orphan prevention
Friday, August 27, 2010 at 10:15AM 
Big NishaOnce about 4 years ago when Nisha was really little and she first came in to live with us we went on a walk to get her a toothbrush. She didn't speak a word of English and my Nepali was just starting to come along. We played a game where she'd point to an object and I would say the word in English, she would repeat it, and then say the word in Nepali and I would repeat her. I remember this morning very vividly. On the way back home she'd point at the same object and recite them to me, remembering each and every one of the words I'd taught her.
Later that week we walked over to the little school house that I had the children attending at the time and enrolled her into school, starting in the first grade. They promoted her within a matter of weeks, and then pushed her up again, and then finally again. Unbeknownst to me, she had gone to all of her other classmates and asked for their old used textbooks and gone through the lessons one by one on her own. She'd stay up late at night and read until I'd go in every night and tell her it was time to shut the lights off and go to bed.
She's always wanted to know how to get ahead. She thrived on competition, compliments from her teachers, classmates, and the principal. She came into my room one morning when she was 8 and asked me if she could go to a private tutor in the mornings before school. Again without my knowledge she had found the tutor and arranged all of this completely on her own. A month later I went to pay her tuition fee and the teacher refused to take the money. He proceeded to tell me that he'd never met a girl with so much potential in his life and that it was his absolute pleasure to tutor her every morning. But it wasn't until her 9th birthday when Nisha asked for an English-Nepali dictionary that I knew something was really up.
I remember the first day I brought home a few paperback stories from the book shop and told the children that reading is the best thing you can do for your brain. She picked up those first few books and read them front to back and then again and again and when she was through she asked for me to go out and buy some more. In a matter of months she was reading both languages fluently and putting English sentences together. In just a year she was speaking English and to this day she acts as the translator for many of our staff and the volunteers. The teachers tell me she translates words that the teachers don't know for them whenever they're teaching a lesson.
A couple of weeks before I left in July she walked into my room one night and asked me to give her an essay topic so she could write an essay "for fun" and then have me grade it, "with a red pen," she directed me, "you have to mark it with red pen." I looked at her for a second and thought to myself, "where did this child come from?" Then I gave her the topic, "what do you want to be when you grow up?" and she proceeded to write. She wrote a beautiful piece that I actually saved for her because I'm pretty sure there are parts of it that she can use for her college essay. It was that good. I remember one part in particular where she wrote about why she wants to be a doctor when she grows up; to save parents of children around the world and set up systems to help with "orphan prevention" a term she created entirely on her own.
Nisha has never needed to be taken care of. She's never needed to be told what to do, when to brush her teeth, study, read, help out with chores. Naturally many of the others followed in her footsteps, respected her and listened to her just as much as they listen to me. I don't know what Kopila Valley would be like without her. I was thinking about all these things after we got off the phone last night when she ended our conversation by saying, "don't worry about us, I'm making sure we're all reading at night and Goma and Karma are helping to put the little ones to bed. Come back safe."
And I felt this overwhelming sense of thankfulness. Like, how in the world did we find each other? How in the world did I get this lucky?
Reader Comments (11)
Sounds like you were both lucky to have found each other. Be safe.
Oh Maggie - this is so beautiful my eyes are brimming over.... What an amazing little girl! Please keep us posted on where her inner force guides her. And as Quyen's lovely post reminds us, you must have remarkable stories of each one of your precious ones. We'll patiently wait for them all to emerge, one by one....
Sending you much love,
It's Saturday morning in London and I'm crying my eyes out. Never thought I'd ever admit to that. I always knew this girl was smart and special. Just look at the intelligence in her face in the first photograph you published where she's wearing a red shawl pulled over her head. She said to you at the time when you were visiting her village that you should 'check out' the other parentless children there. As someone has already said, you both found each other.
I have three things to say. College fund. College fund. College fund.
This is incredible. You are so lucky to have found each other. Yet again I am crying while reading your post. What amazing girls - both of you!
She's a credit to you Maggie.
I don't know how many times I had to bother her for a good translation - but if I had to guess it would have to be about a thousand times. She never failed me once!
love her
one of the nights before I left I was in the girls room and we were all telling stories, and Nisha proceeded to tell the entire story of Harry Potter. It was awesome.
Orphan Prevention--What a concept. Every day I am grateful to know you ALL. Warm good wishes from Cape Cod.
"Amor loci, genius loci".
(Latin language expression - it means that when you meet one place love, you meet the genius of that place).
Girls like Nisha are unique and we have to be gratefull for the future that we can see into their eyes and their thinkings.
Nisha deserves the best education and friendship.
I'm writing in Itlay, thank you for your writing from Nepal .
Just logged on to find out a little bit about you before you speak at the DO lectures and you reduced me to tears. There's no such thing as luck. I'm sure your patience and understanding and the fact that you were actually out there doing something amazingly positive in the first place played a far bigger part in bringing you together than luck ever could.