A DEVOTED charity worker in Nepal has implored people not to forget about the ongoing crisis as monsoon season looms.

Ian Wickens from Kennington has been in the country for weeks helping communities rebuild after the earthquakes just over a month ago on Saturday, April 25 and then again on Tuesday, May 12.

He has taken four weeks’ annual leave from his regular job as an administrator at Oxford University Hospitals Trust, and also runs his own charity, Helptoeducate, which provides schooling to former child labourers.

What was scheduled as a personal trip to Nepal for the 35-year-old became a mission as his flight left five days after the first earthquake.

He said: “I was flying out with a Nepalese person who had no idea what had happened to her family. It was scary.”

Mr Wickens was at a UN building in Kathmandu during the second quake. He said: “At first I thought it was just an aftershock or tremor, but people started running out of the buildings and I could see the fear on their faces, and the tears.

“As we left the building the chaos was incredible. Kathmandu traffic is normally bad but this was mass panic. We got back to my friend’s house and I could see houses falling down in nearby villages.”

Mr Wickens is staying with a friend’s family in a village called Bungamati. After the first quake, the family slept in a field and then moved under the house’s balcony when it began to rain.

Lack of shelter coupled with the changing weather is of serious concern, Mr Wickens said. He recently spent £1,000 on 40 tents but said far more were required.

He said: “There’s tents everywhere. I have never seen Nepal like this.

“In about two weeks it will be monsoon season and without weatherproof places to live there could be another humanitarian crisis with landslides and rain.”

Mr Wickens and other volunteers have been building shelters from bamboo and tarpaulins to keep people out of the rain, as well as temporary classrooms for up to 100 children. Schools are expecting to reopen on May 29.

Mr Wickens said aid efforts need to focus on more rural areas. He said: “Sindupalchok is a priority. Pretty much the entire village has been flattened and it’s on the edge of nowhere.

“We are visiting places no aid agencies have visited before. I’m greatly surprised by that. All the big charities – Oxfam and Save the Children – are focused on the Kathmandu valley.”

Mr Wickens’s mother, Professor Eugenia Wickens, who lives in Oxford, received a call from her son during the second earthquake. She said: “ He has been in contact constantly. He’s doing a fantastic job. We are very proud.”

An Oxfam spokesman said: “We have helped over 100,000 people and we aim to reach 400,000 in the first six weeks of the response. Oxfam is working in seven of the worst-hit districts. In total, we have distributed 6,854 tarpaulins, 8,509 hygiene kits, 2,430 food baskets and installed 419 latrines.

“In Sindhupalchok, more than 30 latrines have been installed and a bladder tank to store clean water. Oxfam has also distributed almost 2,000 hygiene kits and about 130 tarpaulins.”

So far an online fundraising page by Mr Wickens has raised nearly £5,000 to buy food, blankets, tents and medical supplies.

To donate visit http://bit.ly/1d0KtdR

We can still do more, insists fundraiser

Oxford Mail:
Support: Ada Humphrey, who spent time as a volunteer in Nepal

FUNDRAISING efforts for the ongoing crisis in Nepal continue to snowball, but an Oxford University student has insisted that “the work is far from done”.

For Ada Humphrey, 19, raising funds following the earthquakes on April 25 and May 12 was imperative.

Last spring Miss Humphrey, now in her first year studying architecture and anthropology at Lincoln College, spent three months volunteering in Nepal.

Together with a close friend from her hometown in Cambridge, she taught English at the Shree Satkanyamati school in the Helambu valley, 70km from Kathmandu.

She said: “Our host family was great. The Nepali people are lovely and really welcoming.

“In the first few days we weren’t sure if our friends and host family had survived. They were all safe but most of their houses fell down.”

In Gunsa village, where Miss Humphrey stayed with a family who had an eight-month-old baby, about 90 bodies have so far been recovered.

Of these, about 30 were schoolchildren she would have taught while there. She said: “The news is heartbreaking. I would want to go out and help but I think we would be a drain on resources.”

Miss Humphrey has been building support for the Mondochallenge Foundation and the Helambu Education and Livelihood Project, two charities working to support rural parts of the country.

Teams from Oxford and Cambridge have so far raised about £26,000.

At Keble College, students will shortly take on a three-legged walk around the main quad covering the same distance as a Mount Everest trek. The college is also hosting a charity guest night for students’ friends.

For more and to donate, visit justgiving.com/Oxford-Nepal-Fundraising/

Youngsters auction off their giant loom band

Oxford Mail:
Fundraising: Children with the 16ft loom band which was auctioned off

CHILDREN held a “mini-fete” and created a 16ft loom band to raise money for victims of the Nepal earthquakes.

Twelve children in Long Hanborough spent time in their after school club making loom bands to sell and auction on Church Road.

The youngsters raised £350 for victims of last month’s earthquakes by selling cakes, lemonade and loom bands.

The group also auctioned the 16ft loom band after being inspired by Skye Hall’s Loom To The Moon.

The Loom To The Moon was masterminded by the five-year-old Abingdon boy, who wanted to raise money for others after he spent time in hospital for treatment of a brain tumour.

Nine-year-old Izzy Amphlett acted as auctioneer for the loom band, which went for £12.50.

Lisa Hamilton, organiser of the fundraiser and childminder for the group of Hanborough Manor School pupils, said: “We were thinking of ways that we could raise money and we remembered the Loom To The Moon, so the children started making loom bands.

“Everyone in the community was really supportive. Some people were giving us £10 for loom bands.

“With all the people who came and supported us it felt like a mini-fete.”

The 37-year-old said that all the children were really pleased by the turnout and the money raised.

The mother-of-two added that the 12 children exceeded their targets of raising £10 each.

County’s disaster response

FUNDRAISING efforts in Oxfordshire have been phenomenal, with thousands pouring in from across the county.

A charity dinner at the Yeti Nepalese Restaurant, Cowley Road, raised £1,050, and staff at the Tesco Superstore in Garsington Road have collected £3,000.

Much of the funds raised have been collected by Nepalese Community Oxfordshire (NCO) and sent to the Nepalese Prime Minister Disaster Relief Fund and the British Red Cross.

Spokesman Tulasi Paudel said: “We are close to £20,000 now and are really, really grateful. More than 500 schools have been destroyed in Nepal and we are trying to help them rebuild.

“It’s hard to get volunteers as most work five days a week. I’m retired and I’m giving my full time to this.”

Much of the group’s fundraising has taken place online with spectacular results. Mr Richard Dick, chairman of Oxford-based manufacturing company W. Lucy, gave £5,000.

Mr Paudel said: “It’s absolutely brilliant.”