Youth represent the voice of contemporary society and the hope for the future. Viewed in this light, it is imperative that their skills and understanding are sharpened to bring about a change for the better. If they are given an opportunity to meet people like themselves in the other side of the world with different social and cultural backgrounds the learning from the experiences can hardly be equated by any other thing. Not only that they get to see the world from a new perspective but also understand the prospects and problems of other cultures.

MS-Nepal organizes Youth Co-operation Program (YCP) with the objective of gathering young volunteers from Nepal and Denmark to help them learn from cross-cultural differences. Unlike under many other MSiS (MS in the South) youth programs, the young people who participated in the YCP this time did not build houses, trails, or small bridges, but instead, they were given more challenging tasks of launching newsletters, brochures, recipe books, posters, and school education programs.

During July and August 2001 15 youths--four from Denmark, two from Greenland, one from

the Faroe Islands and eight from Nepal—arrived here and carried out different activities under the YCP. The Nepalese participants were from four different MS partner organizations BASE, SICKA, SSD and Norbulingka. The program lasted for seven weeks and it was divided into three main parts.

PART I: The participants met on the 1st of July at the MS-guesthouse in Kathmandu. After an introduction programme and some mutual sharing, they knew each other better and were ready to move to a Tibetan Refugee Camp in Jawalakhel. The organization with which the participants

worked was Norbulingka, a social welfare entity established by Tibetan refugees in 1960. Different Tibetan families hosted all participants for three weeks. The objective of the programme at the Tibetan Refugee Camp was to help it produce a Human Rights Newsletter, two brochures--one for the camp's restaurant and another for its tour group, and a Tibetan recipe book.

During the programme, the participants enjoyed an amazing inter-cultural social life, gained knowledge about how to overcome cross cultural barriers without hampering the efficiency of their work, learned about the Tibetan cause and understood that for minorities, in general, one must always strive to eradicate discrimination.

PART II: Accompanied by several new Tibetan friends, the 15 participants took a public bus to Pokhara in order to revitalize themselves for attaining their next objectives. Activities in the beautiful lake city included rowing and camping on the shore of Phewa Lake, swimming at a waterfall, trekking around the mountains, going to discos, having dinners and in general socializing to strengthen the bond of friendship.

PART III: The third and last part of the YCP was originally scheduled to take place at BASE Bardia, where the participants had planned to create awareness on the issue of monsoon diseases. The Danes were eager to live in traditional mud houses so as to broaden their perspectives on the issue of poverty. However, due to some political problems in the area the group was deprived of providing its volunteer services in the area. The program had to be changed abruptly. Despite MS-Nepal's time constraints and delicate budgetary pressures, they impressively managed to organize a drug awareness program in Dharan together with KYC (Kirat Yakthung Chumlung) in less than a week. As a result, the participants co-operated with the drug rehabilitation center called Punarjiwan Kendra. The programme was aimed at helping the centre in checking the growing misuse of drugs in Dharan by producing a textbook on drugs for school students, drug addicts, the community and families; two posters on the dangers of drugs for the public and for the drug rehabilitation center, and a school education program, which included a drama group.

Lecture programmes on drug related topics were organized at four government and four private schools. Lectures at the government schools were in Nepali, while those in private schools were in English. The target audience was 14-12 age group as majority of drug users in Dharan belonged to that age group.

Likewise, the school education program contributed to analyzing different types of drugs available and being used in Nepal; the mental, physical, social and economic effects of such drugs; ways to avoid narcotic substances, diseases caused by narcotic drugs, necessary help for rehabilitation, and staging of a drama on drugs.

The methodology used in the lecture programme aggressively bombarding the students with real life stories and pictures of adolescents who became drug addicts and destroyed their lives. Some students and drug addicts also made presentations based on their own experiences and/or of people they were acquainted with. Did the kids get the message? The school education program was definitely creative and effective because the children did think about the issue in hand with seriousness; they listened attentively with big eyes to the stories, and even promised to send letters to the lecturers. The only real obstacle was that some of the 7th grade students from boarding schools might have had some difficulty understanding the lectures in English.

During the Part III programme the participants learned that it is extremely necessary to promote awareness about the hazards of drugs among youngsters and had an opportunity to have an insight into the Limbu culture.

From volunteers' point of view the YCP has, on the whole, remained extremely successful. Whether young volunteers have the motivation and ability to offer much more than just charity and sympathy in underdeveloped countries is a question that such trip must answer to.