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Volunteer Report Timo DygaOffice Volunteer “Special Tasks” August - December 2017

Chiang Mai, Thailand

P r e s e n t a t i o n VR

http://www.childsdream.org/




When I lived in Thailand 2009 - 2012 I met Urs Frey, who did the documentary movie about

Child’s Dream. That was when I heard about it for the first time. Their work immediately

inspired me. My Thai friends and I collected donations and build a playground and a kitchen

for underprivileged students from the Karen ethnic group near the border to Myanmar. I

loved it and I decided to work in that field professionally. When I moved back to Germany I

studied Fundraising Management aside my job as social worker. After experiences in

volunteering at NGOs both in Germany and abroad, I got a position as a Fundraiser in

Berlin. It happened that I lost that job and I decided it’s time to come back where it all

began: to Chiang Mai in Thailand. I saw the volunteer job opening on Child’s Dreams’

website, moved out of my apartment, packed my stuff and moved to Thailand to start all

over again.

Child's Dream Foundation238/3 Wualai Road, T. Haiya, A. Muang, Chiang Mai 50100, ThailandEmail: [email protected] • Website: www.childsdream.org • Tel. +66 (0) 53 201 811 • Fax +66 (0) 53 201 812

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Background


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Office Volunteer “Special Tasks” Overview

At my arrival everything was well prepared and I got a warm welcome. Gene patiently

explained my tasks and I could always ask him and all the other colleagues again. My tasks

were mainly project proposal and report writing, updating of marketing material,

translations and others. I wrote quite a lot of project fact sheets that I also used as a

template for the report you are reading right now.

For the proposals and reports I collected the information from the database and previous

reports and asked the project managers when I had more questions. Everyone worked well

together with me.

As there was first also Stefanie and then Denise from Switzerland in the same volunteer

position, we had enough recources to handle all the tasks. Sometimes I even asked for

more to do.


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My Personal Highlights

After two month working in the office I joined Daniel and project manager Sak at a School

Opening Trip in Laos. They joined 12 ceremonies in ten days and I attended at four openings

in four days. The whole experience was overwhelming as community leaders, teachers and

the students were very grateful and gave us lots of food including fried insects and lots of

drinks. It would have been impolite to refuse it.

In my holidays I joined another team to the border town Mae Sot where Child’s Dream

supports many projects for migrants and refugees from Myanmar. I learned a lot about the

difficult situation and challenges that come along when people are forced to live in a

foreign country as parents’ might ask for instance: ‘Should my children been taught in Thai,

Burmese or in my ethnical language? When are we able to move back to our country and

when are we courageous enough?’ We visited five schools and learning centres in three

days. It was very interesting and nice to see the dedication and passion of Child’s Dreams’

managers.


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What I have Learned

In general I learned a lot about how a NGO works. I worked as a volunteer at NGOs before,

but not for full time in the office. It also makes a big difference if you work in an office in

Germany, writing about projects in Asia or if you sit in an office in Asia where the NGO you

are working for operates. You are just closer to the projects. Everything becomes more real

as you have the change to visit the projects and you talk directly to the managers who work

in the field.

I learned a lot about the projects Child’s Dream implements and supports and also about

the situation and the issues of Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Thanks Gene I also

learned a lot about how to present these projects in an informative and nice way.


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Recommended for:

Anyone who is interested in the work of

a NGO, especially who wants to learn

about marketing, design, fundraising,

education.

By the way Chiang Mai is a lovely city,

there are lots of things to do in your free

time. Thailand is amazing and Chiang

Mai is the cherry on top of the cake.


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Conclusion

In my opinion it’s definitely worth to be a volunteer at

Child’s Dream. You can learn a lot and it feels good to be

part of a very motivated team who really want to make a

change. You can bring in your own ideas and share your

point of view since Child’s Dreams’ approach is critical

thinking too.

Personally it also helped me to add another experience

to my CV. At Child’s Dream I met a new manager who

used to work at another NGO in Thailand. I will start

working there as a Fundraiser next month.

Thank you all Child’s Dream members for this experience!

presentation vr...presentation vr when i lived in thailand 2009 - 2012 i met urs frey, who did the...

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