Children dancing to the beat of a madal drum

Children dancing to the beat of a madal drum
Uttargaya Secondary English Boarding School, Betrawati, 2000

[text below from a postcard I wrote on September 26th, 2000]

"...most of the students were already mentally on the two-week Dashain festival that starts in a couple of days. At lunch, I asked Kove, one of the teachers, if there was school tomorrow—I had so far heard differing accounts. He checked with the office and then told me it was still undecided.

After lunch I stuck around and noticed that of twelve rooms, only one or two had teachers. In the second-level class all of the kids were singing in Nepali while one boy danced at the front. I joined in and they all burst into laughter. From the "nursery" class I heard crying, so I went down there. Danuze, a small boy who speaks no English, was in tears. I squatted down, speaking in soft tones knowing that my words wouldn't help, but perhaps my voice would. He stopped crying and I think I may have gotten a smile once I started acting goofy—"Look at my hand Danuze... it's HUGE! It's the biggest hand I've ever SEEN!

The bell rang and all of the kids started yelling excitedly and running out the door—their little backpacks hopping up and down as they went. I followed them out the door and watched as they all ran across the field. It would seem there was no 7th period today and no school tomorrow. I'm going to miss seeing them all over the next 2–3 weeks..."

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Mother with baby and son on porch

Mother with baby and son on porch
Tupche 2000

In a house above a small shop, a proud mother feeds her youngest son.

Down below people may be sharing news, buying white plastic bags of cooking oil, large bricks of Puja soap. If not helping in the fields, girls may be skipping rope, boys playing Carrom board, small children trailing empty plastic bags behind them like kites.

Although it lies just across a suspension bridge from Betrawati, I didn't get to Tupche more than a few times. It's a spread of terraced rice fields with a few clumps of houses and shops peppered here and there. To get from here to there you zigzag your way on the raised dike/walls that separate the fields. After the rice has been harvested children can play in the dry stubbly fields.

When I revisited Tupche two years later I walked by the house and the father, who I had not met previously, stopped me to thank me for this photo.

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I had been kneeling down on the porch to take the first photo; when I turned around I took this second photo.

A father sews while his son sleeps

A father sews while his son sleeps
Betrawati 2003

Next to the only road passing through Betrawati, a father works sewing clothes.
His son Swayta, fourteen months old, naps nearby atop an unrolled mat.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

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Busy mother with baby under her wing

Busy mother with baby under her wing
Manamaiju, Kathmandu 2003

Walking home one afternoon, I ran across this woman taking in the family's laundry.
I love the cloth that holds the baby; it’s like she’s wrapped her son up in a piece of star-filled night.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

2011: With a freshly-printed copy of the original photo in hand,
I was able to find the mother and son again to take this photo eight years later.

Update: I recently ran across this photo that I took of them looking at the old photo.

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Anjana, Sumina, and Astha

Anjana, Sumina, and Astha going to school in the morning
Betrawati, 2000

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

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Present day: Astha just helped collect and deliver food and other needed materials to the people of the three villages of Kavresthali, Kathmandu. 

(photo by Astha Lamichhane)

("Kavresthali is a village in Kathmandu District in the Bagmati Zone of central Nepal. At the time of the 2011 Nepal census it had a population of 4,774 and had 1007 houses in it." –Wikipedia)

Sisters holding bowls

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Sisters holding bowls
Betrawati 2000

These two sisters have traveled to Betrawati to be with their relatives during Tihar. In many ways, Tihar is like Thanksgiving in that distant family comes together, transportation (buses) is over-capacity, and much eating takes place. The bowls that the sisters are holding were made by stitching together large leaves.

During Nepal's Tihar festival women give the men in their lives a tika in a special ceremony. After the tika is given, they are given a tray or bowl filled with fried breads, fruits, nuts, and candies. After this, the men usually present the woman with a sari or, in the case of a child, a kurta.

A tika is a blessing in the form of a colored dot or smudge applied to the forehead. Most usually red, during Tihar one may collect tikas of several different colors.

A kurta is the traditional dress for girls. Often made from the same light fabric, it is two pieces: a pair of pants and a long-sleeved v-neck shirt, which hangs down to near the knees. Often a scarf is worn with it, looping down in front like a necklace with the long ends hanging back over each shoulder.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

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Suntahli, Somjana and Lakshmi

Suntahli, Somjana and Lakshmi, a mother and her daughters,
Betrawati 2003

One of the reasons I love this this photo is—notice the natural placement of everyones hands—how it wordlessly just tells you so much about their love for each other.

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Shezan and Binod

Shezan and Binod
Tupche 2002

Across the river from Betrawati the tiny village of Tupche butts up against a steep wooded hill.
On one of my trips across the cable bridge I took this photo of two friends.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

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Baby resting

Baby resting
Betrawati 2000

A few houses down from where I stayed, a baby rests on a blanket. The floor beneath him and the walls surrounding are smooth and a warm terra cotta color. At his feet sits an hourglass shaped stool where his mother may sit when she has a free moment.

If a baby has an older sister or brother they are usually put in charge of watching them during the day. You'll see boys and girls, some only a foot taller than the babies, carrying them on their backs as they walk about.

On a trip to Trishuli, some nine kilometers away, I passed a mother fixing up a shawl to help keep the baby on her daughters back. The girl carrying her sibling must have been about four years old. As I walked into Trishuli about an hour later I saw that, passenger and all, the young girl had beaten me.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

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Shashi

Shashi
Betwawati 2002

Shashi lived next door, a cousin of my host family. He's sitting on a bench built into their front porch. If you were to sit there you might see his grandmother sorting rice, a group of women singing during the Teej festival, his mother removing kernels from dried corn, or one of his sisters jumping rope after school.

If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.

Present day, Shashi lives in Pokhara, Nepal's second-largest city.
A couple of days ago, he and his friends filled up the back of an industrial truck with bottles of drinking water, and drove them the 143km to Kathmandu. After distributing that, they reloaded the truck with more water, as well as bags of rice and other supplies and drove it the curvy 93km to Betrawati.

(photo by Shashi Lamichhane)