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Johan’s Diary – Valentine’s Day – February 14th, 2016
I woke up at 6:30 feeling refreshed and village life starts to liven. For breakfast I have noodles with an egg, my other breakfasts that I brought with me are all gone. The morning sun begins to warm quickly and I enjoy the sun, my breakfast and morning coffee. I get a nice and loving Valentine’s Day message from Sophie, it’s great to feel loved and maybe a little extra special when I am far away and haven’t seen her for some time. I send her some loving greetings back and hope my Valentine’s Day gift to her arrives. It’s succeeded after a lot of hassle to order a flower delivery as early as Thursday, it will be exciting to see if she will be surprised!
I am excited for the day, as the goal is to start molding above the windows in the morning, so now it starts to look like a house. Shyam and I will also go up to the junior school located higher up in the village, at about 1,800 meters altitude and distribute sweaters, unfortunately we have to wait for shoes since we have too few in small sizes. We will change at the beginning of the week. Today, the first workers arrive earlier than usual and the work gets started, I feel hopeful that we will reach our goal today.
At 12 o’clock, we head up to the junior school; it’s a pretty tough hike. The climb up is about a 300-meter altitude difference. It is very clear weather today so the views are stunning as I look at the snow-capped Himalayan peaks which are about 6000 meters high, says Shyam.
We are welcomed with lots of scarves and flowers from the teachers and students. There are 36 primary students, and I believe the youngest is only about 4 years old.
After the handing out of sweaters, we offer some sweets and biscuits to the children and sit in the schoolyard with a beautiful view. We then head back down the mountain again, happy, cheerful and with warm souls after receiving so much gratitude and joy. Again thank you to everyone who made this possible!
Down (1550 meters above sea level) at the Home of Hope, a lot has happened, the walls are almost finished according to plan. Shyam and I help carry cement and stones and we all work a little harder today in order to reach our goal. At 17:50 the walls are cleared and that means it will be ready for casting tomorrow! I feel relieved that everything is going according to plan.
I have lamb stew for dinner, which is fairly good and there was a piece of broccoli in it that really tasted like broccoli, and I realized that I miss vegetables a lot! One of Brecht’s friends birthday is today so we celebrate him for a while, then I go into the tent to write my diary.
Thinking about our project with Home of Hope and how much fun and meaningful it feels to be here and do what we do. The Lööf Foundation does so much for so many, and has created this project for Home of Hope, and I am only a small part of this process. It’s Sophie and her father who started this foundation. It is a privilege to work with the one you love and share your life with. We make a great team in this project, as I like to do things and solve problems practically and enjoy the simple life in tents while Sophie is phenomenal supporting me from home in Sweden. She does everything from updating social media, to raising money for shoes and sweaters and last but not least, being my rock when life gets hard here in the mountains of Nepal, far away from home.
Today is Valentine’s Day, and I feel very far away from home. I so badly wanted to be at home with Sophie, but I will be home soon, only 7 days left now.
Thanks for being there in my life, I love you!
That’s all for today!