PRESENTING!

today i have to present my personal and professional experiences in nepal. there will be classmates and professors and academics and newspaper reporters at the thing. my personal account reads something like this:

Things I will remember fondly about Nepal:
1. Wildlife in the city: The cows hanging out in the streets and monkeys hanging from wires.
2.The bandh within the first 2 weeks of being here that nearly caused me to mess myself.
3. The food. I might have heart burn after I eat, but I promise its worth it.
4. Frozen Yogurt at Fire and Ice.
5. Pokhara and the Himalayas.
6. Attending a Nepali wedding in traditional clothes and dancing untraditionally.
7. Riding on the back of a motorbike: first to see the impact that microfinance had in one little town and then in Pokhara to see the hills and the lake.
8. Thamel’s overcrowded, densely populated streets.
9. My intimate relationship with a holy man.
10. The tacky sentimental last one: my host family’s kindness and all the wonderful people I met and the friendships I forged with you.

THEN. We will move onto Professional things:

Helped to write a report covering 52 MFIs that were surveyed. (EXPANDS.)

Then, my own project was to try and further understand the interest rate debate. (BLABBERS ABOUT REALLY INSANE/THOUGHT PROVOKING THINGS)

Some things I learned: CONFIDENTIAL.

Finally: credit plus. With money has to come training, education, health programs, etc. MF has to be tied with other projects, credit and savings alone are not enough: Especially given that MF is not THE solution to end poverty, it is just a tool of development.

[STANDING OVATION: Whitney waves like the Queen of England with hand cupped.]