The V.D.C. of Phulkharka is 1 of 9 inside the Dhading district of Nepal. It is a quintessential example of the remote villages that HANDS in Nepal strives to support education in. There is one district that separates it and Tibet. It is accessible by jeep, when the roads have not been washed out. The trip entails waking up at 5am for a 9-10 hour drive, depending on your driver, climbing steep switchbacks and descending mountains. With 90+ degree temperatures and dusty roads, Bhupendra, Rajendra, Kelsang and I tumbled through landscapes, rice paddies, forest and across rivers in efforts to provide some sort of aid.
Leaving Dhading-Besi, the downtown equivalent of the Dhading district, the aftermath of the earthquakes soon became evident. House after house had been reduced to a half a wall, the rest lay spread in piles at the foundation. Villagers walked by carrying an ax in one hand and branch off a local tree in the other. With aid slow to arrive, they have been left to find their own material for temporary shelters. Arriving in Phulkharka around 4pm, we distributed 700 sheets of tin for shelters being constructed in preparation of the coming monsoons, as well as over 100 solar lights, which are highly valuable in a place where electricity is so scarce.
Surveying damage to the school which HANDS in Nepal built brought reality front and center. Every building had suffered from the earth shifting, being only 15 miles from the epicenter such destruction was unfortunately predictable. Standing in what was the library, surrounded by rocks and broken desks, I thought of the day the 7.8 earthquake occurred, a Saturday, the one day children have off from school and at a time when many villagers were outside tending to their crops. A silver lining to the Himalayan shakes I suppose.
Admiration gleamed when viewing temporary classrooms the village had built. Donating tin from their destroyed homes, the community was able to construct makeshift rooms tin order not to disrupt the children’s ambitions to learn. One class was held in what was left of the library, the roof offered refuge from the blazing sun. These noble attempts truly show the desire for education in these foothills. An image sticks with me of a grade 5 class being taught under tattered tin, surrounded by shattered rocks. The class looked on attentively, almost un-phased by the surrounding environment. Interviewing villagers, I quickly came to learn HANDS in Nepal was the first form of aid they had seen other than from Bhupendra, whose family is the region. Over a month later, with helicopters circling over and billions in international aid flowing in, I wondered how it was possible that a small NGO specializing in education was able to reach this remote village before others then I thought of the tireless work by all of the HANDS family. “It takes a village” so they say.