It has been a while since I blogged, life has been a bit of a whirlwind lately but I thought I would pop on and share a link to the video interview I did with my local on-line paper. You may recall that before I went away I also did an interview so this was a little like a follow up on that one really.
Watch my interview here
Upon returning to the UK we all regroup for a Returned Volunteer Weekend, which is a little like a debrief of our experiences. This was great as we got to see each other again a month or so after getting back. We shared our experiences with volunteers that were in other locations and discussed our future plans, how we have dealt with the reverse culture shock (not as easy as you think coming back to your life as you knew it before) and what we have taken away from our volunteering efforts. It was a really nice way to reflect on our challenges with some hindsight and be able to put them into perspective.
We then moved on to making a plan of how we will campaign in the UK for a topic that we became passionate about during our time away. For many of us in the Ethiopia team our focus was Women & Girls, education, sexual health and female genital mutilation. As a whole these are the areas I plan to raise awareness on, not only for Ethiopia or Africa but globally, because to me it shouldn't matter where you are in the world to receive an education, be respected, empowered and have an equal footing.
The final part of the ICS scheme encourages you to continue your citizen service in the UK, most people do this independently (as I have here with my interview and blog pieces) however our Ethiopia team are also collaborating on something much bigger which I will also be getting involved in...
<<watch this space!>>
Kx
Watch my interview here
Upon returning to the UK we all regroup for a Returned Volunteer Weekend, which is a little like a debrief of our experiences. This was great as we got to see each other again a month or so after getting back. We shared our experiences with volunteers that were in other locations and discussed our future plans, how we have dealt with the reverse culture shock (not as easy as you think coming back to your life as you knew it before) and what we have taken away from our volunteering efforts. It was a really nice way to reflect on our challenges with some hindsight and be able to put them into perspective.
We then moved on to making a plan of how we will campaign in the UK for a topic that we became passionate about during our time away. For many of us in the Ethiopia team our focus was Women & Girls, education, sexual health and female genital mutilation. As a whole these are the areas I plan to raise awareness on, not only for Ethiopia or Africa but globally, because to me it shouldn't matter where you are in the world to receive an education, be respected, empowered and have an equal footing.
The final part of the ICS scheme encourages you to continue your citizen service in the UK, most people do this independently (as I have here with my interview and blog pieces) however our Ethiopia team are also collaborating on something much bigger which I will also be getting involved in...
<<watch this space!>>
Kx
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