Olga's Dispatch
March 2002

Kathmandu, Nepal

Well, friends -

This is my last dispatch this year from Kathmandu. I return to Sausalito at the end of March for my annual "stateside" sojourn, just as the weather turns hot here and the kids are anxiously awaiting results of their final exams.

But I leave this year with many of NYOF's "children" growing up so fast. Yes, most of those we support are young, but the older ones are beginning to serve as the voices that this society needs. Two blind youngsters we helped through school are now getting Masters degrees—a girl named Sita, and her brother Baleram. Sita will be the first blind girl to receive a Masters degree in Nepal. They will join Laxman, the only blind lawyer in the country, who NYOF supported through law school. Recently he argued a case on appeal so compellingly that his performance rated an article and an editorial in Nepal's largest newspaper. The editorial stressed that the blind and disabled have the same potential as others to be contributing members of society.

As many of you know, we provide scholarships to many blind, deaf and disabled children because without an education these kids are relegated to lives of shame and uselessness. Only a tiny fraction of blind and deaf children in Nepal have the opportunity to attend school at all. But slowly, slowly, this is changing. On NYOF's new web site, we have posted the phrase, "changing the world, one child at a time"—and gradually the tide turns. (If you haven't visited our web site, please do—www.nyof.org)

I have to admit to a perverse sense of satisfaction when I hear from our blind college students that when they return to their villages they are treated with a new respect. Now they are often the most educated people in their communities, no longer the pariahs cursed by the Gods. Some of them participate in the Special Olympics; one of them, about to graduate from high school, hosts a weekly radio show about the disabled. Without our help, these kids would have grown up illiterate, a burden to society, and shunned in their villages as a punishment for sins committed in a prior life.

I also leave Kathmandu feeling very confident about our Nutritional Rehabilitation Home. We moved the NRH to a wonderful new building close to Kanti Children's Hospital, where most of the children are referred from. The old NRH was located in a crowded, noisy and polluted area of the city (more the norm than exception these days in Kathmandu) and had no place for the mothers to gather or the children to play. But our new building is on a quiet lane and has a beautiful, level compound with old trees. We are in the process of putting in a vegetable garden, so that the mothers can learn to grow green vegetables that are important for the health of their children and to prepare them under the supervision of our nutritionist. We will also install playground equipment in a grassy area, where the children can romp as they are regaining their health.

Best of all, it will accommodate more children. We have been operating this facility for four years now, and in that time we have restored the health—and in some cases saved the lives—of 500 children, mostly infants and toddlers. I will write more about the NRH and send pictures in a letter this Spring.

What will I miss as I return to Sausalito? More than I can say! As I've said many times, the NRH brings instant gratification. There is nothing like taking an emaciated, unresponsive baby and confused mother, giving them the right food, care, and and training, and watching them evolve in a month or two into a healthy child and a mother who knows how to care for her offspring; or almost failing to recognize the five year old J House boy who leaped into my arms on my return last fall—a child who had never known a mother and who was terrified and silent when I left Nepal last Spring, a few days after he arrived at the house.

But thanks to email, I am in close contact with Nepal during the months I am in California, raising funds, participating in board meetings, and taking care of matters at home.

I will be in touch in a couple of months with more news about NYOF and NYOF kids. Thank you again for your support—you make all this happen.

Warm regards, Olga