Nepal Earthquake, Dahding Town
A couple days after I went to Katmandu to have a look around a Canadian named Andre showed up at the hotel after riding out the earthquake in Katmandu on a nearby hilltop with many others seeking refuge. He had been bitten by a dog the day before the earthquake and was taking the rabies vaccination series. We got to talking and wanted to do something to help Nepal. There was an organization on the street near where I’m staying called, Yes Helping Hands.
http://www.yeshelpinghands.com. Yeshelpinghands works in a few areas to create a brighter future for Nepali people in general but has some specific focuses such as empowering the deaf and blind with skillful training and employment in different trades, massage, weaving, beautician and more.
We bought 12/50 kilo bags of rice to add to the donations pile and with a group of western and Nepali folks we started filling family bags with 25 kilos of rice, a large bag of lentils, salt, simple medicines, and assorted odds and ends. When we finished we had 200 bags for families, water and tarps. The truck loaded up in the night and went to Dahding. Ghorka had been supplied with supposedly six months of supplies so the next focus was Dahding.
Andre and I wanted to go and deliver but we missed the ride and decided to go on our own. We hired a kindly elder and his car and drove 4 hours to Dahding. We traveled back down through Mugling and then crossed the river and climbed up the hills for an hour. The road again was narrow with many slow moving vehicles.
The scenery on the way is really spectacular. The florescent green of the rice fields attracts the eye.
Every direction has something of interest.
Again the tell tale signs of the earthquake were apparent at almost every older house made of rock and mud. Walls had crumbled and left gaping holes in many homes.
Other houses were demolished.
We got into downtown Dahding and there was damage everywhere and UNICEF was set up in large white tents and life seemed almost normal. Stores and markets were open and buses were leaving loaded with locals heading out. Kids went to school although as a whole Nepal will lose over 1 million students due to the first earthquake.
The hardest hit areas were outside of town in the smaller farming communities. We didn’t get that far. Again not wanting to be part of the problem we didn’t stick around too long.
Some of the buildings that were severely cracked in the first earthquake have since fallen due to the second large quake. And life went on.
I was in Pokhara for the second quake. I was sitting on the floor working on the computer when there was a jolt. It paused and I waited and then it came rumbling through the building. People were screaming in the street, dogs barked and everybody was running for open spaces. I was three floors up.
There have been a lot of after shocks of various sizes and shakes. The people are scared.
