Re fundraiser Realschule Furth im Wald - geography teacher Eva Schmidt tireless "motor"

This year’s fund-raising campaign at the secondary school in Furth im Wald brought total proceeds of 2.100 €, only a few days before the Christmas holiday. Eva Schmidt, one of the geography teachers of the school, is the indefatigable “motor” of the support of our Nepalhilfe Beilngries e.V. We have been supported since 2006 and Eva Schmidt has been able to transfer the total sum of 8.600 € to the relief organization in Beilngries in the course of these years.

This could be accomplished through her personal commitment, for example her own craftwork of knitting or motivating the boys and girls, the coordination and preparation of the sales taking place every year beyond curriculums and time-tables.

There is always a wide range of articles made of wood or metal and textiles which are offered for sale. This year’s hit were little pearl bracelets for girls but also for boys at different prices.

But selling the calendar of the Nepalhilfe, “Himalaya 2014” and the Nepalese main dish Dal Bhat also attributed to the total receipts.

Especially the pupils of the 8th and 9th grades did extremely well this year showing off their crafts and baking skills.

Eva Schmidt remembers the successful sales in 2014 with pleasure when they sold knitted capes with the Nepalese flag. Numerous mothers of the pupils, Schmidt’s colleagues at school and of course the pupils themselves had lent a hand or rather a needle. They might have a surprise for us when they offer new articles for sale in the Christmas campaign 2014?

The class representatives of the primary and middle school in Oberhaunstadt are carefully listening to Michael Rebele who is talking about his latest visit to Nepal. The children listen especially carefully when it comes to the school in Gothatar, which has been supported by the pupils for many years. The school in Gothatar had been built with the help of donations by pupils and their parents and several different events like the “Nepal race”, collecting bottles or cooking also organised by the teens.

There is an extension of the Shramsheel Vidyapith School planned and one more floor will be built, which the pupils of Oberhaunstadt support again. At the beginning of November principal Helmut Heinrich was able to hand over another donation of €3050 to Michael Rebele and Manfred Lindner. The project in Gothatar, also called “School for School”, can prosper again with the help of the Oberhaunstadt children.

The idea of selling calendars to raise money for charitable organisations is not at all ground-breaking. The NHB started doing this in 1997.
Considering today’s run of 10,500 printed calendars, the beginnings can be called modest. The NHB started with 50 DIY-calendars featured by self-taken photos.
The celebrated mountaineers Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner and her husband Ralf Dujmovits as well as the extreme climber Hans Kammerlander opened again – as they have done for many years now - their photo archives for the present model “Himalaya 2014”. This is one fact that makes the calendar special.

The three benefactors also commit themselves to the sale of the calendar during their own shows or when talking to their business partner.

The calendar is 43.5 x 40.5 cm and consists of one cover, one sheet for each month and one for additional information. The pictures show fascinating impressions of the wonderful landscape, the culture and the people in the Himalaya region. The calendar which costs 17 Euro interests people from all over the world. Chile, Dubai, Australia, Vatican City, Georgia and Canada are countries on our receiver lists.

It’s our aim to invest the proceeds of the sale in projects like schools, hospitals, children’s and elderly homes to support its running respectively its expansions. Worth mentioning is the fact that NHB has recently opened its 21st school and thus enables 8.500 children to receive education - just to name some figures. The foundation stone of another school in Sanosiruwari has already been laid.

You can order a calendar here on this webpage Order a Calendar using the order form.

Additional in:
Regensburg: Buchhandlung Pustet, Gesandtenstraße 6 - 8
Beilngries: Buchladen Barbara Duft Hauptstraße 21 und Touristikbüro
Berching: Cafe Mittelbach, Reichenauplatz 2
Dietfurt: Tourist Information im Rathaus
Parsberg: Buchhandlung Buchfink, Dr. Boecale-Straße 12

134 kilos of goods were packed in three big duffel bags and two metal boxes on 17th November 2013 to start their journey from Regensburg to Nepal. First stopover was the police department in Landshut, where the “collector” Michael Rebele and the “forwarding agent” Fritz Gottwald met.

This was the perfect meeting point for the two police officers between Regensburg and Wasserburg, their respective places of living. Fritz Gottwald, who has been supporting the NHB for many years, and 15 further members of the German Alpine Association (DAV) will take the aid supplies to Nepal. They will arrive their destination on the 23rd Nov and will distribute the goods at schools and the Shaligram children’s home. The content of the huge luggage consists mainly of clothes and shoes, sanitary products like shampoo, shower gel and tooth paste, laptops and school material.

As the generosity and support of the airlines have been continuously decreasing since the early years of NHB, the organisation depends on the forwarding of goods just as done by the members of the DAV from Wasserburg.

Thank you for your support!

Two further, brand-new schools were inaugurated by Michael and Michaela Rebele during their 8-day visit to Nepal in October 2013. The laying of the foundation stone of another school, meanwhile our 21st one, was also an event worth mentioning.

Furthermore, Sunil Shresta, the local coordinator in charge, also organized a visit to the Siddhi Memorial Hospital and the attached home for elderly people. As a matter of course the delegation of NHB members stayed some time at the core project of our organization, the Shaligram children’s home situated between Kathmandu and Bhaktapur. In the various face to face meetings many topics had to be discussed and relations deepened respectively new contacts established.

Highly important tasks planned long before the trip were the handing over of the “Gyan Mandir Higher Secondary School” in Mailchaur, 70km north-east of Kathmandu on the Arniko Highway, and the opening of the “Balchandra Secondary School” in Kavre, very close to Kathmandu – however only reachable on adventurous paths. Thus another 700 boys and girls will have the opportunity of being educated at one of the NHB-schools. The local organizers managed to give the opening ceremonies a glamorous and festive flair each. Speeches by high-ranking politicians as well as singing and dance performances by the future pupils were part of the ceremony.

The laying of the foundation stone of a new school in Sanosiruwari, the district in which most of our schools are situated, was another important item of the travel agenda. Approximately 500 children will attend this school after its accomplishment in 2014. Taken all NHB-schools together about 8.500 pupils will then attend one of our schools. Some more communities also seized the possibility to handover documents of their idea for further school building to the visitors from Germany. For this reason more financial means will have to be summoned by the NHB, as the funding of the three projects mentioned had already cost 200.000 Euro. The sale of our professionally illustrated calendar “Himalaya 2014” contributes to achieve our goals.

In addition to these new projects, our delegation also centred their attention on examining the already operating institutions, which are expected to be on a high standard. This is essential for supporters and donators of our organization to see that their money is well invested. Emotional moving and motivating for further commitment was the visit of the Shaligram children’s home in Lubhu, in which 38 orphaned boy and girls are living at the moment. The German visitors had a huge amount of sanitary articles, clothes, school materials and – of course – sweets for the kids in their backpacks.

There were also preliminary talks with the director of the Siddhi Memorial Hospital, Shyam Dhaubadel, about the extension of the hospital building and the heightening of one floor of the attached elderly home. Mr Rebele handed over a second hand car funded by the NHB to Dhaubadel wishing him an always safe return from the chaotic traffic in Kathmandu.

Back in Germany all findings and experiences of the travel need to be assessed and evaluated, which means a lot of work for the members of the NHB. However a workload which the NHB happily complete bearing in mind their success and the good of the people in Nepal.

Bipin, Pema and Florian moved into the second floor of the „Buy and Help Shop“ building. The ground floor is hired by a textile company to store their cloths. Most of the shops on the first floor have also been rented. In one of them we are going to sell our own products soon. Who knows, maybe our „Buy and Help Shop“ will develop into a proper shopping centre.

Srijana and Pasang passed their SLC-exams excellently (comparable to GCSE). They decided to attend a specialized secondary school, which starts this month. Srijana specializes in hotel management and Pasang in technical and natural science. Tashi, who doesn’t live in our children’s home any longer after having moved to some of his relatives, is attending a six-month technical course at the “Technical Institute” of the fraternity of Franz of Sales in Thecho, which we finance for him. We hope that he will soon manage to stand on his own feet.

Our solar energy plants need annual sprucing up. Repair work needed to be done also this year to keep the warm water supply as high as we are used to. Therefore the black background paint was renewed, the frameworks were covered in anti-rust paint and the rubber sealings and the old leaking hoses were replaced by new ones. These provisions guarantee the warm water supply in the children’s home for the year to come.