IR Binus Student in International Youth Volunteering Chapter India 2019
On March 23rd to 27th 2019 perhaps is the greatest experience that I have for this year. I have the chance to volunteer in the slum schools in New Delhi and Aligarh, India. It was not a long ago that I have heard about the terrible condition in India. In the end on 2018, I saw this information on needing volunteer to go to India on March 2019. Short story, I applied the forms and finishing the requirements. Then in January 2019, I got the interview by phone, 1 week or 2 weeks later I got an email with the attachment of my Letter of Acceptance, I was so happy that I know I will not only be having regular experience because this is my first time on being international volunteer.
On the first night in India, we gathered around in the room and had the briefing about what are the activities that we will do tomorrow and what kind of items that we should bring. The variety of the volunteer itself are quite diverse, in Indonesia there are 19 volunteers that were accepted and 1 from Egypt. All of us, came from different background and field. Some of us are actual teacher, and some of us are university students like me, and some of us are the employee of a private company, and most important the volunteers came from all across part of Indonesia from Sumatra to Papua. And we do have 1 in common, which is our high social awareness.
These 20 volunteershave been divided into 3 groups, 1 for healthcare team, 1 for education team, and 1 for social team. We have a task to do based on our group that we are in. The healthcare team will teach the children about health and so are the rest of the group will teach the children based on their category. I was in the social group, where I was raising awareness to the children on anti-bullying and sexual harassment. The response that I get from the children are quite fantastic, they all so active and always raising their hands to ask more and more.
In India, I have learned that you can even find the biggest gap in the world, for example, you can even find the richest person and you can find the poorest people at the same village. It also applies to the education school there. Where I visited the slum schools, I feel so horrible seeing this children study on the literally on the ground holding only one book and one pencil. Most of their parents are jobless and some of the parents are scavengers. But their spirit to study is quite amazing, I told them the story of the rise of their Prime Minister Sir Narendra Modi, when he was a kid, he is just a tea seller and he never give up until now he is the most powerful man in India. The response of the children is quite overwhelming. The teachers in their school are volunteers, they do not get paid either, it is pure of our social care for them.
Even though, my experience in India is only for a week, but the knowledge and the memories that I had there are incredible. It makes me want to be more active in the social field, especially another opportunity on the other international volunteer program. But of course, in the national experience too. Let me close this story by quoting other volunteer saying “I may only be one person. But I will be that one person who makes a difference”.
