Online volunteering.
My story on online volunteering started last year. My sister´s best friend lulu told me about online volunteering. She lives in Lund, Sweden and is married to a great guy from Iceland, Styrmir. They have two beatiful kids Christian & Gabriel, so you can check how fun is their life in Sweden.
Okay.
After studying my master in europe I decided to start working on social development. My thesis project for the master, proposed the reuse of old industries to transform them into cultural spaces. But not the typical cultural centre or museum. Instead, I proposed the idea of the Arts Centre at Fundidora Park in Monterrey, Mexico, as a cultural space for social transformations.
You can visit these type of cultural centres in Europe, although there are also in other places as in Asia or South America, but not in Mexico.
My study cases were Les Halles de Schaerbeek in Brussels, Belgium, Ateneu Popular in Barcelona, Spain and Kaapelitehdas (Cable Factory) in Helsinki, Finland. These spaces as well as many others, dedicate their work to transform social relationships through art and culture.
That is what I would like to do.
Volunteering. I searched for different organizations in where I could help at a distance. So I must say that this has been a very very enriching and rewarding experience...I have friends from Mexico, South America, Pakistan and Africa. But I will talk about my best friends Khadim and Tosin, in my blog-diary. As well as my other best friends Roberta, Rumi, Julian, Jose Angel who are also far away. And of course, my new family...I adopted them because I really liked them very much Karen, Uncle Roland and my brother-in-law Ralph. But that...you can read it on the blog. (soon!)
Continuing with volunteering, my first organization was Grace Association Pakistan. Khadim Hussain is one of my best friends. He says I am his best teacher because his English is poor, I think is just perfect for a guy full of culture and knowledge. Every time we can, we speak on skype and talk about social, political and cultural issues. I am learning a lot and I am so grateful for that. I admire him very much because he is always looking the best for Grace and his community, he is very smart, talented, enthusiastic, positive and with a huge heart.
Grace has a Public School Astana in the district of Skardu and not only they work on children education, but also on health and environment, community development and rehabilitation and inclusion. My work with Grace was to research on early childhood education. I spent a lot of time reseraching on the internet but this task was very rewarding because I learned a new topic but the most important, it gave me a new friend.
One of my projects is to go there and help Grace in person through teaching and meet all the beautiful people who work very hard to give children and people better life conditions. I can´t wait to wear the beautiful traditional dress!
If you would like to volunteer for Grace, just go to the United Nations Online Volunteer website and look for the different tasks they offer.
Down here you can read some information on Grace and see pictures of the excellent and amazing work Grace is doing.
It is worth to mention that last year 2009, our team of volunteers won the Online Volunteer Award 2009 from the United Nations Online Volunteer website. Here is the link http://www.onlinevolunteering.org/en/org/stories/2009_grace_pakistan.html of our award.
Okay.
After studying my master in europe I decided to start working on social development. My thesis project for the master, proposed the reuse of old industries to transform them into cultural spaces. But not the typical cultural centre or museum. Instead, I proposed the idea of the Arts Centre at Fundidora Park in Monterrey, Mexico, as a cultural space for social transformations.
You can visit these type of cultural centres in Europe, although there are also in other places as in Asia or South America, but not in Mexico.
My study cases were Les Halles de Schaerbeek in Brussels, Belgium, Ateneu Popular in Barcelona, Spain and Kaapelitehdas (Cable Factory) in Helsinki, Finland. These spaces as well as many others, dedicate their work to transform social relationships through art and culture.
That is what I would like to do.
Volunteering. I searched for different organizations in where I could help at a distance. So I must say that this has been a very very enriching and rewarding experience...I have friends from Mexico, South America, Pakistan and Africa. But I will talk about my best friends Khadim and Tosin, in my blog-diary. As well as my other best friends Roberta, Rumi, Julian, Jose Angel who are also far away. And of course, my new family...I adopted them because I really liked them very much Karen, Uncle Roland and my brother-in-law Ralph. But that...you can read it on the blog. (soon!)
Continuing with volunteering, my first organization was Grace Association Pakistan. Khadim Hussain is one of my best friends. He says I am his best teacher because his English is poor, I think is just perfect for a guy full of culture and knowledge. Every time we can, we speak on skype and talk about social, political and cultural issues. I am learning a lot and I am so grateful for that. I admire him very much because he is always looking the best for Grace and his community, he is very smart, talented, enthusiastic, positive and with a huge heart.
Grace has a Public School Astana in the district of Skardu and not only they work on children education, but also on health and environment, community development and rehabilitation and inclusion. My work with Grace was to research on early childhood education. I spent a lot of time reseraching on the internet but this task was very rewarding because I learned a new topic but the most important, it gave me a new friend.
One of my projects is to go there and help Grace in person through teaching and meet all the beautiful people who work very hard to give children and people better life conditions. I can´t wait to wear the beautiful traditional dress!
If you would like to volunteer for Grace, just go to the United Nations Online Volunteer website and look for the different tasks they offer.
Down here you can read some information on Grace and see pictures of the excellent and amazing work Grace is doing.
It is worth to mention that last year 2009, our team of volunteers won the Online Volunteer Award 2009 from the United Nations Online Volunteer website. Here is the link http://www.onlinevolunteering.org/en/org/stories/2009_grace_pakistan.html of our award.
| grace-newsletter1-2009.pdf |
The second organization in where I volunteered was United Nations International Poverty Centre UNIPC in Latin America. I worked with a fantastic team of volunteers, among them are Camila, Eric and Alejandra. We researched different contacts in Latin America to update the UNIPC directory.
I think it was destiny or I don´t know, but I had a lot of contact with a girl... she became one of my best friends too. Ruth Tosin Oladosu, Tosin, from Africa. I was surprised to see a woman from Africa volunteering for a task in Latin America, but she did an excellent work. She used to work for an NGO who is dedicated to help abused women and children. And she writes so beautiful! But I have to ask her permission to publish her writings on this site. She also told me about World Pulse, an International Correspondents site exclusively for women. We participated in a contest to be trained and become an internationl correspondent....she won!!!!!! Now, I don´t speak very much with her because of the training, but I should say that she is an incredible, smart, positive, enthusiastic woman with a great personality, and lot of qualities and skills. I haven´t met her yet, but I am sure it will be one of these days. Africa is another place in my mind.
About World Pulse, I have a diary there. I haven´t written there but I will start again. Here is the link.
And I also made a friend from Mexico at World Pulse, her name is Xthina Avila (Corresponsal de Paz) and really, the world is so so small, that my sister´s friends in Barcelona know her very well. She is also participating in this training and you can find her at Facebook. I must say too, that she is a great woman and that I admire so much ger work and fight on human rights, childhood, economy, environment...you must take a look at her website.
I think it was destiny or I don´t know, but I had a lot of contact with a girl... she became one of my best friends too. Ruth Tosin Oladosu, Tosin, from Africa. I was surprised to see a woman from Africa volunteering for a task in Latin America, but she did an excellent work. She used to work for an NGO who is dedicated to help abused women and children. And she writes so beautiful! But I have to ask her permission to publish her writings on this site. She also told me about World Pulse, an International Correspondents site exclusively for women. We participated in a contest to be trained and become an internationl correspondent....she won!!!!!! Now, I don´t speak very much with her because of the training, but I should say that she is an incredible, smart, positive, enthusiastic woman with a great personality, and lot of qualities and skills. I haven´t met her yet, but I am sure it will be one of these days. Africa is another place in my mind.
About World Pulse, I have a diary there. I haven´t written there but I will start again. Here is the link.
And I also made a friend from Mexico at World Pulse, her name is Xthina Avila (Corresponsal de Paz) and really, the world is so so small, that my sister´s friends in Barcelona know her very well. She is also participating in this training and you can find her at Facebook. I must say too, that she is a great woman and that I admire so much ger work and fight on human rights, childhood, economy, environment...you must take a look at her website.
