There is too much that has happened to try to write about all or even some of my experiences over the past month, so I am just going to write about the present time. I am currently sitting at a table outside with my laptop at the Swayambu cafe, a small cafe with wireless internet a 10 minute walk from our volunteer house in Kathmandu. We had about an hour and a half to eat dinner tonight so I decided to get away for a bit to get a change of scenery and some time alone. This is something that always seems like a great idea in theory but I don't always make the effort to do. Tonight I decided to just go for it. In a weird way, many times being here in Nepal reminds me of being at camp. I think it is just this sense of absolute freedom to roam around without any responsibility, wear t-shirts and baggy pants, eat when you want, socialize, etc.... it's like the entire country of Nepal is free to explore and discover. It's an awesome feeling. I am now sitting here by myself drinking my second cup of coffee at 6:45 p.m. just because I feel like it and am not thinking too much about anything. Just enjoying this time to myself.
Today the people in the women's thematic group visited an organization in Kathmandu called F-PAN which deals with family planning in Nepal. We spoke with the director of the organization asking him questions about contraception to gain information for the work we will be doing in the villages. One of the main goals of the Women's groups will be to educate about family planning - different methods of contraception, what side effects to expect, why it is important, etc. At first I had a lot of mixed feelings about doing this work. For one thing, it felt like a very personal issue to be dealing with. How is it okay for us as Westerners to come into these villages and impose our ideas on these women? Secondly, I am not convinced that the Depo-Provera injection that is given every 3 months is the safest way for these women to practice birth control. It seems strange to take these Western inventions and give them to these women whose bodies work differently, with different diets, a lot of physical labor, etc. and without informing them of the side effects hope to solve the problem of overpopulation. These were my initial thoughts. In our first group meeting I kept going on and on about how there must be more holistic, natural methods of helping these women.
One of the main issues is that without contraception, women in Nepal do not wait between having children. There is some crazy statistic, which I do not remember right this second, about how many women have children within a year of giving birth. Aside from the obvious problems of not having enough money to feed a large family, and that these children are forced to become child laborers, which leads to health problems and more extreme poverty, these high birth rates are dangerous and physically harmful to Nepali women. So, family planning, like all the other work we will be doing here, is a larger issue on both a societal level and the level of individual families. These issues are complex and all very interesting. I sat there in the F-PAN office today wondering how I got here to a place where I am able to use my skills and experience to help doing exactly what I am interested in?! I am fascinated by these health related issues. I am really enjoying doing the research involved and am very much looking forward to working with the women in Mahadav Beshi. I am so happy to be working in the Women's Group. I attribute a lot of the reason I chose to work in this area to my experience in the Sterling Women's Weekend this summer. The Weekend made me so much more connected to my identity as a woman and my connection to all types of women. I am not sure I would have felt this way before doing The Weekend. I used to have feel a certain stigma whenever hearing "Women's" related things but now I feel so drawn to it. As much as I love children, and little Nepali children are the cutest, I know that the Women's Group is the perfect place for me here. The social work aspect and health related issues are a perfect fit for me and I am so thankful/excited to have found myself here.
There is much more to say (I have a feeling I will be ending all of my posts this way), but I need to head back to the house soon and the electricity just shut off so I am now sitting in pitch black by candle light. We are leaving for the villages Sunday! I will have my cell phone there but no internet access. The closest internet access to Mahadav Beshi is a half hour drive away. I am not sure how often we will be going. For those of you who have asked me... my cell phone number here is: 981 - 822 - 6210. I will continue to write. I love and miss you all!
Today the people in the women's thematic group visited an organization in Kathmandu called F-PAN which deals with family planning in Nepal. We spoke with the director of the organization asking him questions about contraception to gain information for the work we will be doing in the villages. One of the main goals of the Women's groups will be to educate about family planning - different methods of contraception, what side effects to expect, why it is important, etc. At first I had a lot of mixed feelings about doing this work. For one thing, it felt like a very personal issue to be dealing with. How is it okay for us as Westerners to come into these villages and impose our ideas on these women? Secondly, I am not convinced that the Depo-Provera injection that is given every 3 months is the safest way for these women to practice birth control. It seems strange to take these Western inventions and give them to these women whose bodies work differently, with different diets, a lot of physical labor, etc. and without informing them of the side effects hope to solve the problem of overpopulation. These were my initial thoughts. In our first group meeting I kept going on and on about how there must be more holistic, natural methods of helping these women.
One of the main issues is that without contraception, women in Nepal do not wait between having children. There is some crazy statistic, which I do not remember right this second, about how many women have children within a year of giving birth. Aside from the obvious problems of not having enough money to feed a large family, and that these children are forced to become child laborers, which leads to health problems and more extreme poverty, these high birth rates are dangerous and physically harmful to Nepali women. So, family planning, like all the other work we will be doing here, is a larger issue on both a societal level and the level of individual families. These issues are complex and all very interesting. I sat there in the F-PAN office today wondering how I got here to a place where I am able to use my skills and experience to help doing exactly what I am interested in?! I am fascinated by these health related issues. I am really enjoying doing the research involved and am very much looking forward to working with the women in Mahadav Beshi. I am so happy to be working in the Women's Group. I attribute a lot of the reason I chose to work in this area to my experience in the Sterling Women's Weekend this summer. The Weekend made me so much more connected to my identity as a woman and my connection to all types of women. I am not sure I would have felt this way before doing The Weekend. I used to have feel a certain stigma whenever hearing "Women's" related things but now I feel so drawn to it. As much as I love children, and little Nepali children are the cutest, I know that the Women's Group is the perfect place for me here. The social work aspect and health related issues are a perfect fit for me and I am so thankful/excited to have found myself here.
There is much more to say (I have a feeling I will be ending all of my posts this way), but I need to head back to the house soon and the electricity just shut off so I am now sitting in pitch black by candle light. We are leaving for the villages Sunday! I will have my cell phone there but no internet access. The closest internet access to Mahadav Beshi is a half hour drive away. I am not sure how often we will be going. For those of you who have asked me... my cell phone number here is: 981 - 822 - 6210. I will continue to write. I love and miss you all!
Ahhh the multiple side benefits of doing the Sterling Women's Weekend!
ReplyDeleteMira, saw your dance, couldn't help thinking that I wouldn't have wanted to be the woman on the end! LOL! Loving your accounts and what a hard set of choices these women are left with...do they even want to practice birth control? How does one weigh the cost/benefit ratio side effects vs longterm health issues...individual vs community! Complex for sure. Keep those posts coming!
Abrazos y besos! Auntie M
Mir this is so fascinating! I want to hear all about the kind of work you are doing with these women and the struggles you went through in weighing the benefits of family planning vs. the seeming-cruelty of imposing our medicines on women with such different lifestyles. I'm reading a book now that I think you would like. It's called 'The End of Illness' by David B Agus. It talks about the body as a holistic complex system and thinking about treatment and prevention in that vein. Love you so much. Hope to talk to you soon.
ReplyDeleteJen