The inhabitants of the isolated villages scattered throughout the Shigatse region in Central Tibet have a simple but extremely hard life. Here, people survive from subsistence farming on mountainous terrain and tending livestock. People are often constrained to look for jobs on road construction or collecting and breaking the stones used for construction to supplement their income and enable the survival of themselves and their children. In this kind of life, for these families, every pair of hands count. In villages that have remained the same for centuries, modern technology has had little or no effect on everyday life: clean water for drinking and cooking needs to be carried from the nearest water source, fuel for heating and cooking needs to be collected daily and stored for the winter, the commonest (and often only) form of transport is by foot… There is no electricity or heating, no drains or running water, no roads or shops, no doctor’s surgery, no hospital and no social services. The elderly and disabled are often excluded from the day to day life and chores due to the heavy physical nature of the work. In this context, people with disabilities become a silent and hidden population, relying fully upon their families and community.
The Rehabilitation and Vocational Training Project at Tashi Lumpo Monastery intends to offer new hope to these very people. Training people with disabilities in a handicraft skill, which they can later carry out within their own home, will not only offer them independence but also allow them to play an active role in the economic and social life of their families and wider community.
However, due to the travelling distances and lack of transport to and from the villages it would be impossible for people to attend vocational training classes on a daily basis. For this reason we need to provide Tashi Lumpo Monastery with the resources to help the people who would benefit the most from the handicraft training programmes.
If you would like to participate in covering the expenses, essentially room and board, of a person with disabilities from a village to enable them to following a course of training or help to provide a person with disabilities with the necessary equipment and materials to become independent in their own village, donations can be sent to:
Lama Gangchen Kiurok Tsochun – Help in Action
Banca Popolare di Sondrio – Agency 13
Account Number: 7770/67
Bank codes: Cab: 1612 Abi: 5696
IT58 D056 9601 6120 0000 2877 X24 SWIFTPOSOIT22
Please specify Rehabilitation and Vocational Training Project on any bank transactions.