One thing from today though that was very interesting was a session about development issues in Nepal. Now call me ignorant but I'd never thought of Nepal being an especially poor country. This, however is not the case. The three major areas we looked at today were:
- Health: although heath is generally improving there are still many issues, for example 67% of children are stunted and 50% of them are underweight at birth. Due to measures brought in to reach the MDG for maternal health, the maternal mortality rate has been reduced from 415 in 2000 to 229 per 100,000 live births.
- Education: although 96% of children are enrolled in schools, the retention levels are very low and the numbers are often skewed. The average amount of years spent in school for males is 2.49 but only 0.6 for females.
- Gender: 7% of girls are married by the time they are 10, 40% by 15 and 51% by 18. Arranged marriage is still acceptable and although the age to be married has been risen, many villages do not abide by this. Women face many exclusions and discrimination, especially in rural areas.
In addition to this Nepal doesn't have much political stability. There have been 21 governments since 1990 and no elections since 2002. Nepal also suffers a lot from natural disasters, not helped by climate change.
For me the gender inequality was what hit home the most as I feel very strongly about this issue, and it was the theme of my project in Tajikistan. In addition to the training I also met one of the long term VSO volunteers who is working on an amazing project called Sisters for Sisters, which helps to get girls into school. She had a lot of really interesting stuff to talk about and it really is one of the best parts of working for VSO, as you get to meet so many interesting people with such varied experiences.
Despite the problems Nepal faces, VSO have been doing some great work through both the long term volunteers and the youth programme. The three main areas they work on are education, health and livelihoods, with cross cutting themes of gender and climate change. VSO have selected 20 districts across Nepal and aim to help women, youth and other marginalised groups.
On a lighter note...
After our training, SJ and I headed out with the two Nepali Team Leaders to go and buy fabric to have a traditional outfit made. Not as cheap as Tajik dress but still very cheap compared to the UK. I've had my measurements taken (was not impressed with the numbers, need to get hiking) and providing I don't look ridiculous I'll post a photo when I go to pick up the outfit.
Of course no outfit is complete without shoes, and I cannot resist a bargain so of course I picked up some shoes too. Here's mine and SJ's (pasty) feet with our amazing Nepali shoes.
The shopping was good because we got to spend a bit of time with the Nepali girls (funnily enough my male counterpart Rahul didn't want to come) as we've only been training together so far. They're really sweet but there are some clear differences between our cultures, especially our ways of working. The programme is all about cross cultural working though, so it's all part of the learning curve.
We've found a great little restaurant near where we live which makes amazing mo-mos, which are sort of like a spicy dumpling containing either chicken, buffalo or vegetables. I can't get enough of them at the moment, which isn't going to help me improve those measurements!
I'm writing this against the clock because we've had no electricity in the guest house all day and I'm running out of charge on my laptop, so that's all for now. I was having a bit of a rubbish day yesterday as I realised just how hard and challenging this is going to be, but my spirits are high again now and I'm really keen to meet my Nepali volunteers next week.
Lizzie x
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