In Pokhara

Arrived here yesterday by bus and it was a good trip, no hold ups.  We brought most of the clothes that Carol brought with us here.  One large carton, 3 small cartons and two big bags and our own packs.  Getting the cartons on top of the bus was a job and one broke open and spilled clothes all over the road.  No problem Nepalis do not get upset about such things but I could not help laughing.  We are going to give these out in the next couple of days and also take some to Chimkhola where we will be going on Friday.  Some members of the Annapurna Rotary are also going as it is the closing ceremony of the Rotary project on Saturday.  I will report on that with photos after it happens.  We now have a very busy week.  I have not had a day off since starting work here.  Tomorrow we take Carol and Keith to Phumdi Bhumdi.

Photos: Loading the boxes, Mann balancing it on his head and top loading boxes in the one of taxes on arrival.  We needed two taxis each end.  A lot of children will be made happy with all these lovely clothes from Doha, Qatar and we thank the people there who donated them.

Photos on Flickr

I have been uploading photos onto flickr.  I try to do some every few days.  This page is not letting me upload photos today but I have put them on flickr.  www.flickr.com/photos/98411

I have put the children in files named after where they live.  If you do not know this I will email everyone when I get home and tell you with an update of your child.  Some of my emails are getting lost so will not attempt to do this till I get home.

Samjhana Tamang

Samjhana and her family of both parents and three younger brothers live next door to our office.  They live in a small brick room next to a workshop where her father works making furniture.  Samjhana is 13 years old and looks after the family completely.  She cooks, cleans, draws the water from the well, washes her brothers and even takes little brother Sunil to school with her.  He is nearly three years old.  the mother does work washing clothes at someone's house but when she returns home she does nothing leaving Samjhana to do all the work.. I see Samjhana put Sunil on top of her school bag on her back and walk down the road to school,  The school lets him go in the nursery class for free as there is no one to care for him.  Samjana is a good student although she is behind because she started late.  She was first in her class last year and skipped from class 1 to class 3.  I never see her play with friends as she is always working.  Last night I put my head in the door and she was peeling potatoes as her mother visited with friends.  In the morning I see her drawing the water from the well at 6 am,  This year she lost her sponsor so I placed her with a new one.  This was a good thing as for the first time she received a letter and gift from her new sponsor.  She was more than delighted.  This was the sponsor that is an airline pilot that I wrote about earlier when she received the photo of him by the plane he flies. I think this really gave her a thrill and brightened her tough little life. I have photos to go with this post but at the moment it will not let me upload them.  Will try later.

Sujan & Suman, Samjhana's brothers

Tomorrow we go to Pokhara on the bus with bags and boxes of clothes.

Carol & Keith arrive from Qatar

 Today we met early with Carol and Keith and brought them to the office.  They brought with them 170 kgs of clothing.  We had some children come to the office for clothes and then went to visit their sponsored children, Pinky and Santi.  They enjoyed their visit very much.  Pinky is the name of their fund in Qatar which raises the money for their children and projects here.  It is the Pinky Fund, Friends of the Qatar Wooden Spooners. 

I wrote about Pradip a few days ago and his brother Sandip who did not have a sponsor.  Carol and Keith wanted to sponsor him so we went to visit him also.  Sandip was one of the first children I sponsored but left school a year later.  In Kathmandu people are cremated at the temple of Pasupatinath. After the bodies are burned the remains are swept into the river.  Here street children dive under the water with a magnet hoping to find gold jewellery  from the bodies.  This is what Sandip did after he ran away from school and home.  He then went to live in the village for one year and his mother said that changed him.  Today he is a good student attending school regularly. When we arrived he was at a friend's home studying and getting some help for his studies.  I really believe he will now go onto college.  He is just going into class 8.  Carol and Keith are very happy with him.
Photos are Keith with Sandesh and Puja at the office, Keith wearing his keta scarves given to him by Mann and Jagat.  Carol sorting out the clothes she brought for the children.  Carol and Keith with Sandip.  Carol and Keith with Pinky.
Tomorrow we take Prakash to see the opthamologist at the eye hospital.

Rising Costs in Nepal

Costs in this improverished country are rising rapidly.  I cannot believe the price of rents.  Some of our families are now having to pay 2000 rupees and more for one room, that is about $30 Can dollars per month.  When you consider that most families do not earn more than 1.50 to 2.00 per day you can see that it is an ongoing challenge to live and then food is rising rapidly also. 
NEF's office and apartment rent is also going up again now to 8000 rupees per month about $110.  When we moved here less than 3 years ago it was 4000 and I am told it will go up next year and the year after that.  This makes our admin costs rise considerably and along with that the challenge of how to raise this money.  We are looking for something cheaper but that means moving further out of the city and then transportation costs go up.
Medical costs also seem to be rising.  Sima, Mann wife, has a problem at the moment that may require surgery and she spent all day yesterday at the hospital having tests and that cost 9000 rupees which is Mann's total salary for the month.
Prakash, the boy with the eye problem is going to the eye hospital on Sunday.  Through Rotarian Joe we have been referred to one of the best opthamologists in Nepal.  He managed to tract down the doctor in Nanaimo who has contacts here.  This doctor we are going see does help the poor so lets up hope this is a good chance for Prakash.
We have had no electric for almost 24 hours now so I am typing this on a laptop which is nearly out of battery so will close.

Stone Quarrey Family

I have always enjoyed visiting the stone quarrey families.  I have known them for some years now and always feel so relaxed in their homes.  These families are among our poorest but wonderful people.  The Lama family I have known the longest and they live in a tin and bamboo shelter and have no toilet.  There is a river across the street and they have to use the river bank for their toilet.  The landowner does not provide land for a toilet. Even so they have to pay 2000 rupees per month ($30 cdn approx) for rent for the land that they have their tin structure on.  Recently they had to move it further up the road because of construction of a new building.  they earn about a $1 per day each working making gravel by hand and filling the trucks.  Amazingly the children always look so clean.  

 Another of our extremely poor families is Pasang's.  His parents look old enough to be his grandparents.  They brought Pasang to Kathmandu at the time of the civil war to save him from being taken by the Maoists to fight in the war.  This is Pasang's last year in school and he is hoping to go to college later this year.  His family live in a tin structure also and his father is a security guard for a construction site.  Once the building is complete they will have to move on again.  I gave the mother a coat and she was just so happy with that. 

 Photos top right is Juni Lama in a new jacket I gave her. Below is the Lama family outside their home and right Pasang mother outside their home in her new coat.  Middle Pasang and his family and bottom children watching us.  Wherever we go we draw attention and sometimes I look up and see the faces all peering in the door.  These children all giggled when I took their photo.  It is hard pasting these photos on here so please excuse the fact that they are not arranged perfectly.  It has been another long day and travelling this city on a motorbike in the traffic is tiring. 

Success Story

Sometimes my job here can be frustrating and tough but then I see a child and he/she makes everything I do so worthwhile and yesterday that happened.  His name is Pradip and many may remember his story as I have told it before but it just gets better.  Pradip has been with NEF almost since the begining.  His siblings were the first children we sponsored in 2004 but we did not try to sponsor him until the following year.  He is the eldest son and was already in school.  I decided the next year that he should also be sponsored and I got him a good sponsor but when we went to see him he was not in school and was running on the streets and had needle marks on his arms.  I thought he was too high risk to sponsor but his sponsor wanted to continue with him.  Six weeks later I returned to see him and he was very sick and needed his gall bladder removed which we arranged with the help of his sponsor again.  Somehow this was a turning point for Pradip.  I went to see him in hospital and he appeared so grateful.  Over the next years he has flourished.  Every year I visit and although he has struggled a bit in school he is now going into class 10.  Yesterday he told us he is working every night from 10 pm to 4 am 6 days a week as a security guard then comes home and sleeps for a few hours before going to school.  He earns $40 per month which he gives to his mother.  The father is a drunk and not there a lot of the time and there has been some violence.  The mother washes clothes and dishes for work.  I had some money from his sponsor and offered some it to him so he could buy himself something and he said "No give it to my mother to pay the rent".  I got a lump in my throat.  Here was a boy who worked so hard yet would take no money for himself.  He wants to go to college and I am sure he will.  I believe now that it is better to have too little rather than too much as it builds charactor.  Pradip should be our poster child.  He is 18 now.  His sponsor gave him a chance when he was at his lowest point and it worked.  This proves how important sponsors are in the lives of these children.  His brother, who was sponsored, we lost years ago to the streets but to my surprise he is back in school, in class 8 and looking like a respectable young man.  He has no sponsor now. Pradip is a great example to him also and I am sure has played a role in getting him back to school.  He also has another brother and sister with us who are doing well.
Next we visited the tea shop we bought for a lady some years ago after she lost her husband.  We sponsor two girls in college here and their young brother in school.  Both daughters go to college from 6 am to 10 pm then come home, change and go to work in a store from 11am to 7 pm six days per week.  They earn $70 per month and give all but approx. $14 to their mother.  I only saw one, Ramilla, but she is such a nice young lady.  Her sponsor sent her some cosmetics from the Body Shop and the body butter she got which I think is about $12 in Canada is $70 here.  she knew as they sell it in the shop where she works. 

Photos Pradip left, Sandesh his brother middle who is back in school for 2 years now and does not have a sponsor and Ramilla at the tea shop reading her sponsor's letter.  I know that most of you wish to sponsor girls and I agree BUT look how Pradip and Sandesh have improved.  Pradip now helps his mother and always will as is the culture here. Had we not helped him what would have happened to her? 

I could go on but this is enough for today.  Must go for a run before we begin the day.