This September, Sally Hunsdorfer of Marion, and a small group of intrepid women will embark on a trip through Nepal and over the border to the remote regions of Tibet. Sally, founder of The Himalayan Project, has been visiting this part of the world for fifteen years delivering fleece jackets to those in need and spearheading community projects to help preserve the culture of indigenous people of the Himalaya.
This is Sally’s 12th trip to Nepal since her love affair with the country began in 1997 when she backpacked around the world for a year with her husband and two teenage sons. She felt an immediate connection to the Himalayan region for its beauty, people and culture – a connection that led Sally to found The Himalayan Project (THP) in 2004 with a focus on three core areas:
•Education: Raising funds to help remote villages in Nepal expand educational opportunities for local youth.
•Community Development: Expanding resources for local Gompas or Monasteries to better serve their communities as well as funding fresh water projects, installing solar panels, and other community advancement projects.
•Social Outreach: Educating American school children about the struggles of their counterparts through a presentation titled “A Day in the Life of a Nepali Child” which nurtures awareness and compassion. The students then collect gently used fleece clothing which is hand delivered by Sally and her THP traveling companions to those most in need in the Himalayan region.
The September pilgrimage will include six women ranging in age from 58 to 72 delivering more than 500 fleece jackets to the Northwestern, and most remote region, of Nepal before crossing over the border to reach the holy Mount Kailas in Tibet. The mountain is considered to be the center of the universe for a billion Hindus and millions of Tibetan Buddhists, Jains and Bonpos.
There, they will make the 32-mile ‘kora’ (holy walk) trek around the mountain sharing the trail with other pilgrims, who for a 1000 years have been coming to pay homage to the sacred mountain. After completing the rigorous trek they will drive eastwards by jeep along the Tibetan plateau, stopping to explore several ancient Tibetan monasteries on their way to Rongbuk and the North Everest Base Camp in Tibet.
They will then visit the ancient town of Lhasa and the Potala Palace, which was the chief residence of the Dalai Lama until the 14th Dalai Lama fled to India during the 1959 Tibetan uprising.
To learn more about the The Himalayan Project visit: http://www.himalayanproject.org/.
