Himalayan Project

The Himalayan Project was conceived out of an incredible passion that Sally Hunsdorfer experienced through several journeys to Nepal and intense interactions with the Sherpa people in the Solu Khombu or Everest region.

Nepal is a country on the edge in every way, riddled with political instability and sinking to its knees under the pressure of poverty and hopelessness. It is a land with an incredible complexity of landscape filled with worldwide challenges to dominate and "conquer" and it has paid dearly by being forced to live outside the laws of nature, constantly balancing tensions of the two super powers of China and India, which surround it. The incredible physical beauty is staggering, immediately dwarfing anything on the human scale and making one wonder how man could ever have blown his importance so out of proportion. There is a rhythmic, pulsating and sensual quality to this ancient landscape that in spite of its incredible harshness can still present a sweet tenderness and vulnerability if only one scratches the surface.

Eight years ago when Sally was traveling back and forth to Nepal, she started a "dialogue" with the headmaster of a school in the village of Chaurikharka. This school, started by Sir Edmund Hillary, is only one of two schools in the Everest region that goes through grade 10. The Sherpa children throughout the region trek four to five hours a day each way to attend classes or live "on site" in stone dormitories and return home to their villages during vacations. Headmaster Biruman Rai has persevered there for 25 years giving direction and vision in spite of the total lack of government support. He has clung to his dreams as he has doggedly worked and watched them unfold.

The Himalayan Project is now raising funds to support his dream to construct a stone enclosure that will house the entire school of 350 under cover during the many months of the year when, as Biruman Rai writes, "inclement weather reigns… monsoons in the summer and snows in the winter."

Along with this building project Biruman Rai's other major goals are to start a school library replete with books available in Nepali, Tibetan and English and initiate a scholarship fund for village children whose families cannot afford the $10 to $12 per month that it costs to send a child to school.

Now The Himalayan Project is on the cusp of moving to the next level with a dream to have this school become a model for the preservation of the Sherpa culture. The ancient, Buddhist traditions of the Sherpa culture are becoming minimized and forgotten within the larger framework of a country that is 80% Hindu. The Himalayan Project goal is to offer a university education to young Sherpa women who have successfully completed their SLC [School Leaving Certificate] after the 10th grade and return to their communities in the Everest Region to teach and pass on in a formal way the song, dance, storytelling, language and cultural heritage of this ancient and vibrant culture. Traditionally the Sherpa people have become involved in the tourism and trekking industry and all the teachers in the Everest region are Hindus who are paid an extra stipend to leave their families from "down valley" and move to the mountains to teach for a part of every school year. The Himalayan Project goal is to secure an endowment that would produce a yearly income to provide for several university tuitions and salaries for prepared young female Sherpa teachers.

If you would like to help support the goals of The Himalayan Project, please donate here.

Donate by mail
Please make checks made payable to the "Marion Institute" with "The Himalayan Project" noted in the memo line and send to:

The Himalayan Project
c/o Marion Institute
202 Spring St.
Marion, MA  02738

Ph:  508.748.0816
Fax:  508.748.1976
Website: www.himalayanproject.org

Sally Hunsdorfer
The Himalayan Project Leader
wildgeese4@yahoo.com