All set for India (nearly!)

I am Mandie Mulloy, General Manager of Wellington and District YMCA.

I feel privileged to be part of the Discovery visit team. I feel a bit like I am going away with strangers but will come back with friends that I have shared the trip of a lifetime with! We all have the same passion for the work of the YMCA but we will all come home with different thoughts on various aspects of the visit that can influence our own work in our local YMCAs.

I am excited with the whole buzz of what India has to offer us, as I have only seen it on film and in books. I am prepared myself as much as I can for the deprivation that I am going to see. I've had to think carefully about what I am taking in my case - I've been given bags of sweets and hand knitted toys to give to the children that we meet which has meant I've had to hugely reduce the amount of clothing that I would normally pack but in the light of what we'll see on the trip, it's brought it home that the material things don't really matter.

Less than 36 hours to go until take off - feeling very excited!

Bears donated via Jake Bennett at Telford Foodbank , from Friends of West Mercia Police and Andy Hudson 

Discover India 2014



Hi, I am Sara, Senior Support Worker at Colchester YMCA.

I am looking forward to being part of the Discovery India group which is leaving the sunny UK for a much warmer India on Saturday. I think I have almost finished packing but I'm sure I will work out more items to take come Saturday morning!

I am really excited about visiting YMCA in India as it is a country I have never really thought about visiting before. It will be an eye opening experience to see the culture and learn more about the people who live and work there. I hope that we can build links which I can bring back to Colchester to inform and educate our tenants and maybe even encourage them to visit in a volunteer capacity in the future.

Discovery Visit India 2014

Me

 

I'm Jon Harding, Housing Projects Manager at Colchester YMCA, and on Saturday I'll be one of the YMCA staff flying to India for twelve days. I should probably start packing at some point, I suppose.

I'd really like to be able to make the necessary contacts with colleagues in India to create a scheme whereby the young people we work with will get the opportunity to visit India to carry out voluntary work. However, I'm realistic enough to know that opportunities may vary, and I'll just have to adapt as we go along.

I've been told to expect a real culture shock: noise, colour, crowds, smells, the lot. I've travelled a little previously, but I'm still a bit trepidatious about this trip. Apart from anything else, I do like to eat. I'm semi-expecting to be ill with the infamous 'Delhi belly' at some point. This will also be the longest I've ever been away from my young son, and I expect to miss him very badly indeed. I'll worry about the project while I'm away, too, despite perfectly able, competant staff here telling me there's no need to do so. They know that I'll worry anyway, of course.

Introducing Kathy from North London YMCA

I am Kathy Mohan and I am the Housing Director at North London YMCA and am also visiting India. I was moved to join this trip to explore how we can work across national divides to support each other. 

I find that I am a mixture of excited and nervous as I prepare to go . We will be visiting a number of projects in Indian YMCAs where I know that they are working with great disadvantage , for instance with street children. It is making me reflect on what the differences and similarities are between the projects that we run.

I lead a comfortable urban life in England- I am going way out of my comfort zone on this trip!

Discovery India

Hi

My name is Ian Burks and I am CEO at YMCA East Surrey.

I am joining Ken Montgomery and others from the YMCA Federation on an exciting trip to India.  I hope to learn how the YMCA operates in a different continent and to find ways to set up cycling projects with young people that offer opportunities for personal development and fundraising for YMCA work both in England and in India.

I am also looking forward to seeing and experiencing a completely different land and culture!

I have got to admit I have been snowed under at work and have only just started to realise that we are actually flying out this Saturday.  Really looking forward to what I think will be quite an experience!

Discovery Visit to India

Getting geared up to our first Discovery Visit to the YMCA in South India. This is part of our International Plan integrating with our Leadership Development Programme.

There will be eight of us in the group, including CEOs and Senior Staff from local YMCAs accross England. We will spend twelve days discovering what YMCA is doing in Cities, town, villages and communities across South India. With the exception of myself, almost all are new to experiencing the International YMCA.

The key learning outcome I would like to achieve is to  be able to explore if it may be possible to develop long distance partnerships between individuals and groups that are developmental for all concerned.

My colleagues on the visit have agreed to post to the blog during our time in India so during the next two weeks expect an abundance of views, experiences and emotions as we 'Discover' YMCA in interesting places.

Hopefully we will also be able to share some of the sights we encounter along the way.

Lessons for life

Here we have Frah Abdi at the Mountainous region of ‪#‎NagornoKarabakh‬ on a hilltop near the town of ‪#‎Shushi‬, ‪#‎Armenia‬.

Frah is a YMCA Staff Member at North London YMCA.

"My parents were among the many who had to make one of the hardest decisions of their lives. To send their child away to safety and hope for a better future. I was one of many Somali children to leave in such circumstances, leaving behind your entire family with the knowledge of sacrifice, intention of betterment and the reality of life's struggles. Growing up in a foreign country without the presence and guidance of your parents comes with a lot of obstacles and challenges. At 16, I ran away from home and I remember being in the park the whole day with friends like nothing was wrong. As it got darker people started to leave until I was the only person left in the park. That’s when I realised I had no home to go to. These challenges taught me that the only thing you can absolutely control in life is how you react to things out of your control, and there’s a lot you can’t control so the better you adapt to this reality, the more powerful your highs will be, and the more quickly you’ll be able to bounce back from the lows. Everything that happens to you in life is either an opportunity to learn and grow or an obstacle that keeps you stuck. You get to choose. My life’s experiences whilst growing up has led me to see the value in young people and provide opportunities for them that wasn’t available to me. Alhamdulillah I work for the biggest youth organisation in the world which enables me to do the job I love and lets me travel the world. So my brothers and sisters when life hits rock bottom, Take a deep breath; it’s going to be ok, maybe not today, but eventually. There will be times when it seems like everything that could possibly go wrong is going wrong, You might feel like you will be stuck in this rut forever, but you won’t. Sure the sun stops shining sometimes, and you may get a huge thunderstorm or two, but eventually the sun will come out to shine. Sometimes it’s just a matter of us staying as positive as possible in order to make it to see the sunshine break through the clouds again and remember Allah won’t put you through more than you can bear, he might let you bend but he won’t let you break". ‪#‎SomaliSideways‬.