
danced in the baking sun. I loved that
Chitwan was so green and hot, every
morning I would get on my little pink
bike and cycle past elephants, buffalos
and the “Namaste Miss!” calls of the
children, to get to the library. I
taught in the morning and the evening to
grubby children, who were so warm, eager
and responsive that it was hard not to
be happy around them! The one thing that
stuck me was the vast gap in education
between the children that attended
private schools and those that attended
government schools. The children from
the government schools found some of the
most Basic English difficult and some
even had problems with trying to
understand how to play games. I found
that if I approached the lessons by
planning and being creative, I was able
to get more out of the classes and could
see the children were slowly learning
more. I returned to Kathmandu where I
spent the Dashain festival with some new
volunteers and Asim and his family. My
next placement was Goljung in the
Langtang region and no matter how much I
was told, nothing would prepare me for
the difference to Chitwan! Sitting on
top of the bus was the best way to get
there; we were joined by an array of
luggage that included huge sacks of
rice, grain and crates of chickens!
After a night in Sebrubesi and a three
hour climb to Goljung, we were met by a
village that was grey, dirty and the
people just stared at us with what
seemed like displeasure! “Oh dear”, I
thought, we should just turn back as
this looked like it was going to be a
difficult place to fit in. My host
family however, was really nice and made
me feel instantly welcomed. It was clear
that finding host families in this area
would be difficult as most of this
village was desperately poor and many
did not have spare rooms to offer
volunteers. The Library in this area was
build by the local people and the place
was amazing, it had traditional
decorative wooden windows and the place
had been filled with pictures by past
volunteers and students. Like Chitwan we
taught in the morning and the evening,
however the children were much cheekier
and not as well behaved. This aside once
we gained more confidence with them and
organized the classes, we found that the
kids were immensely bright and had an
amazing grasp of English in terms of
writing and pronunciation. I really
loved this village there was a huge lack
of health and sanitation, but despite
all this I met people that were clever,
loving and hardworking. All my
placements in Nepal have been humbling
and awe inspiring. The people I have met
have made this experience what it is, I
am still lucky enough to be enjoying
Nepal working with Asim and I will
definitely have to come back to see more
of the excellent work that I now know
that INFO Nepal does.
Britton’s experience of
Amarapuri Libraray -
Well, my
time here in Nepal has come to an end,
but I am wishing I could stay forever.
When I arrived in Nepal, I felt like I
was on another planet, but I feel now
like I am right where I belong, at
home. My placement
with INFO Nepal was in Amaparui, in
Chitwan area and I was placed with the Poudel family. When I arrived into the
home for the first day, I was tired,
homesick and really questioning my
journey to Nepal. Binita, who is 20 and
the host sister in my family, took one
look at me and by the dull, empty look
in my eyes, she knew. Before she even
asked my name, she took me in her arms
and hugged me, “you will never be alone,
I am here to help you with your
journey”, she said, I fell to my knees
and cried. I expected to feel lost, and
lonely, but I never expected to feel
loved. Being placed deep in the heart of
Nepal’s village community was hard, and
standing on my own two feet (still shaky
from the plane) would have been hard,
but the Poudel family was my family now,
and I had their support until I could do
it on my own. There was so many new
things that I, as a westerner couldn’t
even wrap my head around. Eating on the
floor with my hands, showering outside,
the plus 50C heat, the mass amount of
RICE I ate, and even the new toilet
ritual. Being completely immersed in the
Nepali culture was the most
extraordinary learning experience that I
have had. Every minute there was
something new to experience and a new
smile looking up at me. The children
that attended the library that I worked
at all snuggled deep in my heart. The
library was a community supported
program, and the children couldn’t get
enough of the programs that I offered.
The kids would come to my window at 5
am, (when class started at 7am), and
shout “miss, miss, time for class”, it
was hard to roll over and tell them that
they had to wait two more hours, but
sleep in the village was precious. I
spent a week of my placement being the
only volunteer from INFO, then Maura
Pate (from the USA) joined me in the
same host family. We worked together in
the library, and strongly supported each
other while volunteering. Binita, Maura
and I spent much time together, and the
three of us became the best of friends. It was very nice to experience Nepal
with Maura, as there were many times
that hugs were needed at the end of the
day.
Charby and Jenny UK –
Parbatipur Library Chitwan -
Thank you for a great
experience and an insight into Nepali
culture. We really enjoyed all aspects
of our time here, from the teaching,
Happy Home, Kathmandu and Chitwan. Even
though our stay was so short, we were
glad to help in a small way. This
experience has opened our eyes to other
important issues in the world that are
so easy to forget in the routine of your
day to day life.
If there is one thing
we’d like to see incorporated into the
program, is a broader environmental
awareness and education in schools. We
suppose that this is a great excuse to
come back!!
The library in Chitwan is
fantastic, with many students very
excited to learn. Say hello to our
second family in Parbatipur!
Foundrising Charity Party
in Ireland for INFO Nepal’s Projects:
We would like to send a
big thank you to Antje in Ireland who is
organizing a Halloween fundraiser in aid
of INFO Nepal. With the help of our
Irish coordinator Antje is hoping to
raise between €800-1000! The event will
be a festive Halloween party, aimed at
raising awareness about INFO and its
various projects. Any money raised will
be of great help and will go towards
supplies and costs in maintaining our
resource libraries as well as providing
extra funds to the orphanages that we
sponsor so that we can provide the
children with things like school
supplies and other household items that
can improve their living conditions.
Kath and Mark’s
Parbatipur Report -
I and my partner only
realised we had enough time to do some
voluntary work in Nepal a little over a
week before we arrived in Kathmandu. We
were very pleasantly surprised by how
easy it was to organise and by how
accommodating Info Nepal was.
 We had
originally opted to work in an
orphanage, but on arrival in Kathmandu
we met Kerry, a volunteer who had just
returned from her placement in Parbatipur, Chitwan. She had been
manning one of the four Info Nepal
resource Centres / Libraries in the
Chitwan area. She mentioned that the
children there were extremely keen to
get another ‘sister’ or ‘brother’, after
she had explained that this is what we
would be called by our charges, rather
than a demand for more siblings, we were
quickly persuaded that teaching English
to the children of Parbatipur was for
us. In two days time we found ourselves
on a very nice bus headed for Naranghat
hoping that we would manage to get off
at the right stop. We had spent the
previous two days being crammed full of
as much Nepali as our heads would permit
(thank you Bimala), and arming ourselves
against the hoards of mosquitoes that we
were promised. As it turned out we
hardly even saw a mosquito, but the
mosquito net came in handy keeping off
the bat poo. We were met off the bus by
Sagar (age 12) and his father Rishi, and
then whisked through the greenest paddi
fields to the village of Parbatipur,
where we met the rest of our extremely
kind and welcoming host family. The rest
of the day was spent fending off our
prospective students as we opened up the
library for the first time. There was
absolutely no need to advertise our
arrival in anyway! From then on our
lives adhered to a strict timetable of
teaching and eating. We had to two
classes in the morning before school,
and two classes after school, and
several visits from a variety of
students throughout the day. The classes
were taught by ability, ranging from the
pre-school to the fluent: all of them
were very good fun to teach. We have
many extremely fond memories of our time
in Parbatipur, the most amusing of which
come from the youngest class we taught,
the pre-schoolers. Despite the
attendance of the class only being
between three and six students, it was
definitely the most exhausting class to
teach, even with two adults. We both
learnt some very important lessons from
this group. My partner Mark: never to
have a beard long enough for little
fingers to grab. Myself: on not hearing
a small person’s name, never put you ear
close to her mouth for her to repeat it
– should you do so you may well
experience a brief period of temporary
deafness in the said ear.
INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter,
October, 2006
 One of Nepal's greatest Festivals, Dashain has just finished and we are
all back to the work after the Holidays! The New Happy home building is rapidly
coming along and we hope by the end of this year we will finish the ground
floor. The children of Happy Home are currently celebrating the festivals with
their families and relatives at their home villages. We are getting 10 to 15
volunteers each month and would like to thank our Overseas coordinators for
their immense support in helping prospective volunteers. Our Volunteer
coordinator Bicky, is still in
Holland taking in the shock of western culture and will be working hard
networking for the organization when he comes back. Our new program Experience
Real Nepal has had a popular response and we are getting a lot of enquiries
about the new programs. We are very happy to see that a lot of partner
organizations are going to work with INFO Nepal. Our new staff members; Rama,
Bimala and Pratik are doing very well at INFO Nepal and have been working very
hard. We recently set up a new Children's Resource Center in Pokhara and will be
expanding our projects in Pokhara in the future. We are getting a lot of
requests for the placements in Langtang and we are heading there in a few days
to start another
 Resource Center in Thulo Sayabru. This will mean that we have
13 Children's Resource Centers all together and will allow placements for 26
volunteers at a time! That means that 750 children can have accesss to books and
other learning material from the resource centres and volunteers can come and
share their knowledge with the children. We are continuing to expand our work
with other Orphanage homes, as we have started to sponsor all the children in five
different orphanages these are Bapittra, Humanitarian, Dipmani, Birendra Peace
home and Children and woman promotion centre. Within all of these orphanages we
have created a secure leaning environment, where we have supplied books,
furniture, carpets and other learning resources. Birendra Peace Home's children
are very happy to see Bag Racks, Book Racks and two tables where they can read and
write, all donated by INFO Nepal. We have been providing them with extra
knowledge through books, coloured pens, drawing
books, dolls and clothes. We are getting a lot of requests from Orphanage homes
for partnership with us and getting volunteers to help in their homes.
My Experience Volunteer in Nepal - C C - Canada -
Sept 2006
So after two long days of traveling, I finally arrived to the somewhat
overwhelming city of Kathmandu. With it's streets bursting with motorcycles, noise
and smoke, it was a bit of a culture shock.
 The staff at INFO were welcoming
and helped me settle into the Guest House for my first night, and then at Happy
Home for the rest of my stay in Kathmandu. Two days later, my language training
with Bicky started. It lasted about four days and took place every morning for
about two hours? Although I'd have to admit that most of what was learnt in that
classroom is now forgotten, the basics such as namaste, ramro cha, mero naam
cici ho, and henna stayed with me, as I tried to make my way around Kathmandu
just on that. It took me a while to get used to the Nepalese lifestyle, and by
that, I mean the slow pace at which everything functions, but after a couple
days, I was completely converted (which now only makes adapting back to my
student life in Canada just that much tougher) .After one week in Kathmandu I
left for Chitwan with Bishu, the medical coordinator for INFO. Since he had
some time off, he invited me to stay with his family for a couple days, an offer
to which I readily agreed. This was my first taste into traditional Nepalese
culture. I spent my days with his family, and walking around the very hot but
beautiful ground that is Chitwan. I think we might have spurred some local
gossip by going on walks together since Bishu later
informed me that it was a little uncommon for single men and women to walk alone
late at night. On the morning of July 28th, I met Jeremy, an INFO volunteer
from America, at the Chitwan bus station to go to Pokara, where we stayed for
four days, two of them hiking in the Himalayas. The scenery of Pokara is
breathtaking, although I must say, when you're trekking up, sweating and
panting all you can think about is how you're going to make the next step
up, I had to remind myself to look around and take in the view. In the end, it
was all worth it and I recommend it to all volunteers. Once you're at the top,
and you're lucky enough to have clear skies, the view in the morning is
gorgeous. Then, it was back to Chitwan, where I was introduced to my host
family. A huge thanks to them as they were amazing and are very dearly missed.
My host father worked at both a private hospital, as well as the local
government hospital: Baratpur Hospital. As one can expect, the difference
between the private polyclinic and the government hospital was substantial, as
the polyclinic resembled very much something one would see in Canada, and all
the equipments was up to date. I spent most of my time at the government
hospital, usually being there about 6 days a week, 9am to 2pm, and spent most of
my time in the emergency room, and the dressing room. Most of the doctors
there were very friendly and had a good grasp of English, as many of them did
their medical education abroad. They will gladly show you a skill if you
ask them, or explain different cases for you. However, one must remember that the emergencies
here and their response to them aren't like the ones back home, but regardless,
doctors still manage to provide adequate care for their patients. For the next
four weeks, I left in the morning with my host father to go to hospital, and was
back home by 2pm, where on some days, I would venture into Naraguar, for some
shopping and a break from the staple dhal bhaat. Finally, I ended my time in Nepal
with a trip to Lumbini, the birthplace of Bhuddha. I am by no means religious,
but couldn't help but feel a certain sense of spirituality there. The
grounds are beautiful and the peacefulness of the place provided a very much
needed break from the overwhelming noise of Kathmandu. All in all, I had a
wonderful time in Nepal and definitely would love to come back in the near
future. Thank you to all of you that have made my stay so unforgettable.
Volunteering at Orphanage home - Linda Velders and Ron
Bakker, Holland - Sept 2006
We arrived on the 5th
of September and had planned to do volunteer work in October. But because of the
weather circumstances we decided to start our training program earlier. INFO
NEPAL is very flexible in these matters, something we really appreciated. We had
a nice and relaxed stay at Happy Home with Asim his family and the children. We
really felt welcome and at ease.
After the 5 training days
we were placed at the Pabritra Orphanage in Jorphati district (Kathmandu
Valley). The first two days we had to acclimatize to the circumstances of this
placement and the amount of children (total 45 aging 5 to 13) staying there.
Some children spoke some English, but many didn’t including the people working
there. So we did our best to use our newly learned Nepalese language. The
placement was quite primitive, meaning it has only 3 sleeping rooms, 1 volunteer
room, 1 toilet and shower. There was no real kitchen, only a fire stove outside.
Our days started at 6 am
and then we helped some children taking a shower and treating them with scabies
lotion and medication. The scabies lotion we got from the Sherzen Clinic, where
we went with 2 children, who had severe skin problems. This clinic doesn’t
charge any costs.
After this showering we
helped the children with their homework and did some games and playing. At 9 am
they had their breakfast, daal bhat, and were happy to brush their teeth. We had
bought toothpaste, because there wasn’t any supplied. Most of the children have
very bad teeth. Therefore we went to the dentist to get a free check up of the
children with the worst problems. Fixing their teeth would take some days and
would be expensive. Because of the festival we couldn’t finish this project.
This we informed Asim. Then we joined them at
school. Half of the children went to the RIMS school and the other half to the
Eyelens school. We visited the last one a couple of times and participated in
some lessons. We talked about the differences in culture between Holland and
Nepal. The children were very surprised and interested about many aspects…like
eating cow. We had nice contact with the principle, who had some worries on his
mind about the orphanage. Especially about the hygiene situation and the great
amount of children, which had already halved. A few months ago there were 103 of
them. He also expressed second thoughts about the not educated management
leading this orphanage.
We shared his worries and
also had doubts about the managing of some important things, like the lack of
variety in food, meaning no fruit, milk and meat in their diet. They also only
showered on Friday. We tried to change this aspect and did our best to put
energy in maintaining brushing, showering and bringing fruit. The big problem
will be that this probably won’t be continued when we’re gone. When the children
came back from school we helped them with their homework and did some games like
bowling, we had bought for them. We had really nice contact with the children
and this became more intimate after a while. This was the nicest part of it for
us. We did have a wonderful time and experience in this orphanage. But there
still is a lot to be done and therefore we often felt some regret that we were
not able to do more in a short period of time.
Two weeks adventure and volunteering
in Nepal - Mun Singh - Malesiya - Sept 2006
It's a good thing the Info Nepal programme included Nepali
language, culture and village training because that really helped with the
culture shock that came my way for the next 2 weeks.Had it easy in Kathmandu the first couple of days, just doing touristy stuff and
being shown around Kathmandu by the lovely team at Info Nepal.
The culture shock came during the village training. I was placed with a Nepali
host family in Sanga for 3 days. Sanga was beautiful. It's about 1.5 hours away
from Kathmandu and was located in a hilly area. We had to hike for about half an
hour to get to my host family's home. Let me describe the house. It's a 2.5
storey mud house with the kitchen come dining/living room on the ground floor
and the bedrooms on the first floor. They kept the chickens in the attic. The
toilet was
located outside the house. It's a squat toilet which pretty much just goes down
into a hole in the ground. No flush obviously. You'd have to use water and a
torch which was very necessary for going to the toilet at night. The so called
"shower" was really just a tap in the open air. That's where I had my most
memorable shower ever, with family members walking up and down while I was
showering. My "little sister" Dipap was literally just staring. Bottom line is,
privacy just doesn't happen in this country. Found out later how important a "lunghi"
(Nepalese sarong) was for showering. Having said all that, my host family was
absolutely wonderful and treated me like part of the family. The scenery in
Sanga was also breathtaking, with terraced hills of lush green contrasting with
the deep blue of the skies.
My next placement was at the children's orphanage in Chitwan. Took a 6-hour bus
journey to Chitwan, then on to the village of Sauraha where the orphanage was.
It was really hot out in Chitwan. Chitwan was located in the Terai region, the
flatlands. This area was renowned for its safaris and national parks, especially
the Royal Chitwan National Park. Quite a famous tourist destination.
Highlights of my stay in Sauraha…
They Call Me Miss – They have a really nice set up at the orphanage. There was a
kitchen, a dining/classroom/bicycle shed, a boys' dorm, a girls' dorm, an office
and a room for volunteers. There were 14 children altogether – 8 boys and 6
girls. All of them called me 'Miss'. "Miss, look here". "Miss, come here".
"Miss, I like your hair"…..
Back to School – The children were sitting for their exams so I helped them with
their revision. They were sitting for their Optional Math exam, so I really had
to jog my memory, trying to remember formulas for matrices, sine, cosine and
tangent. Hardcore!
The Best Butt Workout – The Nepalese were celebrating the Dashain festival so
the children and I went to Narayanghat to buy new clothes for the children.
Narayanghat was approximately 20km from Sauraha. Imagine cycling that distance.
The journey there took 2.5 hours of cycling, including down time (stopping to
fix tyre punctures). When we eventually got to Narayanghat, my butt felt numb!
It was so tiring! The journey back was worse as it rained. We were all
completely
drenched and shivering from the cold but still kept cycling on. The rain here
goes on forever and we had to return before it got dark. By the time we got
home, we were tired, hungry, thirsty and cold.
150 Momos – I gave the children a treat. Bought chicken, flour and vegetables to
make chicken momo. We had a great time making momos together the whole
afternoon. Even the boys helped. It is not every day that the children get meat.
Most of the time, it is just rice with dhal. They waste nothing here. The bones
from the chicken were saved to make soup and the leftover dough was made into 'roti'.
We made so many momos, that I stuffed myself silly. There was even leftover momo
for supper.
Hunting Rhinos and Chasing Sunsets – Took Prakash on the elephant ride. Our
elephant's name was Madrakali and the elephant driver was Mahbub. Madrakali was
a very obedient elephant and Mahbub was the best elephant driver around. Wow, it
sure was a bumpy ride. I had bruises all over from the ride. The elephant took
us deep into the jungle to look at animals. Everyone got excited because we saw
some rhinos. Also saw some peacocks and other birds. No tigers, though. They're
supposed to be rare. After the ride, we rushed to see the sunset by the river.
Simply beautiful.
The Slideshow – Prepared a little surprise for Aamaa and the children. Showed
them a slideshow of all the photos I'd taken on my Nepal trip thus far, from my
arrival in Kathmandu to my stays in Sanga and Chitwan. They couldn't have looked
happier. Aamaa kept thanking me. You see, other than their village and nearby
towns, they haven't been to pretty much anywhere else, not even to Kathmandu. So
they were seeing all the different places in their country through my eyes. I
felt really touched that a simple act like that could bring them so much
happiness.
The Unexpected Elephant Ride & The Elephant Bath – There was an elephant house
right outside our home. Saw Mahbub and Madrakali the elephant one morning.
Mahbub waved to me and asked me to go over. Then he got Madrakali to stop, kneel
down and signalled for me to hop on. So I ran over, climbed onto Madrakali and
it was on its way once again to breakfast – to get some hay. It was so fun
riding on the elephant without the big saddle. After about 15 minutes, Mahbub
dropped me off and I walked home. On my way home, I saw a vegetable stall and
bought some cauliflower for Aamaa to cook for lunch. While riding on the
elephant, Mahbub invited me and the kids to go for the elephant bath session. I
told him we didn't have the money and he said we could go for free!
The Info Nepal programme has been a great way to experience a whole new culture
while volunteering. The past 2 weeks have really been an eye-opener for me and
helped put a lot of things into perspective. Other than the financial aspect, if
you can spare your time, that's an even more precious gift to these less
fortunate children.
INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter,
September, 2006
We are very happy to see that the Happy
Home children are doing excellently in school.
 As
always Dolma , Naresh and Samjhana have come top of the class and Tenging is
progressing rapidly. Similarly Sarita and Mingma both got good marks in there
exams. Rani still needs a lot of study as she is still having difficulties with
English medium study.
Newly arrived children Mahesh and Mina,
brother and sister, are adapting well to life at Happy Home. Mahesh is shy and a
bit like a son for Mina. The new girl Sangam has settled in very quickly into
Happy Home and is very happy to be with so many friends.
Excellent news, our very own INFO Nepal co-ordinator
Bicky has been invited to the Netherlands by our volunteer Twin. He is there
now, taking part in a cultural exchange program and European studies trip.
He will be experiencing a European lifestyle for a couple of months, which will
be of great benefit to our organization and our volunteers in broadening our
knowledge and understanding of the differences between our cultures.  We
want to say a big thank you to Twin for giving Bicky this opportunity and
putting up with him for a few months!
A lot of things are going on at our network
of Orphanage homes. Yes, one very positive thing is they are now on the right
track of how an Orphanage home should be run. We are very happy to inform that
Birendra Peace Home’s children now have a new house. Thanks a lot to Lisa for
fundraising for these children. A big thanks goes to Jeya who was helping to
shift the contents between the two buildings and giving his time for the
children. From April 2007 our volunteer, Margaret, is going to sponsor all of
these children at Birendra Peace Home. The new Happy Home building is
going very slowly because a lot of festivals are going around at this time. We
at INFO Nepal want to thank our volunteer Anne for the lap top, it is a
huge help to the office, especially in critical times when our other computers
crash!
My Experience
with INFO NEPAL - Anne - UK - August 2006
My name is Anne Aston and I am 63
years old. I was interested in volunteering after visiting The Gambia in
the early nineties when I visited an orphanage and a very poor school,
there, and in Kenya. Then I told myself one day I would do some
volunteering work, and that time is now. I did some fund raising in
my home country England, I organized an Indian meal in my local area and
did a raffle, close friends and family helped me to raise a large sum
of money to spend on the very poor orphanages here in Kathmandu. I have
been out and ordered, and delivered bunk beds together with mattresses
and pillows. I went with Asim, who runs Info Nepal, and had wood
burning stoves made and delivered to 2 other orphanages, four in all.
I have visited many orphanages and cannot help but be moved by the
poverty in this country, however the children are so grateful for any help at
all.
Some of the children actually said thank you for the burners, to me that
says it all, but for all that these children have not got they are so happy.
All the children I have met are so keen to learn and go to school. They realize how important this is for their future. If anybody
reading this thinks they can do anything to help there are so many
children who need to be sponsored please get in touch, if you think you
can help in any way by sending books educational equipment, clothes,
toothbrushes, medical equipment, cleaning materials, anything we take
for granted in our lives, it is very hard to obtain here for these children.
All the children I have been privileged to meet have been so happy in
everything they do.
Well today, unfortunately, is my last day in Nepal
and I would like to thank Asim and Namratta and all the lovely children at
Happy Home, and not forgetting all the volunteers I have had the
privilege to meet. It has been a truly memorable adventure, something that
no amount of money can buy. I would like to say on behalf of INFO-Nepal and all the children that I have managed to help in a
 very
small way, to all my family and friends in England who supported me and gave
generously to INFO's appeal, and especially a big thank you to Annette, for
her generous donation of 500 pounds. We bought a new computer because the
old one broke down and INFO cannot survive without a Computer.
I have had some wonderful days and
some bad days but Nepal has also won through, I will be sad to leave but
feel sure I will be back sooner rather than later. I have made so many new friends on this
wonderful journey. If I can do this at 63 believe me anybody can
it, at
any age. I have visited Sanga, stayed with a host family
and had Nepali
lessons. My host family was lovely and Sanga was beautiful. From Nepal I
have traveled to Goa/Bombay/Delhi then I have traveled to Chitwan, and
went to a village where a girl called Zita has a talent for dressmaking,
so I bought her a sewing machine and all the equipment for her to start
her own dressmaking business. Her face I will never forget, I let her
choose her own Sewing Machine. Then from there I traveled to Pokara
which was once again very beautiful. Nepal is a very beautiful Country. I
also managed to see Mount Everest on a internal flight. Where else
could you do all this from one base but Nepal.
Volunteer in Nepal - Final
Report - Clare Apps (England) & Kate Trebuss (Canada) - INFO Nepal Volunteers -
Aug - 2006
 We woke up in the town of
Syabrubensi (the main ‘hub’ of the Langtang region and pretty much as close to
the middle of nowhere as you can get) the morning after a 9 hour journey into
the mountains and handed our massive packs over to two very slight looking
porters – who then began arguing over who would carry the only marginally
lighter of the two massive bags. Three hours later – out of breath and amazed
that we had somehow scaled a 90 degree cliff face and lived to tell the tale
(after months of next to no exercise) – we arrived at our host family’s home in
Goljung and settled ourselves in our spacious attic room. We had yet to meet
our less-than-friendly roommates – 3 very healthy looking rats and a large army
of rather hungry bedbugs…We soon met all the members of
our host family living in Goljung (three of their four children go to boarding
school in Lumbini): Host Mum, Host Father (Singi) and the angriest toddler ever
to crawl across the face of the earth (his screams of
“aaaaaaaaaaaaamaaaaaaaaaaaaaa” would become a regular feature of our daily
routine in no time…), Pemba. The next day we wandered through
the village gathering children like the Pied Piper with the help of our trusty
bubble wands. We led the children to the front of the library to explain that
we would be there to open it the next day, but the children seemed only to care
about the sudsy bubbles before them as they practically body-checked each other
to pop them. This was the first of many crazy encounters with the children of Goljung! For three weeks we ran the
library each morning before the children had school and each afternoon after
they had finished for the day. Though we struggled to maintain any semblance of
order or continuity in the library, we did feel glad that we were able to offer
a welcome opportunity for play to these children; most of them spend all day in
the fields or watching over smaller siblings. Each day our library was a crazy
zoo that rang with the screams of “MISS MISS KALAM KALAM” and mucky feet tearing
round the room at high speeds. The kids were OBSESSED with Ludo, one of only a
handful of games in the library, and Kate managed to construct a chess board and
pieces, which also intrigued many of the older boys for long stretches of time.
We tried to divide our days into two parts - lessons in the morning and games,
books, and general madness in the afternoon – but this gradually degenerated
into full-fledged, constant madness by the end of the second week. It took a bit of time, but we
eventually got used to rising and going to bed with the sun; this was made
easier by the significant lack of any nightlife of any kind in our sleepy little
village (though we could have made it exciting enough with the amount of “raksi”
we were continuously being offered). Besides, the early morning views were well
worth getting up for! We also became quite comfortable and happy with our host
family (though three weeks of rice, potatoes, and chili were a bit of a
challenge to the digestive system, as were three weeks of “tea” i.e. hot water
filled with giant spoonfuls of sugar)
.One weekend our host father even
took us on a mini trekking expedition to a hot spring in the mountains called
Tatopani (literally “hot water” in Nepali), which was a welcome break from life
in Goljung! We also left our placement a few days early to attend a festival at
Gosaikunda with our host family and pretty much the entire village. It was
amazing to see all the women of the village decked out in their most elegant
finery with their hair painstakingly arranged for this two day trek, while we
two looked like sweaty, grubby hillwalkers!! Though we didn’t make it to the
festival (we were worried about altitude sickness: a real possibility given we’d
be climbing about 2500 vertical metres to an altitude of 4300 m in a single day)
we had a marvelous time with the villagers on their first night away when we
danced, ate, drank and sang in a circle outside the gumba where they were
spending the night. We ended our time in Langtang
with a week’s trek, guided by the father of another host family in the Langtang
region, who is pretty much the sweetest Nepali alive, which made the trek
totally awesome every step of the way, despite illness, cold, and clouds. Perhaps the fates didn’t want us
to leave Goljung or the Langtang region when our date of departure arrived,
because the night before we were scheduled to leave we were informed that we
were virtually stranded in this remote area because of massive landslides, which
had wiped out the only road in many places. We formed many a plan, but all
seemed to get us nowhere until the bus unexpectedly rolled into town at 10 pm,
ready for its early morning departure.
The next morning we boarded this bus
along with half of Langtang (one quarter on the roof, one quarter inside),
several live chickens being used as cushy seats and multiple large sacks of
random produce. We drove for about three hours to the end of the line where we
got out for a four hour trek to the town where the next bus was waiting.
Luckily there were boys hanging about, eager to carry our bags for a bit of
extra cash or we never would have survived the journey! We arrived in time even for dal
bhat, only to discover that our seats inside the bus had been double sold; so,
we volunteered to ride the rest of the way back to Kathmandu Nepali-style – on
the roof! We squashed onboard with a massive youth singing group and held on
for dear life as our bodies were hurled about and bruised to new extremes on the
metal bars making up the "floor" of the roof rack. Watching the sun set over
the Himalayas from atop a bus winding its way through the mountains, surrounded
by Nepali people was truly one of the most memorable moments of our trip.It was overwhelming to return to
civilization; Kathmandu’s lights, noise, and vehicles were much more than we had
grown accustomed to in the hills of Langtang, but we thoroughly enjoyed a good
slap-up meal when we rolled into town and could hardly wait to check our email
after a month away from the joys of the internet!
Overall, the whole experience
was a rollercoaster of ups and downs. We found life in Goljung extremely
challenging, on many days extremely frustrating, but we were very proud to get
through it and to have had the opportunity to get so close to a Nepali family,
whose members were kind enough to take us in and care for us for almost a
month’s time. We can hardly believe we’ve had this incredible, unique
experience, but we are so thankful to have been granted this one-up opportunity
to live life as Nepalis do. We’ll never be able to put it in words and we’ll
certainly never forget it
My
time in a little Library- Kerry - UK - August 2006
My
visit to Nepal started with an a day to sleep off the jetlag and get my
bearings in Kathmandu, then I moved to the Happy Home orphanage to start the
training with another volunteer. Here we met Krishna, who for the next 5
days would teach us Nepali and help us prepare for our stay in many other
ways.
Two
days later we took the bus to Sanga village for the second half of the
training. Several breath stops later we made it the top of the hill and
found something very different to Kathmandu. The house I stayed in was
fairly rustic, which wasn’t a bad thing as it helped me think what my
priorities were for my placement. The family were friendly and made a big
effort to help me feel at home. The highlight of the stay here had to be the
shower with a view: the village tap overlooked the entire valley! So at
the end of the first week I set off to Chitwan for my placement – not quite
where I’d first intended to be as I’d heard about the heat, mosquitos and
leeches, but I was prepared for the worst…
My
host family were really welcoming and the 12 year-old son had soon told me
everything I needed to know about running the library where I was going to
be teaching for the next 5 weeks. It hadn’t been used for 4 months so the
first day was spent cleaning, with a couple of helpers who were keen to find
out when they could start their classes.
After
a couple of days I had 3 groups a day, divided by ability, for an hour each.
As some very young children were trying to come to these classes we set up a
new group for them. Having seven 3-5 year olds searching around the room for
letters and pretending to be animals was a lot of fun, if now always the
most orderly of lessons! The children in all the classes were great, and a
few rules like deducting points for speaking Nepali kept the older groups
more or less under control.
So
what about the heat and the mosquitos? Well, I shared my room with an
interesting mixture of creatures so was glad I’d taken my mosquito net, as I
felt quite safe tucked beneath it. Chitwan was hotter than I’d even imagined
(one day I took a Tolerance out of my bag to find a tube of liquid!) but I
had chosen the hottest month to go there. I did get used to the heat a
little, didn’t find a single leech and even the mosquitoes seemed to lose
interest after a while. I really loved living in the village, had a nice
clean place to stay and a great host family.
Although I wasn’t in the mountains I’d first imagined when I decided to come
to Nepal, the rice fields with rows of people in them are still beautiful.
It was a fantastic experience and I wouldn’t have missed the sunset and
elephant bath in Sauraha for anything! I would recommend it to anyone who
has a few weeks or months to spare – it really gave me the opportunity to
see a side of Nepal I would have totally missed otherwise.
Three
Placements in Three Months with INFO Nepal- My volunteer Experience -
Jasper - Holland - August 2006
I visited Nepal and Sikkim in the
end of 2004 with a friend and during 1 of our walks through the
countryside I told him I think it'd be awesome to spend some time in a
small village and live with the locals. Now, in 2006 I had the
opportunity to do just that and I took it!
I arrived from Holland on the 14th of may and started my language
classes on the 15th which lasted for a week. During that week I spent 4
days in Sanga with my first home family! They were nice people though I
didn't have a lot of contact with them. Since I was there all alone I
decided to go hiking in the nearby mountains. A good idea and I had some
incredible views! Mind the leeches though!
After the language training I went to Chitwan for 3 days of safari! It
turned out that 2 of those 3 days were traveling but the one day that we
had for safari was good. Especially the elephant bathing part and riding
on the back of an elephant. Nice!
Then the time arrived for my first placement, which was far away in
distant Syabrubensi in Langtang. This is the mountainous region north of
Kathmandu. Well, not at all that distant but it took the bus 11 hours to
get there anyway…The bus ride was one of the most frightening I'd ever
had! Especially the last or so hour, going down in zig-zags! It seemed
the bus wanted to tumble down in every bend, but fortunately it never
did…The host family (Ghurmi and Yangzen) there was superb! I loved being
with them and spending time with them…The library where I was supposed
to work was a little under-visited (not at all that many children) but
the time I had there was good. Spending time with the locals and the
host-family and exploring the beautiful surroundings was the best part
for me however…I had some great walks in the hills surrounding us, from
time to time accompanied by Ghurmi. One of those trips took us to
Yangzen's parents' house. Her father had fallen ill and that evening a
real shaman was trying to cure him, making small puppets from rice and
blessing those. I watched the whole ritual, not knowing at the time it
would take about 3-4 hours altogether. A great experience
nonetheless…After four weeks I wanted to move on and go somewhere else
though…Experiencing different host-families and experience different
people in different regions is what attracted me most!
After relaxing in Kathmandu for a
few days (spaghetti again!) I went to my next placement in Chitwan, near
the National Park. I went to a village called Ganganagar (and could even
pronounce that after a week!), where Asim supposedly grew up. My job
this time was not to teach but to garden and clean up the library. I
wanted to do something more fysical and so I did! After some time a
second volunteer (Liam) came there and we worked together which was
great! We re-organized the garden (cutting grass however was next to
impossible even though it looked much better for some days. It just
grows too fast in the monsoon!) and really cleaned up the library which
was in terrible shape when we first got there. The monsoon and sun made
it next to impossible to work from time to time. When the sun was out it
was way too hot and when it was raining, well, it was just too w et! We
had to work while the sun was behind the clouds (it was still rather hot
at those times as well, but what can you do…). And of course it was (for
me) great to see how people in Chitwan lived (which was, obviously,
different from the people in Langtang. They had a whole different
attitude. I'm not sure this is a regional or religious or whatever
difference though….) and worked. Suddenly there were vast areas of rice
and corn which needed to be planted and harvested (respectively). I was
happy to help them harvest and clean the corn and later on even planted
some rice (something everybody should do at least once in their lives)!
Hard work! The food was more bland though…A lot of dal bhat and really
kinda bland. I sometimes still felt a little hungry but refused to eat
more because I'd had enough dal bhat already! Fortunately, my
co-volunteer Liam and I could go to Narayangat (the 'Big City') in
weekends and eat something different…After 3 weeks, this came to an end
as well and I went back again to Kathmandu (well, but not before
visiting Lumbini (the birthplace of the Buddha!) first...).
At this time I still had 2 weeks of volunteering left. I could either go
to Pokhara or stay in Kathmandu. I decided on the latter because I'd be
going to Pokhara later on with my girlfriend. I went to a school called
'Buddha Prakash' near Bouddhanath. The host father picked me up 1.5
hours too late so we weren't off to a good start. It turned out that he
and his wife were very nice people anyway and the even had a kitchen
with cook (and 2 assistants) and I could walk in there whenever I liked!
The school was of course close to Bouddhanath as well (my favorite place
in Kathmandu) so I spent some time there as well. It turned out the
classes where very interesting and students were interested as well! We
talked about many things, but the most prominent things were Holland (my
own country) and Nepal (well, their own country). After a week though I
was getting a little tired of it all and went back to Central Kathmandu
to relax…
Overall, I had a very good time though sometimes it was a little boring
because there was not a lot to do, but overall I had a very good time! I
especially liked my contact with the host family and enjoyed to see
their way of living (which is rather different from the way we live in
Holland). Though I'm not too sure Krishna (my language teacher) would be
too proud of my Nepali now…Fortunately, many Nepali speak English.
Thanks Info for this opportunity!
My
home in Jankauli, Chitwan - Volunteering at INFO Nepal's Children's
Resource Center - Emily - UK - August 2006
For two months I have been 'Emily
Miss' in an incredible Tharu village 20 minutes walk from my host family
in Sauraha. My daily routine was get up early enough to clean oneself,
and any clothes that had been on the floor for too long, under the pump
in the backyard under the watchful eyes of the family cow and a small
collection of goats, chickens and ducks. Breakfast was the Nepali
staple minus the bhaat, instead we had chapatti or if we were lucky the
biggest mound of Choudhray special fried rice imaginable. Brolly in
hand, along with a few liters of water, to replenish what gets sweated
out, we would pick our way through cow and elephant poo and muddy
puddles trying not to flick our flip flops and dirty our nice clean
clothes.
25 minutes into our journey, which takes us passed a military camp and
where they never appeared to be doing anything but playing volleyball,
we would be greeted (every morning) with a chorus of "hello Miss", "good
morning Miss" all the way to the Aamaa's house (the President of the
Pragati Women's group whom we [INFO] collaborat ed with to make use of
the library, (we never knew her name) to collect the key for the
library. Aamaa's house was always a bustling hive of activity and we
usually were set upon by more kids and sometimes even fathers delayed us
wanting to practice their English! Nepali language training for 2
weeks and everyone wants to speak English! So the greetings get more
frequent as we approach the library and we have acquired a following of
bright eyed and bushy tailed, (every morning!) gorgeous kids.
Flip flops off, shutters opened,
fans on. At 10 o'clock Anna Miss takes the first lesson of the day –
the day care kids, the youngest, noisiest and naughtiest group. About
45 minutes of excitement and shouting, by the teacher! and its my turn.
I have the second group of first grade children. A pretty naughty
bunch but fantastic at drawing animals, we sit on the floor for a story
and I get flattened by them all wanting to sit on top of me. So the
daily shower is almost totally unnecessary as by 11 o'clock you've been
covered in grubby, yet utterly adorable children.
Anna's up next, my partner in crime from New York State, with her grade
two and three class, my four class follows and by 3.30 we have both
taught about 60 kids between us, more to come though.
Apart from the teaching we are constantly yelling at the kids, who are
not being taught, to go away from the windows or bribing them with
tennis balls to go away and play together (a notion Nepali's do not
understand – the concept of sharing!). We thought the novelty would
wear off but after two months the same endless window battles took place
everyday. The older students were divided into 5,6,7 class and I had
8,9,10 class at 5 o'clock. Lots of verbs and grammar were of
particular interest to my last class along with talk of weddings and
marriage, dancing and singing and how in England we all want to marry
doctors as they make the most money, unlike Nepali doctors apparently.
Our collective 130ish students have all become one big village family,
but only after we managed to remember their names! (Emily and Anna were
too difficult for some of them though as even after Anna left I was
still be referred to as 'Anna, hmm,no Emily Miss')
Jankauli became our home, not Sauraha where we actually lived, and the
last class would continue to the wee small hours if we didn't have to be
home for dhal bhaat. Saying that our host family were also Tharu and I
started to dream about her cooking, especially her dhal!
The kids appeared everyday and if someone was missing we would
eventually find out that they had gone to help in the fields or maybe to
play in a football match in the next town.
In-between my classes and lesson plans, I would be given Nepali dancing
and singing lessons from the kids, the best Nepali chiya and biscuits or
maybe even noodles we donated by the women and much laughing, smiling
and playing was had to distract the rest of the village away from Anna's
class.
Once a week we would teach the women English, by their own request and
we would have a fantastic hour introducing ourselves and meeting each
other amidst girly giggling and hand shaking.
5 days were formal classes and Sundays became 'play-day', a whole day
where Anna and I were allowed to wear trousers to school so we could
play football and roll around with the kids without flashing white
leg.
I won't attempt or even try to describe how I feel as a member of that
community. I was truly a part of something incredible and I am
heartbroken to be leaving but what we have achieved is momentous and
their amazingly contented spirits will never leave me. I was
transformed, literally, into a Nepali woman by my kids and their
families. One night after school we had our noses pierced behind
the library on the steps of the chaarpi! Yet another
spectacle we made of ourselves. Wedding invitations; massive rice
consumption on behalf of over zealous, force-feeding local women; roxy
intoxication and thereafter Nepali dancing; bathing and washing clothes
in a leech infested river; all aided our integration into the culture,
but most of all being surrounded and in contact with so many incredible
and happy children makes the constant brow wiping and being the evening
meal for mosquitoes thoroughly, thoroughly worth it.
Volunteer in
Nepal - Amarapuri Children's Resource
Center - Silvia and Ester - Italy and UK
- August 2006 .
Esther Nimmo
:
kittykahn@hotmail.com
Soon
after meeting in Happy Home at the end
of July, Silvia (from Italy) and I
(Esther from Australia) met and became
good friends.
After a few days rest and exploration in
Kathmandu, Silvia, Liam-(a Canadian
volunteer) and I began our Nepali
language training. Thanks to Bicky's
teaching skills, we learnt how to say
namaste, dhanayabat, swagatam and all
the other essential words and phrases we
were likely to require once immersed in
village life. While completing our
language training in Sanga village,
Silvia and I organized to do our
placement in the same village. Asim
recommended that we travel to the
village Amarapuri in the Nawalparasi
district to teach English in a
library. Although we were placed in
separate host families, we were both
located very near to the library and
only ten minutes walk from each other
which allowed us to bond with our
families individually whilst also having
the support of each other. Silvia stayed
with the family of a Nepali girl (Binita)
who had previously worked as a teacher
at the library but was on holiday during
our visit. I stayed with a really nice
family who had been housing volunteers
since 2002, therefore were comfortable
with my requests to use a spoon to eat
my dal bhat rather than my hands.
The
library in Amarapuri has been operating
for some time, therefore there were
already a number of students familiar
with the place and with volunteers. On
our first day, after settling in with
our families, Silvia and I familiarised
ourselves with the library, were
introduced to some of the local children
and to Sadikshya, Samikshya, Pratikshya
and Subash, a family who lived next door
and whose help in translating Nepali was
indispensable to us during our
placement. We held our first class for
junior students (aged between 4 and 8)
the following morning from 7am to 8am. 
After having taught kids of the same age
in Japan I initially took more
responsibility teaching the younger
students. We soon realized that one
junior class would not be enough for the
amount of students that were turning up
to the library in the morning so we
created a second class from 8a, to
9am. In the morning class we relied
predominantly on the use of ABC, colour
and number flashcards, songs and games.
In the afternoon we also held two
classes. Between 4:30pm and 5:30pm we
taught about 10 kids aged between 8 and
12. This was the medium class and
probably our most challenging but also
the most fun. While they would have
been happy to play bingo and go for
walks during the lessons, we tried to
combine some fun and games with some
English grammar worksheets, which after
some encouragement they completed
enthusiastically. Our senior class
held between 5:30pm and 6:30pm, was made
up of about 8 guys and girls. After
having learnt English as a second
language, Silvia felt confident in
reviewing English grammar with the
senior class while I assisted with games
as well as with some creative and
article writing.
In the
break between lessons, Silvia and I
spent our time planning lessons, making
photo-copies at the local stationary
shop and drinking tea. We went on
walks around the village and took the
kids on a few excursions to a zoo and
the nearby Nareni River. When we
weren't sweating from the hot weather we
were clustering under umbrellas to
escape the bursts of monsoonal rain, and
despite the discomfort, this only added
to our experience of village life.
Amarapuri is located only 45 minutes on
the local bus from Narayanghar, a town
with internet facilities, western food
and a larger variety of supplies than
was available in the village. As
Saturday is a holiday in Nepal we often
traveled there to stock up on mosquito
repellant and chocolate.
Besides
traveling to Narayanghar we also visited
Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha and
Pokhara for five days trekking through
the Annapurna region. Both places were
exceptionally beautiful and added even
more to our amazing experience
volunteering in Nepal.
Three Placements
in Three Months with INFO Nepal- My
volunteer Experience - Jashper - Holland
- August 2006
I
visited Nepal and Sikkim in the end of
2004 with a friend and during 1 of our
walks through the countryside I told him
I think it'd be awesome to spend some
time in a small village and live with
the locals. Now, in 2006 I had the
opportunity to do just that and I took
it!
I
arrived from Holland on the 14th of may
and started my language classes on the
15th which lasted for a week. During
that week I spent 4 days in Sanga with
my first home family! They were nice
people though I didn't have a lot of
contact with them. Since I was there all
alone I decided to go hiking in the
nearby mountains. A good idea and I had
some incredible views! Mind the leeches
though!
After
the language training I went to Chitwan
for 3 days of safari! It turned out that
2 of those 3 days were traveling but the
one day that we had for safari was good.
Especially the elephant bathing part and
riding on the back of an elephant. Nice!
Then
the time arrived for my first placement,
which was far away in distant
Syabrubensi in Langtang. This is the
mountainous region north of Kathmandu.
Well, not at all that distant but it
took the bus 11 hours to get there
anyway…The bus ride was one of the most
frightening I'd ever had! Especially the
last or so hour, going down in zig-zags!
It seemed the bus wanted to tumble down
in every bend, but fortunately it never
did…The host family (Ghurmi and Yangzen)
there was superb! I loved being with
them and spending time with them…The
library where I was supposed to work was
a little under-visited (not at all that
many children) but the time I had there
was good. Spending time with the locals
and the host-family and exploring the
beautiful surroundings was the best part
for me however…I had some great walks in
the hills surrounding us, from time to
time accompanied by Ghurmi. One of those
trips took us to Yangzen's parents'
house. Her father had fallen ill and
that evening a real shaman was trying to
cure him, making small puppets from rice
and blessing those. I watched the whole
ritual, not knowing at the time it would
take about 3-4 hours altogether. A great
experience nonetheless…After four weeks
I wanted to move on and go somewhere
else though…Experiencing different
host-families and experience different
people in different regions is what
attracted me most!
After
relaxing in Kathmandu for a few days
(spaghetti again!) I went to my next
placement in Chitwan, near the National
Park. I went to a village called
Ganganagar (and could even pronounce
that after a week!), where Asim
supposedly grew up. My job this time was
not to teach but to garden and clean up
the library. I wanted to do something
more fysical and so I did! After some
time a second volunteer (Liam) came
there and we worked together which was
great! We re-organized the garden
(cutting grass however was next to
impossible even though it looked much
better for some days. It just grows too
fast in the monsoon!) and really cleaned
up the library which was in terrible
shape when we first got there. The
monsoon and sun made it next to
impossible to work from time to time.
When the sun was out it was way too hot
and when it was raining, well, it was
just too wet! We had to work while the
sun was behind the clouds (it was still
rather hot at those times as well, but
what can you do…). And of course it was
(for me) great to see how people in
Chitwan lived (which was, obviously,
different from the people in Langtang.
They had a whole different attitude. I'm
not sure this is a regional o | |
