I spent two weeks in February in Nepal on project with All Hands & Hearts. The program started in November so the build was quite far along already. It was really quite different only going for two weeks, seeing as though on my previous projects I did 4 weeks in Mexico, the entire 5.5 months in Nepal last year and 2 months in LA. The 2 weeks really did fly by. But I loved every second!
I got to do some interesting and useful work. Installing rebar. Bending rebar. Some shovelling (I love shovelling). Lots of block laying. And I was involved in a small concrete pour too, which was great. Concrete pours are always good fun.
Some of the staff were back from last year and this year’s program director had been my PD in Mexico. So lots of familiar faces and it was great to catch up with them all. The program director from last year wasn’t on project this year, but I did get to meet up with him for coffee in Kathmandu on my way out of the country so that was great. Many of the masons are the same as last year and there were some very big smiles of recognition on my first day on site.
There were also some familiar faces amongst the volunteers, and it was great to see them again and do some block laying with them.
And, of course, lots of fabulous new people too.
While we were there, the volunteer coordinator from last year (who was volunteering this year) and I went to last year’s project to say hi to several of the community members we worked with and to see the school too. That was really special. There was also a side mission to Hetauda and Sesame restaurant where I spent A LOT of time last year. The staff remembered us and the manager came out to say hi. And the blended iced mocha is just as good as I remembered!!
Like last year’s program, this is a school build. But this project is bigger than last year. We were working on two sites. The main site had a toilet block and six classrooms (instead of the 3 we built last year). And we also built an additional toilet block at a second school. As usual, All Hands & Hearts teams up with Relief Nepal to provide Disaster Response and Resilience training; menstrual hygiene training (including making reusable sanitary pads); child rights training. And again, as in previous years, we also have some female mason trainees who are working on site and learning construction skills from the masons and working with the volunteers. This year we did something a little different too. There is a community member who needed some IT training. She’s doing an accounting qualification and wanted to learn a bit about spreadsheets, so I had a few sessions with her to get her started.
Another great project from an amazing organisation. If you want to support the work that All Hands & Hearts does then please donate to my Just Giving page for the All Hands & Hearts UK Trust. The UK Trust supports the international projects that All Hands & Hearts works on (including school builds in Nepal). And if you’re a UK taxpayer then you can claim Gift Aid on the donations too. www.justgiving.com/page/kath-mcguire-3
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