Published: Monday, 7th September, 2009 12:00pm

'If I could, I's go back tomorrow'

by Rose Harland

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FOR many teachers returning to work in September after a much-needed summer holiday can be a strain.

But it could be a real shock to the system for one globe-trotting lecturer who left the classroom to spend a year helping children in Malawi and Nepal.

Marcia Watson, 59, returned to her day job at Bracknell and Wokingham College on Tuesday after taking a year off to volunteer in African and Nepalese orphanages, providing support to the staff and children who live and work there.

Mrs Watson said: "It was just a fantastic experience and I met some amazing people. If I had enough money I'd go back tomorrow."

Mrs Watson, of Sylvanas, Great Hollands, was featured in the News in January after she had returned from Malawi and was about to jet off to Nepal where she worked in two orphanages, one in a tiny hamlet called Chitwan.

She said: "The orphanage was called Happy Home and it really was. There was only one member of staff, an amazing lady called Bashanti who was 35 and a widow with four girls.

"Bashanti worked like a Trojan and all the children helped with routine chores such as cleaning, gathering vegetables from the garden where Bashanti grew her own food, and washing clothes."

Mrs Watson, a senior lecturer in health and social care, later moved to Pokhara, a small touristy town, to work at the Rainbow Children's Home.

She said: "Both orphanages were short of space and children slept two to a bed so head lice and scabies were common. Chicken pox was just doing the rounds as I left the Rainbow Children's Home and there was also an outbreak at a local school."

While in Chitwan Mrs Watson also had to take a young boy, Tirthray, to the hospital where doctors discovered a tape worm cyst in the frontal lobe of his brain.

She said: "He had collapsed in the garden, this child was not with it. It was like he had an enormous hangover. I took him to a teaching hospital by taxi where he had a CT scan and blood tests.

"I paid for all his treatment and I was so pleased that I did, it was one of the best things I did out there. It was only about £70 but there was no way the orphanage could have afforded it."

Mrs Watson also paid for another boy, Kamal "B", to have his eyes tested and bought him glasses and treated the children to birthday cakes, which many of them had never seen before as birthdays are not usually celebrated in Nepal.

Mrs Watson said she had been nervous about taking a year off work to visit Malawi and Nepal but would definitely recommend that others follow her lead.

She said: "Just go for it. I was scared, it's only natural. The day before I left I was in tears, but you meet some amazing people and it's the people who make the experience."

Mrs Watson thanked her two sons and partner Denis for backing her over the past year, as well as people who donated money which she was able to use to fund projects in both Malawi and Nepal.

She said: "My family have been very supportive, my sons are very proud of me.

"I had a moment back in Malawi when it was so hot and I was having a real moan about the school but my son text back and said 'without wanting to sound like your mother that's why you're there and I'm so proud of you'.

"I would also like you to thank everyone who sponsored me and Bracknell and Wokingham College for allowing me a years unpaid leave and thus making it possible."

To donate to the Rainbow Children's Home visit www.orphancarenepal.org