A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words: Celebrating Community Resilience, Safe Reconstruction and the Beauty of Life in Nuwakot after the Earthquake
To celebrate the reconstruction efforts of homeowners in Nuwakot, the Government of India funded Socio-Technical Facilitation Consultancy (STFC) project held a photo exhibition, displaying striking images which captured the strength and determination of communities across Nuwakot since the earthquake. With the umbrella theme of, “Life of Nuwakot after the Earthquake”, the exhibition consisted of images displaying the multi-faceted resilience of communities through their eyes.
Through the project, homeowners are supported to reconstruct safely by fellow community members, who are STFC engineers, community messengers and community ambassadors. To engage all who are reconstructing in Nuwakot, the whole community was encouraged to send in their best images to a recent STFC photo contest. The submissions led to an exhibition, held at the Annapurna hotel in Kathmandu, on the 24th of January, 2020, curated around six themes. Entries from homeowners highlighted homeowner driven reconstruction efforts and the beauty of everyday life in Nuwakot. The exhibition also consisted of photo entries from project personnel located across twenty technical service centers across Nuwakot. These images showcased the socio-technical work of the STFC, and the collaborative reconstruction efforts of the district through the project’s community and stakeholder engagement. Celebrating the culture and heritage of the region, many images displayed the Historic Durbar of Sattale. Last and very importantly in celebrating Beijing+25 this year, a theme on women in reconstruction exhibited a vision of gender equality that is vital in sustaining resilience in Nepal and around the world.
Speaking at the event were Dr. Ajay Kumar, DCM, Embassy of India; Mr. Sushil Gyewali, CEO of the National Reconstruction Authority; Mr. Komal Karki, Senior Project Manager (OIC), UNOPS; Ms. Genevieve Lefebvre, Housing Project Manager, UNOPS and Ms. Mhendo Tamamg, Communications, Monitoring and Reporting Associate, UNOPS.
In her speech, Genevieve Lefebvre, STFC Project Manager, stated:
While the photo exhibition celebrates the resilience and lives of the Nuwakot communities and Nepal’s progress of Building Back Better, the inspiration behind the photos are the youth. Their engagement in sourcing the photographs through their perspective was particularly important. During the photo contest held last year in August, youth from all around Nuwakot sent in various submissions. They were excited that their passions and voices were heard.
These photographs also echo the friendship between the two nations. There is a story amongst our project that exactly epitomises the friendship between Indian and Nepal — when our field engineers go to different settlements to support the locals in rebuilding safer and stronger houses, the communities with much affections say “Oh, the Nepal-Bharat engineers are here!”. With strong collaboration and support from the Government of India and the National Reconstruction Authority, I am pleased to inform you all that UNOPS, together with UNDP, have reconstructed over 90% of the houses as of the end of 2019.
As a photographer for the STFC, Mhendo Tamang discussed the importance of images as a documentation of harsh realities and articles of hope. She noted that capturing the work of the STFC has allowed her to connect with project participants and community members through meaningful conversations, experiences and smiles.
The exhibition will continue to be on display at the Chayya Centre, Thamel, during the month of February. Further details of the exhibition can be found on the @STFCNuwakot (Facebook and Twitter) social media channels.