Last day in Thinadhoo 11/07/19

We had to wake up early (5.30am!) and after a late night we were feeling quite tired! However it was completely worth it as we had such a great time at the Maldivian evening the night before. We were so overwhelmed by the kindness and hard work from the people of Gadhdhoo. They put together such a wonderful evening with delicious food and brilliant entertainment. 

At 6.30am we got on the speed launch and made our way back to Thinadhoo. The team and other passengers on the boat were once again entertained by Lottie falling asleep. It was so funny to watch her sway side to side while sitting so upright and holding onto her phone and bag. 

Once we reached Thinadhoo we were greeted by one of the leaders and taken to the G.Dh Education Centre for breakfast. Like every day that we have been here, we were treated to a selection of delicious home madetraditional foods. We were served by the Young Leaders and then lucky enough to be joined by the school’s Principle.

After a short rest we began our first session with 15 Young Leaders. The girls had asked to learn some new games and songs and also do a couple of activities on team work and decision making. One of the activities that they seemed to particularly enjoy was the Lego game. There was a structure that had been built out of Lego and in teams they had to take it in turns to look at it and then go back to the rest of the team and tell one person instructions on how to build it. Once each team had managed to build the structure we asked them if they found the activity easy or difficult and what they thought they could do better next time. We talked about the importance of giving clear concise instructions and how sometimes having one person in charge can benefit a team. 

After lunch we began our session with the Guides. Eighty nine of them turned up for our session on decision making and team work. As they arrived we soon realised that we weren’t all going to fit in the room we were given so we quickly came up with a plan. We decided to do some activities together and then some where we would split into groups and use the outdoor space. We started off with a game to get to know each other. In small groups the girls had to tell each other two things that were true about themselves and one thing that was a lie. The others then had to guess what was the truth and what was the lie. After this we did a couple of activities. One that went particularly well was the activity called ‘end of the world.’ The Guides were told that it was the end of the world and that there were ten people who wanted a space in an underground bunker. However only five people could have a space. The girls were given limited information about each person and they had to pick who they would like to give a space to. They were told their sex, age and occupation. It was interesting to hear the discussions round the room, particularly when we gave them more information about each person. Every team chose to change who they would give a space to in the bunker.

In the late afternoon we went for a lovely stroll down to the beach. We were met by a local gentleman who was on a mission to plant more coconut trees on the reclaimed land. He had planted over three hundred and fifty already. We each took our turn in planting a coconut tree and then sat down for some short eats. The doughnuts and chocolate cake were a big hit with the team! 

After dinner we held a held a session with fifteen leaders. We taught them one of our favourite games which we have played a few times on project, the pen game. This game involves passing two pens around the circle crossed or uncrossed. Everyone playing had to decide how they wanted to pass it. They needed to work out the rule to see if they could get it correct. Some leaders found this very frustrating and many found the game funny. Once they worked out the rule the room erupted in laughter. We explained to everyone that this game teaches you to look at the bigger picture to ensure you have all the information and to listen to each other.

We finished up the leaders session just before 11pm and then went back to the apartment to go to bed! 

Gadhdoo 9th-10th July

Gadhdoo 9th-10th July

On the 9th and 10th July we headed to Gadhdoo for a few more sessions. Nothing could prepare us for what was awaiting on the Jetty! But lets take a few steps back...

We had a huge rush to the ferry in the morning which was packed, only 6 spaces left dotted all over the boat (another launch boat). It was very rough and at our first stop, the airport, nobody got off, more got on! It was very cramped and stiflingly hot when there was no breeze from the boat moving!

Thankfully at the second stop lots of people got off and we were all able to sit at the back to lessen the blow of the jumps and bumps the boat was doing. The 3rd stop was a resort island and a man got on. He asked us where we were going and said that there were lots of people waiting for us when we arrive! I don’t think anything he said could have prepared us for what awaited our arrival. The island has a population of just over 1000 people and there must have been at least 300-400 people lining the jetty. Guides and Yls, but also people who had dressed up in national dress, dressed up their children too and Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts!

We were given a cold towel, then further down the line we were given a feyli (this act means we are now part of the island), a coconut in a hand made basket, a handmade shell necklace, a handmade hat, finally collected the towel back. We had a huge line of people to shake hands with. There was an official photographer to capture the moments and even a drone wizzing around us. It was like we were celebrities! Once we had all got down the line, there was a stage beautifully decorated for photos, then men with feylis and red scarves on created a procession to walk us to the school where we were given more gifts from the Boy Scouts of birds made from coconut leaves.We shared some short eats and more photos in the old school then were given some free time in our apartment where we re-planned some of our sessions and reflected on the amazing welcome we had received.

The session with the Guides was amazing, we had 18 girls in total (there are 22 Guides on the whole island) in a room of perfect size for them which made it really easy to get to know the girls and work with them closely. We changed the activities and the girls really got involved and we got a lot out of the session too! Lots of games, lots of singing but also working on decision making. We started with 2 truths and a lie where the Guides had to quickly make a decision on two statements about themselves that were true and one what was a lie and we had to guess which was the lie. The girls who went first found it difficult to choose statements to say whereas the girls who went last within the group had more time to think of their statements. We then played out a scenario where the world was ending and there was a nuclear bunker that could save 5 people, there were 10 to choose from, 5 females and 5 males and all we knew was their sex, age and job. The girls had to choose 5 people and give their reasons why. We then gave them more information about the people and asked if they changed their top 5, it was interesting to see how the girls made their decisions and we discussed the importance of knowing all the details before making such important decisions. We ended with the activity of the farmer and the chicken, a farmer has to get his chicken, grain and cat across a river but can only take one at a time. He can’t leave the cat with the chicken as the cat would eat the chicken, and couldn’t leave the chicken with the grain as the chicken would eat the grain. The girls had to work together to find the solution and I’m pleased to say they all did manage to get the items across the river without any being eaten! We ended the night on a high and all went to bed feeling like we had really made a difference to these Guides!

The next morning we were ready to go for the day ahead, a hearty breakfast with bread and jam followed by a Little Maids session where we did the ‘This is me’ activity. The girls loved cutting out their hand shapes and using the different coloured felt pens to write all the things they love about themselves on their hands. We put them into a fish head on the wall and left them there for the girls to look back at again. It was such a rewarding session!

We then were rushed back to get changed into our swim gear and drop off our little maids resource bag, then off for juice break of passion fruit. We boarded a boat and headed off somewhere unknown. A surprise they kept telling us! On the way we saw manta rays in the sea and a turtle coming up for breath. When we arrived, nothing could prepare us for what we saw! The beauty was just stunning! Think of honeymoon brochure photos: white sand beaches, palm trees bending over towards the sea of stunning colours of blue and turquoise. No rubbish lined beaches in sight. We saw a few pieces of rubbish during our time on the island but picked them up and bought them back to put in the bin - doing our bit to ‘keep the scene clean!’

The scouts had been at the uninhabited island the night before to prepare for our coming. A welcome sign, a bridge, a bench, a huge table and a swing all made from pioneering! Men gutting fresh fish they had caught that morning for lunch and men in feylis beating drums with a large speaker playing traditional music for us! We arrived off the boat and were gifted parrots made from palm tree leaves. Photos on the swing and then into our Leaders session. We had 5 of the 12 leaders with us, sat on the beach talking about why we are leaders, what makes a good leader and how we can’t all have the qualities needed but a mixed team makes up for that, then the sweet game to show that even manufacturers make mixed bags of sweets to appeal to the wider market! We had a go at playing teapot tag and cat and mouse, we weren’t sure how it would work with small numbers but we managed to rope the scouts in to helping us in the games. We had a lot of fun and giggled a lot! It was then time for lunch! Our lunch was all made and cooked on the island. The most amazing fresh fish and lobster caught that morning! We were truly spoilt!

As soon as the Scouts were finished with their lunch, we walked across the sea bed to the next island to find a bit of deeper water, a lagoon, to swim in. We saw sea cucumbers, a baby shark (of course everyone started singing baby shark!), and lots of fish! The Scouts all had knives to keep us safe in case any wild animal tried to attack us! They were our escorts. It was lovely to see Guiding and Scouting working in harmony. After a few minutes of swimming in the lagoon we walked further to a spot surrounded by coconuts. One of the scouts was opening a fury coconut, we tasted the milk from it and then got to eat the fresh coconut, it’s so much better than the stuff we get back home!

We headed back and the scouts started to pack away the camp, we piled onto the boat and headed back to Gadhdoo. When we were in Gadhdoo, we put on life jackets and got onto a rickety little sailing boat that also had oars and we rowed across to Gun Island. Gun island used to house a British army base on it, since the Maldives gained independence, it has remained an uninhabited island but is still used every day for farming. A snorkelling instructor met us at the beach and we all piled back onto the original boat to get set up for some snorkelling! We saw some lovely shoals of fish, a sea turtle, an angel fish, some clown fishes cleaning themselves in an aenenomy. It was an amazing experience.

We then went onto Gun island itself where we were treated to some handmade crowns, another escort from people in traditional dress and then a dance. The island was decorated so beautifully, gorgeous red flowers everywhere and another pioneered table from coconut trees! The people here are so handy and really do use every bit of the coconut tree in their daily lives! The women dressed in their feylis and red hijabs performed a traditional dance with sticks, a bit similar to Morris dancing. A few women sung the song which was amazing, the harmonies and the way they use their voice to sing is so special. We were then invited to have a go at dancing before it was time to get back on the boat! When we arrived on the Jetty, we were given invitations to a Maldivian night that evening. We headed back to shower and change and wear our new feylis   too.

The Maldivian night had been put on especially for us at the new school on the island. The drone was out again as was the official photographer. A number of huts had been built housing traditional Maldivian crafts, we were taken around and shown the historical practises such as using the coconut, weaving, black smiths making tools, lace making for the stunning traditional dresses, traditional teaching and much more. Two tables were laid out for us and lines of chairs behind for locals to join us. There were so many people at the event they ran out of chairs and people had to bring their own! Before we ate, Alyson was asked to make a speech about the work that GOLD does and how important the partnership is between the MGGA and Girlguiding UK. She also took the time to thank the people of Gadhdoo for everything they had done for us. Whilst we ate, the Littlemaids, Guides and Boy Scouts performed traditional dances for us, the final one was the stick dance from earlier on Gun Island and we were asked to join in! It was amazing to be a part of their traditions. The evening ended when we were presented with woven pieces of art and the school principal (also a Guiding leader) thanked everyone who had helped to put the night together.

We went to bed feeling so privilaged to have had the experiences today and amazed at the traditions we witnessed.

To the people of Gadhdoo, Shukuriyyaa.

Day 1 on Thinadhoo - 8th July 

Thinadhoo was awaiting us, but we wouldn’t get there without getting over a few hurdles. The first came when traveling to the airport. We thought we were getting a 10 seater taxi, which would have comfortably fitted the 6 of us, Raza (our YL liaison) and all our luggage. However, a 6 seater turned up! Defiantly not big enough. So it was packed up with most of the bags and 4 of the team while Alyson, Lyndsay and Raza waited for another. But no taxis came. Raza phoned them up to see what was going on. We waited and still no taxis. Raza phone once again to find out that the taxi had been cancelled because her previous call cut out. Five minutes later (30 minutes after we originally set out) we were finally on our way to the airport finally! 

Check in did not go smoothly. Some of our bags had started their journey to the plane when we realised that metal cutlery was not allowed in cabin luggage. There was a mad scramble for everyone to get the metal straws (given to us as part of Rayya’s session ‘Keep the Scene Clean’) out of our hand luggage and put in the remaining hold luggage. 

The second hurdle was Lottie’s bag (I sense a recurring theme here). A little bit of back ground for you on the bag: it houses the camera, 5 lenses, go pro, power pack, other stationary and a laptop when traveling. The man behind the desk was happy with everyone’s hand luggage, except Lottie’s, which he wanted to weigh ... 19.3kg! Now, just to put this into perspective, that is the weight of some of our hold luggage for the full three weeks. When we were in London, Lottie was carrying this rucksack on her front, and one weighing 27kg on her back. Due to the size of the bag it had to be checked into the hold, but because of the specialist equipment, Lottie was keen to see it on and off the plane at a cost of $19 (we are still unsure if this is due additional manual handling or something else).

Our final hurdle was getting through security. Due to it being an internal flight we were able to take as much liquids as we wanted through, however we seemed to forget that scissors were prohibited. Racheal tried to take 2 pairs of scissors through and Lyndsay tried to take the scissors from the first aid kit. All three pairs were confiscated. 

We landed at the airport on an island that was a 10 minutes speed boat away from Thinadhoo. The airport was tiny. We disembarked the aeroplane and walked over the airfield to the terminal, which consisted of 3 rooms. We were met by Guide Leaders and the President of the Council of Thinadhoo, before boarding the speedboat. 

On arrival to at our destination we were greeted by a jetty full of Little Maids, Guides , Young Leaders and Leaders as well as some other island officials and were given a gift of dried flowered wrapped in hessian. We then loaded our bags into a taxi and took a short walk to our apartment (where the president of the Maldives stays when he visits). We unloaded the bags, had a quick refresh before heading out for lunch and the start of our sessions.

After our quick stop and refresh, we took a short taxi to Abookakuru school, where we were greeted by Little Maids who gave each of us a floral headdress. They then lead us into the center of a circle and preformed their ‘Little Maids are we’ song. We then had lunch accompanied by some traditional Maldivian dancing. 

After being well fed and feeling refreshed from our journey we were ready to start our session with around 60 excitable Little Maids. We started the session with a game of teapot tag, which they thoroughly enjoyed (especially when there Leaders were running). We played lots of games and sang lots of songs as well as doing the ‘Praise a Little Maid’ activity. This activity encouraged the girls to think about positive and negative traits of a person within a team and then something that they could be better at. They then wrote a compliment about everyone else in the group in secret, that was sealed with a sticker to be opened at home. We took lots of photos before a short juice break before we started the session with the Stars.

The stars session was full of songs with actions and games including: cut the cake, hokey-cokey, head shoulders knee and toes, there was a crocodile, down in the jungle and the beaver song. During the songs we heard the Call for Prayer, so stopped until this had finished. They all had a great time, and we think the leaders did too! Hopefully we were able to show them some new games and songs that that can do with them. 

When we had finished the session we went on a tour of the island. Adeola, Lottie and Rachael jumped on the back of mopeds, while Alyson, Lyndsay and Sophie piled into a car with all the bags and resources. The island was not very big, so it did not take much time, but we did drive past the Mosque and to the reclaimed land. We returned to the GDh Atoll Education Centre (E.C), across the road from our apartment to have some short eats and Bombay tea (sugary, milky, spiced tea) which went down well. 

We returned to the apartment for some rest and to get ready for dinner. After a busy last few days we were all exhausted, and most of us had a nap of sorts. The beds were big and comfy, to the point that three of us fell asleep on the bed. 

We were taken in the taxi for dinner. We weren’t told where we going to eat, but we could see we were heading out to the reclaimed land, where there were no buildings and no lights. We got out the taxi and were told to stand in two lines. We were lead away from the taxi by two women playing traditional drums. We walked through a channel of mopeds and the lights were turned on when we walked past. We were then treated to a feast of local food prepared by the leaders. To finish the evening each group of leaders and young leaders (YLs) performed a song. One group performed a native song, that the Young Leaders started dancing to, we were invited up to dance too. We had a go at the Maldivian style of dancing but we were not anywhere as good at it as the YL’s. The YL’s then performed ‘Linger’, which we all loved as we have been singing it a lot ourselves. They then asked us to perform a song. We decided to do Edelweiss as we think it is a lovely song with some nice actions to go along with it to finish the night. We all had an amazing, but busy day and were glad to get back to the apartment to prepare for the next day and sleep.

Day 2 on Thinadhoo – 9^thJuly

We had an early rise once again (5.45am) for some morning swimming. The Young Leaders came to get us from the apartment and walked with us to the sight for the swimming. This was on the other side of the island from the jetty. We clambered over some rocks to take the plunge. The YL’s had a couple of sets of masks and snorkels with them that we took in turns to use. Even Adeola dawned a mask to look down to the sea bed, after not previous putting her head under at the YL weekend. We saw loads of different fish, but did not venture too far due to the high tide and current.  After about 30 minutes of swimming we got back to the apartment via pick-up truck. 

Breakfast was back at GDh Atoll E.C. where we had roshi, beans, peanut butter and chocolate sandwiches and a fish and rice dish. We also had a coffee each, but not everyone likes coffee so Lottie and Lyndsay had them all! 

We then had a bit of down time back at the apartment where some of us napped and some of us tried to organise the 1000’s of photos and minutes of video that we had gathered so far. With our bags packed once again (but left in the apartment) we heading for lunch at Hoet Buffet with some of the teachers and leaders from the schools we had been at. 

Our final session in of the day was with 85 Little Maids at Thinadhoo School.  The school welcomed us with the ‘Little Maids Are We’ song and a crocheted flower bracelet. We took photos with the Little Maids and Leaders before starting our session in the main hall. 

We were kindly provided with a microphone, although it did not seem to be working well. Lyndsay was introducing the team, becoming louder due to the apparent faulty microphone. However, it was evident that the system had been working the full time as the speakers were wheeled in with the sound of her voice booming through. 

The session started with a game of teapot tag, before doing the starter to praise a Little Maid and compliment relay as well as a load of games and songs. We only had an hour for the session so tried to squeeze as much as possible. We were on a tight schedule so whizzed round all the girls giving them a sticker before saying our goodbyes. 

We only had 15 minutes to get back to the jetty to get the ferry to our next destination, so it was a mad rush to get back to the apartment, pick up our bags, go to the toilet and change clothes for those of us that needed to. We got to the ferry (speedboat with 22 seats) in the nick of time. We were the last to board and caused a bit of a scene getting our bags and ourselves to fit on. 

Finally we were all seated and we were on our way to our next adventure! 

Young Leaders Weekend - 5th - 6th July 2019

Day one of Young Leaders Weekend.

The weekend began with a 4.30am wake up call before leaving the apartment in Hulhumalé at 5.30am, in the hope to get a bus at 5.40am. Unfortunately this was not to be. We waited until 6.10am to get on a bus that took us to Malé, where we were met by the Leaders and Young Leaders (YL’s) that would be traveling with us to Naifaru by speed launch.

The journey should take 1 hour 50 mins in the best conditions, however it took us over 2.5 hours due to the engines stopping mid crossing and slightly choppy conditions. Most of us managed fine with the journey, and even managed to get a couple of minutes sleep before being awakened by the jolt of going over a big wave, however Sophie did get a bit sea sick. 

When we arrived on Naifaru we were welcomed by the islands Guides (aged 12-16), who presented us with a flower crown and a chocolate muffin each (which was delicious). 

Young leaders from two other island also arrived at the same time. Our bags were taken from us and were loaded onto a tuk-tuk type vehicle, which were taken to the school for us while we walked. 

We commenced with a breakfast of a tasty fish and rice dish with a bit of crunch, which was native to the island, along with roshi, bananas and black tea (which is really sweet). 

Recruitment and Retention

After some short introductions we started our first session on recruitment and retention by discussing the reasons why they are YLs, we used the statement, 

I am a YL because... 

There were lot of inspiring reasons why these YLs volunteer with Guiding. We then asked them to get into small groups and brainstorm the reasons they believe girls leave Guiding at YL age (16-25). 

There were many reasons as to why they would leave, such as heading off to university in a different country, moving island, getting married, having children etc. We then started to discuss some of the comebacks our YLs could use to try and stop girls leaving for these reasons. The session was cut short as we needed to go to somewhere on the island at a certain time.

At 10am sharp it was time to leave to visit the turtle rehabilitation sanctuary on the island. The sanctuary was home to a number of injured turtles who have lost limbs due to getting caught in fishing nets or plastic in the ocean. There were also turtles that were buoyant, and floated on top of the water. They needed to stay in the sanctuary until they are able to dive in the ocean again. It was a huge wake up call to us all. The staff at the sanctuary told us about the work they do in rehabilitating the turtles and a bit about each of the turtles in the sanctuary. Some of the turtles we were introduced to are almost ready to be released back into the sea.

Recruitment and retention continued..

When we returned to the school, we continued with the recruitment and retention session. We got the YL’s sitting in two lines having discussions with the person opposite them, one person argues why they want to leave Guiding and the other person gives reasons to stay! We shared some examples and one of those was ‘I’m getting married and won’t have time for a family and Guiding’ to which Ashi proved that you can do both as she had been married 25 years and had 3 children and still managed to have a part in Guiding and even a part in the MGGA as the Commissioner for youth. There were huge cheers to this and the session ended on a high!

After our second part of the recruitment and retention session we had lunch, which was comprised of ….. which went down well as we are all hungry from our busy morning. We also used this time to get changed into our swim wear, ready for the trip to the beach.

Commitment and Volunteerism 

After yet another tasty meal, we started our second session on commitment and volunteerism. In this session we began by looking at their commitment to Guiding and we made promise and law beads. There was 11 beads all different colours and with different means relating to the colour.

Dark blue - Promise

Light blue – honour is to be trusted

Yellow - loyal

Light green – useful and helpful to others

Red – a friend to all and a sister to every other guide

Orange - courteous

Light purple – kind to all living things

Bright pink – obeys orders

Dark green – sings and smiles under all difficulties

Light pink - thrifty

Dark purple – pure in thought, word and deed

In this session we were only able to cover the commitment part, through looking at the promise and laws of the MGGA and explaining how similar the UK Guides promise and laws. The session had to be cut short again, as we needed to go to the beach.

We enjoyed doing the two sessions, but we were definitely looking forward to going to the beach, or as they like to call it in the Maldives, Salt. We all thought we would just be walking back to the bit of beach were the Turtle Rehabilitation Centre was, but there were two large flatbed pick-up trucks waiting for us out side. We pilled on, with our bags and resources that we needed to complete our session for the beach Olympics. The pick-ups took us back to the port where we got onto two barge like boats that took us to a different island. 

Getting off the boat when we got there was a bit of a mission. Due to the size of the boat we couldn’t get too close to the land, so we had to jump off into to water, which was about waste height, and wade to dry land. We also had to bring with us all the bags, including Lottie’s camera bag (which we now know weighed about 19kg) which was put on Lyndsay’s head and walked to shore. When the second boat arrived we created a train to pass the items off the boat onto the land. We all had a bit of a swim and then a snack of fruit and chilli before starting our Beach Olympics activity. 

Beach Olympics 

To kick start our beach Olympics we needed to get the Young Leaders into groups. To do this, we gave each of them a card with a picture of an animal on it. They had to pretend to be that animal so that they could find the other members of their team. The Young Leaders found this really funny and were laughing and smiling. They then had to make up a team name. Once they had done this and after some cheering and chanting we began our first game. 

We started off by standing in lines and playing over/under with the beach ball. This is where we really started to see the girls competitive side! We played a couple of other games with the beach ball and then started a water challenge relay. The girls had to take it in turns in their teams to run to the sea and fill up a plastic bottle that had holes in. They then had to run back to the start and pour the water into another bottle. Once the water rose high enough the girls could reach a floating peg and take it out. For each challenge the teams were awarded 5,4,3,2 and 1 points depending on where they came. We played a couple of other games with the plastic bottles and then had one last race where they had to pass a cup of water down the line by holding it over their head and tipping it into a cup behind.

At the end of the games, the GOLD leaders totaled up the scores and found out that team Nagin had won. We kept it a secret so that we could reveal it at the closing ceremony. The Young Leaders then ran into the sea and went for a swim. The GOLD leaders joined them and everyone did some snorkeling. It was amazing!

BBQ

For our BBQ with YLs we dressed up in our Maldivian feyli we received as gifts, from the little maids from Huravee in Hulhumalé. Three of us wore the feyli with a black top and three with a white top. As we had been told before we left that the colour theme was black and white. We were ready to embrace the Maldivian culture for the lovely evening ahead.

Once we were ready we headed back to the school, where they told us to go down to the beach. While we were waiting for the BBQ to be ready, we sang songs with the Young leaders, one that they really enjoyed was ‘Down in the Jungle’, we also taught them Edelweiss, as they already knew the clapping actions. When the BBQ was ready ate sausages, chicken potato and rice, which of course was a little spicy.

They also shared with us one of their native songs which was very impressive. 

It was an enjoyable evening, and we ended the night just before midnight!

Day 2.

For our second breakfast of the YL weekend we had the traditional rice dish again, with tuna. As usual it was very tasty. Our breakfast that morning was at 7.30am. However, we miss a couple of things on the schedule, we didn’t manage to make the morning wake up whistle at 5am and we also missed out on the 6am exercise and coffee, as we were still in bed.

Keep the Scene Clean

‪On Saturday morning the first session was with Rayya, the President of the Young Leaders, titled ‘Keep the Scene Clean’. She presented a WAGGGS seminar based on the United Nation’s global sustainable development goals. Rayya educated us on the effect we are having on the planet and how we can try and change things. Would could do this by living more sustainable lives.  After going to the island we went to for swimming and beach Olympics we can see the impact that we are making, which made the topic even closer to home. 

The activity included being given one of the development goals that linked with the environment. We discussed the importance of it and how we could personally contribute to achieving the goal. She also had examples with her of changes we could make that could have an impact: reusable hessian bags for shopping, reusable bottles for water, reusable fabric covered in beeswax, which can replace cling film and menstrual cups to reduce the plastic waste from sanitary pads and tampon applicators. 

We were also all given a metal straw to replace the single use plastic straws we use in our drinks. The session left us feeling inspired to make changes of our own to aid the cause. We each thought of something that we are going to do when we return home including: using the beeswax clingfilm for sandwiches, trying the menstrual cups, reducing how many wipes we use, getting reusable cotton buds, shopping in zero waste shops when we can and much, much more. 

The quote that came from the session was:

‘We don’t need a few doing it perfectly, we just need everyone doing it imperfectly”

Communication and Delegation 

For the second session of the day but our first session we led a session focused on communication and how you can communicate in several ways and how important communication is.

Our first activity in the session was ‘Mirror Charades’ in small groups, ideally teams of six. Where you would have four team members sat in a line: the fifth member stood behind the line of four and acting/miming out an animal, place or object that had been written on a piece of paper (they are not allowed to talk). The sixth member of the team was then stood in front of the four and the sixth person had to copy the actions of the person standing behind the row. The four people sat down, then had to guess what the item was by looking at the signs being used by the person in front of them, which they were mirroring from the individual behind the row.

Once the item on the paper has been guessed, the person who guessed it correctly then gets to the move and stand at the front, the person that was at the front gets to move to the back, and the one at the back gets to move into the empty seat. They then get to repeat this until everyone has had a go at, at least one side of the row, or all the slips of paper have been used.

This game showed the YL’s that by using their eyes and body positions, they can work well as a team to accomplish a goal. The YL’s can share this game within their local units, to develop the use of non-verbal communication.

In addition to this, they took part in an activity called ‘Picture This’ where one member of each group was given a drawing of an item, for example; a snowman, a car or a house and they had to describe what the drawing contained without saying the name of the item and the rest of the team had to draw on paper what they thought the item looked like. By describing the details in the picture, meant that members of each team had to listen carefully and use their cognitive thinking.

Our final activity in this session was a Lego relay. We gave each team a bag of identical pieces of Lego, and the aim of this game was to create a matching structure to the model that we had already completed.

We placed that model at the front of the room and placed a large box in front so that the teams that were sitting closer could not see the model. When we said go the teams were able to come up to the front one at a time and look at the structure. They then went back to the team to start building their model. We had informed them that they should only place one brick at a time, but somewhere this got lost in communication, as they were putting more than one down at a time. If they thought they had finished and had used all of the Lego pieces one of our team would take their model and double check it against the original. Most of the time the teams had not got all the bricks in the right place, so we would take it back to them and tell them to look again and try to solve the problem.

Fundraising 

As part of the YL weekend they had asked us to run a session about the fundraising activities we had done to raise money for our GOLD project and give advice about how to run a fundraising event. 

We didn’t have much of a plan for this session.  But we were able to download parts of the Fundraising Toolkit from the Girl Guiding UK (GGUK) website so we could put together a structure for the session. Throughout all of the sessions we kept chopping and changing our minds on what was going into each session and evaluating as we went along.

As fundraising can be quite a difficult topic to cover we wanted make it more interactive instead of a short lecture. We wanted the groups to have plenty of opportunities to discuss ideas and potentially have a plan to take away with them at the end, so they could begin to prepare a fundraising event. 

We started out with a short group discussion about why you would fundraise and what opportunities it could give to members of Guiding in the Maldives. During the trip we found out that fundraising is quite important to MGGA as they do not charge any fees to their members, and their funding comes mainly from the sale of their uniform and additional events. We pointed out to them that more money coming into MGGA means that more girls could get involved with the movement and they could do more exciting things as an organisation. One Young Leader mentioned being able to travel internationally, which they all seemed very keen about!

After their discussions we got them to write down some of the things they already did to fundraise and picked out a few to read out – there were so many great ideas in the room. Lottie then introduced them to the A-Z of Fundraising produced by GGUK to give them an idea of something different they could do – a Zumbathon seemed to catch the imagination of a few in the room.  She then got them to write ideas of what they would like to do to fundraise. 

After a brief introduction about how events could be so beneficial and could raise quite a lot of money, and a quick outline of the process of setting an event up, Lottie called on Sophie and Adeola to talk about their experiences of running events. 

Sophie ran a very successful quiz night as part of her GOLD fundraising, and she spoke about how she had different people running different parts of it, highlighting the importance of delegation for an event. She also informed the YLs that she had asked for a lot of donations – for example, the Ploughman’s supper included in the ticket price was completely donated, as were raffle prizes. 

As many of our events incorporate smaller stalls such as raffles and tombolas, or include alcohol, for example wine tasting evenings, it was a small challenge to adapt some of these traditional British fundraising staples, as gambling and alcohol are forbidden under Islamic teachings.

Adeola then spoke about fundraising she did as part of her church, particularly focusing on raising money through bag packing and bucket collections at supermarkets during the Christmas season. She said that this was because people were more generous in the festive period, so it’s worth considering times of the year when people are more likely to give money to charity as part of planning for the event.

Once they had listened to these two case studies, the YL’s started to plan their own events, choosing one from the lists they had made and thinking about the different components of it. It was particularly interesting to hear about a festival planned by one group and let them know that annual events work so much better than one-off events, once they are established people are more likely to come time and time again. 

After about fifteen minutes of planning, we got a couple of groups to feedback what they had they planned to the rest of the group, which included the festival in more detail. We are all looking forward to seeing whether the international festival happens! We will be following the MGGA on social media to keep up to date on the process of their events, and we can’t wait to see what they plan in the future!

Closing Ceremony 

To complete our wonderful YL weekend we took part in the closing ceremony. All the Young Leaders were presented with a certificate signed by Ashi, commissioner of youth and Alyson, GOLD team leader. Alyson was taken away earlier in the day to sign all 50+ of the certificates! We were presented with gifts of thanks along with all those who helped run the weekend.

There is a huge amount of planning and preparation that goes into these events! We want to say a huge thanks to everyone who took part in the YL weekend! We ran some great sessions with these inspiring women and had some amazing experiences too.