Update on Ginette Harrison School.
Ginette Harrison School was established this year in Nepal to honour the name of one of the world's greatest woman high altitude climbers. Below is an account of the visit to the school by Bob Uppington, the Chairman of Trustees of SHIVA charity.
Ginette
The trek to Ravi from the town of Banepa was an adventure in itself. The road was bumpy and dusty in this, the pre- monsoon season, and it wound down and down through the valley, with breathtaking views of the Nepalese farmlands. They were now a little scorched and barren compared with when I had seen them last July. Then, torrents of water cascaded down from the hills and across the track to the lush grasses and rice fields below. Now the main farming activity was pounding and grinding the wheat.
The poverty and the stark living conditions were obvious. Some houses built of bricks or breeze blocks, but most were made from the red clay earth and a few timbers. Children ran around bare-foot, and adults seemed to have little to do this time of year, but to sit and talk and wait for the new rains to awaken the soil.
When Sanu Bhai and I finally arrived at the school we were welcomed so warmly that I soon forgot my grimy and tired condition.
I was shown around the five class rooms, and all the children were very polite and well-prepared with strings of flowers (malla) they hung around my neck. By the time I had seen all the children I was beginning to disappear beneath the petals!
I was taken into the little "office" where the Committee and teachers introduced themselves, and thanked the Ginette Harrison Fund a thousand times.
They asked for instructions, saying that they would improve the school in any way I thought fit!
Considering that the facilities at the school seemed to be the building, blackboards and chalk, and that even the tables and chairs, and exercise books were only recently acquired from the previous month's donation, it was not difficult to quickly think of something.
I told them that I would be back after one week, by which time they were to decide where to put a "resource room" for a library, typewriters, and eventually a computer...... to paint the front of the school and put a Ginette Harrison board (with GHS logo).
The latter, as you can see from the top picture, they did. Bookshelves (right) were made, and hundreds of books, and two electric typwriters bought. Thanks to the Ginette Harrison Memorial Fund the 150 children at the school, and many more in years to come, will have an education and chance in life!!!!
