On April 25th an earthquake of 7.8 magnitude ravaged Nepal and thousands of homes were destroyed. One of the homes is of my friend Sunil.
Sunil lives in Bhaktapur. Bhaktapur is one of the most affected areas since there are many old houses made up of mud and stones. Neighborhood and neighborhood of houses were destroyed leaving people nothing but rubble.
Among those houses lies Sunil's house where he was only able to recover a few utensils and clothing and nothing else.
Sunil has 6 members in his family including himself. It is common in Nepal for generations of people to live together. In his family, three generations live together: his grandmother, parents and his brother and a sister. Sunil is a scholarship student at Uniglobe College and his brother and sister study without a scholarship.
His father used to work as vegetable farmer and his mother is a housewife. The income of vegetable farmer is less than $7 a day. His father gets sick easily so my friend Sunil helps his father on the farm.
On May 9th I went to visit Sunil. I asked him how he was doing and if he has enough food to feed his family. They were getting a few packets of biscuits, noodles and water and also tea from different organizations.
While I was talking with him, his mother offered me a slice of papaya. They had a small papaya and almost 15 people to share with including neighbors but still his mother gave me a decent sized piece. Tears filled my eyes since they had so little and still they were sharing their food with me.
I asked him how many people are living under this tarp and he said 35 people were living under it but then slowly some moved out and now 3 families are left.
He said it rained all night and the tarp leaked and they didn’t sleep the whole night. It has been raining a lot nowadays. Monsoon season is coming soon and if they don't have a place to live then there will be many nights that will be sleepless for him and his family.
Just imagine going camping with your whole family, you have a little tent with a thin mat, you all have to squeeze because there isn’t much of a space. Even then you all adjust under that tent but then it rains all night, your tent is leaking and you all are soaked in rain but you have nowhere to go. You just leave the tent and hide your head where there is a little dry place waiting for rain to stop.
That's you and your family for one day. But my friend Sunil is going through that every day since earthquake. When you think of it, it's been more than two weeks. Life is getting more difficult for him and his family.
My friend has always lived hard and with very little. Now, their lives are harder than ever. If they don't rebuild their home, then their problem will be long term. My goal is to raise $4000 to rebuild a home for Sunil and his family. Their life won't be like before the devastating earthquake, but at least they will have a small home to stay out of the weather.
What's small change for us will be a big help for them. So if you are planning to support victims of the Nepal earthquake, may I please invite you to do it by assisting my friend Sunil?
Thank you & Namaste,
Gerisha… (Shalu Pradhan)