Living in Nepal, the life story of an ex-student

Voluntarily

In 2003 I went to Nepal to do a half year of voluntary work. I had nearly finished my teacher training course and had a few credits left to earn. During my stay in Nepal I wrote columns for Sensor, it was therefore a nice surprise when Sensor contacted me to ask me about my life now.

Jobs

When I got home in 2003 I finished my study to live together with my girlfriend in Aalborg. This city lies in the most northern part of Denmark and is with its 200,000 inhabitants the fourth big city in this Viking country. During the first year it was hard to find a job, and I took all chances I got. Not all experiences were that entertaining. But a good result was that I had learnt to speak Danish fluently in a short time and got myself a job at an international school.

Combine education and charity

In the end of 2004 I started my study International Relations & Development and I realized that I wanted to combine my educational background with voluntary work. That chance occurred when had to set up a vocational training programme for the foundation.

Great efforts to help others

The last four years have been a great experience, in which we helped to set up projects for young kids and their mothers in the hills of Dhading, which provided them education, medical care and a fair income. We gave orphans a new start at the boarder of Tibet, we helped an eco-village to stand up in Sankhu, we helped children from the stone quarry to go to school and with grants we could manage to keep a couple of hundreds of kids inside the schools. We did great work.

Monkeys making a mess

Besides working in Nepal there is also living in Nepal. For my journey in 2006 I made a to-do-list for my spare time: hugging a rhino, make a yak and play a football game at the Everast Base Camp (5300 meters high). So far, I haven’t managed to do the first two, but the third caused me to go down-hill with a headache. Together with my girlfriend Jo I live in Kathmandu, a city which looks like it has bursted, because so many people settle themselves here every year. The housekeeping is a chellenge, when you come home and you find a smiling big monkey in the middle of the living-room with food all scattered around the floor, because you forgot to close the balcony door…

Work at the office

The Nepalese government has the intention to deliver free primary education of good quality from 2015 on. Therefore, a plan has been made in 2009, but it has to be worked out now. A lot of money is needed to do so, and it comes from the government mostly but also from donors within and outside the government. The department of coordination of foreign help coordinates the donors and I support the team and have contact with the donors about what must be done with the money, what must not be done, what things costs etc. I work in three districts where we try to offer all children free and good education. My work is very broad. I work with different cases. It differs from a village school to the national teachers’ training. 

Ambiguous feelings

When at 5 pm the office becomes empty, I grab my stuff and leave for home on my motorcycle. After four years, I still have to laugh when I have to wait for a cow standing right in front of me, and remains there until it finally moves again. I still feel sad when I see the glue-sniffing children in the gutters of the formal palace when I pass them, and I still have to sigh when raindrops have chased the smog and the clouds away and allow me to take a short glance at the white tops of Himalaya. 

With my head bowed and a sideways nod, which will be a habit for the rest of my life after four years here, from Kathmandu:

Namaste.