They chorus while they dance standing in a circle, bending their knees and stretching their arms. A group of people has gathered in the compound of a house which is surrounded by black smoke-fuming chimneys of brick kilns at Sundal of Bhaktapur.[break]
The kids, whose parents work at the brick kilns, are performing Hokey Cokey, a participation dance popular in English speaking countries, along with 12 British Council Active Citizens from Scotland while the Nepali Active Citizens cheer them.
The Scottish Active Citizens from four groups - Green Finger, SAIV, Forward Scotland and Future Balance - arrived here on an eight-day Volunteer Exchange Program on March 20. They came to Bhaktapur on Tuesday, March 25 to observe and learn about fellow Active Citizen Diwakar Adhikari’s award winning Social Action Project -Accelerating and Educating Brick Kiln Children.
It is not a normal day for the kids who live in a terrain deserted by continuously digging Caterpillars and surrounded by stacks of bricks -some burnt and waiting to be loaded on pickups to drive to construction sites in Kathmandu and some yet to be baked.
The kids abandoned their schools back home and came here accompanying their parents, who left their villages to labor at the brick kilns for six winter months. The families, who are struggling to make some money until summer, do not care much about their kids’ education, health and hygiene; their sufferings remain unnoticed and their stories untold.
Kids are delighted to be treated so nicely and to learn new games, though they could hardly understand a word the Scottish were speaking.
As soon as Hokey Cokey is over, a Nepali song is played on a cell phone.
“Nacha nacha! Nalajau (Dance, dance! Don’t be shy),” the crowd cheers the little girls while their handclaps synchronize with the music adding to the excitement of the girls with the young Scottish ladies joining them.
“I learnt games and I feel really good,” are the only words shy Sarita Shrestha, 5, says while sheer happiness is seen on her smiling face.
Soon after that, a Scottish lady starts drawing squares on the concrete floor with a piece of brick for the game called Hopscotch. The program also includes the volunteers teaching alphabets and arts to the kids.
On the way, we meet Dambar Shrestha, a laborer at Brahmayani Devi Fixed Brick Kiln, who, according to Diwakar, arranges laborers for the brick kilns.
“I bring laborers from Ramechhap district,” says Dambar. “They come here for six months in winter and spend what they earn in summer back home. Many kids don’t go to school as they work at the kilns,” he says and adds, “The kids are learning a lot through this program and they will do well in their schools in village,” he adds.
Diwakar proposed the project while he was a trainee of Active Citizens in January 2010. “We were asked to come up with a project that is self-sustainable and can be conducted without funding from donors,” he says. “The project is also supposed to bring about changes in the community.
“The Scottish team got interested in my project and wanted to see how this project has been implemented,” says he and adds, “So they are here today to learn about how kids have been benefiting from the project.
“I live here (in Bhaktapur) and I see the kids playing in the mud and eating with dirty hands,” he says.
He adds that he felt pity for the children and so decided to come up with a project for them with the belief that if they become aware, they can improve their health and hygiene.
When his project was awarded, he received a grant of Rs 33,000 from the British Council to spend in his project.
“The project mainly focuses on making the kids aware about education, personal hygiene and aims to minimize health problems in the communities,” Diwakar asserts.
“At first, I selected 10 children who went to school back in their village and arranged admission in Saya Bangal Primary School,” he says. He further informed that the children are from different backgrounds and have different eating and living habits. He gives them an orientation class of one hour four days a week and also takes them to health posts for regular health checkups.
Altogether 150 kids have gone through the orientation classes that last for three months.
“It’s not an academic class as in schools; it’s more of an awareness class,” he says.
When asked about the exchange program, he says, “The program is mainly focused on things that they can learn from what we’re doing here and what we can learn from them.”
“It’s really good and also helpful,” Alice Kenny, 18, of Active Citizen, says excitedly and adds, “I feel really nice to meet people with same ideas.
“The British Council asked if we were interested in forming relationship with community groups in Nepal, and we said yes,” says Sandra Renicks, 48, coordinator of Active Citizens Program in Scotland.
“I’ve learnt about the projects here and some of our problems are similar. It’s really good to see that people are developing solutions to the problems,” she adds.
She further expressed that the volunteer exchange program is inspirational as participants can learn from each other and one can improve one’s projects. It also brings people together. So the program is really helpful.
“Through such programs, you become aware of things you want to change and things you need to change,” she adds.
The Scottish team learnt about other different projects of Active Citizens during the Volunteer Exchange Program from March 20 to March 28.
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