During lockdown we have supported two specific villages where we have built strong connections and have great teams to ensure that food is delivered fairly and safely. For the first month of lockdown reports came back that people in the villages were ok – they grow a lot of their own food and weren’t short of supplies. After a month that message changed so we began to send money to our contacts there too, for them to buy the food supplies and distribute.
Both are remote, a long way from main roads which posed a problem due to the strict restrictions that were in place for moving around in vehicles during lockdown and then due to the monsoon which makes all mountain roads more dangerous.
BASERI, DHADING
Baseri is in the very north of Dhading District, normally about 9 hours by bus from Kathmandu. And one of the major issues was that basic supplies like rice ran out very quickly in the small shops in the village, so our contact Sabin Dhakal worked with bigger shops in Aarughat, 2 hours down the valley to organise for trucks of food to be delivered with our funds. To date we have done this 4 times.
Here’s a message from Sabin…
Dear Sophie and all respected donors,
Thank you so much to everyone who has made it possible to give relief to those who really needed it during lockdown.
It is our immense pleasure to have people like you all with us even during this pandemic, to keep hoping for the best even during the worst time. Words are not enough to describe our gratitude towards you all.
Personally I was so grateful to be part of this because I had a chance to visit the most poor people, especially the people who usually work as labourers, those who lost their job and the single women; those who have lost their husbands.
I visited people’s houses and saw their condition and who were really struggling to join their hand and mouth, to put food on the table. That’s how I choose the people.
It was quite difficult to distribute the food because of monsoon. It was hard to get the truck to the village but still we were able to get it to Baseri in between the most rainy days.
I know people can’t survive with this food for very long but it helped a lot during this difficult situation.
Thank you all so much for your helping hands and for making it possible for the distributions to happen.
PHUJEL, GORKHA
Phujel is similarly remote and needed supplies to be brought from outside of the village to be distributed in Ward 3 and Ward 4. Through one of our fellow Nepal enthusiasts Glenn, who we met in Nepal but lives in the UK, we were connected with Pradip Panta who was able to co-ordinate everything that was needed, ensuring the safety of the volunteers and the families who came to get the food.
