Alliance Nepal is an amazing NGO, working on the forefront of improving communal life, eduction, environmental awareness, etc. in Nepal. Krishna Timilsina, member of Alliance Nepal, was available for an interview.
How does Alliance Nepal try to improve education and quality of life for the people?
The main focus of Alliance Nepal’s work is to improve educational awareness and enhance the lives of villagers through improving education development within the community.
Alliance Nepal is working towards setting up Learning Centers in villages.
The Learning Center will provide students, young people of community and villagers with the opportunity to learn computer skills, dress making and other income generating activities whilst acting as an information resource center.
Another key program of alliance Nepal is to improve education and quality of life for the people in the volunteer program. Our volunteers provide education in villages where schools lack teachers and methods. Depending on the level of our volunteers, we are providing trainings to teachers on modern methods. Students get the platform to practice English. In Nepal we are learning about English but do not learn English in English environment.
Only volunteers from different lingual backgrounds are creating that environment. With them, students are in a real communicative situation with volunteers. So there is learning. I feel they make a great impact on improving their English.
At the same time, we are providing support to families in their day to day life. We are helping families to improve accommodation, tidying up our environment and learn many things which change their lives. Volunteers in Alliance Nepal programs often form lifelong friendships with their host families and other volunteers.
How would you describe the lessons volunteers learn from working with you?
Volunteering your time abroad to help others is a life changing experience that will give you the opportunity to work and live side by side with local people. You will undoubtedly learn new skills through having to adjust to new situations and challenge yourself by volunteering in a developing country like Nepal. In fact, volunteering can be a great way to develop skills, learn more about career options, make friends, garner new professional contacts, get exercise, spend time outdoors/with kids, or even just shake up your routine.
In the process of meeting your personal and professional goals, you are also serving as an effective volunteer, helping to meet the goals of your particular volunteer project and/or helping to move our organization’s mission forward, it’s a win-win situation.
Lastly, don’t forget that sometimes it just feels good to be appreciated; as a volunteer you can contribute unique skills, experiences, and perspectives.
Volunteers are involved in important projects throughout the country. Also, with Alliance Nepal. Be it in programs for street children, assistance on teaching, disaster rescue or rebuilding Nepal, volunteers have taken up a major responsibility.
The earthquake in May 2015 was a terrible tragedy. How is the situation today and what does Nepal need the most right now?
Centered in the Gorkha district, the earthquake was the most powerful to hit Nepal since the 1930s.
The devastation was immense, both in towns and the countryside where entire villages were leveled.
Well over 10,000 people are known to have died. Thousands more were seriously injured and hundreds of thousands have been made homeless. The relief effort has still to reach some of the most inaccessible mountain areas. More then 3 thousands school were damaged by earthquake. Still, People living in tents are facing the danger of landslide during the monsoon season.
How important is the work volunteers do for Alliance Nepal and Nepal in general?
Volunteering is a valuable experience from which both you and your hosts will benefit. Alliance Nepal’s mission is to work as a facilitator and motivator to improve the quality of life of disadvantaged people.
Being a helping hand and support center for the holistic progress of marginalized communities, we work as a path finder of the local clubs and groups to achieve their goal of social justice, equality, prosperity and development. In this mission, volunteers are on the forefront to support us. Most of the volunteers are experts on something. There are no boundaries to support.
In the process of Nepal’s development, international volunteers have a great history.
For example the peace corps and UN volunteers have been involved in the educational and economical development of Nepal. We’ve had a recent example to underline the importance of volunteers in Nepal, which we can barely put into words. After the earthquake in Mai 2015, thousands of volunteers from different countries came to Nepal and helped stabilize the land greatly.
For now, the focus in Nepal is on helping those people who desperately need for permanent shelter and education. And there’s still a lot of cleaning up to do. It’s going to take some time, but many countries are doing what they can to help Nepal get back on its feet. Alliance Nepal was on the ground in earthquake hit areas, and we were working to bring immediate aid to rural communities in the wake of this horrible tragedy at the first two week.
In the second stage, we encouraged and built the construction of sanitary facilities and houses so that epidemics wouldn’t break out. At the same time, we tried to bring education up and running again. We have decided to buy corrugated aluminum sheets for them and built temporary schools.
Our team has recently returned from the remote region of Gorkha. In the third stage, we are going to start to build permanent school buildings from November onwards.
We ask anyone who is willing for help. All skilled and unskilled volunteers may apply on this program.
What would you like to tell the people of the world, who want to volunteer in Nepal or help in another way?
Traveling to a different country and experiencing a different culture can be a scary experience at the best of times, but when you are immersing yourself right into the culture through volunteering and living amongst the local community, this apprehension can often be compounded.
While safety can never be totally guaranteed wherever we are in the world, Alliance Nepal do all they can to ensure your volunteering project is as safe as humanly possible. You are placed in trustworthy institutions and reliable accommodation situations all of which have been inspected and experienced by us. Alliance Nepal offers a number of services you simply will not receive with any other organization.
-Affordability- One of the main motivations behind the formation of Alliance Nepal was to provide volunteers with high quality, safe and yet extremely affordable volunteering opportunities in developing country in Nepal.
Many people associate low cost with low quality – not us.
Volunteers for Alliance Nepal programs often form lifelong friendships with their host families and the people they assist on the volunteer programs. However they also form strong bonds with the other volunteers they meet, work and live with on their placements.
Despite many volunteers coming from extremely dissimilar backgrounds, the experiences that these volunteers share forge strong ties that can last a life time despite their vastly different home cultures.
During your volunteer placement you will always have support close at hand through our local team of experienced staff, while Alliance Nepal will be in regular contact to ensure your volunteer experience is everything you expect it to be.
Volunteering is a valuable experience in which both you and your hosts will benefit through cultural exchange and learning from one another. There is also the opportunity to explore Nepal further like trekking, jungle safari and exploring the stunning and diverse landscape that make up this unique country.
“Volunteers don’t necessarily have the time, but they have the heart.”
Alliance Nepal
The
main focus of Alliance Nepal’s work is to raise educational awareness and enhance the lives of villagers through improving education development within the community. A key aspect of this is through working towards setting up a Learning Center from the volunteer and cultural program fees. The Learning Center will provide villagers with the opportunity to learn computer skills, dress making and other income generating activities whilst acting as an information resource center.
Social Impact
Over the last 4 years Alliance Nepal has been successfully working towards its goal of education enhancement within the village. Alliance Nepal will continue working as a catalyst of social and economic change in a number of surrounding villages in the Pokhara area.
Apply now!
You are interested and you want to apply for an Alliance Nepal volunteer program? Find volunteer programs in Nepal here and apply now. Alliance Nepal is waiting for your application!
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