Volunteer Profile: Michael
Michael Reflects on His Experience as a GCE Volunteer
The meaning of the word “Namaste” can be expressed as “The God in me recognizes the God in you.” A sentence that I have been chewing on for the last two months like a piece of bubblegum that never runs out of flavour. In the same mouthful, the word devotion has too been stuck in my teeth since moving to the quiet little town on the banks of the Budhi Gandaki river to teach English.
The word devotion runs through Nepalese culture like crystal waters run through the Himalayas. Devotion to their deities, culture and the land they call home. Devotion to the earnest daily living. But most notable, the devotion characteristically defined in their service toward each other. No truer depiction of this service, this embodied devotion, was found than that in the daily workings of Baladevi Secondary School. While sitting outside under a large tree nibbling on a green mango given to me by a young boy, I was fortunate enough to observe this rarity of the human condition, this embodied devotion. As the gong rang, signaling the beginning of class, I saw a young girl of no older than fifteen, walk past a classroom of unsettled six-year-olds, peer in the window, stop by the door, and then after a moment she removed her shoes and walked in. The youngsters settled and she spent the next three quarters of an hour attending to the class in the absence of the teacher, giving up her own lesson, to teach theirs.
On a separate occasion, at break time, I watched one of the older Class 10 boys skillfully launch a stick towards a cluster of green mangoes hanging twenty feet above, sending them plummeting to the floor only to be eagerly gathered by a group of eight-year-old girls, sharing the good ones amongst each other. In class one day, while teaching the little ones about a certain cat that sat on the mat, I saw no less than three students tear out a page from their own books without hesitation to hand to the young boy who did not have a book of his own. Whatever your definition of devotion is, there can be no denial of the effect to which the people of Nepal live in service of each other.
Daily life at the school was mirrored by the profound beauty to be found outside. From morning walks amidst tropes of butterflies and greenery never before seen, to afternoon strolls along the river looking for a comfy spot to watch the sunset while listening to the chorus of exotic birds, something mesmerizing could be found around every corner. This may all sound like something out of a dream, but no good thing comes without its challenges, and there was no shortage of those. I learned quickly that being “in charge” of a class of six years olds that cannot understand a word that is coming from my mouth, would require a more thoughtful approach. Slowly but surely, I came to learn the shapes and the gears that would fit together to make each class tick, so that eventually I was able to become a part of the ‘little living machine’ that is Baladevi Secondary School that moved in its own way; and it was this ‘little living machine’ that carried me. I also learned that the Nepali word for mango is “ap” pronounced “up”. So when playing volleyball with the kids under the big mango tree, shouting “up, up” to them, did not always produce the expected result!
I knew my time at the school would change me for the better, but I was not sure to what effect. They say that the kingdom of heaven can only be seen through the eyes of a child, and in the short number of weeks I shared with those kids, I was allowed my very own little slice of heaven. I believe that the purity and joyous wonder that children inherently move through the world with may just be the closest thing to experiencing God that we get while walking this earth. And let’s just say that the God in me was not just recognized, but cherished, loved and held in turn by the same small hands that I flipped through picture books and picked “ups” with.
I could use words like heartwarming, touching and special and they would all be appropriate to describe my experience. But at the end of the day, that’s exactly what it was, an experience. And the Baladevi School changed me in a way that can only be experienced, and for that I am forever grateful.
