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In 2017, The Juniper Trust, an organization dedicated to helping communities in remote regions of the world, rebuilt its 11th school in the remote village of Garjyang following the devastating earthquake in 2015. For the first time, they also organized a team of volunteers, all friends of Sam Rowley from Keswick, England, to assist with the finishing touches at Garjyang School.
Sam’s first visit to Nepal was when he was just 8 years old, traveling with his family on a trek in Langtang. His next visit was 12 years later in the autumn of 2015, following the earthquake that destroyed thousands of lives across the country. Sam witnessed firsthand the devastation that left over a million children without a school.
It was during Sam’s trip to Nepal in 2017, taking a group of friends to help at Garjyang before trekking to Everest basecamp, that he met Abhishek Pandey. Abhishek was a volunteer project manager for The Juniper Trust and one of the driving forces behind rebuilding ten schools in just 18 months following the earthquake. It was on this trip that Adventure Aid Nepal was born.
Adventure Aid Nepal (AAN) is an organization that takes groups of volunteers to help rebuild schools in remote areas of Nepal. In 2018, AAN took a group of volunteers to help at three more primary schools in the villages of Saraswati, Siruwa, and Namuna, all feeder primary schools for the now-prospering Kinja School, one of the first schools to be rebuilt after the earthquake. In 2019, AAN ran two trips, taking volunteers to help out at the 16th and 17th schools to be rebuilt by The Juniper Trust in the villages of Rawa Dolu and Vidhyadatri Khaptel.
Despite laying the foundations for The Juniper Trust’s 18th school in 2019, a smaller kindergarten at Bamti Village, work had to stop due to the Covid pandemic. However, by the spring of 2021, life was slowly returning to some kind of normality, and villagers throughout Nepal were desperate to restart their lives. Bampti Kindergarten was completed by the autumn of 2021, and The Juniper Trust’s rebuilding of 20 schools project was back on track.
In November 2022, AAN returned to Nepal after a 3-year gap and helped out with finishing touches to a village school in the remote village of Maili, which had almost 100 children and was still using temporary classrooms 7 years after the earthquake.
AAN’s 2023 trip will be a special one as this will be The Juniper Trust’s 20th school. The volunteers hope to raise £10,000 to purchase and deliver new uniforms and equipment for the 80 children at Ranjana Beni School and do repair work at two of the original classrooms of Maili Village School, built by The Juniper Trust in 2022. It costs just £25 to give a child new hope with a school uniform, shoes, rucksack, pencils, and books! The money will also buy much-needed school equipment and provide books for a school library, as well as planting 1,000 fruit tree saplings during their visit.
If you are interested in volunteering in Nepal, check out the Adventure Aid Nepal website and join their new trip in October! By volunteering, you can help make a real difference in the lives of children and families in remote areas of Nepal.
30 Wordsworth Street
Penrith, Cumbria
CA11 7QY, United Kingdom
Registered Charity Number: 1053356