by Anna-Marie Guiney

01 October 2009

Kathmandu, Nepal: It has been seven months since I left my home country, Ireland, to embark on my one year placement as a UNV volunteer Intern with UNICEF Nepal.

When I landed in Kathmandu, I was driven straight to our office section and introduced to my supervisor who then gave me all the reading material relating to my job. Needless to say, it took me more than a night to get through it all!

I began my work immediately the next day and was sent to one of our programming districts for a week. It was great to visit some of the schools that UNICEF is supporting so quickly into my placement, as it started me off with a sense of the practical activities taking place. These including learning about the opportunities and challenges of implementing a water, sanitation and hygiene programme in schools in Nepal.

My main job has been to work closely with one of our NGO partners, which is implementing a programme to build district capacity on school water, sanitation and hygiene education in four districts in Nepal. This has included training local NGO trainers and engineers on child, gender and differently abled-friendly concepts and facility designs.

As my own experience has been in gender issues, I have had the opportunity to really focus on the gender aspects of the training, including encouraging a higher representation of female trainers and engineers from the NGOs and the gender aspects of the actual programme.

Menstrual hygiene management, for example, has needed increased emphasis in this programme. Trainings in schools now include this as a comprehensive topic, so that female stakeholders have the opportunity to learn more about managing their menstruation in school and male stakeholders have an increased appreciation of the importance of it.

As a team, myself and the NGO team members have developed a user-friendly training package for NGOs to use in schools as part of a one-week training. I have also had the opportunity to conduct training sessions, which for the first time are specifically on menstrual hygiene management in schools. Now UNICEF is hoping to put increased emphasis on this issue through the central Government level as part of a nationwide campaign in the future.

Next step, to start building toilets!

I work one day a week in the offices of our NGO partner and this has been great for building trust, sharing ideas and understanding of each other’s positions as donor and partner organizations. It means that I feel like a team member of the NGO on this programme as well as being responsible to UNICEF at the district and central level and to the Government of Nepal.

So far, it has been a very interesting experience for me working as a UNV volunteer here at UNICEF Nepal in the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene section. Every time I think I understand a situation, my perceptions are challenged again… I don’t think the learning will ever end!