Namaste, Hello, How are you? – Volunteering in Kaule 2009
Imagine yourself arriving in the middle of the hills to a small blue windowed cottage, dogs lying around in the sun, and a warm welcome is coming from the people already living and working here for months. Imagine that is going to happen after a week walking and negotiating in the dirty streets of Kathmandu and you feel at home all of a sudden. So the place, the project takes place – overlooking Kathmandu and facing the white ranges of the Himalayan -, makes you feel home very soon. This is an important thing for you being in a foreign surrounding which at first isn’t familiar at all. But also the surrounding village and its people became familiar and like a small family quite soon. Already after two days we’ve got an invitation to a wedding in the village and some days later we went to a dinner at the place of a farmer who is taking part in the project. All the other community members were around and we had a great evening with them, eating the national dish ‚Dhaal Bhaat’ and dancing together till the stars were twinkling. You wonder how we were talking? Well, as far as one side could just speak English and the other side could just speak Nepali or Tamang, the local language here, we tried to talk with hands and laughing, which worked out quite well. But why not learning a little bit English? So Alina’s idea of teaching the members and their children some English started the next days. A small cottage was found and in the evenings after the fieldwork for the farmers and after the project work for us we met there: in a small room, mattresses on the floor and very interested pupils sitting on the floor as well. It was an overwhelming experience. Already the walk to the small schoolroom was like going through your village at home saying „Namaste, Hello“ all the way along. In the lessons with the help of a nice translator from the village we had the young children at first, who were very keen on improving their English skills. We had much fun together teaching them small English dances and songs, and afterwards the adults: already asking for pen and notebook before class even started, giving us a plate full of strawberries to say thank you in their way. The first dialogues in English with the farmers started soon: „How are you?“ we asked, and then we heard the first weeks a „How are you?“ plus a laughing back. But after a while the right answer was given, not a „How are you?“ anymore but an „I’m fine“ combined with a great smile and a nice giggling. Also when the farmers came to our cottage to take part in a training program we could „talk“ this way. And so it went these days. For me the most impressive situation, which I still have in my mind now being back at home, was an old farmer lady. I gave her a paper on which I wrote her English name (Budda Laxmi) just to have it for herself. The next day she handed me back the paper, having practiced her name over two pages long. She probably never had a pen in her hand before. These are moments, which give you back a lot. And so the project in total gave me a lot. I also tried to contribute something to it with helping to clear the project site to make place for new plants, to put concrete on the walls of the cottage to protect it from heavy rainfalls and to take care of the project site in general. For me the best was to be able to do so many different things like teaching, working outside and being able to learn how to mix cement or how to built a fence. This is possible because Alina gives you a free hand to do what you feel after. So every day was different and an adventure itself because in Nepal there is always something happening: the water-tank is breaking or the electricity is not working anymore. With nice people like other volunteers from all over the world and at first Alina around you can face those problems better and at the end of the day sitting on a camp fire you can laugh together about it. Finally you can see all the small steps the project is taking towards its aim and you feel how the farmers realize what they have to do in order to improve their situation. And all these little moments together make it a great adventure for a volunteer coming to Nepal with some expectations and going back with a lot of great experiences. At the end of this report it is time to say „thank you“ to Alina!! Just her great organization, work and enthusiasm make this project possible! Dhaanyaabaad, Thank you, Dankeschön!
Marie
