Johan’s diary – 19th of May
6:00 I awake from the alarm clock and I am a little tired. First there was the traffic in the village during the night with aid shipments of rice from the government. Then there was an aftershock at 4 o’clock. I wake up as soon as it starts, it shakes and sways as if you are in a water bed and someone would stand and kick it. There are both long and short rocks and when it starts we do not know if there will be a small, large or long aftershock or whether it is a new earthquake going on. I feel a little insecure, not exactly afraid as I did in Kathmandu but it is a bit uncomfortable.
6:15 The sun is coming up and I eat a peanut bar and I drink coffee and orange juice.
6:30 People have already started to gather to fetch more sleeping mats. Some of the orphanage children come to fetch the supplies we bought for them.
7:00 Now comes the first mothers with nursing children, they are up to about two years old and they get blankets and teddy bears.
7:50 Shyam logs all that we hand out. He ensures that the orphanage children get the right amount of rice, lentils, sugar, salt, oil, toothpaste, toothbrush and soap.
9:00 Now nine of orphanage children had their portions. Very heavy to carry, about 40 kg per child. Fortunately they have someone with them that can help them to carry. A large number of small children have received their teddy bear and blanket. Some older children will each receive a ball. It feels so emotional to see how much joy a small teddy bear can spread among both children and adults. Even emotional to see that children can become excited over a sack of rice and a few liters of cooking oil. Throughout the distribution Shyam acts also “pharmacists” and provides many mothers with medicine for their children who are sick. We give antipyretic to last for three days and then they have to come back. Diarrhea tablets as well, as a pharmacist in Kathmandu has prescribed.
11:00 36 mothers with small children have now been here and gotten a special baby blanket and teddy bear. None of them have had a teddy bear before so it felt very meaningful to know that these little children have a teddy bear to hug now. I take a lunch break, there will be pasta with mushroom sauce, coffee and water.
11:30 A truck drives through the village with monks that are on their way further up the road to a neighboring village and deliver aid shipment with more tarpaulin.
11:35 Continued distribution of blankets, teddy bears, food for orphans and sleeping mats.
12:00 The two orphans who live right on top came. They are so grateful and they say that they will carry home everything themselves. I would say none of them even weigh 40 kg themselves so it will of course be enormously heavy for them to carry home. It is a climb of about 700 m and without packing it takes them about hour one way. For me it would take about 1 hour 45 minutes to walk without packing. I cannot let them go themselves, so I talk to Shyam about it. After an hour someone from the top arrives so now the children have help to carry it all.
13:00 All teddy bears and blankets are out, 70 pieces have been distributed. All the orphanage children except one have collected their things. There continues to be people to collect the mattresses. The truck with the monks returns. Karma jumps up on the roof and goes to Kathmandu together with them.
13:30 I go and fetch water at my waterfall and seek out a shady spot and some privacy. It is enormously hot and so many people. This is the first moment that I had the need of some private time. I sit in the shade under a tree. Sophie calls, it’s always good to talk to her! After our conversation, I feel a little homesick, but now it’s only nine days left until I go home. I greet three water buffaloes as a little kid comes along with them, they are to drink water at the waterfall.
13:50 When I get back, Shyam is just plastering a wound under the eye of a man.
14:00 Very lively meeting about how the night aid supply of rice to be distributed in the village. There are 40 bags of rice weighing 30 kg each. I sit a little off to the side and I am interested to listen. For rehydration (by order of Sophie) it is important that I drink rehydration drinks, I make myself two! Then I take a bit of a walk up into the trees to find shade to sit down and write the daily diary. It’s probably about 40 degrees today, clearly the warmest day so far. There is no wind and the sun is straight up at its zenith. I stop and talk with some goat kids on the road, they are not so used to being cuddled but they seem to enjoy it.
16:30 My diary is now up to date, a small afternoon breeze comes and it feels very nice! I go and charge my mobile with the new solar charger.
16:45 Distribution of rice and sleeping mats is still ongoing. I am going to wash myself, and get water at the waterfall. I stand under the waterfall and “shower”, it is about 20-25 degrees in the water, it’s so nice and cool off and the feeling of becoming clean is wonderful! It’s very dusty in the village and you become tremendously dirty.
17:45 Back at the tent, I see that the distribution of sleeping mats and the rice is still going! Many village people help out. There is a light breeze and the sun begins to disappear behind the mountain. Shyam says that he freezes even though it is about 25 degrees out so he wants to play badminton to bring up his body heat. Me and Shyam play for 5 minutes and then, all the young people want to play with us. Luckily we bought three badminton sets!
18:20 There is so much laughter. After I go away to cook and I’m really thinking about how fantastic and fulfilling it feels to be here to help when I hear all laughter and I see all all gratefulness.
18:45 For dinner, I have couscous with chili spiced vegetables, coffee and 6 crisp!
19:05 Now I am waiting for Sophie to call.
19:10 Sophie calls, I first talk to her father TorBjörn and he tells me how proud and impressed he is over the work I do here and I am very glad to hear it! I feel very uplifted to have received such a fine appreciation! Then Sophie and I have a lot of phone trouble. The phone line stops working a lot today so so today’s diary has taken over 2 hours to transfer.
21:30 I feel both tired and very happy. Tired because it has been quite a tough day in the heat but I’m glad I was able to talk to Sophie, it feels very meaningful to share the day’s events, and then it was so nice to be appreciated by both Sophie, her dad, and facebook (Sophie reads to me every day). Now I will try and go to sleep, for tomorrow we will walk around the village and distribute tarpaulin and make home visits to the orphanage children.