Namaste Kathmandu: The Villagers, New Room, Exams and Tons of pictures

Reed College students Kritish and Erica are working an internship for Namaste Kathmandu at Mechi Mahakali School in Paruki Gaun Village at the banks of the Bagmati river in Thapathali, Kathmandu, Nepal. They will be working with the teachers and community members in the school, as well as gathering information for the non-profit to compile into a report on the situation in the village.

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The Monsoon has finally started in Nepal; since last Saturday it has been raining almost everyday making the ground and paths around the school full of puddles and mud.

The muddy path to the School: local ducks are going to have some fun!

I've been going to the school everyday this week. My friend, Anup, is volunteering to teach at the school. Since Erica is off traveling, Anup has taken her place. He goes to Dartmouth as an undergrad, and he is here for the summer. He has been of a great help at the school. He has also been helping me take surveys in the village. Everyday we've been walking around the village meeting and talking to the villagers. Although during the day time most of the people go for work, we still met many. There are usually women, either sitting outside their houses or, drawing water from pumps, or doing some household works. We also met some men who were hanging around when they didn't have any work to do. The villagers are very cooperative. Specially when we meet some parent of some kids from Mechi Mahakali, they talk to us and even offer us tea.

Talking to the villagers, we've learned a lot of new and interesting stuff about these people. We've interviewed total 56 families including 25, who send their kids to Mechi Mahakali school. Almost all of them had moved to this place at the banks of the Bagmati river about 3 years ago, and that was when this settlement started. But all of them have been living in Kathmandu for longer than that: ranging from 4 yrs to more than 40 years. They are originally from more than 35 different places scattered all over Nepal - from Mechi in the far-East to Mahakali in the far west (that's where the name of the school Mechi-Mahakali came from) and from villages at the base of the Himalayas in the north to the the plains near the border to India. All of them moved to Kathmandu for basically the same reason: in hope of getting work and earning a livelihood. Some of them were threatened out of their homes and land; some of them lost everything in flood or landslides; some of them wanted to give their children a better education which was not available in their own villages. Here, most of them, both men and women, work at construction sites. Some women just look after their homes. They've been growing corn on small plots of land behind their homes.

Most of the families we talked to send their kids to school; if not to Mechi-Mahakali, they send them to barely affordable government school nearby. Some parents even work hard to send their children to better private schools. They all said they felt very happy that Mechi-Mahakali School was built. The thing they like the most about this school is that it is a part of their village; they all had contributed their labor to build this school, so they feel it is their own. They want to send their kids to this School, but this school has only up to grade 2. They said they'd definitely send their kids to this school if it had higher grades. Some were also concerned about the standards of the school. They said that this school did not met the standards of even an average government school. This is quite true. Right now, it has only two rooms for three classes and only three paid full time teachers. But progress is happening. Construction of a new building with three more rooms is going on. So, hopefully, next year older kids at Mechi-Mahakali school will not have to go to other schools due to lack of higher classes.

Yes, times are changing at Mechi-Mahakali school. Just today, Class 2 kids took their Science exams in a new room right opposite to the school. The person of the house generously let the school use this empty room which is quite huge and can be partitioned into two. From next time, one of the classes (either KG or 2) will be held in this new room. They will not have to share the same classroom.

The new room is right across the street from the main school building

Class 2 students taking their science exams in the new room

Yesterday and today, students of Mechi-Mahakali School took their first term exams. They had English, Maths and Nepali exams. Class 2 had an additional Science exam too. They also had oral exams for all subjects except Maths. Now the kids will have four days off before the next term starts.