“It’s nearly done,” I answered.  Our project staff were preparing a large number of containers which would be delivered to project sites in the western region of Mongolia, approximately 1,500 km from the capital Ulaanbaatar.

“Well, it’s too loose,” said my supervisor, a national project manager, concerned about potential damage. We grappled with these containers, re-opened them, and shifted things back and forth, up and down. Finally we managed to finish packing. The time was already past 11pm.

What’s inside? There's 3,000 bottles of chemical solution, booklets, disinfectants, alcohol lamps, masks, and so on, all the necessary equipment for water quality testing. This is one of the activities to improve drinking water in remote areas where laboratory facilities do not exist.

What am I doing here? Let me ask a question first. Globally, can you imagine how many people lack clean and safe drinking water, and how many lack adequate sanitation services? Currently, 1.1 billion people (one in five) suffer from drinking contaminated water and 2.6 billion (one in three) have no toilet, one of the most basic elements of human dignity.

What about in Mongolia? With extreme urban-rural disparity, the water situation is much worse than the global average. This is an awful reality. Moreover, the demographic structure makes it extremely difficult to deal with the problem in a coordinated manner, since Mongolia is one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world.

However, there’s hope. A determination to achieve Millennium Development Goal 7, halving the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation by 2015. In October 2008, UNDP initiated water and sanitation projects in rural areas to cope with the challenges. Later on, I joined as part of the project implementation unit with a two-year contract. 

So far, I have had multiple tasks which are similar to ordinary office work; analyzing surveys, drafting reports, designing publications, developing terms of reference for recruiting consultants and so on. The major difference, which makes my job more distinctive, is that I am working for people who need helping hands, rather than creating profit. This is what propels me to move forward. 

Since I’ve got involved in humanitarian affairs, I’ve always had sympathy for the less fortunate. Having worked in both the private and public sectors, I realize that sympathy won’t make any difference, so I decided to study abroad. A year later, I gained practical hands-on experience from WEDC (Water, Engineering and Development Centre); a visionary organization which trains engineers and managers to create appropriate public health systems. Upon completion, I was fortunate to serve as a UNV volunteer Water and Sanitation Officer. So here I am.

“One receives more than one gives,” this is a lesson I learned from my previous volunteer experiences, which I cherish deep in my heart. In fact, the word ‘volunteer’ came from ‘voluntas’, a Latin word meaning ‘free will’. Yes, it has certainly brought me to Mongolia.

I do have a great willingness to serve humanity, but I know I can’t change the entire world.  Nevertheless, I set out to make a positive impact on the lives of others, believing that such a small plastic containers will make a real difference on the ground.