A VOLUNTEERING EXPERIENCE

I was going to volunteer; mad I didn’t know what I was thinking. What a waste of time! Was I mad or something like that? I must have been out of my mind. Well or maybe it was the greed for certificates that made me think so. I just passed my 12^th grade, what else could I think of? I wanted a well managed education and I just saw that chance abroad, not here! And I heard that a volunteering certificate could make it a lot easier for getting a scholarship. I just wanted certificates; as many as I could collect.

Then I went on for it. I attended the orientation of National Youth Service of Youth Initiative, a volunteering program and also a volunteering platform. Even there, I was just concerned about a certificate and I just kept wondering when the presenters will jump to the certificate part. Well they did obviously and at the end I just registered myself for some opportunities if they came along! No sooner I got a call from them and there was my chance to just pile some certificates, I mean that’s what I thought then!

I met with the presenters as they had called me for confirmation and a sort of counseling. My job was to go to the ‘Community Learning Center’ of Naga Tole, Pulchowk, Lalitpur and help the kids there with their homework and ECA for at least two months with 2 hours of service per day from 5p.m. to 7 p.m. each day excluding Saturdays.

I thought to myself, “That’s it! That’s all I got to o. seems to be easy.”

But who knew what lay ahead. The problem that I faced was that I was alone so I just convinced mu friend too with those words of a certificate. He was finally ready to join. We went for the first day and it was obviously an awkward situation. I just kept staring at the ducks enjoying as they themselves were enjoying their world on a patch of grass. It made me think a lot, suddenly disturbed by one of my new student. She approached and began asking some mathematics question and just kept me busy. This was the first day but the next day I got mixed in their group. It was fun I do admit but I hated children so, it was not that fun.

Days passed on, me and my friends getting closer to students day by day and suddenly a storming change approached me without a warning and surely an incident was responsible. It was ‘Teachers Day’ and unexpectedly we were in for a surprise. They celebrated the day as if we were someone great, a leader, a family to them. I just couldn’t help myself; I mean the respect they showed me and my friend I had never ever loved or respected anyone so much. It just hit my heart, my heart cried silently.

Whole night I kept on thinking, “What had I done to get that respect? Did I really deserve it?” I just couldn’t think of anything I went blank with every seconds. And that was not all that was waiting. Their exams came and ended and finally it was time for their results. At that day a kid, one of my students, he came around me, sat down and handed me his report card with a sort of a compliment that made me stare speechless and proud…..

“Sir, because of you I have passed my exams and look I have come second”

For him it was just a small sharing but for me it was something I never expected. “Did I really do it?” I didn’t know but each second I was changing and one more day came and it entirely changed my thoughts as if flushed away, as if blown away by a hurricane. One of the students as she was doing her homework she suddenly stopped looking at me she said………

“Sir, if you weren’t there then what would have happened to us! We could have been the worst. I hope you won’t leave us sir!! Please don’t leave and even if you do find us someone just like you!” with a big smile and hopeful eyes.

I was again speechless and I just wished I could cry or something like that but none could happen. I just smiled back with a heavy heart, I don’t know why? And since that day my view of volunteerism has changed. I no longer wanted just a certificate, but that place, those kids; they taught me something they didn’t realize. They taught me that the world is always short of help. Happiness I gained but not through things I had expected to gain from but just form a bunch of kids who showed what happiness meant, though they didn’t even realize that.

These are just a few moments of my experience and it has happened nowhere far but within the country, within the valley, with a proud kid who once thought that no one can be happy and volunteering; well it’s just for certificates. Well finally he learnt it’s a lot more than that!

-Ashish Bhandari