Teacher training without my right hand woman and a morning at Bagnas

When I was at Amrit we asked if there was anything that they needed for the first aid box, a women asked for more sanitary pads for the girls, which got me thinking. After a bit of research about the Nepali culture surrounding puberty, menstruation and contraception, I thought that it was a topic that needed to be covered by some sort of teacher training. As I am the first woman that Manisha UK have placed in Nepal I thought that I was in the perfect position to deliver such training. We invited one woman from the secondary schools to come to Tansen for this training.

In previous generations, and maybe now in some remote villages, women were exiled from their homes during menstruation. They had to sleep and eat in cattle sheds and were not allowed to cook or touch cooking utensils that the rest of the family were using. They were not allowed to be touched and were not allowed to go to school. These traditions are now changing and as it is a topic that I am confident to speak about I was really enthusiastic to make this meeting happen.

The women who came were happy to share their own experiences and stories, as was I, and the whole meeting was a really positive one. The teachers that came were very happy and kept repeating their thanks for the training and how helpful it had been for them. I also bought 100 sanitary pads and waste bins for the disposal of the pads. I had to make it very clear that they pads were for emergencies and not for everyday use as this would become unsustainable and all the women and girls would start relying on Manisha to always provide them, which is something I really didn’t want.

The following day, the 14^th, I walked over to Bagnas for the morning. I had the intention of spending the whole day there, but there was a wedding in the village to less than half of the children were in school so it didn’t seem like a very good use of my time to spend the whole day there. I spent some time working with a community paid teacher there who is brilliant and voiced her concerns about not wanting to teach whole lessons that day as the other children would miss out. I was also able to observe the head teacher there which was very interesting. The children here are always a pleasure to be around and are very keen to learn.