Life is seemingly returning to normal, while the extent of the damage is getting clearer. Kathmandu was relatively spared, despite the pessimistic warnings which saw most victims here, and it seems to be mostly rural Nepal that got hit. Many people have returned to their village.
Since Monday I also had to start working for my NGO, WSM, again, as internet was running again and work was piling up. I met with our two local partners, GEFONT and NTUC, who are organizing relief help to their members as well and both urgently welcomed any support from WSM. To my frustration, WSM requested additional information before being able to authorize any funds and I'm still awaiting news... Sigh...
On a more positive note, regarding the mission to Dhading our group organized: Jessica spoke to our team who travelled for 3 days to reach the final destination, including 2 days walking up steeply over landslides etc. to reach Ree Gauring VDC. They are now descending back down and we hope to have a full debrief in Kathmandu Thursday. I can't wait to hear their stories. But already, despite limited communications, they have been able to pass on vital GPS coordinates and details of the situation on the ground. All of which we have passed directly onto contacts at United Mission Nepal – the main NGO responsible for organising relief support to this area.
Our team have seen firsthand widespread devastation of homes, displacement of hundreds of local people into makeshift villages without proper cover, medical support or food with an example of a water source now half an hour’s walk away over a landslide. At least our medical supplies, tarps & food – carried by wonderful local porters – have made it through and the information gathered has been passed back to the organisations who are right now gearing up to provide relief via helicopter on a scale we cannot even begin to prepare. Good luck to them!
 |
| Stock waiting at Army base. Photo: Jessica Stanford |
Wave 2: With the information gathered from our team on the ground, and speaking to United Mission Nepal on Monday afternoon, we realised that it would be a few more days before large scale relief could reach these areas. As a result we decided to quickly pulled together a wave 2. Special thanks to Frank of Precontec.com who through his connections arranged an Israeli military helicopter to support airlifting out badly injured people. The team in Kathmandu quickly arranged a substantial amount of food & supplies – rice, daal, powdered milk, sanitary pads and rehydration & diarrhoea medicine for adults & children etc – which were delivered to the BIR military hospital Monday night and delivered our support as well as more from larger organisations, which were flown out. It's amazing we could make this all happen, in such a short time, with everybody chipping in.
Though I'm having to take a step away from the volunteering, they are moving their focus to efforts to #rebuildnepal, as the Nepal army and large NGOs kick into action on the relief front. A group has been started to look into techniques and ways of rebuilding more sustainable, quake proof houses, using simple and available materials. A couple of places are running workshops and demonstrations for volunteers and Shaun offered to demonstrated the dirt bag earth techniques at his house to villagers from the region.
We can also feel the media attention moving on. Less headlines, less calls from journalists. With great difficulties I drafted an
article (in Dutch) for a media outlet in Belgium, MO*, which also inspired an article for
En Marche (French). It is hard to know what to write. So much has appeared already, and I hardly recognize myself in anything. It always seems simplistic, or leaving too many things out that seem important to me, or too black and white, but drafting something myself made me realize how tough it is to share these things. Should I talk about the general situation, what I've seen myself, how that makes me feel, or give my opinion on what I think should be priorities? So hard to write anything I feel okay with, when you're submerged into it. Why do it then, you might wonder? Why spend precious time on writing anything that will be read (a bit anyway), by people in Belgium for away, who'll mostly glance over it and move on with their lives? Well, I suppose I see it as part of my role, to at least attempt to explain some of the realities I witness and experience here to people back home, to stimulate thinking globally, to use that cliche, to look beyond our own comfortable little world and borders. And it is also the opportunity to invite people to support us, the work we and our partners do here and which I strongly believe in, and that can make a real difference, in small and bigger things.
And for those who wonder, the updates to this blog are different, since I keep this blog mostly for people I have a personal connection with, so people who are interested can get an update on my life and how I'm doing. During these days, I received so many messages and questions from friends wondering how I was, without having the time to reply, it was easier to refer them to my blog, where I put efforts into drafting something each day. It doesn't have a huge following (around 200 views a day), but sometimes quality is more important than quantity, right? It's also nice to sort of have an online archive, diary, which I sometimes browse through, nostalgic and amazed at how much I've already forgotten. Though it seems hard to forget the last couple of days...
