A Day in Ghunsa

One month into my stay in the little Nepali village, a regular day in Ghunsa felt just that – entirely regular. The gentle clanging of yak bells in the early morning was as natural a sound to me as the gurgle of magpies that had woken me in Australia for eighteen years. Walking from my room in the family’s guesthouse to the living room above the stable for breakfast, the spectacular Himalayas no longer shocked me as they loomed over the village on both sides.

Ghunsa is a very special place in many ways, but that feeling of belonging is particularly unique. Making the seven-day trek into the village seems to be test enough for the villagers to deem visitors one of their own. I had only known them four weeks, hardly spoke a word of Sherpa and had a long way to go in learning about their way of life. Yet this little Nepali community had adopted me. 

The village leaders invited me to every town meeting, welcoming me with home-brewed thomba and Buddhist scarves. I couldn’t walk one hundred metres without being invited by the locals for at least three cups of tea. After school each day, the teachers told me stories about their homes far across the mountains, and gave me much-needed lessons in Nepali culture. Walks to school became my favourite part of the day, as I was accompanied by a chattering, dancing parade of excited children clinging to my hands and clothes, as well as one or two village dogs and, naturally, the odd goat.

It was only on my final day, as I stood on a wooden bridge over the roaring river with my hands raised in farewell and a garland of forest flowers around my neck, that I fully understood my full and enthusiastic reception. As I watched almost the entire village wave me off, their faces were shining and open with it: hope. HDFA is their beacon, the light in their lives that represents a better future for their children. And as I turned to walk away from the people who had adopted me so readily, I silently promised them that their hope wouldn’t be forgotten. 

The children of Ghunsa Lower Secondary School impressed me every day with their eagerness to learn. They would beg me to talk with them in English for hours after school, and not once during my entire stay was a student late to class. They don’t know that they’re disadvantaged; they quite literally don’t know the meaning of the word.

When asked about their ambitions in life, they speak confidently of practising law in America, traveling around Australia or studying medicine in India. These children are certainly not lacking in drive, but rather in opportunity – the exact thing that HDFA works to provide.

Many children in Nepal are robbed of the essential innocence of childhood. It is not uncommon for children to miss days of school in order to labour on their family’s farm, or to never reach secondary school because they so desperately need the money that working as a porter provides. Every donation to HDFA works towards an education program that not only keeps children in schools, but also provides toys, sports equipment, books, games and other resources to give them the childhood that they have every right to.

Teaching English as a second language is a task in itself. Teaching English as a second language high in the Himalayas with no technological aids and speaking very little Nepali was another challenge entirely. Ghunsa’s teachers thanked me daily for the teaching resources that HDFA are able to provide the local school, and during those weeks, I found that I was equally grateful. Maps, charts, posters, books, stationary and art supplies are essential in constantly capturing the attention and interest of students, the entire world over. HDFA plays a part in helping to spread these modern educational methods across Nepal, where traditional principles of lecturing and note-taking still reign supreme.