Arrival in Delhi

On the 26th of July, after a journey of 17 hours we finaly arrived at Delhi.

The temperature was extremely high and it was not easy to find some shade. In the excitement of arriving and finding our taxi driver my father forgot his handluggage in the airport, luckily it was still there. After a chaotic drive, on the left and right side of the road, through the red traffic lights we found out that honcking is a national sport next to cricket. We stopped at a busy road full of shoppers, people working and sleeping in their beds? or on their tricycles. At this early point we experienced our first cultural shock.


Through a very small funny smelling street we arrived at our hotel. We where very surprised how the inside contrasted with what we saw few seconds before. After some rest we put on are tourist shoes and mingled with the chaos of the old part of Delhi.


In the middle of the night we left for catching our plane. We where truly asthonished of the immense amount of people sleeping outside at the most impossible places.

Visit of Rev. Geshe Pema Dorjee at our home

Today we got the visit of Rev. Geshe Pema Dorjee. He was very pleased with the success of our benefit concert. We had the opportunity to discuss what we could do with the amount collected(+/-6000€). We decided that half of the amount would go to the project of the village Rathankot and half would be going to the renovation of the class rooms at the monastery Porong Pelmo Choeding Monastery (www.bodong.org)plus the purchase of sports materials for the pupils.
The money will be transferred to the monastery and they will make up an overview of the various costs spent.
During our stay we would both have an in depth look at the works which could be financed by it.



Over lunch we had the opportunity to discuss the various issues together with some friends (from www.maketheswitch.be) belonging to the team which organised the concert.

Development projects in Nepal

The history of our projects:
The projects were started some time ago by the Rev. Gesje Pema Dorjee.
It was when we first met him in March 2007, that we learned about the many projects he had.

Rev. Pema Dorje is very concerned about the equilibrium between mental and physical health for his pupils (between 11 and 20 years)at the Porong Choeding Monastry in Kathmandu. Up to now the mental health was the major and almost only concern.
As a sports teacher I was excited to take on such a challenge offered to me.It will require a combination of skillfulness and inventiveness knowing that normal sports facilities or sport attributes are totally lacking.

The second project is about the development of a rural village (Rathankot) 80 kms of Kathmandu. The major problem being that young people are leaving the village for trying their fortune in the big cities. My father an agricultural engineer will try to help out in order to improve agricultural production. First we need to learn more about the actual situation.