New projects and open vacancy!

Samudayik Sarathi has recently started two new projects: Street Children Survey and School for Manohara slum.

Details of the Street Children Survey

 

The amount of street children and other unmonitored children has grown in Kathmandu Valley. During the past years, the migration from rural areas of Nepal to urban areas, especially to Kathmandu and Pokhara, has caused problems for many people, when their hopes and thoughts have not matched with the reality. Several reasons are behind this migration movement: hopes of earning more, having a better life and provide better education for children are usually factors, which drives people from rural to urban areas.

When the life does not take its expected way, many families end up suffering from extreme poverty. Poor social and economic situation is often associated with low quality of life. Children tend to seek a way to escape and sometimes this way is been found by starting a life in the streets.
In a co-operation with social work students, Samudayik Sarathi is conducting a survey in which street children and NGOs working with street children are interviewed. Key Informant Interviews will also be collected.

The objectives of the survey are:
– To identify and track the amount of street children in Kathmandu Valley
– To examine street children’s backgrounds, social circles, employment and financial situation and substance use and the impact of all these on children’s lives
– By interviews, to examine the factors, which are causing children to start their lives in the street and unwillingness to return home
– To examine current service gaps
– To suggest and put in action measures in order to reach more children and provide services to them accordingly

School for Manohara slum

Samudayik Sarathi has started to build a preschool in Manohara slum (building plan above). At first, 3 classrooms will be build and yard constructed. After opening, the school is expected to have over 100 students.

There are no changes in the opening times of Samudayik Sarathi’s Community Center, which will keep running even after the school has opened its doors.

For the new school Samudayik Sarathi is now looking for a principal.

Details of the open vacancy can soon be found at Samudayik Sarathi’s website http://sarathinepal.org/vacancies/

 

Christmas Kathmandu experiences and our new products!

Last weekend Samudayik Sarathi was present at Christmas Kathmandu 2014, which was organized in Jawalakhel. Despite the rainy weather and cold wind, we met many warm-hearted people, who were truly interested of our work.

We were also selling some of our products in order to raise funds for our Community Center in Manohara slum. We sold sweaters, toys and vases (made by the women of Manohara), Christmas cards (made by the children of Manohara) and paintings. Out of the profits, certain amount will be paid directly back to the women, who made the products and the rest will be used for the facility improvement of our Community Center. At the moment, our children are in a need of interactive toys and education materials for learning and studying. We are also hoping to be able to purchase some furnitures, to make the Community Center’s environment more pleasant. Since children are also provided lunch at the Community Center, we will also target in providing nutritional and healthy food.

Would you like to support our work? Here’s what you can do!

If you wish to support our work, there are many ways how you can help.

1) Purchase our products. We will be opening our internet-based “shop” soon. Meanwhile, if you wish to purchase a sweater, clothes, painting, vase, toys or books please send us an e-mail to: info@sarathinepal.org
On sweaters and vases we have various colors and prints available.

2) Buy our Christmas cards. These are currently available in Pilgrims Book House and Tibetan Book Store, which are both located in Thamel. You can also visit our office in Thapathali.

3) Make a donation. This can be done either by our website, by cheque or stop by on our office

4) Share your expertise. We are constantly looking for new ways to improve our work and expertise of our staff.

Thank you for your support and keep following our blog for more exciting news, which will be announced soon!

 

Training days at Manohara slum

Samudayik Sarathi, in a co-operation with the Embassy of Israel, organized a two-day training for the women of Manohara slum. The women were taught, how to use puppets as a way of teaching children about sanitation and hygiene. On the first day of the training, knowledge was shared concerning sanitation and hygiene and first glances towards using puppets were learnt. On the second day, women were divided into groups, where each of them made their own puppet and created a short puppet show concerning the topics of sanitation and hygiene.
Lessons learnt: Through stories, puppets can teach children about sanitation and hygiene in a way, that child listens. Health education through puppets is a possibility, which gives parents more chances to tell about safe environment. Samudayik Sarathi is very excited about this new possibility in the field of health education!
And we all had so much fun!