Maggie founded Kopila Valley Children’s Home (in 2008) and School (in 2010) in Surkhet. She had brought those laptops as a gift to her students from the Peck School Community in New Jersey, USA. Now, they were in the hands of the Customs Department.
The link at the end of Maggie’s original tweet leads readers to her blogpost where she urges people to email Arjun Pokharel, the Chief Customs Administrator, to return the goods.
In the post, she also hints at giving up on those laptops for good: “I’ve exerted all my time and energy and patience and now it’s time for me to move on. My apologies to the entire Peck School Community for your laptops not reaching the children they were intended for. We all really appreciate your constant support and generosity. And to my students, I’m really sorry. I will find another way to give you computer classes. Don’t you worry.” This post itself had generated 82 comments, been tweeted 282 times, and gotten 260 Facebook ‘Likes’ by press time.
The immediate response, as may be expected, was to ask why it had happened and how to be helpful to the situation. Several Nepalis expressed embarrassment at the behavior of their government officials and apologized for it. Journalists were contacted, and on a Facebook post, the respected and proactive Social Entrepreneur Anil Chitrakar immediately responded “On it.”
Two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof even tweeted about it to more than 1.1 million of his followers. But his tweet was unfortunately misleading: “#Nepal government steals laptops donated by Americans for Nepali schoolchildren,” directing people to Maggie’s blog. Nothing had been stolen, but his tweet went on to be retweeted by more than a hundred people and surely viewed by tens of thousands more.
The fact of the matter was that the officials at the Customs Department had impounded the laptops because Maggie’s organization was unaware of the Department’s regulations that require a pre-approved waiver from the Ministry of Finance. The link explaining this on the American Embassy’s Nepal website was soon tweeted by another Nepali to Maggie. With that came the end of the confusion over the laptop incident.
A request to speak to Maggie via email was declined; she is currently in China. Her organization responded to the media inquiry by directing us to their blog.
“I know the government had to ban the donation of secondhand medical equipment because they were turning Nepal into dumping ground,” a response on Facebook by Mabi Singh, a dentist and member of the Nepali diaspora in Boston who is part of the Help Nepal Network, said. “Out of model [equipments], non-availability of the parts if needed, no qualified technician to repair them caused more problem than help…Even though we know those laptops were meant for a good purpose, thugs might use the same strategy for their personal benefit. Hopefully, they will be released without taxation. Help Nepal buys [its] computer[s] in the local market.”
Maggie, after a day of Facebook and Twitter activity by others, updated the situation on her own blog. “It is in fact illegal to bring used goods (mainly laptops and vehicles) into Nepal without permission from the government,” before trying to explain that the reason she couldn’t resolve the problem was also because of load shedding and Nepal experiencing a “time of transition.” In the lengthy entry, she fails to explicitly explain that her organization overlooked a procedure that is required not after arriving in Nepal but before departing the country of origin. Still, the post hints of hope that the laptops may yet reach their intended destination.
Maggie’s is a wonderful story about how a curious and compassionate adolescent who finished high school in New Jersey “traveled the world” and fell in love with the children of Nepal, established the Kopila Valley Children’s Home and School in Surkhet for 40 children (http://blinknow.org) by age 23. It comes as no surprise that her dedication and work has even landed her on the cover of the New York Times magazine and put her on a speaking circuit for young people, highlighting not just her work but also the need for education in Nepal as a whole.
Her work is also but a glimpse of the affection that the world has been showering on Nepal, some even from Nepalis themselves. Here is a look at just a few with their base in New York.
The Old Guard and the New Wave
Help Nepal Network (http://www.helpnepal.net) arguably pioneered channeling Nepali diaspora’s philanthropic spirit. Its One Dollar A Month Fund for Nepal is well known in most quarters of the organized diaspora around the world. In many ways, it is the old guard of the “give back” philosophy and it has recently begun to step up the pace. HeNN, which has traditionally focused on education, health and natural disaster relief, is currently building a Children’s Center in Dhulikhel. They have also already built 22 electronic libraries in schools with plans for more. That is not the extent of their plans, though.
“We have recently worked out an arrangement with NetworkForGood.org to collect donations online, and the Nepali company Muncha.com has agreed to waive all fees involved in transferring the money to Nepal,” Abhaya Shrestha, a volunteer and executive member of HeNN, said over dinner recently.
But the money isn’t just coming from outside. Earlier this year Nepali industrialist Siddhartha Rana contributed Rs.one crore (Approx. US$138,000) while others have contributed Rs. three lakhs each (approx. US$4,100). There are also plans to establish an endowment fund that will enable HeNN to function more sustainably while regularly adding to their seed funds.
Then there is the New Wave. A recent issue of Vogue magazine dedicated a whole page to Shikshya Foundation started by New York-based fashion designer Prabal Gurung and his siblings Kumudini Shrestha and Pravesh Gurung, to help educate underprivileged girls in Nepal. The designer has been taking time out between working on his collections to plan establishing a field office for the foundation here in New York.
Grassroots Movement in Nepal (http://www.facebook.com/gminnyc), on the other hand, is a fully registered New York-based non-profit.
“GMIN’s primary focus is on bringing education to rural Nepal,” explained Sonam Ukyab, one of the group’s cofounders. “The best avenue we have discovered so far is to renovate government schools that are in total disrepair.”
They are currently working primarily in Dang district. Apart from school building, they also sponsor students by linking individual donors to students that need financial help.
Recently, their first annual fundraising benefit concert raised US$11,600 in profit.
“This is an annual party in NYC where we submit an oral report to the public about our work for the past year and the projects we plan on undertaking for the upcoming year,” Sonam said. They transfer the funds from New York to the bank account of Nepal Youth Awareness Organization, their sister non-profit, based in Kathmandu. The process costs them a total of US$65.
GMIN has a busy year ahead: On Sunday, a four-member amateur athlete team is participating in the NYC Triathlon’s Olympic Distance event to raise funds. On October 1, GMIN will be hosting a concert with Kutumba in New York on their first US tour. Then there are plans for an arts and movie festival later in the winter.
“GMIN wants to inspire Nepali people worldwide to get involved in developing Nepal in their own capacity. Taking this as an example, young Nepali people we had never met formed GMIN UK and held a fundraiser and raised US$1,200 in one day. In the same vein, chapters have formed in DC, Boston, Dallas, Houston, Hong Kong, and Canada,” Sonam mentioned. Besides renovating schools in Dang and one in Sindupalchowk, GMIN is also actively looking for dedicated partners/individuals to work with to build/renovate schools in other parts of Nepal.
But it’s not just rural Nepal that is getting all the attention. Enter: Kids of Kathmandu (www.kidsofkathmandu.org). It all started when Jami Saunders and Andrew Raible went to Nepal for their honeymoon in March 2010 and spent their time volunteering at an orphanage.
“As a photographer, I was constantly shooting during our stay at the orphanage. Towards the end of our stay, my husband suggested we have a small exhibition back in New York to raise funds for the children,” Jami said. Three months, and several conversations with friends later, Kids of Kathmandu was registered as a non-profit in New York.
On a recent afternoon, two interns worked on their laptops in Jami’s and Andrew’s apartment as the couple played with ideas to develop their project. Kids of Kathmandu uses art, photography and design as a way to raise awareness and funds for 41 orphans in Nepal. They hosted their first fundraising gala with The Desk Project. The collection of custom-made children’s desks was auctioned and by the end of the night US$40,000 had been raised.
“The money is in action in Nepal, where we have been able to move all the children from a government school to a private school,” Jami said. “We believe in education first and foremost and have pledged to continue to support the education of the children for as long as we can.”
The group is also already planning The Poster Project, a mini-fundraising event for later this year, and The Enlighten Project for next year. They are also working to develop ideas of doing something with fashion to raise funds for school uniforms, and another event involving chefs to raise funds for an eco-farm for the orphanage.
There has never been a shortage of love and support coming Nepal’s way, and so the country must do what it can on its part to absorb it effectively and efficiently. As its diaspora grows and becomes economically stronger, the trend of giving back may only grow as it has been demonstrated in recent years by not just the groups mentioned in this article, but also many others. There will also probably come a time, if it hasn’t already, when these organizations themselves need to begin communicating and interacting with each other regularly so that their efforts are concentrated and reinforce one another when possible. Perhaps HeNN could add electronic libraries in government schools that have been restored by GMIN.
And, as made clear from the case with Kopila’s laptops, organizations also need to follow operational guidelines, and perhaps offer suggestions if they feel it can enhance the process for both sides. After all, it would be a shame if all this love and goodwill get lost in translation, or at the Customs Department.
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