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Nepal Orphans Home Newsletter
  "There's no such thing as a small act of kindness.
Every act creates a ripple with no logical end." -Scott Adams
Editor:  Liz Early Fall 2018

PAPA'S UPDATE

There is a lot to share in this update. I am touched by the evolution of our children and organization and will be writing about that and more. But first I am writing this under the eclipse of Hope’s surgery which will take place in Greensville, SC, the other side of the planet from me, at 6:45 pm my time, just 4 hours and thirty minutes hence.

  

Hope is one of the most impressive children, scratch that, humans I know. She has never questioned her missing feet, nor has she ever complained. When she falls, she quickly offers “I’m okay” for my sake, I believe, and carries on with a smile.

[Continue reading here…] 
 

CECC Update (plus Happy Dashain and Tihar!)
By Prashanna Bista, CECC Director
 

Update from the Chelsea Center:
The Weekly Schedule-

We developed a schedule for the vacation with a daily Zumba Dance Class (7 am) and Computer Class (9 am-10 am). We organized other activities such as a morning tour, creative writing, Chelsea Ambiance (Decorating the Chelsea Center), Chelsea Tedx (a platform to share weekly experiences during the vacation), a tour with mentors (a day to explore the local market of Kathmandu Valley), professional exposure (an opportunity to visit real life work setting and interact with professionals), 108 Vocabulary (remembering and learning the use of 108 new English words), and a Let’s Play Deusi program (an event to celebrate Tihar festival by singing and dancing).

All the activities included working in teams, brainstorming ideas, creating an action plan, preparation, and performance/presentation. To highlight a few: on October 25th we took the students for an organizational visit to Zegal (an IT company), The Hotel Woodland, and Nepal Medical College. On October 26th a group of four students visited Bal-Mandir (Baby Orphanage) and on November 5th, two students interested in Media Studies visited M&S (Media House).

 


On the day of professional exposure, an IT professional explains his work to the students. Anupa and Srijana (grade 10) told me they know the basics of the software the professional was using at Zegal. They were the happiest on this day for they understood the work of the most experienced professional of the company.

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The price of apples was Rs.175 per kilogram, and we paid Rs.150 after Rajan (grade 10) negotiated. This was the first time Rajan negotiated. I think while negotiating for the price Rajan negotiated the taste as well—truth to be told the apples were not tasty.
 

Debrief Session-

Hearing the students share their experiences, I realized this simple visit and interaction had a profound impression in the hearts of these young learners. They were very thankful for these exposures and I felt thankful to Michael (Papa) who came up with the ideas. I am thankful for our daytime teachers Anuja Niroula, Jashmina Thapa, our evening teacher Waro Basnet, and one of our volunteers Santosh Chetri as well who helped us make all the connections. I believe this exposure added a lot of value to the understanding of Papa’s House students.

AND, for the first time ever in the history of Papa’s House, we are going to celebrate Tihar festival by playing Deusi. Deusi is a joyous way of celebrating Tihar, where people within a community form a group, visit different houses within the community, sing the Deusi song, dance and offer blessings to the family. Since Papa’s House is a community into itself, Papa’s House kids are preparing to play Deusi in Dhapasi Community.

The kids are preparing for the Deusi with excitement and utter enthusiasm. To add to this, there is a group students who made a commitment to learning 108 new English words. At 5 pm in the evening, on the Papa’s House ground, I am working with a group of ten students to remember and learn the use of 108 new English words. Isn’t it a great beginning?!

Our vision guiding these activities is to encourage the NOH students to learn, grow, experience the growth, and express the experience.
 

* * *


Happy Dashain and Tihar!

Dashain-Tihar is the longest Nepali festival, which goes from October 8 to November 12. Most of the schools are closed for more than a month.  With Dashain reaching near, all of the students in the city started preparing to go back home for the first time in a year, in most cases. Unlike any of my previous holidays at Papa’s House, I noticed that the students were happy to go home and, at the same time, they were sad to go away from the Papa’s House for a month.

It was a fun and a wonderful learning experience for the kids who stayed at Papa’s House during this vacation, as the way it was envisioned to be. We organized different activities for the students—we designed all the activities to give a fun-learning and practical life experience to the NOH kids.

On October 9th we led an Orientation session to introduce the set of activities for the Dashain-Tihar vacation. That evening we took the kids to Pashupatinath Temple to attend the special Worship Ceremony. Since we had a smaller group of 20 students, we took a public vehicle (unlike other tours where we had to hire a bus). Since the students were not used to travel in a public vehicle it was a challenging experience, but the tour was fun. Some of the students had to push themselves to pay the bus fare which they had never done before. They said that interacting with the bus staff to pay the bus fare was a tough task.

 

Gomati holds Sandip’s hand before the bus started.
The warmth I saw in the eyes of the kids on that day is still fresh in my memory.

 

Sumi leads a group of Grade 7- 10 girls across Durbar Marga Street, on the day of tour with mentors. I never imagined crossing a road could be such a huge challenge for someone. The students practiced crossing the road several times that day.

* * *
 

Read below for our children's firsthand accounts of their Dashain-Tihar vacation experiences:

My Meaningful Journey
By Anupa

I went to an IT company to get exposed to the work that the IT experts do. To be an IT engineer was cultivated within me from an early stage of my life. So I was very excited to get exposed to my future profession.  The IT expert’s work has sown the seeds of further curiosity in me. And learning new words every single day was a marvelous feeling. After these two useful activities, I started to make my future plan with great enthusiasm. This vacation offered me an opportunity to fill myself with renewed energy to my life.

My Experience
By Sarita

This vacation was the most effective one for me. I enjoyed a lot in this Dashain vacation. I also learnt some activities. I learnt dance steps and I learnt new words and how to use them. I also learnt how to speak English better.

Lesson from this Vacation
By Gita

This was the most productive vacation ever. I experienced that I profoundly improved my writing skill during this vacation. I was able to utilize my time in productive ways which also helped me create a new vision for my life.

Playing Deusi Bhailo
By Sita

We had played for two days deusi bhailo and has al lot of fun. This was my first experience and we went to different houses. We were with Prashanna dada, Waro sir, Nawang sir, Sumi, and some of the adults of our house who has passed out SEE . We had practiced the dance before Tihar and we performed the dance in different houses. We danced with the owner of the houses. We went to Sunita mam's house and had dinner in her house where there were various kinds of curry. We had a lot of fun. Every morning we shared what we had done with Papa and he said that it sounded fun.

My Vacation Experience
By Srijana

As an individual I experienced that this Dashain vacation was full of zest. During this vacation a lot of opportunities knocked at my door, but I could only welcome a few. I did my regular zumba class followed by computer and Chelsea decoration classes. We went to visit many serene places like Jhor, Buddhinilkantha, Krishna Mandir, Dada Gau and many more.

Eventually, I along with my pals who were interested in the field of IT wanted to visit somewhere and get exposed to it. So with the help of Prashanna Sir, we went to one of the IT companies of Nepal. It was a wonderful experience visiting there. We asked many questions that were inside our heart for decades. One of the website designers explained how to design a website. I was contented as we had already learned Html and css with Rahul sir and the website developer was also using the same Html and Css along with Java script to design a website. I gave a little tap on my shoulder which is taught by Auntie C to express my blissful vitality. By being exposed to this field my interest towards IT has been raised thousand times.

My Experience:  The Leader Within
By Mina

It was early in the morning and I was just planning for the vacation. I like spending time away from the monotonous life that we have for 11 months. On the same day as I was planning for my vacation, Sumi came to our house to share ideas for the vacation. I really liked the plan that they had made for this vacation.

After Dashain, we had small meeting about decorating the classrooms at the Chelsea Center. I was very excited about it. We were divided into three groups. We all had good leader to help us. They all had marvelous ideas to share with us. We were happy to decorate our classroom.

From this activity, I learnt that we all are leaders and if we want to do something, we just need to go for it. 
 



Volunteer Spotlight Follow Up-
Maleny High School Hosts NOH Staff

By Saroj Dari, Himal Shahi, and Chham Gurung
 

In the last newsletter, Shreya Upadhyay wrote about the experience of a group of 24 volunteers from Maleny State High School, Australia.  These students and chaperones had such a memorable time that they raised enough money to bring 6 Nepal Orphans Home Staff members to experience Australia! Below, you will read highlights from Saroj, Himal, and Chham’s trip.
 

 

 

Saroj Dari:
 

I couldn't actually believe that we got visas and were going to Australia until we got there. My excitement going to Australia kept me awake for the whole 12 hour flight and 6 hour layover.  After going through security in Brisbane Airport, Robyn - along with some of her team - jumped and ran towards us to welcome us. They welcomed us with big hugs. The road was really smooth and I started noticing things that were different to Nepal.

 

Robyn and her team had made all the plans already- they had plans to give us all the Australian experience while we were there. The plans included taking us to the ocean, boating, Sea Life Mooloolaba, abseiling, visiting Australia zoo, bushwalking, seeing a campfire, going to the cinema, and much more.

 

Visiting the primary school (River School), Maleny Primary, and Maleny High School was a great experience. I had never seen children enjoying nature and music in school before. They were very excited to meet us and to learn about Nepal. They had lots of questions too. The people in Australia were really friendly and helpful to us. The food was really good and didn't make us miss dal bhat.

       

I couldn't believe 21 days had gone so fast. I'm very thankful for Robyn and her team for working so hard for us and making this trip possible. This trip has really changed my life and all the experiences given to us are going to last in my heart forever.

 



Himal Shahi:

 

We spent the last week of our trip visiting different schools, taking some classes with the students, giving presentations, doing drama, and telling the Australian Kids about Nepal. I was really impressed by the education system and the environment that the school provides for students.  Teachers were really into their responsibilities and paid a lot of attention to the kids to take care of the them emotionally and physically. They made sure that each kid was happy to start the day and asked the reason behind it.  There was more teamwork and collaboration rather than the homework.

 

There was so much respect to the kids from teachers. Creativity was all over the place from the kids with the support of teachers. The primary school students were learning to grow vegetables, managing waste materials, learning different languages, learning to take care of the animals, and learning woodworking.   Dance, drama, carpentry, and art classes are different classes than we have here. Research was the big part of their learning as well as inventing new things. Every teacher was wonderful at teaching and took their responsibilities seriously, where you don’t see that here. There was respect for new ideas and the students’ creativity from the teachers, whereas our education is based on whatever is in the books and they teach the same things for many years. I wish we had a similar education system where there would lots of invention and discovery of new things.

 



 

Chham Gurung:

I was so full of excitement, surprise, and honor, when we were welcomed by the Australia team members and their families. I had a really wonderful trip and made the best memories with the Australian families.

We were invited to visit the Australian zoo. It was such an great opportunity to see so many different animals and birds that are different from those in Nepal and and their habitat in the zoo. We were also on TV, online, and published in an Australian newspaper.

For a few classes, I taught some Nepali folk dances that the kids really loved. We played soccer and did lots of fun activities. Some adventures we did were bush hiking, climbing some Australian mountains, and rock climbing. We also went to beach, did lots of swimming and so many surprises full of entertainment. I also promoted and advertised my trekking business called "Four Brothers Trekking" in Nepal.  For more information, visit www.fourbrotherstrek.com

The country is so big.  It has lots of open space, is full of greenery and is surrounded by an ocean. Things are so beautiful and the roads are so much wider. They have a clean environment and no traffic jams. I wholeheartedly thank the whole Australian team from the bottom of my heart for an such wonderful trip to Australia, for all your support and for your love and trust.
 


THANK YOU FOR YOUR DONATIONS

On November 27th, join the #GivingTuesday movement, an international day founded to celebrate and fosters giving.  Fueled by social media, #GivingTuesday is a great way to promote organizations you believe in to family and friends.  Please share this link http://greatnonprofits.org/org/nepal-orphans-home-inc with the hashtag #GivingTuesday on Facebook & Twitter.

Nepal Orphans Home receives no government support and relies on the contributions of individuals sharing our mission to provide for the welfare of children in Nepal who are rescued from slavery, orphaned, abandoned, or otherwise not supported by their parents.

Please help support our amazing kids by making a donation in any amount at our website. Get an inside look at Nepal Orphans Home for donation ideas.

If you would like to make a donation of stock, please contact Peter Hess at pehess@davidson.edu to obtain the routing number for our account.

Did you know?!  You can contribute a penny for every internet search to NOH by designating Nepal Orphans Home as your cause on the GoodSEARCH search engine 

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