Dear friends,
Nepalese people don't read newspapers, and if they can get hold of an old television set, they often spend days watching cheap Hindi films that don't exactly stimulate their minds. Most of them are still unaware that a certain Donald Trump has already ensured a return to poverty in their country by abolishing the major American aid organization USAID (United States Agency for International Development) a few days after taking office. It was founded in 1961 and has since ensured better health and nutrition in the Third World: in short, USAID brought underdeveloped countries exactly what their own governments were unable to do for them.
At the end of January, the American employees of USAID/NEPAL were ordered by Washington to leave the country immediately and were forbidden from making any official statements about the recently dissolved organization before their departure. The Nepalese health authorities immediately began searching for replacements among UN agencies and other major international organizations, which, however, were far from being able to promise assistance due to the current recession. The government knows full well that, at the latest when the monsoon season begins in June, disasters and diseases will once again shake Nepal and that, without effective international support, the country will not be able to solve difficult problems, especially in the remote regions of the Himalayas, where medical aid is always difficult to provide.
Most of the time, Nepalese people only learn about current events through the frequent demonstrations in the larger cities: they consider their leaders to be corrupt and incompetent and show no interest in their disputes. Time and again, the royalists wake up, and thousands of them regularly march through the streets of the capital. After the cruel massacre of the entire royal family at a family dinner on June 1, 2001, the murdered king's only brother, Gyanendra, was appointed regent, and in 2008 the monarchy was finally abolished. This mass murder remains a mystery in the Himalayan state to this day. In the minds of the Nepalese, Gyanendra is the evil murderer of his brother and his family. Today, he lives near Kathmandu as an 80-year-old man. Although King Birendra was only a constitutional monarch, he was very popular with the people, especially since the king of Nepal had always been considered the reincarnation of the god Vishnu.
Gyanendra's supporters today are young people who were not yet born at the time of the massacre. They are unemployed and dream only of a new king who will turn Nepal into a flourishing Hindu state. Almost every day, charter flights from America land in Kathmandu, bringing home the many Nepalese who immigrated there illegally. They were arrested in the US immediately after Trump took office and are now being deported. It is a great shame for them not to return home as “rich men” and a great disaster for their families, who are now ruined after having to borrow a lot of money to pay the devious, unscrupulous “travel agents” who claimed they could make their children's dreams come true. The failed young people fill the large slums of the capital, such as the Thapathali slum. They are frustrated and, of course, unemployed. Most of the time, they sleep in their huts all day to avoid friends and neighbors. It is mostly the women in Thapathali who feed their families and hire themselves out as stone and cement carriers on construction sites. This heavy work should be done by men, but women are preferred when it comes to hiring because they earn much less.
Since the mayor of Kathmandu was unable to dismantle the slum, he had electricity installed in the settlement. People pay nothing to live in Thapathali, and yet most of them do not hesitate to rent out tiny parts of their huts to other needy people for a lot of money in order to earn some extra income. Some of the men work as painters when there is work available. Otherwise, they sit together during the day, playing cards and drinking homemade rice schnapps.
We now only give our vitamin- and mineral-enriched milk porridge to the children of very poor single women, because our finances no longer allow us to provide it to all 500 children in the slum. We also pay their school fees. It is now illegal to live in tents in Kathmandu. That is why the Madhesis – whose camp was swept away by floods last summer – were driven out of the city. Despite our help, they remain desperately poor. They marry within their own clan and eat rats, which is why they are rejected by other groups of the clan. The men work when they can find something to do on construction sites. The women, on the other hand, roam Kathmandu begging to collect old clothes, which they then sew together into blankets and sell.
Having children means security for their old age, but they have not yet understood the benefits of sending them to school. To learn to read and write, they all come to Ghattagar every day, to the newer tin shanty town of our “Maute” people, where the classroom is empty during the day. Sushma teaches them arithmetic, writing, and reading there. Here they also receive our valuable milk porridge, which they so desperately need. The children of the “Maute” settlement have been going to school themselves for years and are determined to study until they graduate from high school. That is why we plan to continue to support them financially after we have completed our project at the end of 2026, until they have finished school.
Our “Ghattagar Maute” are the people who have benefited most from our work in Kathmandu in recent years. It took ten years for the clan to understand the importance of hygiene and cleanliness. This development only really began five years ago when they moved to the tin shanty town, where they had access to running water, toilets, and showers for the first time in their lives. Today, they have become so accustomed to this new way of life that they cannot imagine living on garbage dumps again. These people are born into a world that, they believe, was and is determined by karma and the gods. The children are breastfed until they are three or four years old. They live completely freely in their clan. They are never punished and are loved by everyone, but as a rule they are not encouraged to become “more” than their parents. It is very difficult for these adults to eventually understand that good housing and food come at a price and that you cannot depend on others financially forever if you want to continue to live better. And this is what our Maute clan learned in the end. For three years, we have slowly “weaned” them off our support, telling them that we had financial problems and that we could only support the children.
We were curious to see their reaction, and it was a great joy to see that, without complaining, they now take care of themselves and even pay their own rent without ever asking anything of us. They worry much more than they used to because it is so difficult to earn money, but they still retain their cheerfulness and friendliness, which are innate to them anyway and mean more to us than a thank you. Our thanks go to all of you who make this work possible in the first place through your loyal support!
We will be in touch again in December and will then send you the donation receipts for 2025.
Kind regards
Elisabeth Montet