Preliminary Remark: The villages and the schools in Upper Dolpo are located in one of the remotest mountainous areas in the world at around 4,000 meters altitude and there is no or hardly any phone contact and Internet is not available. To get to Kathmandu from Upper Dolpo, you need to walk 7-8 days and additional 48 hours by bus. This said, we only can deliver detailed reports of the school sessions with 9-12 months delay after the school period ended. We need to give the school coordinator time to write and provide their reports once they come to Kathmandu. Thank you for your understanding.
This report about the school lessons for the year 2022 consists of three parts:
Winterschool Nyisal
The period of the winterschool in the “Shree Yanjer Gumba Basic School” last from December 2021 to March 2022. A total of 32 children attended the winter school. We had three teachers and one assistant to prepare the meals.
The three teachers differentiated the levels of the students according to their grades and literacy skills in all three language subjects (Nepali, Tibetan, English). Classes were held from 8:30 a.m. to 4:15 p.m.
To assess the learning outcomes for the three-month period, the teachers conducted an assessment at the end of the winter classes. The assessment helped to compare the desired level of the students with their level of reading and writing. All students made remarkable progress. This assessment also served as the basis for the allocation to the classes of the 2022 summer school.
Winterschool Saldang
In the “Shree Shelri Drugdra Basic School” children were taught from beginning of December 2021 until mid of April 2022. Three teachers, two kitchen helpers and an assistant taught and accompanied 60 children through this period.
The winter classes focused on the literacy aspect of the three core languages: Tibetan, Nepali and English and also involving the students in various extracurricular activities (including Tibetan culture) that play an important role in the child’s development and learning process. In addition, the winter school serves as both remedial and preparatory instruction for the students during the five months. The teachers repeat the topics taught in the summer and prepare the students for summer school.
Some children stay at the school and sleep over the whole time. As in Nyisal, there was an exam at the end of school with very good results.
Summer school Lhuri
Since our school building in Lhuri will only be completed in the summer of 2023 in stage 1, the lessons in the “Tripitak Basic School” were again very limited in 2022 because there are currently no rooms available. The children had to be taught outside again.
Despite the adverse circumstances, three teachers did their best and taught more than 20 children. With the completion of eight rooms (three classrooms, dormitories for teachers and students and a small kitchen), the situation will improve fundamentally from mid-2023.
By visiting all three schools in autumn 2022, we were again able to get a good impression of how it works and the challenges.
We spent a total of 22,000 USD on school operations for all three schools in 2022. All teachers, helpers and assistants were paid for this, the food for the students and the teachers. At the school in Lhuri, all school materials, clothing and other necessary materials are paid for, including transport costs from Kathmandu.
This all can only happen wit your extraordinary support. Thank you so much.
Although we are not permanently active in the district Mugu, we did a relief project as Mugu is the neighbor district of the Dolpo.
SHELTER AND FOOD RELIEF PROJECT following devastating landslides and flash floods.
Three communities in Mughu district in western Nepal are affected.
In October 2022, in Mugu district, Chhayanath Rara commune was isolated by continuous rains lasting days. Streams and rivers have burst their banks and swept away everything on their way to the valleys.
Several people were killed, but also many animals. More than 200 houses were completely destroyed and many families were left homeless. People have lost all their belongings and crops have been destroyed. There were food shortages and health problems. The families of the victims have sought shelter under tarpaulins for the cold nights and will have to live there for many more months until their houses are rebuilt.
As with most disasters, children suffer the most, be it due to a lack of food, shelter, clothing or health problems. In addition, the winter with the snow will increase the risk of further landslides in the village. It is therefore safer for families to seek shelter under the tarpaulins in winter.
After the disaster, the Red Cross, the government and other organizations provided initial, short-term emergency aid. However, in order to get through the winter, we have provided emergency financial aid and, in cooperation with our project partner in Nepal and with the district authorities of Chhayanath Rara, to give support to 287 families in some villages.
Upon completion of the project, victims in Districts #6, 7, 8, and 11 will have access to adequate food supplies and warm shelter. We have given each affected family 30 kg of rice, 2 kg of lentils, cooking oil, soap, warm blankets and tarpaulins for emergency shelter to get through the winter.
What were the criteria according to which the families received support?
We immediately made funds available to alleviate the highest need. Almost 300 families (number in brackets) in the villages of Jyari (120), Salim (73), Bhalai (27), Mathi Ghuera (23) and Kotila (40) were supported. We will continue to monitor the situation in order to provide further assistance in a timely manner.
We welcome donations for this project and thank you for your support.
To share the experiences of a nearly 5-week trip to Upper Dolpo, you need more than one article on the website.
For this reason, only a brief summary of the most important findings of the trip is presented in this report:
There have been some changes since the last visit in 2018. In particular, the fact that the government has decided to open up Upper Dolpo by building “roads”. They went up the mountains with big bulldozers, and some of the paths slide down again when it rains. It seems to us that it hasn’t been well thought through, more like aimless “activism”.
There are definitely divided opinions about this infrastructure measure. The younger generation finds this quite good, because it is possible to cover faster distances with a motorcycle. It is also hoped that the transport of goods will become cheaper.
But there are also critical voices, because many jobs are in danger of being lost (mainly in the transport sector with mules, horses and yaks). Tourism could also change drastically.
Climate change is noticeable in the Dolpo. On the one hand due to heavy rainfall and significant landslides in Lower Dolpo. On the other hand, there is a lack of water in some villages and there was heavy snowfall in Upper Dolpo as early as October. We experienced it all first hand. The residents have never experienced weather extremes like this year.
People are suffering considerably from the pandemic because China has kept its borders closed for three years. Trade with Tibet is important. People currently have to buy their goods more expensively in their own country or do without.
The locals of Upper Dolpo continue to urgently need the support of foreign organizations such as the HUMAN Foundation. Education and medical care are still the areas with a very high need for support.
Operations of our winter schools in Saldang and Nyisal is felt to be very important. We have been asked several times to continue to finance these lessons in the long term. The two winter schools for the period 2022/2023 start again in November.
Our new school building in Lhuri has come to a standstill because the timber could not (yet) be transported over the passes due to early snowfall. Construction will continue in 2023, so use will not be possible until the middle of next year. The residents of Lhuri are eagerly awaiting its completion and the children are very much looking forward to it.
Currently in Lhuri there is the shell of five classrooms and two rooms as a hostel for students from other villages. Next year will be two more rooms for the teachers to sleep in and the construction of the school kitchen as well as the roofing of all buildings, floors and a corridor along the classrooms.
Our excellent network is particularly positive and important, both with the local population in many villages and with other foreign organizations (NGO’s) that are active in the Dolpo.
Despite the optically not very nice road construction, a trekking tour to the Upper Dolpo is still a dreamlike experience.
There will soon be a new film about the Dolpo and our projects, which will be completed and published on the website by the middle of the month.
We see our work in the Upper Dolpo as very purposeful based on your excellent support. If you feel the same, we would be more than happy if you could support us in future as powerful as today. Thank you so much for your generosity.
Preliminary Remark: The villages and the schools in Upper Dolpo are located in one of the remotest mountainous areas in the world at around 4,000 meters altitude and there is no or hardly any phone contact and Internet is not available. To get to Kathmandu from Upper Dolpo, you need to walk 7-8 days and additional 48 hours by bus. This said, we only can deliver detailed reports of the school sessions with 9-12 months delay after the school period ended. We need to give the school coordinator time to write and provide their reports once they come to Kathmandu. Thank you for your understanding.
The Tripitak Basic School was established by the Nepalese government in 1975 but was only in operation for a few years because the government did not take the local needs of the population into account. The number of students decreased, and the school was closed. Dawa Phuntsok, a former villager, reopened the school in 2019 as co-coordinator and was looking for a sponsor. In spring 2021 we decided to finance two teachers. In January 2022, we as the HUMAN Foundation pledged to build a new school and finance the school operations.
The main goal of the school is to provide free and high-quality education to the underprivileged society in Upper Dolpo in order to develop the potential skills of the children so that they can stand on their own two feet after their education.
Our vision is to offer primary education in their home village so that they do not forget their mother tongue, Nepali language, religion, and traditions and keep in touch with their parents. After primary school education we want to send them to Kathmandu to give them further education.
The 2021 school year began on May 1st and ended on the last day of October. The lessons went smoothly, and the students achieved very successful results. It is very difficult to direct the school lessons because there is currently no real classroom, school furniture, too few teachers and a lack of good facilities. However, we managed to do it by teaching on the floor of an old building and accommodating the teachers in a house without any facilities. There are currently three well qualified and enthusiastic teachers who are willing to improvise and adapt to new challenges and demands in order to achieve the best for the children.
The school management committee (SMC) meeting was held several times over the past year. All members are very supportive and helpful towards the school. They help us for free and are also very loving and caring when dealing with our students. There were three meetings on school planning, school administration and activities to improve school operations.
For the 2022 school year, all the goods and equipment needed for the school have already been purchased and transported from Kathmandu to Lhuri. And at the same time, the planning for the school building is in full swing. If we get enough wood, there is hope that we will have eight rooms available in autumn 2022.
Thank you very much for your outstanding support.
With this report we can deliver great news. In January this year, we finally decided to build a new school in the village of Lhuri in Upper Dolpo. We have been supporting the "Shree Tripitak Basic School" school in Lhuri since 2021.
The village of Lhuri in the Upper Dolpo, between Saldang and Nyisal, consists of the three-village parts Ke, Lhuri and Sungjer, all at an altitude of around 13,000 ft. The school in Lhuri was closed during the civil war in Nepal (1999-2006) and did not reopen afterwards. The government built a small school building a long time ago, but it is now in a very dilapidated condition and is not a safe environment for children's education.
Dawa, a youth from Lhuri village who attended the school in Kathmandu, recently reopened the school with our support. Last year, 23 students attended the school. Three teachers were available for teaching and supervision. Since the children have not had any regular lessons up to now, there has not been any class assignment. Of the 23 children, 14 children were in the care (nursery) and 9 children in kindergarten/preschool. The plan for 2022 is that 11 children are in care (nursery), 5 children in kindergarten and 7 children in the 1st grade. With each additional school year, the next higher class will be started, so that class 5 can be put into operation in 2026. One additional teacher will be hired each year, making a total of 6-7 teachers.
In the long run, an increasing number of students is to be expected, since the children from Sungjer and Ke are also attending the classes. In particular, the children from Sungjer will sleep at school because it is too far to go home.
We want to start construction of the new school complex in the local architectural style this year and by the end of the year we will have built eight rooms:
The crucial question is whether we can get enough wood approved for construction. Wood is a very scarce commodity and is regulated by the government.
If everything goes according to plan, we will construct the remaining buildings in the coming year, including the sanitary facilities and a school wall. Then we hope to have enough wood for the interior design, such as the school desks. We may also have to postpone some construction activities until 2024. For this year it is important that we lay the foundation for the new school.
We also fund ongoing operations and have made a commitment for at least 20 years, barring any extraordinary event. The funding of the school building is largely secured, but the annual operation expenses must also be ensured for the teachers, teaching equipment and game materials, food, school clothes and the high transport costs from Kathmandu to Lhuri.
We are very pleased that we can tackle this project, especially because a local and former student from neighboring Saldang, where we finance the winter school, took the initiative.
We would be very pleased if you continue to support us with our new undertaking. Thank you for your generosity and your trust in our work.
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