Olga's December 2008 Email Dispatch

Dear Friends,

Greetings from dirty, polluted, but loveable Kathmandu. Nepalis do not celebrate Christmas, but the foreign community does its best. We’ll have Father Christmas arriving on Christmas Eve at J House, carrying a “doko” (the local carrying basket) filled with gifts for the little kids. Things are going well here – the kids are wonderful, as always, and we are getting ready for a big push in west Nepal in mid-January to rescue indentured girls in the Bardiya District and to celebrate the eradication of the bonding practice in the Dang District.

Many of you have seen the PBS documentary made earlier this year about this project. (If you haven’t, it is available to view from our website, www.nyof.org, or email us at info@nyof.org and ask for a copy on DVD.) The program opens with a picture of Sabita, a little girl who was sold at six years of age to a family to baby-sit their children, and it shows the grief of her mother at having to do this terrible injustice to her daughter because of economic necessity. Now let me tell you the back story behind the filming.

 
             Sabita and me, with her house and her father in the background

My job during the filming was to keep the village children, including Sabita, away from the film crew and their interviews. One thing I have discovered is that the contents of an average American woman’s purse can keep Nepali children entertained for hours. (I tried it first in Kenya years ago on a ten hour bus ride, and it works just as well there.) There is the tape measure and the recording of the height of each child in a little notebook, the mirror, the lipstick, the use of the lipstick, the nail scissor, and the magical appearance of a nice-smelling moist towelette from a tiny plastic packet, one for each child. Then the group recitation of the alphabet and numbers in Nepali and maybe in English, the writing of same in the notebook, and finally, when the going gets desperate, the naming and drawing of various animals based on my incompetent efforts to imitate their sounds (quack-quack, moo-moo, chirp-chirp). Even allowing them to get into our four-wheel drive vehicle and pretending to drive. The goat we gave Sabita’s family when she was rescued as compensation for her lost wages looked on complacently, as befitting an expectant mother.

Sabita, like the other village children, was funny, amused, curious, lively. But I sensed an underlying sadness about her, which I attributed to her traumatic experience as a bonded laborer at such a young age. As it turned out, while she was indentured, she cried constantly in yearning for her family, and had to be sent home before the one year contract period was completed. Now she is in school (at NYOF’s expense), and we plan to support her education through high school. This will save her from early marriage and enable her to make a better marriage when the time comes, and she is more likely to use family planning and to educate her own daughters. Pretty good for a $100 initial investment!

That’s all it costs to liberate a child from bonded labor, bring her home to live with her family, provide them with a piglet or goat which they can sell to make up for her lost wages, and pay her education expenses for a year. After that, it’s $68 a year to keep her in school.

• Wouldn’t this make a great Christmas gift for someone on your list?
• Or how about $350 to save the life of a severely malnourished baby and educate his/her mother in child care so that the condition won’t recur?
• Or $75 to sponsor the education of a village child for a year?
• Or if you’re flush, the sponsorship of a child in boarding school or at J House or K House, among the best children’s homes in the country, for $1700 a year?

If you donate through our website, you can immediately send e-cards notifying your friends of gifts made in their honor. Our office will follow up by mailing a beautiful honoring letter on handmade Nepali paper to your honorees. We think changing our world, one child at a time makes a pretty great gift.

In spite of the global financial crisis, dollars go far in Nepal, and can accomplish more good here than almost anywhere else. Especially if, as NYOF does, they are used efficiently and effectively. You don’t have to take our word for it – Charity Navigator has given NYOF its highest rating in recognition of the cost-effective way in which we operate.

Oh – and a wonderful holiday to you all and my most profound thanks for all your help and advice over the years.

Warm regards,
Olga

NYOF will be on PBS again, with updates! 

The episode of PBS's NOW program that aired last spring will be broadcast again on Friday, December 19, with updated information about the former child slaves featured in the show. To find out how Sabita and others are doing now, watch this episode. 

Please check your local listings to find out when the show will air. Afterwards, we plan to put a link to the episode on our website so you can watch it online. Please pass this news on to friends who might be interested in our work.

Please donate your equipment 

We want to thank everyone who generously responded to the request we made for office equipment. These donations enable us to minimize expenses in the U.S., and support as many children in Nepal as possible. Our office in Sausalito, California is currently in need of a projector that can be connected to a computer, a screen for a projector, and computer speakers. If you have any of this equipment that you can bring to our office or that we can pick up, please email us at info@nyof.org or call us at (415) 331-8585.

We can give a presentation to your organization about NYOF 

Are you are a member of an organization, church, or other group that may want to learn more about NYOF? A member of NYOF’s staff can come to your group to give a presentation or speak about NYOF’s work to transform the lives of children in Nepal. Please email us at info@nyof.org or call us at (415) 331-8585.