To The Doorsteps Of Chepang

More than a month of preparation was finally going to hit off. We had an energetic team of young lads and ladies ready to embark on a vision care mission fixed nearly 6 months back.

Left to Right: Jeewa N Bist, Prateeva Devkota, Mukund Pant, Aashma Dahal

From the warm-up, Prateeva took a lead in this mission coordinating over everything that comes over. She used her mother's connection to bridge our needs to the capacity of the grassroots, in the days of groundwork. We have another enthusiast who is never tired of challenges Dr. Sudarshan Khanal. He is near-perfect in handling permits and paperwork.  

 

Never-tiring Dr. Sudarshan in Friday Mood

Mukund Pant and I collected ophthalmic drugs from various sources to be distributed to the people in the camp. Jeewanand Bist, our senior dai (Uncle we are used to calling him), landed KTM a day before unfortunately missing the fellowship dinner at Samsara. 

If you, kinda, feel passing out, don't bother to read. Just click on the video below and watch the synopsis. But if you got time, it's always good to read the whole story in detail!

All our members of Better Vision including Man Bahadur Kunwar, Rajani Pokharel, and Arun Dhungana participated in that dinner at Thamel on 20th September.  Manish Poudel was also joining our team as an optometrist. Also, in order to help in data collection and research works we had requested Ms. Aashma Dahal, an MPH student, to come.

Rajendra Gyawali and Nabin Poudel were constantly advising us from abroad. The next day we drove off from Kathmandu at 9. There were two vans one would leave in the morning and the second group would leave in the afternoon.

First team: L to R: Ben, Wayne, Terry, Prateeva, Rabindra, David, and Jeewa

We had set up an agreement with Everest Mountain Bike Tours and Travel company as our travel partner. The First Group consisted of Jeewa dai, Prateeva and myself along with Wayne and his son Benjamin from Australia, Dr. David, and Dr. Terry all the way from the States. it was for all of us, like, dream come true project as we all shared a common interest in serving the mankind through vision care, at least once a year. 

Jeewa dai brought the group from Thamel in the first vehicle in which I joined at Koteshore and Prateeva joined at Balkumari. There was nothing as such to remember but at Chalnakhel Bansbari, our vehicle got stuck at a road traffic jam. we made a stopover at Humaney Bhanjyang which served as the beautiful viewpoint to look upon Kathmandu valley, mainly Chapagaun, Khokana and many places of Lalitpur to the South.

From Humaney Bhanjyang

Yes, pears are always sweet and delicious when you get an opportunity to taste them afresh. Pharping is very famous for Asian Pears. You see the orchard of those pears right by the side of the road and in many places, you can have them in your hand's reach. We also had brunch over there: some hot curries, sel and so on.

We were supposed to attend a meeting with the organizers and locals at Hetauda that day at 2PM but sadly it was already 3PM when we reached Avocado & Orchid Resort. Later we went to a rooftop restaurant at Hetauda downtown at 4PM. Lions club of Hetauda Bhutandevi and Lions Club of Manahari were major supporting organizations in this mission. So they have brought the volunteers as well as the locals for the introduction and assignment of possible duties.

Lions Representatives

Volunteers

Our Team (L to R): David, Prateeva, and Aashma

 

Babulal Syangtan, Chairperson ward no3

We discussed many things and we were quite surprised even to see the interest of those people in making the mission a success. That meeting added a lot of confidence to us. 

Back to the hotel and refreshed we went to a Prateeva's home. It was very splendid. Then again we went to a restaurant that was across the river and we had to traverse throught the suspension bridge. David was to fly drone from the bridge at dusk. It was dark and the team second came to meet us at the restaurant. After having coffess we returned to the hotel. We took out the stuffs, mediciens, and glasses from the bus in order to arrange them and sort them out for 5 consecutive days. There was some misunderstanding about the accommodation liability of two drivers that went with us.

Then next day, we had to get on to the road as early as possible. We woke up at the dawn and started to lead the bus. The drivers helped us a lot.

Just loaded the Jeep!

 While the vehicle was kickstarted, Prateeva called everybody who were to be incited in order to set up the camp venue. She called Gauri Chimouriya who informed us some three guys from local Leo Clubs would be going with us to Raksirang-3, the first campsite. We met Lions Club of Manahari president Mr. Hom Magar at Manahari who played a very vital role in making the whole camp a grand success, managerially and logistically.

Meeting the good samaritan Mr. Hom Magar