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Dashain Festival 

Dashain is the longest festival in Nepal, traditionally celebrated for two weeks with prayers and offerings to Durga, the Universal Mother Goddess. The great harvest festival of Nepal, Dashain is a time for family reunions, exchange of gifts and blessings, and worship.

Goddess Durga, symbolizing courageousness and bravery, is worshipped and offered sacrifices to ensure the devotees’ progress and prosperity. During the first ten days, pilgrims gather at various rivers early in the morning and sacred places in the evening. Ghatasthapana, Phool Pati, Maha Ashtami, Navami, and Vijayadashami are the series of events under Dashain each marked with a different set of rituals.

On the tenth day known as Tika, people are seen moving around with their foreheads covered with rice tika, wearing new clothes. There is much feasting as people visit relatives’ homes to receive tika and blessings. People enjoy delicious delicacies with their families. 

There are always happy moments shared and that is possible only when we meet our loved ones, the Dashain as usual provides the opportunity to meet all the family members in one place. The Dashain creates a beautiful situation where every member of the family who is scattered in different places for different reasons like profession, study, and business get the public holiday from the government to celebrate the festival. People visit their hometowns to celebrate the festival. 

<YouMe School, Khotang>

YouMe School Khotang started the first terminal exam after a very long time. This is the first physical examination conducted after the government allowed the opening of a school physically.

All the students were very happy to sit for the physical examination. The government analyzing the COVID still says it is compulsory to wear the masks. The government has been running the campaign for the vaccination and it is still going on in different government and private hospitals, municipalities, and community health posts in rural areas.

Nepal being the developing state is trying its level best to manage the different development sectors to come back to a normal situation. People want to keep their business, office, school, and different government offices open.

School being one of the important sectors for education and home for creating the future for the nation should open following the state laws and protocol for health security.

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world” – Nelson Mandela

YouMe Nepal always follows the right path to bring positive change that develops quality in every sector. We are always positive towards hard and smart work.

The hard work from the school team brought the opportunity to our students to be involved in their first physical exam. They were so excited to move their hands and see their answers on paper. We hope to see our students coming to school every day and learning new chapters to create the space for their future.

<Home Visit >

We recently conducted a home visit program in Khotang. The goal is always to advocate awareness of Health and Nutrition with different nutrition programs and empowerment activities to the students and their families. Our Nurse Miss. Nisha Rai taking the lead in this project went to Khotang to conduct the two activities. One of the programs was the Home visit which has the criteria to intervene at the grassroots level where she took the survey with the standard questionnaires to see the nutrition practices and health condition of parents of YouMe school students.

Along with the home visit, the other influential program was the Health and Nutrition awareness program where the Nutritionist took the simple way to bring their attention to empower them about the good health practices and nutrition with the support of a Brochure containing the information about the basic health and nutrition practices which follows the different topic like healthy life, Balanced Diet, Food Habits, Physical Exercise, Personal Hygiene, Proper sleep, etc.

“I decided to work for the better world in the better way” – Nisha Rai

The grassroots level intervention is the best practice that directly involves the target group. It is very effective in the context of Nepal where we still find the traditional practices to sustain their life. It is very important to understand the situation of the project site before we go for any action implementation. We thrive to bring the best approach to connect with the people and help a lot to change and understand the project goals.

<Teachers Corner – Dashain Special >

Mrs. Januka Adhikari, is a Nepali teacher in the YouMe school, Khotang. She teaches the Nepali subject. She loves being with kids. She is also very active in extracurricular activities. She likes traveling and singing.

This year brought happy moments to her as she was not able to celebrate the Dashain last year and also missed the family. Due to the COVID, she was in Khotang last year hoping for a good time for everyone. 

This year she finally celebrated the Dashain with all the family members. She is from Ilam. Ilam town is a quiet little hill town and interesting places to visit are the viewing tower not far from the town and Mai Pokhari which is an hour’s drive away. Diverse species of fish are found in the small lake. Local visitors go to Kanyam Tea Estate for horse riding, hikes, and picnics. The distance made by the COVID was covered with different sharing of happy moments with family members. This time she enjoyed the holiday to the fullest by celebrating Dashain and visiting the beautiful places in Ilam. 

【YouMe School Biratnagar】

Keeping the new wave of hope for a better future YouMe school, Biratnagar physically started the first terminal exam. The full attendance of the students brought positive results and showed that students felt happy to be involved in the physical examination. All the level students and teachers were happy to be involved in the physical first terminal examination.

The pre-primary section kids creating the skill and making their best in the art exam made us thankful to the school board team for this opportunity.

“Teacher helping kids to write their art exam” Educating to educate righteously always provides a good result. Education being the change factor for the advancement and development of the new hands for the future should be given the priority from local level to the regional level.

“I love drawing fruits that create the mood and I love being in the mood after I eat fruits.

My mama helps me go to school to learn and write. That’s the way to become right.

We are the beginner for the future, that’s why everyone should help us for good nature” – The voice of the pre-primary school kids seeks pure love and support from their parents and school and also asks for a beautiful environment where they can learn more and be more. 

Rijesh Bhattarai from SKG who is just seven years old is trying his best to make his Art and Craft exam excellent. He seems very happy to be involved in the physical examination which we can easily recognize from his pose.

<Tagaki program>

Tagaki international speech contest creating the platform for international involvement to offer the global experience for all the children through fun ways and Embrace and enjoy the difference, To Empower the children by encouraging them to express themselves in their unique ways and to Create child-friendly space utilizing the digital environment.

The orientation program was successfully conducted in Biratnagar where we tried our best to be aware of the international opportunity at our school. Some of the important activities were a selection of students, teacher’s orientation program, student’s orientation program, and different level interaction shortlisting and finalizing the final names.

<Teachers Corner – Dashain special >

I always believe that the love and support from the family complete my life. We need the family in every situation to support our goals in Life. Professionally, I am a teacher in the primary section in YouMe school, Biratnagar. I enjoy my profession as I love to be with kids and make them understand the initial path to develop their school life with beautiful rhymes.

This year is probably a good start to bring back the memories that we had before by celebrating the Nepali festival Dashain. I celebrated my Dashain in the best way possible. The festival not only allowed enjoying the rituals but also made the environment to be in one place and share the ups and downs. I enjoyed Dashain by sharing my new plans for the school.

The family is the initial place to start new things and I always start my day with their encouragement. The happiest part of the joint family is the mutual understanding and support. My family and I always believe in creating the best ways to support the family in every condition. 

<Unseasonal Heavy Rainfall Disaster>

Recently incessant rainfall hugely affected several parts of Nepal. The impacted area included Biratnagar city too. The houses, roads, even the airport were submerged in the floodwater in Biratnagar. Due to the overwhelming situation, there was a power outage and no internet connection for many days.

However, the rainfall has stopped and people are gradually settling in though this has led to extensive damages to crops, properties and even claimed many human lives. We are happy to share that our teachers and students are reported safe on the ground. 

Meanwhile, amidst the devastation, an extraordinary glimpse of people catching fish on the road was a funny and weird sight to behold.