Delbrook Senior High School
Classes Of 1959 - 1960
A message from Susan Mann
CHHAHARI
“In The Shade”
Stop child prostitution in Nepal through education
These children, primarily girls, are sold by their parents to a person whom they may know well or other persons who take the child to Kathmandu under the pretense they will work for a wealthy person and their pay will be sent back to the family. However, the children are taken across the borders, acting as a wife of the buyer, transported by cart, train and foot to a city where they are SOLD to a madam of a brothel. The children, between the ages of 6 and 23, are innocent of the expectations. The madam expects them to have sex with any man that enters her room. Virgins are highly valued. The child rebels. She is starved, tortured, drugged. Then she performs. Since she is now ‘owned’ by the brothel owner she will never get out. She becomes drug addicted, will become pregnant, and infected by all sexually transmitted diseases. Her life as she knew it is over.
However, there is an ‘NGO’ of men of differing nationalities, who go into the brothels to befriend a girl, try to create trust and tell her she has a chance to get home to Nepal if she will come with them when they come back for her in the near future. This is the tricky part.
When they return with the police, who have been bribed, they go to the girl to ostensibly have sex, tell her they are here to take her out and return to Nepal.
Some do, some don’t.
The book “SOLD” by Patricia McCormick, tells the true story of this horrendous happening to the poorest of the poor girls in Nepal. Please buy it. Cost: $11.00.
A quick, very emotional read... you will cry, you may howl, you will wonder how this could be happening in this world. You will ask, “What can I do to stop this? It is so far away, in another country.”
This is my own project in Nepal. I am asking for your help.
CHHAHARI, meaning, “In The Shade”, is a Nepali education programme for young girls and boys. (Boys are generally sold into the circuses in India.)
This programme is offered to the poorest of the poor children who would never go to school. Their parents see no reason to educate them, and, if they did, cannot afford the uniform, which is a requirement of the Nepali government.
CHHAHARI is offered for 2 hours a day, 6 days a week. The parents refuse to give their children any more time as they are required to work the fields and look after their siblings. Some parents want their children educated but simply cannot afford it. Others have to be talked into sending them to this programme.
The children attend class while sitting on a woven plastic mat, in the shade of a huge tree, or in a hallway, or under a thatch roofed shack...thus the name.
They attend for one year and then are sent to the regular Nepali schools and watched over for 3 years, giving them enough time to learn to reading, writing and arithmetic, thus becoming as asset to the family which reduces their chance of being sold. Uniforms, scribblers and pencils are paid for by CHHAHARI.
Teachers are paid $35.00/month.
There are now 60 classes, dispersed in Mid Western Nepal. Many are near the border with India as this is the prime ‘recruitment’ area...easy to get across the border without being caught.
My hope is that you will be able to help by donating whatever sum you can. There is no tax receipt as this programme is administered in England and Canada does not recognize it.
The cost of the programme is $30,000.00 a year to date. This year there will be 250 additional students.
There is no middleman...all funds go directly to CHHAHARI.
I pay my own way to see that all is ‘above board’...and it is. I've been to Nepalgunj twice and taught First Aid to the teachers...great fun and they were soooo enthusiastic!
Please make cheques to:
Susan Mann (put CHHAHARI in the subject line at the bottom.)
If anyone would like to support this programme annually, that would be greatly appreciated. Or include it in your will so it will be able to function without asking for donations every year.
My address:
Susan Mann, 9206 Northcott Drive, Coldstream, BC. V1B 2K2
Phone: 250-545-3410
They attend for one year and then are sent to the regular Nepali schools and watched over for 3 years, giving them enough time to learn to reading, writing and arithmetic, thus becoming as asset to the family which reduces their chance of being sold. Uniforms, scribblers and pencils are paid for by CHHAHARI.
Teachers are paid $35.00/month.
There are now 60 classes, dispersed in Mid Western Nepal. Many are near the border with India as this is the prime ‘recruitment’ area...easy to get across the border without being caught.
My hope is that you will be able to help by donating whatever sum you can. There is no tax receipt as this programme is administered in England and Canada does not recognize it.
The cost of the programme is $30,000.00 a year to date. This year there will be 250 additional students.
There is no middleman...all funds go directly to CHHAHARI.
I pay my own way to see that all is ‘above board’...and it is. I've been to Nepalgunj twice and taught First Aid to the teachers...great fun and they were soooo enthusiastic!
Please make cheques to:
Susan Mann (put CHHAHARI in the subject line at the bottom.)
If anyone would like to support this programme annually, that would be greatly appreciated. Or include it in your will so it will be able to function without asking for donations every year.
My address:
Susan Mann, 9206 Northcott Drive, Coldstream, BC. V1B 2K2
Phone: 250-545-3410