EHN English Teaching in Bardia National Park, Nepal

Everyone in Nepal was really loving and kind. I never once met anyone who did not want to help me. My host family were really amazing, if I felt ill they were really concerned and gave me the best care, food and treatment I could have ever asked for. They really treated me like part of their own family and were really generous towards me. The children in the school were also very special, everyday they would greet me on the way to school, during the day, in the playground, after school when I was walking home. The children were very respectful, intelligent and obedient and always wanted to learn more about my culture and my life. The teachers were equally as welcoming and friendly and really embraced me as part of the staff, several of them invited me for dinner and made sure that I never felt alone.

My experience was unique and special because of all the people that surrounded me and supported me in a new situation and I really felt at home. I miss them all very much. It was amazing to see how people with so much less than where I come from are more happy, caring and willing to share the little they had with me. It really opened my eyes to an amazing new culture and increased my understanding of how NGOs work. Also, having the chance to visit Chitwan and see the beautiful Nepalese countryside, having a bath with the elephants and seeing how hard the rural women work was something that will stay with me forever.

I think this experience has impacted my future, not only in regards to having a the experience of volunteering abroad, but in enabling me to have a greater understanding of a different working environment, culture and alternative lifestyles. It has also given me useful knowledge of how NGOs work and how they develop their projects, funding and different initiatives. This is something that I am interested in, as I would like to work on making NGO projects more efficient in the long term, I also have many interests in education and environmental conservation; which was partly encouraged by all the natural environment I enjoyed during my travels.

This experience changed the way that I analyse aspects of development initiatives as part of my degree and has given me a more global outlook in what I would like to achieve in the long term. It has also given me a wide network of new friends and I believe the experience has been pivotal for me, in shaping some of my future goals in relation to International Development and the conceptualisation of other cultures. I now see it as much more of a reciprocal process. Personally, it has made me much more appreciative of the little things in life; I lived in a developing country under very basic conditions. But everyday I could look out of my window and see beautiful mountains and walk to work seeing smiling faces. It has definitely made me less materialistic and more conscious.

We are unique in many ways I suppose because our aim is to build an organization that helps people, we don’t actually like charity because we believe that you should use the natural resources of Nepal to help its people. Saying that if organizations want to invest in charity work then EHN are the people to work with because we will provide you exact records of where your money goes and how it is spent. But many come for trekking and volunteering so its only right to use this as a way to fund our work.

Another thing that makes us unique is the passion behind our work, everyone connected to EHN has the drive to do better, help more and see our projects work. When the medical centre was finished and opened we were on such a great buzz for a week. Also the final point is this, we don’t see EHN as a business but as a hobby for helping people, I am currently based in London and I work 50 hours a week here to support myself and then an extra 20 hours min for EHN because I believe that all of the fees should go to Nepal where its needed. One day I will return there to run EHN and take a salary but it will be£2000-£3000 per year rather than £20000 a year needed in the UK.

A good volunteer is someone who can understand that they are entering a third world country and the standards will not be the same. I have seen many volunteers when I was there before EHN was created complaining about the conditions of certain orphanages I know because they were basic. I use to say to them these are basic conditions but think where the children have come from, the streets, mountain huts and other places where life is far harder than in a home. Least where they are now its two meals a day, education and safe environment where they can at least sleep without fear of getting hurt. But what I say to may volunteers is this, don’t be afraid to try everything once, keep an open mind and have fun. You will learnas much from this experience as the people you are trying to help.

With a lot of hard work is the only answer to this. Our personal EHN projects we are constantly working adapting and trying new ideas (if one way fails then we try another) and this is the way forward by never giving up. Its not easy to work in Nepal as many people know but things can be achieved if we are willing to adapt to the situation.

Regarding projects we support every volunteer can provide feedback and we because we donate far more than most organizations to the placements we also have a certain say in what goes on. Currently one placement wants to set up on its own because their partner organization isn’t supporting them. So we have said we can give you website support, provide more volunteers and if you find several other placements in the area then we will send them though you which will provide more support. But as with us there is a catch the standards must be kept up to ours.

EHN have actually refused to work with a number of orphanages and a monastery (my colleague was met by the head monk who was driving a range rover which in Nepal costs around £50,000 which put us off straight away) because the money clearly doesn’t go where it should. We have a duty of care to the volunteers as well as the placements.