Over the last few years I have been working to break out of the static inward-looking "children's home" mentality that is so prevalent in Nepal. This has been reflected in offering more to the children who are in our care than merely catering for their basic needs and education. Accordingly our Child Education, Development and Reintegration (CEDAR) Programme incorporates elements like introducing children to activities that will identify and develop other, non-academic, talents (see my post of 11th Feb on The International Award) and encourage children to become good young citizens who are socially aware and up for a challenge in life.
Recently I have been considering out to take CEDAR a step further by broadening our service provision to the communities that lie in the locality of our children's facilities in Godawari, near Kathmandu. This would allow us to work beyond the refuge walls offering rewarding activities to underprivileged children in the neighbourhood and to fully incorporate our resident children better within the wider community through involving them in projects with village children.
To get the ball rolling on this embellishment we've just started an in depth needs analysis to establish what we might do in future to help the local community's children. Over the last week UK-based volunteer Mike ("Mac") McCurry has been trudging through rain and muddy hillside with our local researchers Bijay Karki and Reena Paudel to lay the foundations for the study. Their early findings have been thought-provoking. Although Mac goes back to UK on Saturday he will continue to support Bijay and Reena from afar in their research and report writing for the guidance of the Trustees of the charity.
I joined them for a stroll today, looking over possible landsites for our future children's facilities that will serve as refuge and community centre. One in particular that caught my imagination was a very verdant one that I gather could one day have the planned Kathmandu outer ring road ploughed through it. Maybe if we can get there first we can develop it very sensitively preserving its wealth of flora and fauna and hope that the ring road skirts around us and through a less environmentally sensitive area. An intriguing project.
At the end of the tour I called to see our local Director's home which is now under construction. Shailaja is very proud of her bungalow, not least of the large hall that she has incorporated into the construction. With a chuckle she told me how she could use this as a children's recreation facility during the school holidays.
Shailaja can never resist the temptation to take some "work" home.
