INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter, December, 2006

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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.

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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.

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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.

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INFO Nepal - Monthly Newsletter, October, 2006
 

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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

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

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 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 assistents) 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!

Emily - UK - August 2006
My home in Jankauli, Chitwan. - Volunteering at INFO Nepal's Children's Resource Center
Emily Licence : Email : Licence.E@cie.org.uk

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] collaborated 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.

Rewarding and challenging periods of our lives. Two weeks volunteering in Nepal - Hans Mouser and Digvy Singh - U.S.A.- May-June 2006

Our volunteer experience with INFO Nepal was one of the most rewarding and challenging periods of our lives.  We spent only a few short weeks at the Sacred Home Orphanage in Jorpati, but the kids made it feel like it was just a few days.  From the moment we arrived in Nepal, the INFO family made us feel comfortable and secure in a new country.  The thoughtfulness and experience of the INFO team allowed us to mesh well with the children and environment of the orphanage.  When we arrived at the Sacred Home we were immediately taken aback by the enthusiasm and eagerness to learn exhibited by the children, despite what many in the West would consider meager conditions. One child in particular, a 12 year-old boy named Santosh, was very intelligent with traditional subjects such as math and science, but lacked exposure to geography and English comprehension.  During our first lesson at the Eyelens English School, he – as well as many other children – were unable to place large western countries in their correct continents.  However, by the time we left, he knew not only the locations, but also the capitals of many countries. 
After the children returned from school each day, they worked very hard on their homework for several hours.  They excelled in math and science, and seemed to enjoy the help we could offer in the subjects in which they struggled, such as English comprehension.  It was rewarding to see how the children improved their understanding and use of the English language by leaps and bounds during such a short period of time.  Simply by sitting, talking, and living with the children, we were able to share their enthusiasm for learning. 
It was humbling to see how much work the children did and how happy they were, despite sharing so little with so many. The 50 children at the orphanage were more like a group of brothers and sisters rather than a mixture of boys and girls who had just met. We were happy to be dhais (older brothers) even for just a short time.  Hopefully the things they learned from us will help brighten their lives as much as this experience has brightened ours. Thank you INFO Nepal for allowing us the opportunity to help these children! We would happily recommend this program to all of our friends, or anyone else with the desire to help the people of Nepal.

My one month Volunteering in Nepal - Paula Mullins - Irish Volunteer - June-July 2006

I decided to come to Nepal on the advice of my cousin Mark who also volunteered with Info Nepal in January. I must admit that I was apprehensive about traveling to Kathmandu. This would be something I would dream about but never actually go through with. However, to anyone who is having second thoughts about volunteering with INFO Nepal you should book your ticket now!
During my time in Nepal I don’t think I was alone for longer than a few minutes! I did one day of training in Kathmandu and then traveled to Chitwan with Asim and two other volunteers, Jenny and Doug. I truly had the most fantastic time here. We got to meet a Tharu family and eat dinner with them, bathed with elephants and also visited the orphanage in Chitwan. We all said for our next placement we would like to go to the orphanage. The children are just amazing and they have a wonderful set up there.
Less than 24 hours after arriving back in Kathmandu I was sent on my placement. I went to Dhulikhel which is just outside Kathmandu. Although it is quite near to the hustle and bustle of the city it feels a million miles away.
I got to teach in two schools. One of them was a private school and the other was a government school. The government school was on holidays but Rajesh, who works for Info Nepal, managed to get pupils to come to classes in the afternoon. For me, this showed the dedication the students have to advance their education. As a teacher myself, it was great to see how the Nepalese educational system worked. The students in both the schools have impeccable manners; I think both the teachers and parents need to be praised for this. The students in both my schools were amazing and I was so sorry to leave them. I feel that my method of teaching was different to what they are used to and I hope that they learned from me.
My host family were extremely hospitable and welcoming, I really felt like one of the family. I think this part of the Info Nepal programme is so important. To have first hand experience of Nepali culture is wonderful. There were aspects of their culture which I found difficult to understand but I tried my best to do what was expected and I feel that I fitted in well. I also made great friends with neighboring families in the area and they were all so kind, teaching me Nepalese, making me clothes and keeping me entertained!
The staff and students at my school in Ireland were very interested in my trip to Nepal. They were all so generous when I explained that I  would be going to teach children less fortunate than themselves. I took one class to a shopping centre packing bags for a day and customers gave tips to them which also went towards the donation. I feel that Asim and the other staff at Info Nepal will be able to make good use out of this money. There are so many projects on at the moment and each one is more deserving than the other. I hope that the money I raise will be used to make life easier for some Nepalese people. I am now delighted that I am able to offer this having experienced the people and their culture. They are all so welcoming and open to volunteers. Good luck to all.
I feel that this experience has been so positive, I can not think of anything negative to stay about my stay in Nepal. The people are so warm and open and the country is beautiful. I will take lots of great memories with me.
Thank you to all the staff at Info Nepal for all your help during my stay.

Staying with Nepal Host Family in Nepal - Pamela Burke - Northern Ireland - 28th June 2006

I have just returned back from completing my 4 week voluntary placement and can’t believe the time has gone so fast.
Throughout my time as a volunteer I have found the INFO team to be very welcoming and helpful.  From the moment I landed in Nepal the INFO team have been very attentive.  It was great to see a member of the team at the airport, especially as my flight was delayed by several hours.  I was taken directly to the Guest House and after a couple of ‘welcome’ phone calls from the INFO team and a goodnight’s sleep, I moved to Happy Home and started my four day language and cultural program.  The language training, although short, was well organized and provided me with the basic essential phrases required to get by on a day-to-day basis.  The cultural aspects of the training program included a range of interesting sightseeing trips to Swayambhunath, Pashupatinath Temple, Bodnath and Durbar square.
Following my training period I moved to Dhulikhel.  Rajesh, the local INFO volunteer coordinator was extremely caring and managed to organize good teaching placements, despite my voluntary work occurring during the school summer vacation period.  I taught English in three local schools over the three week period I was in Dhulikhel.  This enabled me to teach a wide variety of students, not only in terms of age, but also in terms of ability, as I taught in both private and government run establishments.  I found all the Nepalese students I taught, to be exceptionally polite, disciplined and eager to learn.
During my time in Dhulikhel, I lived with an extremely friendly and accommodating host family in a local village.  There were fourteen members in my family ranging from 3 years to 60 years and I enjoyed immensely interacting with them all, from playing games with the younger children to learning more about Nepalese culture from the older members.  During my free time, Rajesh kindly organized local sightseeing tours which took in some of the amazing scenery and temples to be seen in Dhulikhel. 
Before coming to Nepal, my wish was to experience the life and culture of Nepalese people and interact with them as much as possible.  INFO NEPAL has made this possible and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time in this country and will go back to Northern Ireland with many fond memories of the people I have met and the things I have been privileged to see. 

Thank you INFO Nepal.
Pamela Burke -

Volunteer with Flexible and friendly people in Nepal -  Maggie Wilcock, UK -  volunteer April-June 2006. 
Email: mwilcock@ukonline.co.uk

I am a mental health social worker from the UK, who has just finished a 6 week placement, based firstly in a health centre, then teaching in a mountain village.
Everyone’s experience is very different of course, but for me, one of the most satisfying things about being with INFO has been the organizations flexibility which has afforded me a variety of unexpected experiences!!These have included visiting a co-coordinators family for 6 days (being treated as  a guest of honor at the local school, putting tikka on children who had passed exams, and visiting the jungle on a motorbike), visiting the only psychiatric hospital in Nepal, harvesting wheat, and making a trip to consult the local village” wise woman”.Whilst both my placements were challenging in different ways, I found I had very little to offer at the health centre, which was surprisingly well staffed, (and less busy than the “wise woman!). I was impressed with the way INFO responded to help me find something more suitable.
Of course flexibility has to work both ways, (especially in Nepal!). The political situation was very unstable when I arrived. I always felt very safe, but strikes and curfews curtailed out training program and cultural excursions. There is generally a very relaxed attitude to time, (and organization ) in Nepal, and this requires some patience!
INFO is a small enough NGO to be able to respond to individual volunteers needs, not only in terms of type/location of placement, but also other activities, including post placement arrangements for trekking/safari etc. As staff are all local they have extensive contacts throughout Nepal, so are able to help with virtually any request.
This along with INFO”s genuine desire to improve conditions for the less privileged people in Nepal, has given me an experience I would recommend to anyone considering volunteering. Not, I have to add , a sentiment I would extend to visiting wise women!.

My Second time volunteering in Nepal - Jenny McDonald - Simsbury, Connecticut, USA - July 2006
Email: jem2148@columbia.edu

This trip to Nepal has passed lightning fast, and I can’t believe I’m leaving Kathmandu and Happy Home tomorrow morning. 
After training and sight-seeing in Kathmandu, I left for the Kakani Health Post with Biswa, a health care assistant and friend to Asim.  In Kakani, we’d wake up, dhal bhaat and work in the clinic until the early afternoon.  After work, Biswa would take me hiking through the surrounding mountains, and on a clear day, we got breathtaking views of Langtang.  (On my last trip to Nepal in 2003, I trekked through Langtang and the Gosainkunda, and I was happy to see those peaks again!)   On my second placement, after a 3 day ‘vacation’ in Sauraha, I was placed with a beautiful family in Thirpati Chok, Chitwan.  Never a big fan of daal bhaat, I was thrilled to learn that my aamaa cooked a variety of tasty meals, including lo mein and chicken momo, and her pickles were the best I’ve had in Nepal.  After only a week with my family, I was loath to leave, and I missed them on my ride back to Kathmandu.
Tomorrow I leave with another volunteer for Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha, and from there, we will pass into India and visit Varanassi, Agra and Delhi.  In my opinion, the best thing about INFO is the people that you meet here: other volunteers, Asim and his family, and the people at the placements.  It’s remarkable to me that you can form such close bonds so quickly and find suck kindred spirits so far from home.  I will miss everyone I’ve met this time, just like the last time I was here (Hi Loks, Jet, Jens, Rebecca and Eugenie), and I wish the INFO Nepal family all the best. 

Jenny McDonald

A trip to Sauraha with new volunteers and a new library plus Sponsorship for Sita

As newly arrived volunteer's interest, INFO organized a trip to Chitwan for Jungle Safari. We had a great time there with a lots of jungle activities. The Elephant bathing was the most memorable event for all of our volunteers. We visited a local Tharu village and met Sita and her family, we joined them in eating Fish and drinking the local Raksi, wow it  was fantastic!! We learnt whilst there about  Sita's interests and family background. Sita is 14 years old girl who left school two years ago because they could not buy her school uniform. Sita's father dances for the Tharu Stick Dance which is performed 4 days in a week in Sauraha for the tourists. Sita is interested in learning how to make clothes, without any training or resources Sita managed to make herself a Kurtha, Salwar. We discussed with Sita the possibility of  providing her with training so that she can set up her own business within her village so that instead of all the villagers going to Tandi Bajar for their clothes, Sita would be able to provide them for them cheaper than if they  purchase them from a larger city. Having talked with some of her neighbors and receiving such a positive response we are hoping to begin this as soon as possible. We have also found a building that will be suitable for Elder persons literacy classes. While talking with the chair person of the center we decided to make a Children Library and start the Children's class in that building. Our new volunteer Emily and Annett will be heading there next week to paint and decorate the building.
Happy Home : This week is a very happy week for all of us that we are starting building Happy Home. It is a big task to arrange every things for building. I am very happy that Namrata is now active to look after the building construction. All of our children are very happy to see the building but now a days they are very busy to prepare their first exam .Tenjing , Sarita and Mimgma seem a lot of progress and very egger to take exam and show to Dolma and Naresh that they are also very good in the class. There is no dough that this time also Naresh and Dolma will come first in the class. The bigger child Rani, Nangsi and Samjhana are more interested to help in the kitchen beside studying.

An Experience working with Orphan Children - Margaret Ferrer - UK -May 2006

This small children's home is in Balaju, a rural suburb a few km north of Kathmandu. There are thirteen children in the home, ranging in age from three to thirteen. They live in four rooms of a shared house, and share a backyard with the other families who live there. In the yard is the water pump, and small brick wood burning stoves, where all the cooking is done. The accommodation is very basic. Six girls sleep in a bedroom which has three beds in it – all broken. The beds and bedding are all in need of replacement. The boys sleep upstairs, where there is one bed and mats.

The home is run by a young man, Niranjan, with assistance from his mother. The children look after each other, with Shova, the eldest girl aged 13, doing the cooking for them all.

They are all affectionate, caring, loving children, who are on the whole very happy. The three youngest children, who have only recently come to the home, are rather quiet, and need time and encouragement to settle in and join in the fun. All the children, apart from Suntali, aged 3, attend the village school – a 10 minute walk up the hill and across the terraces behind the house..

INFO Nepal has only recently established contact with this home, and has made a commitment to sponsor the educational costs of the children. The home has no formal support from the Government, and is dependent on donations from many sources to provide for the day to day living costs of the children.

I have been working with the home as an INFO Nepal volunteer for three weeks, encouraging improved hygiene, teaching English, and encouraging play activities. There is a bare room, designated the school room, which we have been making more usable, with the addition of carpets, making posters for the walls, and starting English lessons.

All the children come from very poor backgrounds. Most of the fathers have been killed by the Maoists, and the mothers, unable to provide for themselves or their families without support, have remarried – leaving the children without parents.

I have never met such a wonderful group of happy, friendly children – who welcomed me into their home and called me Mummy. We have had a lot of fun together – playing, washing ourselves and our clothes, learning Nepali folk dancing, singing, going on a picnic in the Royal Forest. And a lot of new experiences – first day of school (how smart and proud the children looked in their new uniforms), attending the free health clinic in Kathmandu, seeing little Suntali learn to play with Duplo and to begin to smile! I will miss them all so much.

Volunteering in Goljung Library - Doug Lincoln - Australia - June 2006

My placement was in the village of Goljung in Langtang National Park. It was a beautiful location to spend a month volunteering in Nepal. I was to teach an English class, morning and afternoon at the community library. However, it was an unfortunate time to be volunteering because the conjunction of political striking and school holidays seemed to drastically reduce the number of interested students appearing at the community library. I was taking up to five children in each class and we would play word games and sing English songs. Attendance was haphazard. However, when school reconvened after about two weeks, there were more students coming to library classes. Furthermore, the principal asked if I would take an English class for the rest of my stay. I took Class 4 for English lessons and it was an enjoyable experience. There were 23 students and the majority of these were girls. The students varied greatly in their English proficiency, which complicated the lessons somewhat. But most students were eager to learn and it was a wonderful experience.

My host family was fantastically generous and welcoming. I was staying with Singe and Timjama in the loft of their house. After some time settling in with the family, I was helping with some of the household chores and spending a lot of time with my hosts’ three-year-old son, Pembe. There were some scenic day walks around the village and I spent a number of hours exploring between Gatlang and Syabru Bensi, visiting many of the unique villages in the area. The hot, yellow bath in Tatopani with three other volunteers on my last weekend was a treat. I walked back to Kathmandu via Gosaikunda over eight days. Despite the rain and mist blocking many of the (apparently stunning) views during my trek, I’d highly recommend this method of returning to Kathmandu: though, walk it earlier than late May. Overall, I enjoyed my time in Goljung. Despite some of the difficulties in teaching English, I found the experience to be rewarding and memorable.

Volunteering at Orphanage Home - Terry Mahoney   age 60 years " too old to die young !-  " Norfolk. ENGLAND. June 2006

When I first came to Nepal 5 years ago, it was not only the beautiful countryside and the Mountains that stayed in my mind when I got home…….it was also the Children always seeming so happy, eager to learn and so full of life. Now with the help of everyone at INFO NEPAL I have been able to come back and spend a short time living with them, learning about their way of life, their interests and their dreams for the future

With my Nepali language skills being non existent they supported me all the way through [ especially on a day trip to the Zoo !! ] Even some of the little ones gave me guidance

The Humanitarian Concern Center at Maharajgung was founded by Chairman Buddhiman Pariyar and has around 30 kids. It is run by "Mother and Papa " two of the kindest people you could wish to meet. They are literally Parents to all the kids and do an amazing job. The whole place exudes Love, you can feel it within minutes of entering the gate, the "Parents" look after the kids, the kids look out for each other, take pride in their daily chores and are incredibly sharing, something that sadly we are not too good at in our world.

With continued support from INFO NEPAL this centre will, I am sure produce some fine citizens to help drive this beautiful country forward in the future.

For fear of sounding like an "OSCAR" winner I would like to thank INFO NEPAL for giving me this wonderful opportunity, to Bicky for his support throughout my visit, to Namrata and everyone at the HAPPY HOME for making me so welcome on my arrival

{and for teaching me Nepalese Dancing !! }

I would also like to send my love and thanks to everyone at the Orphanage especially

"Mummy' for never tiring of trying to "fatten" me up !!

My advice to anyone considering volunteering is…….

JUST DO IT !  contact INFO NEPAL Today .

Teacher Training in Dhulikhel -         Marina Velez 
marina.velez@open.net 
7 Southbrooke Close
CB2 2HX
Trumpington
 + 44 (0)1223 842991
Nepal Report on : http://home.tiscali.nl/marina.velez/Nepal.htm
We would like to send thanks to Marina from Holland who provided the Teacher Training to the Teachers of Dhulikhel. The training went very well, "I think my teaching will be more effective due to the teaching methods provided by Marina" said the teacher of Bal Mandir L.S School, Samjhana Khatiwada. The teachers were very enthusiastic and taking part in every section. Most of the teachers had a 2 hours walk to the training center. "I learn how to make your lesson very interesting from this training" said Rajan Jamgam of Saraswati L.S school. It was a new technique for the teachers to make their lesson plans very interesting and use the available material in the class.
INFO Nepal is going to buy land here in Kathmandu .As my Dad has promised to be a guarantee for the Bank loan that INFO will use to buy the land here in Kathmandu. By next month we will be finishing all the paper work and saving more money to pay the Bank loan. Our plan is to start building the INFO Nepal building by the end of this year and by July next year in 2007 complete the first floor where the INFO office, volunteers and my family can stay. By the end of the 2007 we will have finished the second floor and move the Happy Home children into this building. We hope all of our friends and volunteers are going to support our dream project of gaining more volunteers for INFO Nepal. I have been invited by The Daneford Trust, UK, for an exchange program of four weeks, at the same time I will be participating in the ICEF conference in London on the 8th and 9th of May. I am hoping that all of our volunteers and friends will help us fundraise for this event and help me by providing a place to stay in London for a few days. I would be happy to visit more venues and show them a presentation about INFO Nepal.  

INFO has also been busy celebrating, as Holi (the festival of colour) as well as birthdays have been abundant.  Holi marked a great occasion when as many as fifteen volunteers happened to be in Kathmandu to celebrate. The volunteers enjoyed playing with colored water with the Happy Home children before they ventured into the streets of Kathmandu to brave the enormous water fight.  They were all impressed by the rooftops filled with people hurling water bombs across the city.  The tradition of celebrating birthdays was also in full effect as Happy Home got gigantic cakes for both Farahana and Nirnaya on their birthdays.
Gatlang Library - We have newly set up a new library in Gatlang. After 6 weeks of teaching there Freya and Lisa from Australia have came back to Kathmandu and we have already replaced Dan and Ceryl in Gatlang for 6 more weeks. We hope that things will go nicely.
Donations from London Borough of Hillingdon Youth Offending Service and Childrens Service were happily received. Books, posters, coloured pencil and toys were donated and every child in the Humanitarian Center Orphanage received a pencil, ruler, and bookmark to help them with their school work.
Naresh Asim - Director INFO Nepal

This is Sunyi’s story: By Robin - USA - Seattle

It was early on a Friday morning just as I was about to leave the village of Sephryu Besin in the Lang Tang region for my placement in Goljung when a fellow INFO Nepal volunteer summoned me into a small local home. I was shocked to walk in upon a little girl who had fallen into a kitchen fire in a nearby hill village, and now thirty percent of her body was covered in horrific burns. I immediately located the only phone in the village, and tried to call my father, a physician in the U.S. Luckily he was able to give me at least general advice, though far from ideal as I am not a physician, to at least temporarily address the situation.

I realized beyond the pained cries and screams of little Sunyi, that this situation was dire, and that it was imperative that the little girl be taken to a doctor and to a sterile environment where she could be safeguarded against infection. What is not as serious a situation in most developed countries is without a doubt deadly in Nepal, as medical attention and facilities are a commodity.

I found myself lost amidst a series of problems. First and foremost was the sense of apathy that surrounded this terrible situation in Sephryu Bensi. The family, the locals, and even the tourists took to an attitude that seemed to say, “Yes, it is a shame, but what can we do.” It was a classical case of social apathy in some ways, where everyone is aware if what is going on, yet they do nothing either because they figure someone else will, or because they feel helpless; in other ways, it was a case of lack of awareness and education; the people in Sephryu Bensi largely do not realize what causes infection, what it is, nor do they realize it can kill; the closest doctor, a three-hour walk away, was to be absent from his clinic for the next few weeks; I was desperate for medical supplies, having only antibiotic cream and Vaseline, I had to substitute banana leaves for bandages, and try my best to clean the burns and change the dressings; the Maoists had declared a bandh, and transport out of the village, other than on foot, was risky and next to impossible; there is the concern that by helping the Nepali people more than they are willing to help themselves sends an enabling message; and finally, there was the uncertainty of how the child’s medical treatment, her mother’s accommodations and food, as well as transport would be paid for.

In my mind, it seemed like a long shot that I would be able to coordinate getting Sunyi to Kathmandu, and even more unlikely that the family would agree to have this happen. Everything seemed to be working against the situation, and it was a constant exhausting challenge to keep a clear head, and to reassure myself that I was indeed doing the right thing. But in the end, I knew that it was absolutely my duty as a human being to try anyway. It was no longer about the message I would be sending the village about a volunteer’s role, nor a matter of enabling a family who fails to act alone. It was about Sunyi, and it was about me, as a person who needs to follow her heart.

On Monday evening, I received a call from INFO Nepal’s director who told me to, “get her and the mother out of there. Get them to Kathmandu. We will do everything we can.” I was so incredibly grateful, a sense of overwhelming disbelief washed over me as I cried in happiness.

The next day, Sunyi, her mother, and myself made our way to Kathmandu. Sunyi was admitted to the Kanti Bal Hospital at one o’clock in the morning, given medications for the pain, cleaned and bandaged, and given transfusions to re-hydrate her severely dehydrated body. I have visited Sunyi everyday since we arrived here, and I am so very happy to report that she is doing very well. The doctors have done a commendable job, and we love watching her progress each day, and are learning that this special little girl likes to throw a ball, color, and to snuggle her teddy bear. In the span of a week, this child has endured so much, but thanks to the love, support, and effort of those who cared enough to follow their hearts, Sunyi continues to mesmerize and inspire us all with her will to live.

This experience has affected me personally and profoundly in so many ways. Never could I have imagined I would find myself in such a situation, nor in a position where so many decisions would have to be made so quickly. I have learned that there is no right or wrong solution, there is only what is right in your heart, and that you must trust in that. And I learned that one person can make a difference when intentions are pure.

I would like to extend thanks to INFO Nepal for extending their knowledge, passion, and support, to our friend Yensing who acted as translator through the ordeal in Sephryu Bensi, to fellow volunteers and friends, Sandra and Julia, who extended amazing support in so many ways, and to my dear friend, Rene, who gave up his jeep transportation for myself, Sunyi, and her mother, and who has provided me with absolute love, validation and support.

Going forward, I recognize the desperate need for medical educational awareness and facilities in remote areas of Nepal. In the next many months to come, I will be trying to plan, fundraise, and establish a community integrated medical clinic, most likely in the Lang Tang region. If you are interested in contributing to this project, I would be happy to correspond with you on the matter.

Dan and Cheryl’s final report on Teaching English in Parbatipur Library, Chitwan.

We have just finished our placement, lasting Four months to the day! We were sad to leave our host family and what had started to feel like home. The library children and our friends have made our experience really special and something we will always remember. We hope we have left them many happy memories as well.
When we first arrived in Parbatipur it was winter time, the fields were being harvested and the cold mornings brought a thick mist over the countryside until late morning. During our placement the fields have become lush and the days hotter, bringing more stunning bird life- egrets, parakeets, eagles and storks. We have been lucky enough to see the seasons change and also the Children grow- front teeth falling out, trousers becoming too short and their English improve!
At the end of January, we refurbished the bookcase and decorated the Library, turning it into a bit of an art gallery with all the kid’s pictures! We moved the white board to make better use of the space in the Teaching room and made some tiny little curtains for the windows above the wooden shutters. Then the Library went Crazy! Overnight we had about thirty more kids coming for library time. This was knackering but great. It was so nice to see the Library getting so much use. And the kids were always polite and eager to learn. For 7am class they kids would be sat outside for 6.30 and for 5pm class the kids would get there for quarter past four. They all called us brother and sister, which made us feel part of the community.
During our stay we really enjoyed the festivals and weddings, as Dec-Jan is the main months for marriages. One of the men in the class that Dan held in Kanchanbasti, was recently married, and it has been great to celebrate these milestones with the students. Although sadly, we have had to say goodbye to several local men who have gone to foreign countries to work and support their families.
We partly celebrated Shiva Ratri, where it is tradition to stay up all night singing, dancing and worshiping Shiva. It was great to watch the Nepali women dance in their dazzling red saris whilst listening to dohari songs, where a man and woman sing opposite each other, thinking of the next chorus off the top of their head. Amazing! We didn’t stay all night though, as we had library lessons the next day.
Parbatipur community arranged a picnic to a nearby picnic area. This was a great day-they organized a bus and brought a 30kilo goat along and some big pots! Again we enjoyed the dohari songs but this time found ourselves dancing to the enchanting music. We were very lucky that one of the men had videoed the whole day and gave us a copy, so we will be able to show our familes how dohari songs sound and how Nepali women dance. And of course how we tried to dance Nepali stylie.
During these get togethers we would often meet some of the kid’s parents- this was when our Nepali language came to use. Over the time we have gotten the ear for the language. When you first arrive in Nepal you feel you will never get the hang of it.
The last festival we celebrated was Holi. The colourful festival. We started the day with a busy library- we all played ring-a-ring a roses and hokey-kokey which turned into a big colour fight. We then played Holi with the family although our host parents said they wouldn’t play. Afterwards we went to Kanchanbasti (nearby village) where Dan has been helping their community clubhouse by teaching English to older students. We played Holi with them, going from house to house having water fights. When we cycled back to Parbatipur, soaking wet and covered in colour, a group of women blockaded the road , who had obviously been playing Holi themselves, and covered us again in colour. Amongst the multi-coloured crowd was our very own host mother, Rama-red, black and a big smile on her face. We also discovered Rishi our host father covered in colour, to which he just laughed. It was a great day.
We really fitted in with our crazy Nepali family. I can say that as they called us crazy brother and sister! So we enjoyed many, many laughs. They also looked after us when we needed it, if we were a little homesick or had any illness.
When the final day came, it was strange packing up after we had settled in our little room with the bats and lizards(I’m not joking). Even on this day several kids came for library at 7am, I had told them we were going. I went down to say goodbye again and they gave me a peacock feather, which I will treasure and I must admit made me cry. They waited outside until we left to go on the bus. We jumped on the roof with all our baggage and waved goodbye to Parbatipur, all the familiar faces came out to wave us off, with the kids chasing after the bus until they couldn’t catch up anymore.
We arrived in Kathmandu to our other familiar grounds, the Happy Home. Asim and Namarata always make us feel welcome. We now look forward to our next experience in Langtang, to continue a new library. Watch this space.

Jacquie Crowther & Claire Harris (UK)
Well, what can we say about our time in Nepal? Having spent our time between two placements in Maharajgunj we have met some fantastic children. The orphanage children were all eager to learn new English songs and practice their English, as well as colouring pictures to decorate the school room in the orphanage. Our other placement was in a school, where we did a project on England and taught more songs and rhymes. The experience was made complete by the fantastic host family in Dhapassi who really welcomed us into the family – even the cow was friendly! Having found time for a quick trip to Chitwan, and bathed with the elephants, we are finally ready for home, but not without mentioning Bicky – our ever helpful friend.

Syd and Arjan from Holland

After our final exams we concluded that we disliked school. University, or  "UNI" as experienced travellers seem to like to call it, was not an option,
so we decided to do some volunteer work! Through Google we happened upon the  Info Nepal website. We discovered that this particular NGO offered a three month stay at a so-called host family, Nepalese language classes and the chance to help an underpriveliged community at a reasonable price. On February 1, 2006, Aryan....Erjon....Allp....Arjen and I flew to Kathmandu under the assumption that we would be working in an orphanage in Chitwan. The moment we got there the staff "casually mentioned" a different orphanage, their living circumstances were poor, the children were so cute and would we mind working there for a month. How could we refuse without being caricatured as heartless demonoids from the west? So with two weeks of language classes under our belt we were armed with an extensive vocabulary and a healthy sense of self-confidence. The placement turned out to be two placements (both in Kathmandu); one at the orphanage and the other at Stephens International School . Every morning we would get up at 6.30 (with a little help from the maid and her vast supplies of "KALO CHYA CHINI CHHAINA") and meander down to the orphanage. Here we would order the children to clean their rooms or when the mood took us, the kitchen. At 9.00.
we made sure to be back at the host family's place where the schoolbus would be waiting. After a gravity-defying ride with the enthusiastic but incapable busdriver, we would be deposited at the school where our tasks included teaching, playing with the children and correcting faulty pamphlets. At 15.00 we would have a break at home and at 17.00 head back to the orphanage. No cleaning this time, just playing, helping with homework and teaching the children mindless pop-culture. We certainly came to regret the day we taught the kids: "That's some funky shit!!!!" The month flew by and before we knew it we were being awakened every morning by the sound of trumpeting elephants. Sound like an unlikely scenario? Not in Chitwan. We are living in an orphanage in Sauraha opposite several elephant stables. Even more amusing than the elephant's incessant bellowing are the elephant drivers. It never fails to bring a faint smile to my lips when I see one dig his feet into the back of the elephant's ears and vociferate: "HAKATHAKATHAKAT". The children have just completed their term exams and our now free to do what they like.
Apparently, all they like to do is swim, in the exquisite lake not a ten minute walk from here. All in all our time in with Info Nepal has been groovy. We loved the orphanage and its inhabitants in Kathmandu, we love the kids here in Chitwan and we managed to remain tolerant of the students in
Stephens International (e-) School. There seems to be only one thing left to say:

WEEH! MUSA! CHITO CHITO!
Arjen the Space Penguin and Syd

Lisa and Freya - Australia - A new INFO Library in Gatlang, Langtang
Our Experiences in Gatlang

Where to start?  The task of setting up a library in a remote village in the mountains of Nepal seemed a daunting one at best but we decided we were up for the challenge.  Heading off into the mountains armed with loads of books, stationery and library supplies we began our adventure.  The ten hour bus ride was the start of our eye opening experiences; crammed into our seats, dust blowing in through the open window, huge trucks passing us on the narrowest of roads next to steep cliff edges, and the windiest rockiest roads imaginable – I was definitely outside of my comfort zone.  But the views were remarkable, the countryside constantly changing and as the journey continued and we glimpsed the first snow capped mountains I couldn’t help but feel a shiver of excitement and awe. 

We stayed a night in Thulo Barkhu and a night in Sybrubensi, meeting the volunteers there and sharing ideas and tips as well as checking out their libraries.  This was a great opportunity to get a feel for the INFO Nepal presence in the villages and to gain valuable insight into the workings of established libraries.  We left feeling enthused and energized and really excited to get to Gatlang and start work.

The walk from Sybrubensi to Gatlang took us around four hours.  It starts with one of the steepest, hugest hills I have ever encountered.  It definitely tested my fitness, which at that stage probably wasn’t what it should have been, but that certainly changed after five weeks.  This first time we were lucky enough to hitch a ride in a truck about halfway up but we were not so lucky every time.  We had two porters with us carrying the bulk of our luggage and the library supplies which was a huge help.  I would definitely advise anyone walking up to start their placement to make sure some porters are organised.  Once up the top of the hill (which takes two to three hours) the walk is fantastic and I really enjoyed it.  The track winds around the ridge with incredible views of the mountains and overlooks a few villages situated in the valleys below.  For my first time walking in Nepal it was amazing and I felt so lucky and inspired.

We finally saw Gatlang village, our home for the next month, perched on the side of the hill.  It was a relief to finally arrive after so many days travelling.  I will never forget the reception we received when we first walked into the village.  Children of all ages, dressed in the most amazing array of colourful clothing, began appearing from every direction and soon we must have had over one hundred children all following us, pointing and whispering.  The sheer number of children in their colourful ragamuffin outfits against the backdrop of the traditional little wooden and stone houses and the mountains was incredible.  It felt like we had been spirited back in time.

Our first few days were quite a confusing and frustrating time.  The communication barrier was huge; most of the villagers speak Tamang with only a little Nepali and no English.  Nothing seemed to be organised and no one seemed to know where we should stay or who should decide this.  We were adamant we wanted to stay with a host family and not just above the library where they first suggested.  It took some fairly strong persuasion before they showed us a few options for host families.  Nobody was home at either and we decided to stay at the nicer, cleaner house which we were told was a guest house but that a family lived there also.  This turned out to be the right decision as a few days later our host father arrived and as he speaks good English we were able to sort out many issues and questions we had.

But in those first couple of days our spirits dropped a bit.  It seemed that the people in the village didn’t want us there or maybe it was that they didn’t understand what we were there to achieve.  We couldn’t really talk to them properly and so felt at a bit of a loss and very much as outsiders.  It was quite an isolating feeling.  A couple of days later a delegation of young men informed us that the community would prefer the library to be located up at the school and not in the tourism building.  The Headmaster took us to the school and offered us one of the tiny, dark and dirty rooms to use.  This room was not even spare; as it was there was a whole class level having their lessons outside.

It took quite some effort to explain that we couldn’t have the library there at the school and after much discussion a compromise was reached, whereby we would continue with the library in the tourism building on a temporary basis and when new buildings were built at the school it would be moved up there.  I was left feeling quite bewildered and disappointed at this stage.  We were only here to help the community and look out for their interests and it felt like they resented our presence even though we were assured that the community had specifically requested for an INFO Nepal library.  I think it didn’t help matters that all these discussions and arguments were going on around us in Nepali and Tamang and we were only have bits translated back to us.

In the days and weeks that followed things improved and our spirits and motivation increased.  We spent time at the school teaching classes and hanging out with the teachers.  The teachers did a lot more hanging out than they did teaching and when we found out in later weeks that the academic level of Gatlang students was amongst the poorest in the region we weren’t a bit surprised.  Still, they were a very friendly and funny bunch and delighted in teaching us some Nepali and practising their English.  Only one teacher could really speak English and he used to try and translate jokes, the result must have been quite funny because the teachers would be in hysterics while we often sat there quite bemused.

The library was a huge attraction for the children, particularly the younger ones, and the first day we held a class in our opening week we had over one hundred children pushing and shoving outside to be let in.  It was quite overwhelming.  We had trouble communicating with the kids and they couldn’t understand even the most basic instructions.  We both became very good at mime.  Luckily some older students showed up that day (as the teachers who promised they would come and help never did) and they were able to help us somewhat in controlling the kids.

Over the next few weeks as the kids got more used to us and our rules they were better and we able to have some proper classes.  It took a long time to discourage them from peering in through the windows when a class was on and blocking all our light.  You would be inside teaching and suddenly realize it was really dark and quite hard to see and then you would notice the kids in the windows.  They would be back five minutes after you had shooed them away.  I think they thought it was a great game; you could only laugh. 

Drawing pictures, browsing through books and particularly story time were favourites of the younger kids.  They didn’t understand much of what we were reading to them but would listen and look attentively and parrot what you said.  The older classes enjoyed drawing and writing as well, especially using coloured pencils and textas and were really enjoying games such as UNO and memory when we left.  These were my favourite library classes, we could actually teach and communicate, even if it was a struggle but you did feel the students were getting something out of it and they were so enthusiastic and thirsty for knowledge.

Overall, we had a really great time in Gatlang.  The kids are just gorgeous if a bit grotty, but very enthusiastic and friendly.  Our host family was lovely and we had many fun evenings playing cards with the extended family and friends.  When we discovered that the girls could knit we spent many hours knitting together and they loved teaching us new patterns.  The Headmaster is quite a character and would insist on being our tour guide and taking us out for outings.  We had several adventures with him and the local little blue truck and he loved using his broken English on us.

On the day that we left it was with mixed feelings.  I was starting to feel more settled and accepted and was really enjoying the time there and it was hard to contemplate leaving.  At the same time I was really looking forward to the trek back to Kathmandu that our host father was taking us on.  I feel that the time we had there was too short, to set up and establish a library you really need to have a lot of time up your sleeve.  Still, I hope and think that we have made a good start and am confident that the next volunteers who have several months there will have great success.  It is a beautiful little village with some beautiful and amazingly hard working people living there and I feel privileged to have shared in their lives and their culture.

Sandra Hopkins - Ireland - Syabrubensi Library

My unforgettable 3 months volunteering in Nepal has taught me so many things that I am coming away hoping that if the people I taught learned as much as I did I will consider my job well done.

My placement was in the small Himalayan metropolis that is Shyabrubensi, at the start of the Langtang Himal trek. The town that is never spelt the same way twice! Here I taught English and Environmental Awareness to the women and children for five hours a day, early in the morning, afternoon and the evening. I also taught in the local school for two hours a day up until the local exams and holidays.

The library where I taught was never in short supply of children and their enthusiasm to learn was overwhelming. I nicknamed the younger classes “the crazies” as before coming into the library the throngs of hyperactive four to ten year olds outside would always worry me. But this seemingly unruly crowd of kids would turn into the most attentive and sweet bunch of children once inside. During my time there myself and Nancy (my fellow volunteer) decided to brighten up the little library building with a morel of the mountains. We also tried our best to brighten up the inside with plenty of projects and paintings by the children, who were only too delighted to see their work decorate the walls.

Shyabrubensi is quite the bustling town and to be honest not what I expected to come across after the ten hour bus journey. Having trekked to some of the surrounding villages of Gouljan, Gatlang and Bridim, Shyabrubensi is definitely a lot warmer and sheltered, something I learned to appreciate. Also I learned how lucky I was with the numerous hotels and shops in the town where the basic necessities ie batteries, fruit, peanutbutter and Snickers were easily found! I also had the luxury of a tato pani (hot spring) nearby where I could wash in the open air and bathe in the hot baths while listening to the gushing glacial river that flowed by only feet away. A real experience especially if you were accompanied by a few locals!

My host family, Yangen and Guromi Tamang and their two children, Asish and Achhen, were great. Their house was situated right on the main street of the village where every evening the daily buses from Kathmandu would trundle to a halt for the night. The same buses that insured that I was awake every morning at 6:30 and earlier due to the revving of engines and beeping of horns, which it seems is necessary even in the mountains! I was spoilt for choice when it came to food with noodle and other various types of soup, chowmein dishes, pancakes and of course tasty dal bhat. However, on St. Patricks day my green blood could not help taking over the kitchen and mash potatoes were dished out. Now Achhen’s favourite food!

The people of the town could not have been nicer as I was made feel so at home and completely accepted as a member of the community. The constant drinking of yak butter tea (a taste I quickly and surprisingly acquired much to the dismay of my arteries) and the cooking of nettles with local flour dough were a regular occurrence. This involved numerous neighbours sitting by an open cooking (smoking) hearth, indulging themselves in the goodness that is the Nepali stewed nettle. A taste I did not so quickly acquire but hey, when in Rome!

The Losar festival in late February celebrates the Tibetan New Year and myself and Nancy were lucky enough to experience it and all the preparations involved. It included the making of traditional sweet and salted Tibetan bread which we helped out with, watching Yangen make 40L of the local brew “raikse” and the constant playing of traditional music (not chart topping stuff, yet I find myself  humming it, non-the-less). A two day picnic ensued following the New Year which involved all of the villagers. Also (and unfortunately) the fresh butchering of a buffalo which was cooked and eaten with the tastiest dal bhat and washed down with oceans of Tibetan and milk tea. All this was enjoyed by the locals in their best and most colourful dress, in bright sunny weather amongst by beautiful clear views of the surrounding mountains. One of the many images I will remember of Shyabrubensi.

I was also lucky enough to fit in a few treks to neighbouring villages during my. Most weekends I would meet up with fellow volunteers who would come to Shyabrubensi to restock and indulge themselves in a hot shower or two at the local hotels! We experienced some amazing views and even more amazing people. The true beauty and peace of the Himalaya’s was in its inspiring people and their numerous traditions and cultures.

I feel absolutely privileged that I was able to spend my time in Nepal within such a great little community but also that during my stays in Kathmandu I was able to stay at Happy Homes orphanage. For that I thank the children, Asim, his wife Namretta and their two beautiful sons, for being so welcoming and making my stay there so much fun. I would also like to thank the charismatic Bicky, in whom we trusted and was always there to lend a helping hand. Also all the other volunteers who I was lucky enough to share my whole experience with and will look forward to keeping in touch with.

Jane carpenter - Wales -

I arrived in Katmandu on 1 st March 06, booked into the Peace Guest house and within a short time I was taken to the INFO office and introduced to Assim and a few other volunteers.  The office was pleasant and welcoming and seemed full of life.I spent a week in Katmandu trying to learn basic Nepali (very difficult for me !) as part of the organised programme, also various tours of the temples and talks from Asim on the culture of the country.(Nepali toilet training included !)  this was valuable and interesting week.

I arrived at my placement in Chhipini at the house of Shiva which was in a beautiful spot down a quiet lane.It is in the middle of farmland, fields of mustard and lentils with bamboo hedges and haystacks. There are buffalo, goats and chicken farms dotted around the flat landscape, with the hills as a backdrop. The family made me very welcome and told me to treat it as my home. I got to know the children Birendra and Ashok and of course the hardworking and beautiful Basanti.

The local school was very well run and I did a few days drawing pictures and talking about where I lived etc.  The Holi festival and exams put an end to my work here.  I was generally impressed with the level of English and general knowledge of the children.I did some drawing at Shivas house with the local children and also spent some time in the local Community Centre playing and drawing with the children.  As my actual placement was three weeks by the time I went to the community centre it was too late to set up any kind of system.

There were frustrating times waiting for people with keys for the cupboard, and for material and due to running out of time unable to set structure going.This centre would benefit from more funds for materials such as a computer, rubbish bins, books and pens.It was a unique experience and one I am glad I did.  I did take a while in settling in due to the language barrier or me not being given clear information on the following'

• Clear information on the placement  even before arriving in Nepal

• Basic knowledge of the family circumstances, structure and home.

• Clear knowledge on both sides about how much the family gets paid for you to live there and clear expectations on your limitations as a volunteer (in terms of what you can help with in the future.)

It was a great experience and I would like to thank Shiva and Basanti for looking after me.  I am sorry if there were any misunderstandings and I hope that my stay did not cause any problems.  They gave me a lovely party on the roof of the house before I left with all kinds of treats.

I have grown to love Nepal and its people and have a small understanding of the complex issues involved in running a volunteer organization in this country.  I have certainly gained tremendously from becoming involved in INFO Nepal and from meeting the other many and varied volunteers.  Thankyou everybody and good luck.

Nancy’s time in Nepal.... Nancy- Canada

During my 6 weeks volunteering with Info Nepal I was placed up north in Shybrubensi, which is in Lantang National Park, about 20 km from the Tibetan border. SB is the starting point for the very popular Lantang trek, positioned at the bottom of a valley with a beautiful Himalayan river running through it. The host family in SB is very lovely, and they are great cooks. Both the mother and father cook a wide variety of dishes, including dhalbhat, chowmein, and noodle soups. SB also has a hot spring right in the village, down by the river, which is a great place to bathe, wash clothes,etc.

During my placement the village celebrated the Tibetan New Year and it was great to see the changing of the village flags, replacing all the year old, fading flags with the new and colorful ones. Since the school was closed for a week, Sandra (the other volunteer placed there with me) and I decided to paint the outside of the library as it was just a plain concrete building. We thought that a great way to inject a little color into the village for the festival was by painting a mural on the side of the library..... the kids just loved it. And the kids are great!!! You will fall in love with them almost immediately, they definitely know how to pull at the old heart strings, especially the little ones in class 1 & 2. They are all extremely enthusiastic, at times we would have up to 30 kids in class, and they are all genuinely interested in being there and very eager to learn.

The days were spent between the library, the school and planning lessons. With 2 classes in the library before school, then a few classes at the school in the morning. In the early afternoon we would spend an hour with the village women who wanted to learn English to improve their communication skills, to be able to deal more effectively with the customers visiting their hotels, shops, etc. Then the afternoon would end with 2 more classes in the library. A pretty busy day, but a really great way to just throw yourself into the community.

If you are placed there and you have some free time, I highly recommend doing a few things. A walk to visit the other volunteers in Goljung and Gatlang is a great way to spend a couple days, and a great chance to see some very traditional Tamang villages. If you have a little more time to spare, and you don’t mind a ‘little’ climb, the hot springs, or Taato Paani (literal translation meaning hot water), just past Goljung and on top of the next ridge is a lovely place to visit. With the great reward of some really hot springs to sooth your aching muscles at the top, its definitely worthwhile. Also, a one day trek into Lantang NP, to stay at the Ganesh View Hotel and Lodge in Rimche for a night is well worth it - at 50rp a night for 2 people (that’s about 50c each!!), great food, hot showers, new mattresses and amazing views it’s pretty hard to top.

So overall it was a totally fantastic experience and I wouldn’t change a thing... Nepal Rocks!!!

 Nepal - Can I Go Yet?

Well, yes, now you can. I arrived here as the situation grew increasingly tense, and I was here during the infamous 18-day strike that forced the king to concede. Even so, I did not have any major problems. Until the strike began, daily life went about as usual. True, there were stories in the news about local people being injured while protesting and clashes between the Maoists and the army, but in all honesty it didn’t affect my day-to-day activities. INFO would not place any volunteer in an unsafe region. The only reminder of the circumstances came from delayed travel times, as there are army checkpoints along the highways to hinder Maoist mobility. That said, foreigners are not in danger of any harm. All parties--the government, the army, Maoists--do not want to hurt the economy; they want to protect tourism, so they will not cause trouble for tourists. In fact, in my opinion tourists receive special treatment. The general strike did cause a disturbance in that daytime curfews were implemented, so I had to remain in my home all day. My family was very cautious and overprotective, as I’m sure all of the host families are, and I never felt in danger of bodily or other harm. It was pretty much like an extended holiday for everyone who was not involved in the demonstrations. Now that the strike has ended and parliament has resumed, the situation—which wasn’t a problem for foreigners anyways--is improving by the day. The Maoists declared a ceasefire, and people are cautiously optimistic that democracy is on its way to being restored. So strikes should not be an issue, nor should safety concerns. It’s always a good idea to be informed, so do check with your home country’s travel advisory board, but remember that the perception given by the media, especially in the West, may not reflect the true nature of the situation for those living in the country.

FINAL REPORT

Well, I’ve just returned from my post-placement trekking trip to the Annapurna Base Camp. It was amazing and a definite change of landscape from Bharatpur, Chitwan, where I had been volunteering for two months and living with a wonderful Nepali family. My stay in Chitwan was not what I’d envisioned it would be at the outset, but that’s often how it works, and it was an incredible experience nonetheless.

I arrived at an awkward time for teaching because the country-wide exam period was fast approaching, but I was able to teach for some time at two institutions; the local government school Balmandir, and a new private school, Step By Step (Ooh Baby). Immediately, I recognized the large gap that exists between the students in these two groups. At the government school, all classes are taught in Nepali save for one English lesson, and at private schools such as S.B.S., it’s vice versa—all classes are taught in English except for one Nepali lesson. So as you can imagine, it was much more difficult for the students and me at Balmandir, because they speak and comprehend very little English. Although they can read, write and answer questions, these actions are limited to the material in their texts, which they are heavily reliant on. Their speaking and communication skills need the most attention, in my opinion. I did what I could with the time I had; though I had lesson plans, they’d often go out the window. For this kind of environment, you often have to improvise and be prepared to veer from your course. All in all, I enjoyed the challenge of teaching at Balmandir.

The teachers and students at Step By Step were a pleasure to be around. They were very welcoming upon my arrival and enthusiastic about speaking with me and learning about my life in Canada. I taught mostly English language classes, but also covered for absent teachers in other subjects, as all the students were eager to have some time with me. I enjoyed getting to know the students and faculty, whom I’d see frequently around the town—students and their friends would sometimes playfully chase me down the street screaming “Hello, Miss!” and “How are you?” It was a nice environment to be in.

As for Bharatpur, it’s a friendly, relatively quiet town with a mix of both affluent and poor families. I’d often walk or take a short tuk-tuk ride to neighboring Nharanghat, the closest major city in Chitwan. There you can find many Nepali shops and also a few for travelers, as well as a local vegetable market, several banks and restaurants. Munch Time Cafe and The Kitchen Café are popular eateries for the traveler’s appetite.

Besides teaching, I gained the invaluable knowledge of understanding Nepali culture from my time with the family. By helping out with daily tasks such as buying food from the market and cooking dhal bhat, as well as accompanying the family to various social functions, such as a Nepali wedding, office party or barda munda (sort of a Nepali bar mitzvah), I learned a great deal about Nepali customs, Hinduism, social etiquette, pop culture, politics, and much more. I truly felt like I became a member of the family and the community, albeit a special one.

Overall, my volunteer experience was a worthwhile challenge, and my trip to Nepal has definitely been enriched by it. I am thankful to everyone at the INFO Nepal family for their help and support.

JORDANA - CANADA
February 2006 – April 2006

LIBRARY…

Our first introduction to the library was complete carnage, there may have been around 30 children all desperate to get inside and abuse, whoops, I mean meet the new volunteers…. We had to have a previous volunteer (Tyler) as doorman….

It started to settle down after the first week and we would have our regulars…. I say regulars in the loosest possible sense, it was always a bit like a lottery. They might come orrr they might just not… unfortunately when they didn’t it wasn’t due to laziness but that they had to go to work in the fields with their parents. I cant imagine many children in the UK being able to drag themselves away from there play stations, during their holiday, long enough to help their parents feed them..

The kids were filthy, completely and utterly filthy, so it was our job to get them to at least wash their hands before the library ended up being covered in ……. …..

The level of understanding was again completely varied due to the fact English is their third language, Tamang being their first. So we had SUCH fun trying to communicate and I may be wrong but I suspect when they didn’t want to do something their English suddenly deteriorated….. What cunning creatures they are.

NEPALI NEW YEAR…

The Goljung ‘crew’ just love their Raksi and love to party… the Nepali New Year was celebrated in a SIX, yes SIX DAY party. Probably started at about 10am each day and went on till I eventually passed out listening to the sound of singing.

We went to the Gompa (temple) each day, to start with the drinking. I reckon the WHOLE village must have been there and even though the local women didn’t drink, it was fine for them to force the local rice wine on me… roughly around every 5 mins….  Ahhh many a day I stumbled out to my library class…. A shining example for the kids!

During the weekends, myself and the other volunteers within the region would meet up for treks to near by villages/settlements and were welcomed in the truly hospitable style of Nepali’s..

So the end has come and I am back here in the ever delightful Kathmandu!!

But saying that it has been wonderful to meet up with my friends back here and I will be helping out here in the office for a few weeks, until I throw myself into the meditation centre, in the hope for some kind of enlightment, cause now I’m back here… think I’m gonna need it.

Julia Henderson,
Reporting From Kathmandu, the city of dogs.

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