When the earthquake struck at midday we were in our weekly music and art class. Our orphanage, Unatti Foundation, is home to 20 girls but on Saturday children from the outside, mostly street kids, join us in our music centre. We had around 70 kids altogether. We had to get them all to an empty space near the centre. They were all crying but luckily no one was hurt. It was very stressful.
For a few hours I didn’t know what to do. I was sitting on the floor and someone came to me to ask for donations to buy rice. I immediately donated 2,000 rupees (£12) to them. Then I decided, no more donations, I will take care of this. I went to a dealer in town to buy sacks, I could still drive there, and we started cooking for people on the street. Now we are taking care of more than 5,000 people.
The girls are looking after one spot by themselves. They were scared at first but after I talked to them, they became strong and now they really like helping people. They are cooking and clearing up the dust and plastic. I am very proud of them. And they are proud. They are serving people. They want to do more.
The international organisations are doing nothing in Bhaktapur. Today was the first time I saw big trucks come into the town. The aid supplies will start by tomorrow I hope. The rice market where I buy the food is going to be empty soon. So even though I have the money, it will be hard to find the food for the people.
Many people from Bhaktapur city have moved out because they lost their homes – 40% of buildings have been destroyed here. The old buildings are all destroyed. Our fear is that everyone will leave then there will be very few people inside the city. And then even the people who haven’t lost their homes won’t be able to stay, because there are so few people there. We are worried about this.
The hospitals are working but it’s a very limited service. Many people who were injured during the earthquake are not getting the support and medications from the hospital because they say that they have to take care of the serious injuries first. I’m scared that if we are not able to maintain our cleanliness then there will be diseases. That might be a big problem in the future.
Until yesterday the girls were sleeping in tents, now they are back home sleeping in the Unatti Foundation’s building. In the morning they will go out to the spot in the street and take care of everything: preparing tea, biscuits, dhal bhat (rice and lentils) for lunch and they will prepare snacks and dinner in the evening.
There are big organisations like Unicef, UNDP, and other international NGOs in Nepal, but still none have come to Bhaktapur. The people are very angry. It’s been five days and no one has come to us. One international NGO came with around 100 tents but the people needed around 10,000. They were so angry, violence was about to break out. It’s really different than the picture you see on TV. They ran away.
It seems like many people – the Red Cross, government – came with very few supplies and taking lots of photographs. It seems like they are focusing on publicity not on solving the problem. We need support anyway, anyhow, any channel, it doesn’t matter – Unicef, UNDP, any local NGO.
Now we have 20 girls in the home but maybe after this earthquake we will look after more – it seems like we should.
• As told to Anna Leach.
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