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Volunteer Opportunities in the USA
Mother's Kitchen
In 1996, people inspired by Amma's teachings about serving the poor asked her if they should find a place with a real need and try to help. When Amma said yes, they found a small soup kitchen in west Oakland serving free meals every weekday while operating on a shoestring budget. Mother’s Kitchen began serving hot meals there twice a month, soon adding bagged lunches too.
The idea spread and soon Mother’s Kitchens began popping up all over the map. Currently, there are more than 50 in the U.S., Canada and Costa Rica. Most help existing facilities, by purchasing food and supplies from donations made to Mother's Kitchen, and by supplying volunteers to prepare, cook and serve the meals.
Mother’s Kitchen groups in North America prepare, cook and serve 150,000 meals for the homeless and hungry each year. Some groups also collect and distribute clothing, household items or food staples for communities in need. If you would like to participate in Mother's Kitchen activity close to your home, please contact Kasturi.
Karma Yoga
The Amrita Karma Yoga program is designed for those who would like to experience living in spiritual community while engaging in a service project. Participants stay on-site at the ashram and volunteer their time. This provides them an opportunity to deepen their spiritual practice by participating in the center’s daily schedule. Karma Yogis are also able to receive guidance from Br. Dayamrita Chaitanya. And they can choose to join many of the classes and workshops offered at the Center while they are here. For more details about the Karma Yoga program in San Ramon please click here and for information about the Karma Yoga program in Chicago please email us here.
AYUDH
AYUDH, or “Amrita Yuva Dharma Dhara” is the youth wing of Embracing the World, aiming to use the powerful force of young people to perpetuate natural harmony, social justice, and personal empowerment.
As an organization we are open to youth between ages 15-30, irrespective of religious, social, and cultural background. We aim to use Embracing the World’s volunteer based methodology to tackle global issues on a massive scale. Get involved today in AYUDH's ripple effect of positive change!
Groups and Centers in North America
For information on local groups and centers that serve the local community please visit our North America groups and centers.
Volunteer Opportunites in India
Translators Needed
A Call for Translators! Do you want to help in Amma’s work in India’s villages? Do you have skills or talents you could share to support women’s groups as they become independent? Would you like to share your success with those less fortunate in your spare time?
AMMACHI Labs, a research wing of Amrita University in India is seeking translators to help us create top-notch, rich computerized, multimedia courses that teach women in villages vital skills. Learn more about Amrita cVET here.
We are seeking volunteers to work remotely to help with translation in several Indian languages: Telugu, Hindi, Kannada, Gujarathi, Marathi, Bengali, Oriya,Tamil, Malayalam If you want to come to India, that’s a bonus too! Let us know.
Skills for Livelihood. Skills for Life.
Amrita Serve
Amrita SeRVe’s vision is to empower villagers to live in communities that are prosperous and self reliant. These are places where people are healthy and educated and where they lead lives of dignity in a clean, pollution-free environment. Amrita SeRVe envisions a world in which Indian villages are thriving, have locally self-sufficient economies, and are able to preserve age-old cultures and traditions. In order to facilitate this transition, Amrita SeRVe has launched a Fellowship Program under the guidance of Sri Mata Amritanandamayi, Amma.
This Fellowship provides opportunities for Indians, as well as those from other countries, to really learn about the needs, values and resources of Indian villages today. Fellows are trained to be facilitators (instead of executors) of change. They bring the community together and help develop the plan and timeline of developmental activities according to villagers’ priorities.
Please contact us for more details. You may also subscribe to our most interesting newsletter here!
Live-in-Labs
Amrita Live-in-Labs™ is a multidisciplinary experiential learning program that facilitates the research, development, and deployment of sustainable solutions for current challenges faced by rural communities in India. The program is designed to engage participants in a mutual learning and sharing experience by breaking classroom and lab barriers to implement theoretical knowledge to address real world problems. The program allows participants to study, observe, and interact with rural populations while living in rural communities to gain a better understanding of challenges in the areas of Health & Livelihood, Education & Technology, Environment & Farming, Energy, and Infrastructure & Basic Facilities. The University of California, San Diego (USA), was the first institution to sign on as an international partner for the Amrita Live-in-Labs™ program.
For more details please email us. To Stay in touch with Amrita SeRVe Projects you may subscribe to our very informative newsletter!
Ammachi Labs
India recently set a national goal to end open defecation by 2019. To address the lack of toilets in the country, AMMACHI Labs is offering vocational courses in masonry, plumbing and life skills to village women so they can construct, install and maintain toilets.
Mentorship
One of the many exciting developments following the Women Empowerment Project is the formal launch of a mentorship program to support the new micro enterprise cooperatives (SHGs) formed by project graduates. For more details.
