21 October 2008
by Luu Thi Ngoc Anh, UNV

Tiitta at her desk in the Poverty & Social Development Cluster at UNDP

More than 2 years ago, Marjo Riitta Tervonen (Tiitta) stumbled across a job advertisement for a UNV volunteer, UNDP Viet Nam was looking for a Gender Specialist. Although she was pregnant at the time and knew that – if accepted – she would be starting a brand new volunteer assignment with an equally new baby, she couldn’t resist applying.

Tiitta, a Gender Specialist from Finland, already held a Masters degree in adult education and had extensive work experience at policy level in education and gender by the time she arrived in UNDP Viet Nam in October 2006.

Tiitta’s job has been to represent UNDP in the UN Gender Theme Group, which later became the UN Gender Programme Coordination Group, to develop new gender projects for UNDP and to advise UNDP projects on gender mainstreaming. Concepts such as gender mainstreaming are not yet firmly established in Viet Nam, so specialists like Tiitta are among the first pioneers taking issues of gender and women’s empowerment and integrate them across the wide spectrum of development projects. As a result of this work, gender issues are taken seriously, as current debates about women’s rights demonstrate.

However, living in Viet Nam, a developing country located in the tropics, is something of a change from the frequent sub zero temperatures in developed Finland. “Of course there were many challenges of moving to a new country and to a new working environment. I have to say that I probably thought Viet Nam would have been a bit more developed and I was not prepared for the lack of Western products which I needed for my daily life. But that is perhaps because I had not been working in developing countries before, but after a while, it did not matter if I did not get my favourite cheese for breakfast,” Tiitta says. She also remembers how in her first days in Viet Nam, she couldn’t find a facial moisturiser which didn’t contain skin whitener – quite unnecessary for the majority of Finns! She remembers these days with fondness and good humour. To help her through those early days, Tiitta was always able to rely on the support of her husband Pekka, who shared the parental leave with her so that they were able to come to Viet Nam when their son, Toivo, was just five months.

Tiitta taking part in the Gender Discussion at the UNV annual workshop 2008

Despite these problems, Tiitta has found great satisfaction working with her UNDP colleagues, her gender colleagues from different UN agencies, the government and other networks here in Viet Nam. “I have to say that my colleagues and agencies have always treated me just like any other staff member, and I have always felt appreciated as a UNV volunteer. My UNV colleagues, especially Finnish UNV volunteers, have helped me a lot in overcoming challenges”, Tiitta proudly states.

Tiitta is also working on staff work-life balance issue which is for her an area of interest as well as experience. Tiitta is proud to be setting a good example of work-life balance to her colleagues by leaving the office at the specified time to see her little toddler son.

Now that he has spent his first few years in South East Asia, it’s high time for Toivo to start learning a second language! “I never forget the moment when my son’s first Vietnamese words came out. I have always encouraged his nanny to speak Vietnamese to him. At the age of 2 years and 4 months, his favorite word is “khong” (no)!,” Tiitta says.

Long before she thought about coming to Viet Nam, Tiitta was an active volunteer. As she recalls, her university days were packed with such activities: “There was a time when I paid my membership fee to 10 or so organizations, and so I never got bored as I always had so much to do on top of my academic work.” Accordingly, Tiitta has not missed the chance to promote volunteerism and mobilize volunteer resources in her work when on the occasion of International Women’s Day and the International Day on Violence against Women, Tiitta and her colleagues recruited a huge number of Vietnamese volunteers who became active advocates for these significant events. These volunteers remember Tiitta as affectionately as she remembers them.

Tiitta and Finnish President Tarja Halonen when she visited Viet Nam in February 2008

A highlight of Tiitta’s experience and a moment of great personal honour came when she and her colleagues in the UN Gender Theme Group working in cooperation with Vietnamese parliamentarians organized an event to mark the passing of the Domestic Violence Law in Viet Nam. Another time was then Tiitta got the opportunity to meet and discuss gender issues with the Finnish President Tarja Halonen, a great supporter of gender and recognized feminist, when she visited Viet Nam.

“This is definitely a great adventure, although financially you may need to make some sacrifices! But the experience is worth more than a million dollars!”