In this unprecedented situation, the staff members of Umbrella Organization Nepal wanted to testify about the crisis and their daily work. They are continuing their actions as best as possible, facing a complicated and constantly changing social and economic situation.

"Namaste Everyone,

My name is Dinesh Chaudhari, have been working as a youth officer in the Umbrella Organization Nepal for ‘Chautari Youth Club’ (CYC), relatively a new project of Umbrella for the youths' empowerment and strengthening through different workshops and skill based trainings.

Since the whole world is facing the serious pandemic situation of COVID-19, a nation-wide lockdown has been implemented here in Nepal since 24th March and also it has been extended to 2nd June due to the increasing number of infected cases and some deaths cases. After the lockdown we started working from home and life in home quarantine is of mixed feelings for me as I experience difficulties in performing all the official and household activities inside the same four walls.

Now, as we had to adopt new way of working, teaching and learning, we (youth officers) have been conducting the online workshops on the different relevant topics; building confidence and resilience, time management and goal settings and internet safety with the huge number of nation-wide youths' participation. The participants are from different ethnic and family backgrounds. The workshops are basically focused on interactive sessions, group discussions and energizers and brainstorming activities along with the participants’ collective feedbacks for the next session. Another exciting thing for us is that we are in the process of launching our computer courses online soon. However, as it has been a little challenging because of unavailability and slow speed of internet/WIFI’s services in some parts of Nepal; we have been supporting with the mobile Internet data to those having no Internet at home.

During this lockdown the most important thing I learnt is to remain positive and not to think too far about the future.  I feel I am lucky because I still have a full-time job.

This is a hugely worrying time for all of us but I do believe if we all stick together and support each other we will over come the situation.

Stay safe and be happy."

"Namaskar!

I am Santosh Sapkota, working as reintegration officer in Umbrella Organization Nepal since May 2016.

The lockdown in Nepal started since 24th March 2020. When lockdown started, we had not guessed that lockdown will go longer and situation will get worse like this. From the very first day of the lockdown, we are staying at home. Managing food and vegetables for family is main priority during this period.

Grocery shops here are allowed to open 3 hours in morning. I have bought food items in bulk and I am buying vegetables enough for a week. I do exercise in morning, play different games with family members and equally involve in family work as other members of my family to make homestay entertaining.

Working from home is new experience for me. First few days were quite challenging to focus on office work as family expects help when they see me at home. As working from home extended, it became habitual for family and they realized my work. My prime office work nowadays is taking updates from reintegrated beneficiaries through phone calls, social media (Facebook) and updating weekly to the management. I also make sure that our beneficiaries are updated with the latest progress about the virus and the situation. I am to call each beneficiary twice a week. Taking phone update of few beneficiaries is quite hard as some family do not have mobile set and some are living in rural areas whose phone is unreachable most the of time. In such case, I call their villagers and call them in morning and evening hours. Monitoring through phone calls is not as effective as in-person monitoring but I am doing my best from my side to make it fruitful.

Lockdown have surely disturbed our personal and official work plans. But, unfortunately we do not have other options as well. Staying positive and making ourselves busy in work are the only options to make ourselves engaged.

Thank you!

Stay safe! Stay healthy! Stay positive! "