Hello, I’m Brittany and I’m writing to tell you about my experience with my volunteering placement which many people from St Mary’s Church made possible with their kind donations that I received at my stall after mass back in January. Thank you all so much again. I volunteered in Nepal during February and March with the International Citizenship Service and Restless Development.
My placement was in Boshan which is a rural (incredibly hilly) community just outside Kathmandu. I worked with three other UK volunteers and three Nepali volunteers to present our project to the stakeholders of the community. We aimed to focus on livelihood related projects which included career development, savings management and waste management. Unfortunately my placement was cut short by the coronavirus outbreak, however I had an amazing experience and we still managed to achieve lots.
During our time in the community we successfully completed twenty three sessions with students in the local school. We ran sessions with students aged ten to fifteen mainly around career development in which we talked about goals, enterprises and vocational training. We hosted an extracurricular quiz competition for the whole school which had an excellent turn out and had the students and teachers motivated and engaged. One of my personal highlights was the menstrual cycle awareness and sanitary pad making session which we ran – it really brought together the members of the women’s group and created a space to talk about a subject that is often taboo in Nepal.
I will be forever grateful for the personal growth that I have experienced. The combination of being far away from home and immersed in a new culture, learning about so many new topics, meeting many brilliant people within the community and other volunteers gave me confidence and resilience that I’ll carry with me for a long time.
I have now moved on to the third and final stage of the ICS journey which is Action At Home. Of course, plans have changed due to covid 19 but i look forward to helping out within the local community where i can. Thanks again, Brittany.
