Happy New Year beautiful people! Amy and I hope you are all enjoying the holidays.. As we mentioned in the Christmas blog, there have been some changes to our projects delivery that I will explain in this update. We are currently awaiting approval for our proposed major project. We have been volunteering at Talamarang children’s home, meeting with communities, researching and training in sustainable building, connecting and working with local NGO’s and organising our main project.

In regards to our major project, it became clear that many of the items that we originally fundraised for have either already been acquired by Team Nepal, or are no longer a priority. Before our arrival, Team Nepal had already acquired 6 goats, a buffalo and a spring water system. There is still the need for a fencing compound around the orphanage but the greatest current priority as expressed by Team Nepal and other local NGO’s is for the rebuilding of classrooms and homes.

After several meetings with Talamarang secondary school, Team Nepal and Birds of Passage, we decided to channel most of our funds into the rebuilding of Talamarang Secondary School. Our decision to move forward with this project seemed logical as it is the greatest identified need in the area and we were given a rough cost estimate of $40,000 for 12 classrooms, which to us was completely achievable. After receiving the final technical drawings and blown out costing’s for the project, it became clear that the community’s vision for the new school was simply too far out of our reach financially.

Amy and I had been researching alternative, eco friendly and sustainable building techniques before coming to Nepal and we decided to explore this road a little further for a multitude of reasons. After a few days of research, we decided that Earthbag construction is definitely the most relevant solution for Nepal as it is earthquake resistant (as determined by ICBO shake table test), cost effective, sustainable, and even applicable at a DIY capacity. The only hurdle was finding an organisation that could provide us with specific Earthbag training, technical advice, site management and quality control.

Our serendipitous meeting with Good Earth Nepal was in response to an email we sent, hoping that they could make time for a meeting. They are currently one of the only NGO’s we have found actively employing Earthbag technology in Nepal and they have been doing so under the guidance of one of America’s leading experts in Earthbag construction, Dr Owen Geiger. GEN was recently awarded by the Prime Minister of Nepal for best rural design by public vote. Kateryna Zemskova, co-founder of Good Earth Nepal, replied to our email and happened to be near where we were staying in Thamel. After our first few meetings it became clear that we could all help each other. Since then, Amy and I have been able to support Good Earth Nepal by working on several presentations for Earthbag Technology, as well as working on the proposed government building guidelines for Earthbag construction in Nepal. Good Earth Nepal have since provided us with training with Dr Owen Geiger, as well as providing engineers to inspect the site of several proposed projects. For more information on Earthbag technology, please find the link to Good Earth Nepal FB & their website – goodearthnepal.org

After consulting with BOP in Australia, it was decided that we would first work on a smaller Earthbag home before building classrooms. This option would not only provide a displaced Nepali with a home and deepen the trust of the locals for a non-traditional building method, but it would also benefit the community by providing locals with training for a construction method that is cheaper, safer and sustainable. Team Nepal put us in contact with a woman identified by the community as the most in need. Lila Kumari is a widow with 6 daughters who also tragically lost her 20-year-old daughter this year in the earthquake. Lila currently lives with her two youngest daughters in a tin shack that rests beneath a landslide prone area. The site itself presented us with many challenges and a hybrid design of half Earthbag and half bamboo on a stepped gravel trench was created in response to the weight concerns of the structure resting on predominantly fill with site boundaries that slope down the mountain. After spending a few weeks demolishing the old fallen structure, clearing the rubble and levelling the site, we received the final costing’s and drawings from our engineers to find that the hybrid design and stepped rubble trench, coupled with the severe fuel crisis that has been affecting all of Nepal as a result of India’s blockade, tipped the budget of this project over by $4K. After a great deal of discussion with BOP and GEN, it was decided that the funds should be allocated for the rebuilding of classrooms. We are currently in the final stages of approving a new school for 35 primary school students in the region of Nuwakot. There are three primary schools in the region, all three of which were completely destroyed in the earthquake, with children currently being educated in correlated steel sheds. We are truly excited to be involved in this project and will announce final approval following with regular project updates and daily photos. We will be sleeping in a tent on site so we won’t miss a single moment! Lila’s new home will be postponed until the completion of our major project. To hear more about Lila and her situation, please the link to “Lila’s story” which we have put together for a fundraising campaign – Lila’s story

In between organising our major project, Amy and I return to Talamarang orphanage to spend time with the children and work on small projects. There are many bright new faces and sadly, some that have moved elsewhere. We spend at least four hours a day with the children, eating together, working together and playing together. Whenever times are challenging, the children here have a way of putting everything in perspective for Amy and I. The pure joy that they are is unavoidable. We have tried to employ some simple CBT strategies and encouraged the children to write diary entries every day, but the language barrier is often challenging. We are lucky that music, food, work and play completely transcend language. Unfortunately Apsara the housemother here makes us do a lot of homework and I’ve always dreaded homework. The other kids seem to really enjoy it though. I have attached a flipogram video made with some of the children just for fun.

We have cleared levelled and prepared newly acquired land at the children’s home, built a pond to be used as a water source for the new gardens while also containing a moisture issue from the side of the mountain. We have assisted other volunteers with their own projects, helping Bill from Utah with an irrigation project, assisting locals with the building of a Nepali outdoor kitchen as well as assisting with general improvements on the property. We have completed a promotional video in support of a local NGO that work with youth on the street of Kathmandu and will be working towards creating an alcohol and drug awareness education program. For those interested in viewing the promotional video we have put together and finding out more, please find it attached a link to the FB page – A Cup of Love.

We have spent more time in Kathmandu than we would have liked, mainly for communication purposes. It’s the village life for us. Kathmandu has a way of wearing you down along with your immune system. The current fuel crisis has made everything more expensive as well as making it harder and more dangerous to travel. Restaurants have set menus and the lines for gas resemble a parking lot just after a big concert. Life goes on in the village though. There is still plenty of rice, fresh spinach, cured spinach, recently harvested potatoes, tomatoes getting close, cauliflower, corn, radish, grapefruit, banana, always milk… Life is good. Everyone has just finished beating millet, which is used to make the national food of millet paste eaten with curry. Many also ferment the millet to make a strong wine called ‘Rokshi’ which we had the pleasure of drinking out of a Castrol oil container during a sleep over while visiting a community to survey a building site. I slept in a bed with three other men that night. It’s cosy like that in Nepal. Everyone in the village is family. A language barrier means nothing to the Nepali who knows that kinship is of the heart and not of the mind. In some respects, we are able to communicate arguably better without labelling everything around us and simply enjoying the surrounding beauty while working or playing, both of which blur in the village and merge into a single state of just being.

Of course there are challenges too.. The language barrier becomes a significant challenge whenever there is a need for detail and specifics. Even when we have had translators during meetings, it has been obvious that we have never received a truly accurate translation. It reminds me of a scene in “lost in translation” where Bill Murray receives seemingly detailed instructions in Japanese for over three minutes but the translation is simply “hold your head there.” In terms of other lifestyle challenges, I feel as though Amy and I are managing happily although we both dream of hot showers and I dream of anything other than Dal Bhat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Meat is normally only eaten during festivals in the village, but every now and then we get chicken for everyone which the kids get more excited for than they did for their Christmas presents! Amy and I both come from excess and have experienced an adjustment. Living simply has already cultivated a deeper appreciation and gratitude in both of us.

I recently cleared an area on the newly acquired land and built a ‘Flintstones’ BBQ out of stone, mud, rio bar and wire. That night, the boys of the home (only because the girls did not want to venture out into the newly acquired land at night) had their very first BBQ. Even the bones were eaten. After our fingers were licked clean, the boys placed the leftover juices over the fire and as it came to the boil we all took a deep sip as though out of some sacred chalice. Prasoun explained to me that he chanted “Om mane padme Om” for the entire time he was butchering the meat, in thanks for the chicken’s life. We were all certainly very grateful that night as we huddled around the remaining glowing embers of Krishna’s bonfire. I have attached a brief video of the BBQ.

Our time in Nepal so far has been inspiring, challenging and above all, revealing, as we have tried our best to navigate through the challenges that have arisen and often our own fears and insecurities. We have immersed ourselves in the culture of this exquisite country and have worked with local NGO’s on several projects without spending any money. We were initially disheartened with many of the delays, changes and challenges, but we are now able to better see their worth in experience and feel better equipped in our role to make every single dollar donated truly mean something.

-James