We are Living Stories

Steve is our Children's Communication Specialist, working with children in our projects around the world, to support them in developing their communication skills. In this blog, Steve shares some of the stories, directly from the children of Bangladesh along with pictures drawn by them:

By Steve Richards, World Vision UK

Everyone is a storyteller and has an important story to share. In fact, we are Living Stories.
I’m in Bangladesh working with World Vision community volunteers to support them in developing their facilitation skills so they can support children to improve their storytelling skills.
Here are a few real life stories that children have written using World Vision UK’s Storyteller tools as facilitated by our amazing volunteers:

The best day of my life

“One morning my father asked me, do you want to visit the forest? I agreed and was excited. The forest was nearby our house. We started our journey with a great joy. Oh what wonderful trees and a place it is. Suddenly, we heard the tiger’s sound and became afraid and stopped in our tracks. I saw the tiger with a beautiful cub, it was amazing.

We saw the Aboriginal people in the forest and I became happy. They were taking snacks and they shared with us.  I was very interested to know this life, their styles and culture, and I discovered they farmed and collected wild honey, and collected different leaves to make thatch roof. They gave us some pure honey and we were very satisfied. We walked around the forest; I was so impressed to see the hills and a waterfall! There are different kinds of birds, butterflies and other animals. I was so impressed by the forest and have become very sad to see people cutting down the trees; these people are doing a bad thing. When we saw that the sun is going down we planned to go back home. This was one of the best days of my life.” Sabnam, 14yrs.

There is a reason behind every sickness

“Sometimes we face some problems. Sickness is one of them. Once there was a child specialist that came to our area. I was sick that time. My father took me to that doctor, who told me I have stomach trouble. He gave me some medicine and asked me to drink much clean water. 

After then we started to drink boiled water in our family. Doctor was very good to our family. He did not take any money from anyone. There were so many friends who came to take treatment from the doctor. I suggest to my friends to take boiled water. Then I understand that there are reasons behind every sickness.” Oion, 14yrs.

I love my village

“I love my village very much. I make a lot of fun and my friends welcome me and gift me many things when I go back to the village. I like to travel by boat in the river, catch fish and have a picnic, I like to cook in the picnic. At noon we bath in the river. In the evening I hear songs in paddy fields. At night I sit with my friends on a mat and chat together. At night I like the light of fireflies in the forest. Sometimes we hear the Vatiali (traditional) songs. I like these songs very much, many stories are described in these songs. 

I remember a funny incident every time I go back to the village. When we go to picnic we sleep at night and our older brothers calls us to wake up in the morning. Once we woke up by their calling and suddenly one of my friends fell in the water as he woke with a jump! We laughed very much. When I’m in the village I fly kites in the evening and enjoy. Many times the villagers arrange kite flying events. I enjoy buying kites and have many in my home. In my village I not only enjoy but also take care of the surroundings. I make aware of my friend not to waste water. I also tell my neighbours not to cut trees. I keep my area neat and clean and work for it, I enjoy doing this. I want to develop my village like other villages; I want to make it the best village!" Seam, 11yrs.

I will never forget that day

"I like to sing a song. I also like to hear songs. One day I participated in a song competition at school. I sang one of our country songs. I thought that I sang well. Everybody told me that I did well.

In the afternoon, prize giving ceremony was held. I was scared when it was the time of declaring first prize owner name. I was surprised when my name was declared! I was so happy to receive my first prize. After that, my mother encouraged me a lot and I became very happy. It was my most memorable day. I will never forget that day!" Mim, 10yrs.

Thank you Steve for sharing these fab children's stories with us. Have you ever asked your sponsored child to describe the best day of their life or the village they live in? Head over to our Facebook page to join the discussion.