Lao PDR, the country in the heart of Southeast Asia, is a place that is still home to untouched and stunning nature. While these areas are an important habitat for many species, the decline of forests due to Lao PDR’s fast resource-based development results in many of them being threatened. The project I was supporting during the past year is working on the protection of at least five endangered species - the Asian elephant, the critically endangered Siamese crocodile, a beautiful deer called Eld’s deer and two types of monkeys. Sounds like a great time, doesn’t it? Now let me tell you about my passion for nature conservation and development. How it led to my work as a UN Volunteer in Lao PDR and how this assignment shaped my personality, career and view on volunteerism.

I remember my first contact to volunteering and the global south was an annual day we had in elementary school. We were fasting until lunch, when we all had a bowl of rice together. We had a fair where we sold old toys to fellow students and the earnings went 100% to a schooling project in Brazil. And we had people invited that were supporting this project for many years, telling us more about their work and passion for philanthropy.

I remember being super fascinated. One part was definitely that I was also dreaming of chewing some sugar cane, like the kids in the pictures. But a big part of it was the social aspect of working together across countries to make a difference in someone’s life and share our happiness. A driver that lead me to volunteer in very different organizations, tasks and topics, countries and cultures in the years ahead.

Many years later, during my studies in international development I discovered my passion for nature and wildlife conservation that is socially inclusive and contributes to development. I felt that a UN Volunteering assignments is exactly the place for me, as it combines this passion with insights into the professional work in this field, while working hand-in-hand with and learning hands-on from the most experienced and best educated national and international colleagues.

My work as a communication officer is on one hand to make the wildlife project known in Lao PDR and abroad, and raise awareness in the communities about the key ideas of the project and challenges it faces. While reporting on the successes through stories, videos, events and radio podcasts. Additionally, my task was to help communicate UNDP’s work in Lao PDR in general, making it easier to grasp, and the technical and diplomatic initiatives better digestible.

During this time, I’ve learned so many things every week. Fearlessly diving into new tasks and topics opened up new areas of work to me, and closely working together with my team and colleagues, observing the way the do and approach things, while reading up background information and watching oh-so-many YouTube videos made me get better and faster in the new things I learned.

Now let me tell you about three unforgettable experiences during this time. Things that shaped the time here in lao PDR, but also stand for many other adventures that made my UNV assignment so special.

Culture. Living here in Lao PDR, to me a completely new culture, I learn so much every day just by observing people and experiencing live in a different place. During April, we celebrated the Lao new year. Here, we don’t light fireworks, but the whole city - if not country - turns into a huge water fight. People sit on the back of pickups and throw waterbombs at each other in the street. Along the street everyone is wearing water pistols around the neck and music is blasting out of way-to-load speakers. A beautiful and exciting way to welcome the new year.

Learning. My current team is very diverse. That means in terms of origin, knowledge, skills, age and way of work. It is a common thing for us that everybody is trying out new tasks and the ones who already have experience happily share what they have learned before. That means, we often have sessions where one of the team members is explaining others on how to edit movies, how to update the website, gives feedback on a written news article, or after an introduction get responsibilities to organize parts of an event. Furthermore, we even get to research new idea. For example how to make flixels – still photo-images that have a moving video part –or how to optimize our website for google searches. This continuous and mutual learning helped me to grow during my assignment with such a steep learning curve.

COP23. Last but definitely not least, a key moment during my time here was my participation in the global climate conference COP23 in Bonn, Germany. I was chosen to accompany the Lao delegation to the climate conference to report on their activities, Lao PDR’s UNDP side events at the conference, and cover the event through video-logs and in the local newspapers to make the conference more accessible for the broader public in Lao PDR. A dream came true for an environmentalist like me.

Looking back at my time in Lao PDR, not only COP was a dream coming true. The entire assignment, working for an organization like UNDP, sitting at tables together with high government officials, being part of visits from both the UNDP Administrator and UN Secretary General, being part of the first steps of the creation of a new national protected area, supporting the work towards Lao PDR’s graduation from the least-developed-county status and just seeing how an international organization work and acts was an incredible and life changing experience that I will never forget. An experience that motivates me to continuo working towards a sustainable world that leaves no one behind. Remembering the events in elementary school I understand more and more that the youth is an agent for positive change and that it’s the little things that shape and motivated them to contribute their part. I hope that many more can have the opportunity to experience a UNV assignment that not only strengthens them, but further strengthens the global community.

I am very much looking forward to coming back to Lao PDR in a few years, visit the national protected area and observe some Asian elephants and Siamese crocodiles. Protected creatures that will then have their little safe-haven with a tiny little bit of my support.

Jonas Aechtner, German, is an International Youth Volunteer, working as a Communications Officer at UNDP in Lao PDR.