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 Emergency
Fund
The Association, in Nepal, Tibet and
India, is often approached by people in desperate need of immediate
assistance: some need money for basic medical care for themselves or
their children (there is no free medical care in these countries) and
others for urgent life-saving operations; some people because they have
no work or have lost their harvest and have no other way to feed their
family or pay the rent; others because they are elderly and alone, not
able to work they are left abandoned to themselves.
The Emergency Fund also takes care of sustaining temporarily those
children whose sponsorships have been interrupted. In this way children
are not forced to leave school or to return to their initial difficult
living situations.
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 Healthcare
Projects
Project for people with
disabilities - Tibet
Project 2002/2003/2004
This project was realised in the years
2002-2003-2004 and was co-financed by the Italian County of Lombardy.
The project was a collaboration between:
Lama Gangchen World Peace Foundation - Help in Action.
Don Gnocchi
Foundation NGO, one of the most important bodies working on behalf
of people with disabilities in Italy.
Association for
Solidarity between Populations AISPO, the NGO of the San Raffaele
Hospital in Milan, Italy, committed to important social and healthcare
projects in poor countries.
Tibet is one of the poorest areas of the
world, especially in the rural regions where the only form of livelihood
is that of subsistence farming. Social services, especially those
relating to healthcare, are completely lacking in the villages and are
minimal in the cities.
In this context, the situation of people with disabilities is
particularly difficult: unable to carry out heavy agricultural work and
the lack of appropriate rehabilitation and treatment denies many the
possibility to play active roles in village life.
This project is based in Tashi Lumpo Monastery Clinic, in the city of
Shigatse. Here the monk-doctors, who practice above all traditional
Tibetan medicine, receive around 100 poor patients each day who come
from the surrounding villages with the certainty of receiving help.
However, these doctors are often impotent when confronted with cases of
handicap: many cases are fractures left untreated, which render the
person less able as time goes by. Degenerative disease such as b-bone
disease is still very diffused in Tibet for unknown reasons and cases of
blindness and cataracts are common even amongst the youngest of people
due to the strong sunlight, dust and lack of hygiene.
In the Clinic experts from the Don Gnocchi Foundation, who stayed at the
Monastery, taught monk-doctors physiotherapy and about the
rehabilitation of people with disabilities. Now, these monks are able to
offer concrete help to these patients who have had to wait for a long
time.
Photo
Reportage
 Himalayan Healing Center - Kathmandu -
Nepal
This Clinic situated in the outskirts of
Kathmandu in Nepal, in the same complex where the Association is based,
provides minimal cost healthcare to the poorest and most needy of the
local population.
The Clinic offers allopathic medicine alongside traditional Himalayan
medicine and is composed of five consultation rooms offering general
medicine, dental care, family planning and reproductive health services,
as well as facilities for ophthalmology, ENT and homeopathy.
The Clinic has a full-time Nepalese staff.
In 2004, the Clinic offered medical care to approximately 16,000 people
at a minimal charge or with no cost. In July, during a week-long medical
camp, 800 people were treated completely free of charge.
The Clinic also acts as a base for important community health programmes
promoted by Nepal’s Ministry of Health such as: the Dots (Directly
Observed Treatments) for patients with tuberculosis; the national
campaign against polio, still common in some areas, and the vitamin A
programme. The diet of many poor families in Nepal consists almost
exclusively of rise and lentils and is therefore lacking in many
essential vitamins such as vitamin A that can cause serious health
problems including blindness. This vitamin is now administered
periodically to children and is sufficient to avoid a lot of suffering.
The Clinic also participates in immunization programmes that aim to
protect children against preventable disease such as polio, hepatitis
and measles.
The Clinic needs funds to buy medicines and equipment, as well as to
continue financing educational healthcare activities in the local
community.
 Village
Dispensaries - Tibet
The health problems in the villages of
Central Tibet are serious and widespread: malnutrition, sicknesses
caused by the use of contaminated water, tuberculosis and lung diseases
such as pneumonia, lack of childbirth and maternity facilities,
untreated fractures (which leave people disabled for life), eye problems
(cataracts and blindness) are common even amongst small children caused
by the strong sunlight and dust, total lack of dental facilities.
It is of utmost importance that the inhabitants of these villages have
at least a basic medical assistance to count upon, because their state
of health is often already weak due to the climate, diet and
contaminated water. The healthcare structures of the city are too
expensive and difficult to reach, and often those who are sick remain
without any kind of help.
The Association already constructed, some years ago, a dispensary in
Gangchen Village, the first in an area that has been completely without
any kind of formal medical assistance for many years. There is a
resident Tibetan doctor who makes use of traditional Tibetan herbal
remedies and who visits regularly, often by foot or bicycle because
there are no means of public transport, another 15 villages in the
surrounding area.
In 2005 thanks to funds collected a new and bigger dispensary has been
built in the nearby Singma-Gangchen Village: it is an ample building
with a large courtyard situated next to the main road that runs from the
cities of Lhasa and Shigatse to the border of Nepal. Even though it is a
dirt road – at this time however there are road works underway that will
make a great improvement – it is one of the main roads in Tibet and as
such makes the dispensary very easy to reach from many other
neighbouring villages. The Tibetan doctor and his family are already
living in the new building, which will substitute the older and smaller
dispensary in the nearby Gangchen Village.
The local people are extremely happy to have access to this medical
assistance and the fact that it is available from Gangchen, where
monk-doctors have for centuries assured everyone of medical care, is
also very meaningful to them.
Other small dispensaries have also been built in the villages of Redu
Lamoshan, Tsarong Shan, Sakya Tonda Shan, Macha Pulchung Shan and Lunak
Shekar.
A donation from the Italian company Chiesi Farmaceutici in 2005 was used
to realise a dispensary in Nepu Village, an area completely without
medical assistance. Thanks to the commitment and enthusiasm of the
building coordinators and labourers, the construction was almost
completely finished in August of the same year. The building is located
about 500 metres from the newly built Nepu School, in the direction of
nearby Shishung Village and of other villages that are all connected by
a dirt track. These villages will also be able to access the new
services. There is a waiting room, a consultation room, a larger room
that will provide bed places, a storeroom for medicines and materials
and two rooms for the doctor and his family.
 Tashi
Lumpo Monastery Clinic
Shigatse - Tibet
Tashi Lumpo, founded in the 16th century,
is one of the largest monasteries of Tibet and the traditional seat of
the Panchen Lama; it can be found in the city of Shigatse, the second
largest city in Tibet, and is home to approximately 800 monks.
In this clinic, makeshift and extremely poor, are the only medical
facilities available to many of the poor inhabitants of the local area.
The monk-doctors, who practice traditional Tibetan medicine but also
have some knowledge of allopathic medicine, receive around 150 patients
each day and treat them all for a minimal charge.
In one part of the Clinic the monks, after collecting various herbs in
the nearby Himalayan Mountains, prepare the remedies of Tibetan
medicine. The pharmacy however also has a stock of western medicine, and
each person is given the opportunity to choose their preferred
treatment.
In 2004, the clinic was provided with the equipment necessary to make a
small laboratory for the analysis of blood and urine, long awaited by
the monk-doctors, enabling them to improve their diagnostic capacities.
The income the Clinic generates is not enough to cover the cost of
purchasing material and medicine; it manages to function thanks to
donations. The Association regularly helps this small clinic to cover
its running costs.
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 Monasteries
Gangchen Monastery in
Tibet
Founded five centuries ago, the monastery
of Gangchen in Central Tibet was once home to 350 monks: here were
preserved the most ancient and profound spiritual, medical, artistic and
handicraft traditions of Tibet. For the inhabitants of the area this
monastery was a point of reference for their spiritual life, for medical
care offered freely by the monk-doctors, for education and for concrete
help in the most difficult and important moments of life.
The ancient Monastery, destroyed in 1959, was rebuilt in 1999-2000
thanks to funds raised by the Association. The heart of village life for
Tibetans the rebuilding of the Monastery has given them an important
sign of ethnic and cultural survival.
The building comprises of a large prayer hall, living quarters for the
resident monks, kitchens, a retreat centre and a small clinic. The
project also foresees a library and a laboratory for the preparation of
traditional Tibetan medicines so the ancient healing traditions of
Gangchen can be preserved for future generations.
There are 40 monks living and studying in the Monastery, including some
children from the surrounding poverty stricken villages.
 Tibetan
Monasteries Project
The help of the Association reaches many
Tibetan monasteries. The monastic institution has been for hundreds of
years the heart of tradition and community for the Tibetan people. It is
here, within the monastery walls, that precious medical, artistic and
spiritual knowledge is kept and preserved: heritage for the whole of
humanity.
Symbol of the Tibetan identity, many small monasteries have today been
rebuilt, but they are very poor and only survive thanks to the donations
they receive. These donations also allow them to give homes to young
children who want to study. But they have little money to buy food,
medicines, clothes, shoes, beds, covers, fuel or to carry out frequently
needed repairs - necessary because of the extreme climate of Tibet and
the precariousness of the buildings.
Many monasteries in Central Tibet ask and receive help from the
Association for basic necessities, as well as to realize small sanitary
or water structures, to rebuild parts of the monastery, to buy solar
panels and so on.
Gangchen Monastery has been completely rebuilt.
In the Monastery of Tashi Lumpo, today the largest in Tibet, where
approximately 800 monks lived without running water or sanitation
structures, the Association realized a number of wash areas and showers
complete with hot water. The Clinic of this monastery receives help
regularly.
Riwo Choling Monastery received financial help to realize a new
hydraulic system to replace and entrench old pipes broken in different
points.
Sed Gyued Monastery is also under reconstruction.
Many other small monasteries receive help for their basic necessities,
thanks also to the long distance adoption of monks.
(see long
distance adoptions) have also requested help.
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 Water
Projects in Tibet/China
In Central Tibet there is a dramatic
scarcity of rain, concentrated in the short summer months it results in
long periods of time when people are completely without water and are
forced to drink stagnant waters from naturally forming ponds. This
water, often polluted, has grave consequences particularly upon the
health of children. There is no water for irrigation, leading to sadly
inadequate harvests, and the cultivation of fruit and vegetables is
unthinkable resulting in a diet seriously lacking in essential vitamins
and minerals. Villages in this area are without aqueducts or sanitation
services.
Chilean engineers "Jack Stern Ltd” prepared three projects for this
region on behalf of the Lama Gangchen World Peace Foundation - Help in
Action. Following the construction of an aqueduct, they estimate to
extend the life span of local inhabitants by at least 15 years, thanks
to the provision of potable water, improved harvests and the possibility
to grow much needed fruit and vegetables.
The first aqueduct to be built, was that of Gangchen Village: it makes
use of a natural mountain spring situated some kilometres away from
Gangchen and provides enough water to serve three villages, the local
school and Clinic. The aqueduct also provides a modest quantity of
electrical energy. It was inaugurated with a village party on the 8th of
August 2001, in the presence of the district authorities. It has clearly
demonstrated in the following years that it is able to withstand the
severe weather conditions of the Tibetan winter thanks to the special
technology used by the engineers of Jack Stern Ltd.
The second aqueduct was made to serve Namling Village, and a further
project for Nye and Dakshu Villages has already been drawn up but is
still waiting the necessary finances.
Many other villages have requested help to build aqueducts, water pumps
and irrigation systems.
Solar Panels
In the villages of the Gangchen district there is no supply of
electricity, the pylons that carry the electrical current to the city
stop about 15 kilometres away from the villages. Solar panels are the
easiest method to provide energy in these places: those already
installed near Gangchen Village provide enough energy to light some
rooms of the monastery and clinic. However, electricity is also needed
for the village, for the monastery, school and water pump.
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 Educational
Projects
Schools in Tibet
This project takes care of some already
existent infant schools in the Shigatse area of Central Tibet. These
extremely poor schools, made up of 3 to 4 rooms, are constructed of mud
bricks with beaten earth floors and are almost completely without
equipment or furniture.
Village schools offer instruction only up to the third year. The school
of Nye is the only one in this district that offers education up to the
sixth class and therefore also has to offer very basic residential
facilities, because of the lack of transport, to the 200 children who
come from surrounding villages.
The schools often lack desks, chairs, money for heating, to buy books
and scholastic materials, to carry out basic maintenance such as roof
repairs and the replacement of broken glass that is so necessary due to
the extreme climate of Tibet. Donations received by the Association are
used to cover these expenses. Thanks to funds raised for the schools
project, the Shongma Shang Village school was completely rebuilt in
order to replace the existing dangerous building. Other donations were
used to buy blankets and mattresses for the children of Nye School, who
slept on wooden palettes and were badly covered, due to the lack of
blankets, against the extreme climatic conditions. Many of the children
“adopted at a distance” in Tibet attend one of these schools, and in
these villages the numbers of children able to receive an education is
growing.
For children who do not receive any help it is very difficult for them
to attend school, because their families have no income and therefore
not even the small amount of money needed to buy school materials, but
these parents also need to give up help in the fields, with younger
siblings, with the animals, for the collecting of fuel and so on.
Thanks to funds collected from the end of 2004 and in 2005, two new
schools have been built in villages that the Association helps.
Nepu School
At the beginning of 2005, thanks to a donation from the Italian
company Chiesi Farmaceutici, the construction of a new school in Nepu
Village was started. By the month of August scholastic activities were
already underway, thanks to the arrival of a new teacher from the city
of Lhasa.
The school building consists of three classrooms (from class 1 to 3),
rooms for the teacher and his family, a large assembly room, a storeroom
and a kitchen; it is situated in a courtyard protected by a surrounding
wall, where the children have planted lots of small trees, so precious
at this altitude for their life.
Soon new desks and chairs will arrive for the school, as well as a stock
of books and stationary.
The children are already hard at work studying in their new school, and
in return for this big gift they give to us their most beautiful smiles.
Pandin School
Last year the inhabitants of Pandin Village asked the Association
for help because the old village school, a small precarious building
situated on the rocks near the banks of a small river, which when full
has threatened more than once the safety of the actual building and its
occupants.
Thanks to the funds collected it was possible to buy materials to build
a new school, which in the summer of 2005 was already finished and
working.
The women of the village came one by one to offer gifts to the
representatives of the Association – cups of tea, barley beer, a handful
of incense, a white Tibetan scarf – testimony of the immense gratitude
that these mothers feel for those who have helped their children so
much.
 Samling
Nursery, Kathmandu, Nepal
Nearby the office of the Association in
Kathmandu, a small nursery school was constructed a number of years ago
to provide free education for the poorest children of the area. It is a
pleasant and well-equipped environment and a great help for the mothers
who often have to work full-time in local carpet factories. Without this
facility they would have to take their children to work or leave them in
the charge of elder brothers and sisters, making it even more difficult
for them to attend school. Everyday a small truck collects the children
near their homes and takes them home in the evening.
Many of the children “adopted at a distance” through the Association
make use of this facility, where the dedicated teachers use the
Montessori method to teach the alphabet, numbers and a little English.
Schools in the area confirm that the children who pass through this
nursery are well prepared and ready to learn, and this is a reason for
the teachers to be proud!
Outside of the nursery is a small fully equipped play park and lawn
where the children can play safely and peacefully.
In 2003, at the side of this nursery, the construction of Gangchen
Samling School was finished.
 Gangchen
Samling School, Nepal
In the same complex as Samling Nursery and
the office of the Association in Kathmandu, Nepal, the construction of
Gangchen Samling School was completed and inaugurated in 2003. The
school offers the best possible education to many children from poor
families, for whom education – by payment in Nepal, would otherwise be
impossible. The school is registered with the Nepal Government and
follows the national education programmes.
The three-storey building has luminous classrooms and is well equipped.
Each floor has bathroom facilities and filtered drinking water. There
are offices for the school management and library, and spaces
pre-destined for the future establishment of laboratories dedicated to
language and computers as well as to science and technology. Also
foreseen are sports fields and out door play facilities.
During the scholastic year 2003/4 – thanks to a staff of 15 teachers –
245 children attended the nursery and classes 1 to 5. From the beginning
of the 2004/5 session, the numbers of students increased and the school
extended its capacity in order to provide class 6 facilities.
The majority of students who attend the school are adopted at a distance
through the Association Help in Action. All the students of the school
receive periodic medical check-ups from the Himalayan Healing Centre
Clinic Clinic.
The School also intends to offer students, other than the normal formal
education, a programme of education about peace and tolerance, centred
in particular around the vast multiethnic and multi-religious traditions
of Nepal; it was also take into consideration the principal spiritual
values, common to all religious traditions.
 Vocational
Training, Kathmandu - Nepal
The Kathmandu office of the Association
organises sewing and knitting courses in order to help mothers, often
widowed or separated from their husbands, who find themselves in very
difficult economic situations. During the full time course the women
receive a monthly allowance that ensures that they can complete their
training without having to worry about making money to feed their
children. The aim of the course is to train the women so they will
eventually become self-sufficient, thanks to a new trade, and be able to
provide for both themselves and their families.
A project of short vocational training courses is also under preparation
for Gangchen Samling School – electricians, plumbers, tailors – aimed at
the many young unemployed who have no other possibility of finding free
training.
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 Agricultural
Development Project
Due to the altitude and arid climate,
trees are very rare and very precious in Central Tibet. The land,
already poor and dry, is also effected by heavy erosion that leaves it
increasingly unsuitable for agricultural use; there is no kind of
protection from the extreme climatic conditions of Tibet: the wind, the
strong summer sun, the rains which when they come can be extremely
violent and cause landslides destroying houses and cultivated land.
Wood is rare and the only fuel for cooking and heating is dry yak dung
mixed with dried twigs and bushes.
There is no fruit, and as a result the diet is completely lacking in
vitamins, considering that vegetables are also difficult to cultivate
due to the lack of water.
In the villages of Gangchen, Nye and Namling thousands of trees have
been planted, and in Gangchen following the realization of the aqueduct,
a small pilot project has been initiated to cultivate vegetables. Many
villages are still totally bare of trees and the region is in urgent
need of reforestation.
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