The global reaction to the Nepalese earthquake has become local with a group of Maitland teenagers raising money for those forced to rebuild their lives.
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Students at Maitland Grossmann High School have rallied to raise more than $1200 after a 7.9 magnitude earthquake struck north-west Nepal on April 25, devastating the districts of Lamjung and Gorkha and entire sections of Kathmandu.
The money will be donated to The Umbrella Foundation, which aims to alleviate the impact of trafficking, poverty and war in Nepal.
“This foundation is wonderful because it does grass roots work and helping to raise this money is the proudest time in my captaincy,” school captain Zac Bayliss said.
“I feel very proud to be the leader of the student body here and I think the students, collectively, should be very proud of themselves.”
The earthquake is believed to be the worst natural disaster to hit Nepal in 81 years and claimed the lives of more than 8000 people.
The school started supporting the foundation last year.
“I was shocked when I found out this had happened because we have helped some of these young people in the past and everything they had is now completely gone,” Zac, 18, said.
“Emotionally, this has been very hard on all of us.
“But we need to be aware about what is happening across the globe because we aren’t all as fortunate to live in Australia and to live in a free, pluralist democracy.”
Linda Harwood, the Thornton woman behind the Australian branch of The Umbrella Foundation, said many of the foundation’s youths and reintegrated children remained unaccounted for.
“My role here is to get money together,” she said.
“I know Maitland is suffering [in the wake of the storms] but we have every resource offered to us here, whereas it will be literally up to aid organisations to put Nepal back together.”
To donate visit umbrellaaustralia.org/donate/ or email linda@umbrellanepal.org.
