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Dateline:
9 October 2007
Suresh Tharu, 16, is a student of class VIII at
Churiya Higher Secondary School, who received
the education relief package. He is a resident
of Banaha Ward No. 8 of Bardiya district. All
his school stationary and education materials
were damaged by the rains that entered the house
from the roof as well as from the ground. He had
been to his uncle’s house on that fateful
night. He was helping the uncle’s family
and waiting for the rain to stop. Later when he
returned home, he found that the village was flooded
due to incessant rain and blocked drainage.
He
dried his books with the help of fire and sun
whereas the notebooks had become unusable. He
thanked the organisation for including educational
material in the relief material package. He said
the notebooks he had received from LWF Nepal would
help him rewrite his notes.
He
is the only child in the family. When asked, what
he would do with all the notebooks, he said, “I
will share them with some friends. I will save
others for next year.”
Dateline: 11 October 07
Koili
Devi Mauriya, 38, is a member of the local community
group that functions under the Khajura Janajagaran
(People Awareness) programme. The community-based
organisation covers some five VDCs in Banke district
that is also home to Indrapur.
She
recalled that her village was under water for
a few days during the flood period. “Our
household contents were not swept away, but were
totally damaged by the water,” said Mauriya.
Those
who had better houses could save some commodities,
but those who had low-raise mud houses lost their
stock of grain and clothes to floods. The books
of children and documents of the family were also
damaged.
LWF
Nepal staff met her when she came to collect supplementary
food. She has a three-year-old child. She said
such relief would directly help the mothers and
children who were not able to eat tough food,
and therefore nag their mothers.
“We
are happy that there are organisations that realise
the problem of women and children. The quantity
and quality of the food recently distributed [by
ACT/LWF Nepal] is good. Because in rural community,
every body likes to eat such food and even the
grown-up children create complain over hard food,”
she says.
She
thanked ACT/LWF Nepal and all donors involved
for distributing the right kind of relief materials
and in the right way. She said: “Since you
all had personally come to distribute the material
we received the actual quantity, if it was distributed
through local-level hands, it would not had have
reached the real affected people like us.”
Dateline: 14 October 2007
Sarita
Pun Mangar, 17, is a student of Class XII. She
is studying Commerce. Til Kumari is a student
of Class V, and Anju is studying in Class III.
They are the daughters of landless people of Kalika
VDC, Tansanpur-4 in Bardiya district.
Their
families do share cropping and work on daily wage.
Their village was not fully damaged by the flood,
but thatched roofs could not withstand the heavy
rainfall, which mainly damaged the education materials
of students and household items, and partially
damaged food items.
Sarita
Manger said: “It is indeed a blessing to
get so much note books at one time.” Otherwise
she would have to go through hard ways to replace
her notebooks.
All
the students, who received the relief items, said
that this was the first time in their life that
they had got the sufficient quantity of notebooks,
pen, pencil, ink and a geometry box. They planned
to share some of these materials with their brothers
and sisters.
When
asked what they would do after the completion
of the study? All of them said: "Though our
parents are very poor and uneducated they have
managed to send us to school".
First
of all, they want to complete their study up to
a level they can afford and stand on their own
feet. Then they said they would help their parents
to educate brothers and sisters. They feel that
the family's life can be changed through education.
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