Volunteering in India: A Life-Changing Experience
In 2023, I spent 2 weeks in India volunteering with Plan My Gap Year. They have many different volunteer programs but the project I chose was teaching English and Maths to the local children who were unable to attend public schools. These children lived in the local slum and during my time there I learned so so much.
It’s safe to say that by the time I arrived in India I was well prepared for unforeseen circumstances. Having been stuck in Qatar for 15hrs on my flights over, I exited New Delhi airport at 5am with no service and waited for my arranged airport transfer to find me. There was a thick fog that morning and paired with the pollution of India’s capital, visibility on the roads was extremely poor. Actually, that’s an understatement – you could see no more than a couple of feet in front of the car. The roads in India are chaotic at the best of times so how we made it to the volunteer house in one piece amazes me, because the only way the driver knew where to turn was from memory!
It’s no secret that India has a high percentage of the population living in poverty and the slums are something we are taught about at school, so you’d think you’d know what’s coming. Yet when I saw it with my own eyes, I felt such a wave of both sadness and gratitude. The kids had their lessons in the park opposite our volunteer house as their school building was waiting on repairs. They climb over barbed wire and a brick wall to get there, arriving in misfitted clothing, some with no shoes, but with an eagerness to learn like I’ve never seen. A class of all ages from 4 to 12 years old, they speak no English and learn only simple words from picture books and their level of mathematics is significantly higher than what we’re taught in the UK at that age.
At the end of each school day (only 3 hours long and full of dancing and games as much as studying!) the children lined up by the volunteer house door where we had a bucket of water, towels and trays of biscuits. We washed their hands and gave them snacks and it filled me with sorrow seeing the cuts and bruises, scrapes and burns all over their hands. A heartbreaking reality that is the result of the environment they live in. I have never felt so grateful for the reality I had growing up, in comparison.
Another moment of realisation came at the end of my first week, another volunteer named Isobel and I, went to a local family’s house for the evening. We played games on the roof with the children, helped cook dinner, ate together and were dressed up in traditional Indian sarees. The young girls did some henna tattoos on our hands and we even got the opportunity to drive their tuktuk! All of this they shared for nothing in return and it highlighted for me the importance of embracing different cultures.
The generosity we received from people who simply wanted nothing more than to share with us what their daily life is like, where they live, what they eat, what they spend their time doing was brilliant. It’s easy to get caught up in stereotypes, or a certain perpective portrayed by the media but at some point as you travel, you will understand the value of such raw exposure to another country’s culture and traditions.
”The world would be a much better place if we were all a little kinder to each other.”
This quote is something I find myself saying a lot. A little kindness can go a long way and I have the perfect example of this. At the end of my two weeks in India I learnt about the sponsorship scheme that was in place to help fund the children’s schooling. While the money I had at the time I was going to need for my travels, there was nothing stopping me raising it another way. Just £100 can sponsor a child for a whole year of schooling, resources and transport – £100 is really not a lot of money in the grand scheme of things but due to the currency exchange rate it goes so far for them.
So, that was the goal, which my brilliant friends and family crushed in just a few days! We raised a total of £170 and so the extra £70 went as a donation to the school for supplies and daily snacks for the rest of the children. Don’t underestimate the impact of the little things.
India is the kind of place that is so unpredictable, nothing can really prepare you for it. You could bury yourself in research, be told every detail, and still when you arrive it will still blow you away. That’s not to say research is useless; research is never useless. I’m simply saying that when travelling to India you need to be prepared for the culture shock (yes it’s a real thing) and be ready to embrace the unexpected. My experience in India was absolutely incredible – way better than I ever would have thought – and I would go back in a heartbeat.
~ This volunteering was made possible by PMGY (Plan My Gap Year). Read more about it here!
