VaaO episode 6: 10/12/2016 - 'Creativeness overloaded'

Today was our 6th day at the orphanage. Today we did lots of different engaging activities. At first we gave each child a balloon, which we had bought for them. They all enjoyed inflating it and then asking us to tie it for them. This was our starter activity- to get them active and going. Then we played some music and then gave the kids books to read for sometime- some read books and some played with the football. Later, we gave them drawings to color and blank pieces of paper to the ones who wanted to draw. Results were fascinating! (pictures attached). While most of the kids were drawing or colouring, a few kids were sitting in the other side of the room. I went there and I saw them play with the football, basically what they did was they flipped around one of the chair and used it as a basket and use the football as a ball and played basketball. (Picture attached). This was such an innovative and creative idea- literally they played basketball with a chair and a football! We all were very happy to see those kids be so creative! Towards the end, we gave them the pack of juice we had brought for each kid, they enjoyed it! Also, I have a few stars of the day; who came up with the idea of the basketball game:

1. His name is Sowropp Tuladhar, he is years 8 old studying at Kantipuri school
2. His name is Sabin Magar, he is 13 years old studying at Kantipuri school

Today was really fun overall!

VaaO episode 5: 3/12/2016 - 'Beautiful Bracelets'

Finally after 8 weeks we went to the orphanage today :( We couldn’t go firstly for the 4 weeks because of dashain- we had gone outside and also the kids of the orphanage were gone away for their holiday. After that we had a school charity activity which we had to attend from our school for the next 2 weekends. Then in the previous 2 weeks the students at the orphanage had gone for a picnic so we couldn’t go :(

Today, we reached there at 11:00 pm, the kids were excited to see us and they all said “Namaste” to us. Seeing those children always makes me happy since they always look very excited and eager to learn from us. They expect a lot from us and we expect a lot from them too! After reaching the orphanage we first made tang for them and served them tang. We had music playing in the background so they enjoyed and were engaged as well as  entertained. Then we kept the reading books we had for them on one table and they came and picked one and started reading. Some students who probably didn’t enjoy reading much they played with the football which we had brought for them. After sometime one of my friend had brought a box which had items to make bracelets. All the children were very excited, they all ran towards us, which made me immensely happy. We guided them at first on the steps to make the bracelets and then they were so smart on their own that they didn’t even need our guidance later on. Each and every student made a bracelet for themselves. After making the bracelets, we did the mannequin challenge with them (video attached), which they hopefully enjoyed. Last but not the least we had a few colour pencils, so some of them drew very nice pictures and some played games with their friends such as tic-tac-toe and hangman. Me and one of my friend went outside and played football with the “sporty” kids who were eager to play football for sometime. (Pictures attached!).
We all finished by 1 pm.

All of us enjoyed these 2 hours spent with these astounding, astonishing and awe-inspiring children. We hope to see them again next week!

An educational essay I had written last year:

HOW TO REDUCE HUNGER IN TANZANIA - ESSAY. 

Tanzania is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It is bordered by Kenya, Burundi, Zambia, Malawi and the Indian Ocean. Tanzania borrowed money from MEDC's -> lack of money. The interest rates later rose and Tanzania couldn't pay back. Cuts were made to public services by the MEDC's. The number people in the population rose without any education. Education lack lead to poor land management; not enough money-> malnutrition. Which lastly meant that it created hunger in the country. Low income lead to poverty which then lead to low intake of food. Diseases like Marasmus and Kwashiorkor spread out to children's; disabilities. This meant that they can't work properly later on and have a very low income. This is the poverty cycle which kept on happening. 27,000 deaths of children PER DAY! Can you believe it?

 I believe that the best solution to reduce hunger in Tanzania is Farm Africa! This will help them because they teach adults and children how to manage their own livestock and crops in a sustainable and profitable way, befitting the whole community. Improved ways to manage their crops, livestock, forests and access to water. They will be provided by a goat which will cost Farm Africa thirty pounds per goat! Therefore, this will reduce the amount of hunger because they can profit by selling the crops at a high price since they will be very good quality. They can also sell the milk which they are getting by the goat; 3X more than a cow, to the people and earn money from it and use it for their children's education. Their children would be provided with pure nutritious milk which will be a good diet for them and enough protein for the day. This option is sustainable because it helps the locals education and education is something which can be passed onto generations. Education is the key thing to life.

 The reason why I rejected the other three options was because the other three options were not as sustainable as this one. They were also not very profitable. Firstly, I rejected drop the debt because it was not a very sensible idea since the MEDC who the LEDC has borrowed money from would not want to lose all their money which they lend to the LEDC’s. Another problem was even if the MEDC agrees to not have the money they gave back, it would still not be helpful to the LEDC because they are not yet developed; they still need money. It will not progress the development of the country by doing this. Secondly, I rejected Alternative food sources because it is not environmentally sustainable option because if the people have not grown up eating insects then they will not be able to eat insects for all their meals and it will disgusting as well. If we would have grown up with eating insects then it would be normal for us to eat insects and we would love it. If we all eat insects at a regular basis then the insects we eat will be extinct and we would run out of them, so it is not sustainable. Lastly, I rejected Family planning group because it is not socially sustainable. You can’t just go up to a family and say that you are only allowed to have 2 kids per family and teach them about having safe sex. This option also involves money but no one is financially supporting it.

 However, there is one disadvantage of my decision which is that Farm Africa needs a very big company to financially support them because all the equipment for farming which they will be giving out to the farmers will cost them a lot of money. Paying 30 pounds per goat will not be cheap as well, so they will need a lot of money and great donations from very rich organisations.

 There are some good points about my rejected options they are, drop the debt will help the LEDC for a time that they will not have to pay the money back and losing much more money than they borrowed which will very strongly financially support them for a short period of time. Alternative food source would be a good thing to do since it will mean that nobody will be hungry and the food will not be unaffordable for the poor people. It will be eating insects which will have much higher nutrition than normal food, it will also be convenient to grow, keep and sell. It would save a lot of time and money. Family planning would be a good option because it will never cause overpopulation and if there will be less humans in the society then less food would be consumed. It would also reduce the number of child death rates.

 In conclusion, I believe that the best option for Tanzania would be Farm Africa because it is the most sustainable and profitable out of the four even though it is a bit expensive and would have some financial problems. Farm Africa would not harm the environment or the people in the society at all so I think it is the best option to reduce the hunger in Tanzania.


Written by- Shreyas Agrawal Y-9B

VaaO episode 4: 01/10/2016 - 'Tattoo making'

Today was the 4th day of us visiting the orphanage. It is very fun when we go every week to an orphanage to help children, it is an honour to be able to attend and a golden opportunity. This week we were running a bit short on time since most of our team members needed to leave at 12 PM instead of 1 PM, so we only did the activity for 1 hour this week. That 1 hour was more than enough to give us satisfaction and make the children have a happy time and day! In that 1 hour we managed to do various activities efficiently. The main activities we did were:

• Tattoo making on their hands.
• Coloring
• Music and dance
• Reading
• Played football
• Team building activities
• They watched us do cards tricks
• Distribution of pen and pencil to the children by us.

At the end of our activities we wished them happy Dashain (a very big and famous festival in Nepal at this time of the year). We also told them that we would not be coming for the next 3 weeks because it is Dashain and we had holidays from school, some members were going on a holiday but most importantly, most children won’t be there and they would be going somewhere for Dashain, so we told them that we won’t come too. I’ll miss them for 3 weeks!

VaaO episode 3: 24/09/2016 - 'Lets paint'

Today was the 3rd day. Today’s main focus was on painting/hand printing. We split the group of children into 2, one group is instructed to read and the other group is instructed to paint or hand print (for smaller kids). Today’s episode will be focused on a particular boy/girl who was the star of the day!

Star of the day:

The name of the star was Minesh Limbhu. He is 11 years old, studying at the Pinagal Academy school. Today, all students were amazing but this boy was an exception. He made a very good painting and he challenged himself, that’s what I liked the most about him. We had told him to do hand printing but he said he wanted to make a painting, so we said okay. He made a masterpiece which was unexpected. Picture attached.  He was also a very nice and kind boy, followed instructions and listened carefully to us. He had also introduced himself very nicely. He was a confident speaker, wasn’t shy to talk to us. We all liked him very much. All students had made a painting or did a hand print, but his painting and the amount of effort he had put into that work was above our expectations! He had also helped me organize all the paintings. The way he had read was beneficial not just for him but 3 other children as well. He was basically reading a book and then 3 little children came up to him, who didn’t know how to read English very well, so as he was reading his book he was translating the story into Nepali and explaining it to the other 3 children which was indeed very impressive. We all just loved him!

VaaO episode 2: 17/09/2016 - 'Change your station'

Today was the 2nd day. Me and my friends (Nin-waam, Sneha, Tencho, Suvrat, Dhanvi)- we are doing this together in a group because it will be more beneficial for children at the orphanage. As a starter activity we played passing the ‘passing the parcel’ game with them and whoever the parcel had stopped onto had to say there name, age, school, class and what they like the most. Then, after a few minutes we divided them into 3 groups and made a circuit. One of the circuits was coloring, another was reading, and the last one was sports activities. Each group was at each station for 20 minutes with 2 of us on each station with them for help. They rotated and went to the next activity after 20 minutes, and then again, so they all got a chance to do everything. To finish off, we played music for the last 15 minutes and gave them freedom to do what they liked and wanted to do. Some danced, some played football, some read, some played indoor games, etc. We also gave them chocolates just before leaving! It was fun overall!

Volunteering at an Orphange (VaaO) episode 1: 10/09/2016

After organizing this great opportunity to volunteer at an orphanage with friends, we all met at the Swimming pool, Satdobato at first. Then we all went to the orphanage and met the lady in charge and I talked to her and told her that I came last week, and then she welcomed us inside. It was very nice of her. We went to her office and told her the days and timing we are planning to come at and what we will be doing generally. She was very happy and so were we. She introduced us to the children, there were about 30 children and then each child stood up and introduced himself/herself to us. The children were approximately 6-14 years old. They all seemed very well mannered and nice children and they were. After a while when we got to know them and since it was the first day we mostly only played with them and they did what they wanted, we just guided them  roughly. In a while, the main owner of the orphanage arrived. She was a kind hearted and a nice lady. She welcomed all of us and asked us where we are from, our names and why we are doing this. She also welcomed us by giving us all a scarf. Picture attached. Another thing, we were so excited about this that we even forgot to ask the lady’s name!