Up on the roof...

We are writing to you from the rooftop of the Padma Hotel, with a view of the stupa while sipping an Everest Beer. First full day in Kathmandu and lots to talk about already. Arrived in KTM on time and were greeted by Karma's smiling face and a lei of marigolds. Drove through the craziness that we've come to love to arrive at the Padma hotel in Boudhanath.

Exhausted but feeling completely relaxed, in a zen-like state we had a big pot of Nepali tea with Karma, Nyima, Pemba, Neema, Lhakpa Yangzum, Tashi and Tashi! We faded during dinner but not before we secured our plans for the next 3 days.

Day 1: loooooooooooong breakfast with lots of tea, local bus adventure ride to Thamel to Neema and Karma's place for more tea. This, according to Tanya, has been the best tea (cinnamon leaf and masala) ever. En route Tanya jumped out of the way of another pedestrian on a narrow precipice and landed her left foot in a giant pile of mud/who knows what that claimed her shoe... the first casualty of the trip. Tashi, her now knight in shining armor, first rescued and then resurrected her shoe. Not only did he scoop it out of the mud but he then washed (cleaner now than the other) and hung it to dry in the sun. After a satisfying dal bhat. with more refills than we cared for, we set off on a mini shopping adventure.

Souvenirs now in hand we headed to Ratna Park for a microbus trip home. Squeezed, and I mean sqeeezed, into the back (picture face plastered on the glass) of the microbus we had an amusing ride back. Then, off to our favourite Garden Kitchen for chili fried momos and paneer tikka masala with garlic naan. We met computer/director/magic/banner Tashi who gave us a sim card that we put in Mads spare device and we now have a phone! That's a first!

Plans are...breakfast with Chaudhary Sir and Roshan, then Bhaktapur by motorbike. Thursday, Pati Banjang by jeep and a 2-hour walk to the village of Thakani to visit the school and the health post. Next day off to Sermathang... walk, bus, walk for 2 more nights to visit Yangrima school.

More tomorrow.... Namaste and goodnight.

What can you do?

We are now on our way to Nepal, sitting in the airport in Abu Dhabi and looking forward to our trek up to the village of Thakani to see the school, the playground that the students from SJK built last year and the new health post.

The first time we met Roshan Chaudhary in 2003, son of the Headmaster of Dhauleshowary, R.N. Chaudhary and his wife Sabita Miss, also a teacher at the school, he was a young boy. Although he was shy and soft-spoken, he had a smile that could melt your heart. He proudly showed us around the village, including an abandoned health post, in perfect condition, just on the outskirts of the village boundary. We were told that this was built and stocked by a Scandinavian group but the project was cancelled because visas and interest ran out. He proclaimed then, that he would like to one day be a doctor and reopen the health post because it was badly needed by the people of the region. Our tour continued to see the school, then quite small, the village shop, and finally his family’s home, a tiny adobe room above the stable where the water buffalo slept – pretty basic by any standards.

We are about to embark on another visit back to the Dhauleshowary School – now a lower secondary school – offering classes up to grade 8 to some 130 children from the surrounding villages. We have had a close relationship with R.N. Chaudhary and his family over the years and have watched both his children grow. We sponsored their daughter, Joyti, through her nursing education and she graduated in Sepetember 2009. Their son, Roshan, is the younger sibling and is now finishing his second year at the Lord Buddha Academy, Nepalgunj Medical College. We have talked about the health post each time we’ve visited as it is the parents’ dream to see it reopen and be staffed by his children. Both Joyti and Roshan have promised that if they would be given the opportunity to do so, they would practise medicine at this health post.

Roshan is in need of sponsorship as medical college in Nepal is very expensive. Although R.N. Chaudhary is the headmaster at the village government school, his salary is the same as that of a teacher in Kathmandu. He is able to live comfortably in the village on this salary but is by no means able to pay for tuition, boarding, lodging and books for Roshan.

Roshan remains motivated and positive and hopes that sponsorship will be found for his medical education. He wishes to continue his studies and work towards this dream of bringing health care back to Thakani and the surrounding villages of Sindupalchowk.

How can you help? For those who would like to donate online you can do so through the organization, called the Canada Nepal Medical Society (CNMS www.cnms.ca) and click on 'associated projects for specific information. You can then specify which project you would like to donate to. 3% is taken by “Canada Helps” which is the organization that provides an internet presence for many charities and the ability to make a donation on line. Tax receipts will be issued for donations over $20.00.

Stay tuned for updates and pictures as we near our destination. Thanks to those who have already given so generously.

We are back!

Hi Everybody,

It's been a while. But we are back now. We are about to embark on our next adventure to Kathmandu. We that is Jude and Rob, Liz and Eric and Tanya, Zena (I hope I got the spelling right) and myself, Mads. Tanya, Jude and I will leave this Saturday, February 25th. We will be checking on our friends in Sermathang, Thakani and Kathmandu before the rest of the gang arrives the following week. This time around we are not organizing any races. Very sad, I know. It was just way too amazing and we didn't want to try to top a once in a lifetime experience. So this time we'll be just hiking a little bit. We're going to be in the Annapurna region and hike the circuit. They keep telling me that the pass that we are going to cross is about 5416m high. Yikes. So somebody please tell me why I live in flat country farmland Waterloo on about 5m above sea level with no mountain anywhere close by to train for that? But of course we're not just hiking a little bit? We are doing a little fundraising here and there as well. No big events or anything. We decided that we want to support a graduate of the Thakani school, Roshan, to go to medical school. Thakani has a little medical post that is unstaffed and abandoned. The headmaster's daughter went to Nursing school with the help of fundraising that Jude and Rob did. Both 'kids' want to go back to their village to staff the medical post and bring health care to their home village and the surrounding villages. Medical school is expensive even in Nepal where everything seem to be so cheap. We have decided to help out. How can you help us help? Stay tuned for more details. Soon we'll post more details about the trip and also the fundraising efforts.

Namaste,
Mads

Run for the Hills Keeps on Giving!

Tashi delek and namaste to all our friends,

As you may know we returned from Nepal last Sunday night. Our group was small, 7 teachers including Rob and I (4 phys. ed. teachers) Six women and Rob…he certainly gets the medal for holding it together on shopping day!! Our goal was to visit Thakani and Sermathang to do teacher workshops.


When (running) Tshering heard we were coming he decided that he would go ahead with his plans to conduct a sports symposium (for phys ed. teachers of the Helambu region) at Yangrima School. The idea for this symposium was to teach Physical Education teachers at village schools how to run a program for children of all ages and abilities. (You may not know that he and Maya (his fiancée) moved up to Yangrima and are keepers of the hostel which houses about 10 children so far…)

So, with (computer and banner maker) Tashi (now known as director Tashi) at the helm and Tshering as an symosium organizer they got 23 schools to register and participate in a 6-day sports symposium (all funded by Run for the Hills!). Funds we raised (by your generous donations last year) not only paid for the cost of the workshop but for all 23 participants from all over the valley to attend, sleep and eat. The national running coach (Tshering’s coach) and the national table tennis coach both attended and ran workshops for 3 days and then our group ran workshops for the other 3 days. We did everything from low organizational games, cooperative games, initiative tasks (led by Rob, Nancy, Anne and Liisa) and then basketball! That’s right, Sandy (Falco) (who is a basketball coach at St. John’s Kilmarnock school here in town) was one of the phys. ed teachers and she taught them to play ball! It was the first time playing basketball for many of them and they loved it as did we watching Sandy! Tshering also made a basketball court of which we had to move the rocks out of each day to play. It was fantastic. Finally, the money we raised also paid for each participant to receive a goodie bag of sports equipment for their school. Each participant received a parachute, 50 juggling scarves, skipping ropes, yogi elastics, a low organizational game handbook (made by one of our group members), a set of 16 skipping games posters, a basketball coach’s manual, basketball coaching poster, kids football shirts, and a basketball! We also were able to pay for the transport of all the materials up to the school.

We first visited Thakani for 2 days and did an ESL workshop with their teachers building a word wall. Then, we climbed down the valley to the river and were now able to take a bus up to a village only a 20 minute walk from Sermathang (4 hours on the roof of a brand new road was a bit of a nail-biting experience). While in Kathmandu we also had time to shop for books to create a new library (stamp, catalogue and put pockets and cards in each book thanks to Monika,Liisa and Nima) at Yangrima. Our trip was short but we did a lot.

The school is about to have their 1-year anniversary celebration (see the facebook page for the Yangrima Boarding School) on April 14th. They hope to double the number of students for this upcoming year and be ready for students grades nursery to 8! They’ve done a remarkable job! Finally, Tshering and Maya’s wedding will take place at Yangrima on April 15th following the school celebration if anyone is available and perhaps in the area!! Check out the album below:

Nepal 2010

Momo night in Kitchener

Dear Friends,

ready for a little cooking class? The gang met at Jude's place for a delicious meal of momo. That's dumplings the Nepali way. Filling: all sorts of veggies (carrots, cabbage, onion, ... and tofu...), finely chopped and fried. Dough: white flour and water. That's it. Easy. 

Well, some find it easy

                                                                                                 

             Some find it not so easy

  

Some are really good at supervising

we all are surely good at eating them! No matter if they look good or not so good... 

We steamed them in the imported original steamer that Russ brought back from Kathmandu for Jude. A variety of dipping sauces et voila! 

Mads - very hungry all of a sudden

Photo Album! Yeah. Finally!

Namaste everybody,

I have grey hair now and my nails are bitten down to the bones.

But I think I have figured it out now. I have posted a few photo albums to picasa and it looks as if it works.

The exciting thing is, it even links to this blog! Whoohoo. See for yourself.

Nepal trekking

Nepal faces

Nepal from Start to Finish though not really in order :D

Nepal - THE RACE

Mads

Amazing Race

Well folks, this is the race that just keeps on giving! We continue to get emails from friends and school classes looking to make donations! How wonderful. Just to let you know, thanks to everyone's generosity we raised an amazing $15,000.00 in just 3 short months. Here are the plans for these funds and for the future of "Run for the Hills".

While we were in Kathmandu Tshering Lama and Tashi Lama (shown in the picture) registered the Yholmo Conservation and Development Committee as an official NGO. We opened a bank account and then were able to use the money to fund part of the race and to begin to buy shoes.

The plan is that Tshering will now begin to organize his first visit into the hills to work with the government school in the village of Thakani His mission is to teach them about sport, training and fitness and how to incorporate this into their education program. Thanks to the generosity of the students of St. John's-Kilmarnock School in Breslau, Ontario who visited Thakani in 2001, 2007 and again this past March, the school has lots of sports equipment. The problem is that they just don't know how to use the equipment.

Tshering's idea is to begin his project here and to work with the staff and students at the Dhauleshowary Primary School. We look forward to updates and promise to keep you posted. In the meantime if you'd still like to make a donation please contact us at info@magicsuitcase.ca.

Dhany abad...thank you!