Nepal – Day 8

Shahzad & I headed to the hub at Benepa to pick up the last of the tarpaulins that we had received from India.

On the way we stopped off to take some photo’s of the Kailashnath Mahadev Statue which according to Wikipedia is the world’s fortieth-tallest statue, four below the Statue of Liberty.

The statue depicts the Lord Shiva, which is one of many Hindu gods and is 144 feet tall. It is made of copper, zinc, concrete and steel, and is located on the border of the Bhaktapur and Kavrepalanchwok districts, which is about 20 km from Kathmandu.

There is also a water park called Kathmandu Fun Valley at the foot of the valley which would normally be packed with people but at the moment lies dormant due to some repairs that are obviously being made after the earthquakes. Construction finished in 2013 and on opening day it had over thirty thousand people turn up to experience the first of its kind in Nepal.

After we had picked up the tarpaulins we headed to Sana Byasi Camp to drop them off for future use as temporary shelter and water proofing for the many tents that are starting to deteriorate due to the inclement weather. Nepal is almost at the end of the monsoon season, when it rains it really rains!

While the tarps were being unloaded we made a quick visit to see one of the celebrations that were taking place close, by that honors those that died during the earthquake.

Much of the afternoon was spent reconciling databases while Ralph (the second Kiwi deployed) packed his bags in preparation for his flight home that night back to Auckland. Obligatory photo’s were taken at Sisters Cafe & Beauty and then we saw him off at the airport.

Now the International team is down to four. However, Heather joins us from South Africa on Sunday.

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Nepal – Day 7

This morning Dave headed off to the airport, while MJ, Ralph & Shahzad headed out to a few of the camps. Meanwhile I headed by taxi to Bagiachia Restro & Bar in Jawalakhel, for a Shelter Cluster meeting. The Restaurant is located near the Alka Hospital and Central Zoo. The taxi driver was able to get me into the general vicinity but from then on in I was on foot (just as well I had bartered him down from 300Rs to 200Rs).

After walking around for about 20mins or so I finally found where the meeting was being held and made some notes before heading back to Sisters Cafe & Beauty on foot just so I could get an idea of the sights & sounds, as well as an idea of distances etc. Also I wanted to see how I fared on foot amongst the hustle and bustle of people everywhere.

3/4’s of an hour later I arrived back at Sisters for a lunchtime meeting with representatives from International Organisation of Migration (IOM) who had also been @ the cluster meeting. (Don’t you just hate that!) The outcomes from this meeting were that I had a bit of work to do to get some reports completed as soon as possible as they had been waiting for information for quite some time.

So the rest of the day was literally spent in front of a computer looking at databases and figures (Joy!) trying to get distribution lists to balance – note to self, if ever I am on an initial emergency response team make sure all the correct information is loaded where it needs to be in the standard template…

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Nepal – Day 6

This morning David, MJ & I headed across the city to the airport hub for UN so that we could attend the Logistics Cluster meeting. Travelling in the back of a small truck sitting is not the most ideal way of travelling around town but it gives you a different perspective of the cities traffic. Cars, trucks, buses, motorbikes, tractors and bicycles all clambering for road space and then the people who literally have to play chicken to cross the road is definitely an eye opener. Drivers & riders seem to be more concerned about the livelihoods of animals than they do fellow human beings.

After the meeting Dave took me to the office of Fishtail Air so that I could sign the necessary paperwork, this was so that I can organise any flights out to the remote places for members of the team that need to do monitoring and further assessments of needs, as well as organise transportation of goods i.e. non-food items (NFI), possible corrugated iron (CGI) etc.

In the afternoon David spent time packing up to get ready for his trip home and providing me with as much information as one can about the operations of the team over the past few months and what computer databases, reports etc. that I need to get accomplished in the remainder of my time here.

This image taken from google images: ‘fridayweekly.com.np’

In the evening we had a beautiful meal with Majors Sanga & Manum and their two daughters @ The Bakery Cafe as a farewell to Dave who goes tomorrow morning. The meals were very nice and appreciated by all, although the Nutty Professor drinks seemed a bit off.

The Bakery Cafe is known for accepting and employing deaf staff who are otherwise not considered eligible for work in most professional settings.

Shahzad was able to communicate with one of the waiters very well and was joking and laughing along with him for quite some time explaining what The Salvation Army is doing in Nepal.

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