Jennie from the UK wanted to spend a gap year in Asia doing something to make a difference to the lives of others and she decided to book a trip to Sri Lanka and volunteer.
In this article she reports on her first four months in Sri Lanka helping Aabadha Sahitha Kanthawange Sangamaya, the Sinhalese for the Association of Women with Disabilities (AKASA), which proved more than eventful.
Arriving in Sri Lanka
On arrival in Colombo all of us were really keen to do some aid work and really help Sri Lanka rebuild itself.
We spent 10 days at an organisation named Sarvodayas doing all sorts of jobs – packing boxes, loading and unloading lorries and one day we spent the whole day folding sheets to be sent to the refugee camps. It was a really enjoyable experience and I really felt like I was helping Sri Lanka by doing that.
Last Friday I went to Ambalagoda, an area that was badly hit by a tsunami to help clear a house that had been completely destroyed. Although the actual house was in one piece, all the furniture was completely smashed up, all the clothes had to literally be scraped off the floor and there was rubble, dust and dirt everywhere.
The toilet had exploded, which meant there was water everywhere and it was very smelly! I felt very proud of myself for clearing it all up because it was something I used to find pretty disgusting, actually it was but it gave me so much satisfaction to know that I’d helped a family tidy up their home so that they could live in it once again.
My Placement with AKASA
Moving on to my project. I am working in a residential vocational training centre for disabled women, which is based in the North of Sri Lanka near Anuradhapura.
In Sri Lanka disabled people often suffer from discrimination and therefore struggle to find jobs. AKASA aims to protect these people from discrimination by changing the attitudes of both the disabled person and their community by various projects that help develop their skills and talents. The organisation was established and is now run by a lady called Kamala who is actually disabled herself after suffering from polio as a child.
The vocational training centre that I work at is one of AKASA’s many projects. There are currently 10 students here aged 18 to 34 years and with either physical disabilities, mental disabilities or hearing impairments. I have really enjoyed working with all the students, as they are all such fantastic people and have made my project partner, Jesse, and I very welcome here.
The vocational course lasts for 2 years and in that time the students learn various skills such as sewing, painting, literacy and garden work in order to help them find a good job in the future. Many of the students have been deprived of education because of their disability so we’ve had to help them learn to read, write and count in Sinhala, which has definitely been a big but thoroughly enjoyable challenge.
Role
My role here is to assist the students with their everyday tasks. Every morning we have to get them up at 5.30am (something I that I found very difficult to adjust to when I first arrived in Sri Lanka) and supervise them with their morning duties such as cleaning the hostel and sweeping the yard.
The students start school at 9am and we teach them sport for the first 2 hours followed by an hour of English and then the rest of the school day is spent helping them with their vocational training. Teaching English has proved to be one of the biggest challenges ever because all of the students have completely different abilities i.e. the deaf girls are very good at writing, some students are good at speaking and then there are some who just don’t understand it at all!
For those who can’t even count to 10 in Sinhala, counting in English seems almost impossible but I have noticed that most of them can do English handwriting a lot better than their Sinhala handwriting as it is so much easier!
After school we then have to supervise the girls with washing at the well and cooking dinner (which of course we do help with from time to time!) and then make sure they are all in bed by 9pm. It is a very tiring day as we have to be with the students for 15 hours but I have thoroughly enjoyed my time working with them all.
Adapting to the local culture
Like any job I have had my ups and downs here and my bout of culture shock but I’ve learnt to accept that the Sri Lankan way of life is totally different from mine back home and I feel that this year will have such a positive outcome when I realise how much I have matured even in the last 4 months. Getting used to the Sri Lankan’s lack of organizational skills, time keeping and the ability to keep you informed about what they want you to do has definitely something I’ve had to learn to get used to.
Making a difference
I have been on many trips with AKASA to assist with their other community volunteering projects, which I’ve found really fascinating. AKASA does a lot of counselling work, empowerment programmes and skill development programmes with disabled people in the refugee camps across the North of Sri Lanka.
As a result of the civil war in here between the Tamils and the Singhalese there are a lot of people without homes and with disabilities so it has been a great opportunity to be able to work with these people and hopefully try and improve their lives in the future.
In my first week of being here, I went with AKASA around some poor refugee camps to deliver fresh water and it was absolutely fascinating to watch all the refugees piling up with their water pots to collect the water we had brought for them.
What to expect
Sri Lanka really is a beautiful country and I feel very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to live and work here for a whole year. An island covered in lush green paddy fields and outstanding views is really not something to complain about!
Anuradhapura itself is an ancient city that has many Buddhist’s statues and temples, which are really interesting to look at. I have been really interested in learning about Buddhism during my time here.
The things I used to find strange about Sri Lanka I have now learnt to accept as being something unique to this country and that is what makes it such a fascinating place. When I first arrived I used to find the driving very scary, the way everybody overtakes everything all the time regardless of whether they could cause a crash and the buses were absolutely terrifying the way there is no limit to how many people can fit on or to the speed in which they travel at.
I now no longer find it strange to see a bus driving down the road at 60mph with 10 people hanging out of the door clinging on for their lives, in fact I think I’ve probably been known to do it myself on several occasions!
Food
Moving onto food… my diet literally consists of eating rice and curry 3 times a day! Occasionally we’ll have bread or noodles but this is generally the staple diet in Sri Lanka. The portions over here are absolutely huge; if you don’t finish your meal they get very offended and if you do finish they will give you more and then get offended if you don’t want it! So either way it’s a no-win situation!
I also have to eat with my hands (the right one in particular!), which is great fun, especially as it was always something I was told off for doing as a child! I was very disappointed at the lack of fruit over here as I expected to be bombarded with all sorts of tropical fruits!
However, we do get the occasional mango and papaya that we grow outside the office, which are always nice and refreshing after a very hot and sweaty day (and there are many of those!).
Accommodation
I live in the hostel with all the students except Jesse, and I have our own room, which we have covered in photos, postcards, posters and anything else we could find! We even have bus tickets stuck to our walls!
We do have a Western toilet here but one thing I had to adapt to was the fact they don’t use toilet paper. Instead there is a shower type hose object that you use to wash yourself or if you go to a very poor place with an Eastern toilet (by that I mean a hole in the ground!) there is usually a bucket that you have to fill up with water.
We usually wash at the well with the students after school, which is extremely good fun. Unfortunately it rains quite a lot up here so a lot of the time we have to wash in the bathroom, which isn’t too bad once you’ve learnt to ignore all the spiders, ants and lizards that roam around!
I’ve definitely learnt to appreciate things about Western society a lot more since I’ve been here such as washing machines as we have to wash all our clothes and bed sheets by hand, which after a really busy week is the last thing you want to do! It has been such a learning experience visiting Sri Lanka as a volunteer and not a tourist because it has really opened my eyes to how poor a country can be and how everybody can still live a successful and happy with very few possessions.
Language
If I had one tip for solo female travellers to Sri Lanka, or anyone going on holiday or joining a similar program to mine, try to pick up the language (Sinhala). This has definitely been a bit of a challenge especially as not many people in this area speak English so we’ve really had no choice really but to learn.
I can now say I can hold a basic conversation with anyone I meet but I’m very fortunate in the way that most of my students can only talk basic Sinhala themselves so it is fairly easy to understand them!
I’m also trying very hard to learn to read and write in Sinhala, which has definitely been a very big challenge that hopefully by the end of the year I will have completely mastered! As 4 of our students are deaf, I’ve also had to learn sign language, which I’ve really enjoyed, it’s just a shame I can’t use it back in England!
I would highly recommend volunteering in Sri Lanka
I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience volunteering abroad here so far and have met so many great people in the process. The first 4 months I suppose are the hardest, apparently now it will just fly by. I hope my experience will inspire you to go to Sri Lanka, or apply to volunteer with AKASA.