This is hard.

Is my blog supposed to be all about how wonderful and life-changing this experience is?  To be clear, it is both of those things.  But also, this is hard.  This is harder than I even imagined it would be. I have been inspired, amazed, horrified, frustrated, angry and confused by what I’ve experienced so far.  I have felt proud, guilty, lucky, empowered, helpless, too demanding, too permissive, too academic, not academic enough, lonely, isolated, vulnerable, good at my job, bad at my job, social, anti-social, energised, and exhausted.  And I think I experience all of these daily.

When I moved to London, I had this sense of feeling like an outsider.  As soon as I opened my mouth, people would ask where I was from (and then usually ask me about my thoughts on Trump upon finding out I was American, but that’s another story).  I know this was mostly meant out of curiosity and genuine interest, as London is a very international city, and I was far from the only person sporting a different accent.  But it is an immediate way of acknowledging that I’m not from there.  It took months for me to feel like I really belonged there, but London did eventually become home – thanks in large part to my incredible support network of women on my MA course and in my flat, groups of people with whom I immediately had something in common.  I came to terms with being a foreigner, and in some senses even enjoyed it.  It felt important to experience being an outsider.  As a white American woman, I haven’t often had the experience of being in the minority of anything.  And in London, my level of ‘otherness’ is mild - I have to open my mouth to be outed, and even then I at least speak some version of the same language. 

But here, everything about me screams “you don’t belong here!”  From my skin colour, to my language, to the amount of luggage I carry with me for a two week stay in a rural district, to my inability to drink the same water as everyone else, or my struggling to survive on only dal bhat and curry, to my electronics and my attachment to them.  Mostly, I am a novelty American dancer person who doesn’t eat enough rice, can list roughly 50-60 Nepali words to the amusement of others, and from whom everyone wants to learn dance. 

I am spending a lot of time in very rural Nepal these days.  The girls in the shelter in Kathmandu are in school for the better part of their days, and so Raksha Nepal has chosen to utilise my skills in their outreach program in rural districts to empower young women identified as high risk for trafficking, forced prostitution, and sexual violence.  My periods in each district are short – a mere two weeks.  This involves two full days allotted for traveling (up, down and around mountains in buses on narrow roads, often made of dirt – or more likely mud now that the rainy season is approaching) and a short 10 days of work as a DMP and Promethean Spark Life Coach. 

I’m not positive that everyone in these villages has seen a real life white person before.  Needless to say, English is hardly spoken.  I am able to communicate with some people (most notably my Social Mobiliser in each district – my host, guide, and the Raksha Nepal representative who provides non-dance related life skills and economic training to the girls on a regular basis).  However the communication is often stilted – both speaking in very short words and sentences in an effort to understand and be understood.  A support network in my own language doesn’t exist outside of my phone – and that is reliant on the availability of data and electricity, which are not always reliable. 

In the last district, I got sick and really struggled to explain that curry is a very strong flavour for an American sick stomach.  Rice, curry and dal are their staples -  if I was sick surely I needed to be eating more of these things to keep up my strength, not less.  And my lovely and hospitable hosts worked so hard to try and find food I could keep down, and insisted I go see a doctor (which I did.  I’m fine now).  In the midst of this I continued to run sessions.  45 minutes walking up, down and around hills to work with girls who know nothing about me, but are excited for my presence, who don’t speak any English, and have a world of completely different life experiences from me.  And then in 10 days, I’m meant to provide life skills coaching and therapy, adjust to a new district, climate, host family, learn the names and get to know 25 new girls, and try to leave some kind of lasting impression amidst their expectations that I will somehow teach them some magic trick to be successful and perpetually happy.

Does this sound like I’m complaining?  I know it’s a privilege to be here doing this work.  There has not been a moment here that I have not felt reminded of how incredibly fortunate I am to have everything in my life I’ve ever had, beginning with the pure luck of being born where and to whom I was.  I love this work, and I think it’s so important.  And instead of questioning if I’m making any difference at all, I’m constantly trying to understand how I can make the most lasting (albeit small) difference by updating and improving the program I’m offering in each district, while continuously adjusting to the individual needs of each group.  I’m not complaining.  But this is hard.  It just is.

I’ve struggled with the idea that my abilities as a teacher and therapist may be ultimately less important than the fact that I’m here at all.  I think I came here wanting to be some super capable therapist who could help these girls through some meaningful process.  And I do still have hopes that I am doing that in some way, especially with the girls at the shelter with whom I have the opportunity to do more longer term work.  But the fact that someone would travel so far to work so closely with them at all is probably one of the biggest senses of empowerment I can give them – simply that they’re worth the trip.  And they are.  I know it, but my whole point in being here really is to help them know it for themselves.  And what better way to show them than to actually be here putting in the work every day?  This is what the PSI life coaching and DMP are about – having the embodied experience to know it’s true.  

The truth is, that’s the best place I can start.  As much as I don’t want to admit that the kind of person I am may be more useful to these girls than the kind of therapist I am, that’s probably true.  Although I have to acknowledge that the kind of person I am is a therapist (among other things).  There’s no separating those two points.  The kind of person I am has of course influenced the kind of therapist I am; the kind of person I am led me to become a DMP in the first place, instead of continuing as a professional dancer, or pursuing anything else in the world that would probably be more lucrative.  I’m here, whether they are appreciative and excited or miserable and defiant.  There’s an unconditionality to that that I get the sense they are not accustomed to in the villages.

I feel as though much of what is making this experience difficult for me – being singled out at every turn as a different, being so far and out of literal and digital reach from a support network of friends and family while doing difficult and emotionally draining work – is likely the first part of what makes me useful here.  They have no idea how difficult this might be for me, but they do know I’ve come a long way and they view me as an expert.  While I have certainly spent plenty of time questioning my actual level of ‘expertise,’ I’m happy for them to trust me.  Because how special is it to have an expert travel 7,500 miles to be with you?  My discomfort with being such an outsider and having such high expectations put on me are precisely their first lesson in how worthwhile they are.  It’s a power dynamic I’m still figuring out exactly how to manage.

This work is hard.  The language and cultural barriers are isolating, and after a month, I’m still very much adjusting.  I am grateful to all of you who are offering support in all the digital ways possible.  You are a big part of my self-care.  I don’t think I ever truly realised how emotionally necessary it is to be continuously connected in some way to people with whom I share a culture and can speak my native language.  I’m aware in the current global climate of refugees and immigrants, that that luxury is not available to everybody.  It is one more thing I can count myself lucky for having, even and especially in the moments when it is not as available as I would like.

As usual, if you would like to offer financial support to this project in addition to what you’ve already shown by reading this blog, please follow the link here.