Recovery

Namaste.

In earthquake-hit Nepal, life for many has gradually returned to normal.  People have moved back into their homes if they were not damaged, and offices, shops and schools have mostly re-opened.  The aftershocks have almost petered out; we hadn’t had one for a week and then overnight everything shook again, not once but twice!  

I went to Kathmandu at the start of last week for a training course. The journey was the first time I had travelled back to the city since the earthquake.  As we climbed the hills into the Kathmandu valley, all along the road, in each village that the bus passed through, there were rows of multi-coloured temporary shelters; small tent-like structures made from a bamboo frame covered in tarpaulin or any other waterproof material that people could find or acquire.  Lots had the aid donors name emblazoned on them. “UK AID – from the people of Britain” was one that caught my attention several times, along with ‘Red Cross of China’ and several others. Many families had taken their beds into the shelter, so that they did not have to sleep in their damaged houses, fearful of another quake. I could not bring myself to photograph these shelters, it seemed such an invasion into these poor people's lives, when they were already suffering.

Also on the main road I saw a convoy of long lorries, empty now, but each proudly bearing a banner on the front "UN - Emergency Relief Supplies". 

In Kathmandu, it is the modern houses that mostly remain standing and in many cases are little damaged.  The old streets of Thamel near the hotel where I stayed, narrow and normally full of bustling traders and tourists, were much quieter and in many places filled with rubble from collapsed buildings. Houses still standing, old and traditional, had walls propped up with wooden beams.  The temples in Durbar Square had mostly fallen and those that hadn’t were surrounded in bamboo scaffolding.  The tall brick walls of the beautiful ‘Garden of Dreams’ (see blog 'Dream of a Garden' from November 2013), the renovation of the old palace garden, had become piles of bricks on the pavement below and the garden was closed.  The large open space/sports ground, the Tundikhel, which acts as a massive roundabout in the centre of the city, was full of temporary tent homes.

However at 6 weeks since the first earthquake, there are now many signs of recovery and rebuilding to be seen. Rubble from collapsed houses has often already been sorted and any materials suitable for re-using is stacked neatly on the sites. Many lorries and trucks on the roads were loaded with sacks of cement or building materials.  New bricks, stones and sand were piled by the sides of the road waiting to be used for new buildings. 

The Nepali people are resilient and determined to bounce back. New homes and schools will eventually be built, but in the meantime, people will manage, despite the hardship and inconvenience, in their temporary shelters and classrooms.  The aid donations from the rest of the world will continue to be vitally important in helping with the rebuilding of this nation.