Great news! Angela, Jolana, Me and my girlfriend Yoshie, are all going to be in Nepal in April. We will be joining Mon and the community of Aandhimul to put into action some new programmes.
More great news! Mon will be working full-time in April and with many of us from the project being their, much can be done. Things that we will be working on include; dealing with water issues in the village, participating in teacher training, doing creative workshops and working on relationship building within the community. There will be more details about these projects in later blog entries, and of course in May/June there will be many photos, videos and reports about these programmes and more!
However, since the conception of the project Mon Bhujel has been working on a part-time unpaid basis, his full-time job is a teacher in the beautiful town of Bandipur. But as you have just read, as of April this year we will be employing him as the first full-time worker on the project. It was a joint decision between Mon and me, because during my previous visit in October/November 2008 it was obvious we needed someone to be working full time on the project and within the community.
Also, for Mon this is not just a job, it's a passion, as it is for all of us who are working with this community. He has a desire to help his people in any way he can. Which is why we have decided to employ him, and we have a lot of trust with him going from our experiences so far. Of course his passion goes beyond money, but like all of us we need money to survive. He has a beautiful wife and son and needs to be able to support them.
Therefore, we need to cover his monthly salary of approximately £180 (US$280). This is where we need your help, we are looking for people to sponsor his monthly wage. We can arrange a direct debit from £2 a month (however much you can afford), and just a little every month from many people can help cover his salary.
We believe that without employing Mon in the village, the project will struggle to succeed, he is such an important asset and a inspiring man. Without him in the first place, there would be no Aandhimul Project. So supporting him is one of our greatest priorities and we hope you will agree. So if you are interested in helping, please don't hesitate to contact Lee any time. Thank you!
Also, more great news from Angela about her plans for her 4 weeks in Nepal. She's bringing with her lots of resources for Aandhimul's primary school, and Singapore Airlines has allowed her to take 30kg of baggage (no charge for the excess).
After consulting with a teaching colleague, she has decided to take educational resources that can be used many times for a variety of lesson activities. Resources such as bug catchers, magnifying lenses and measuring tools for learning about insects in their village are on the list. Also on it are weather charts, along with rain and wind gauges for measurement and observation projects, a brilliant inflatable skeleton along with body system charts and a stethoscope for learning about the body and how it works. She also hopes to pack some building blocks (light ones of course), along with building straws for the kindy class and an activity book. As the school doesn’t yet have a library (or anywhere to store books), she intends to buy a few books in Kathmandu to take to the school, and as she so rightly says "We’ll find a way to fill the library when we can afford to build one!"
