A Canadian children’s therapist, Ashwin Sharma (left in photo), was invited to work with children at an orphanage in a small village near Pokhara, Nepal.

There, his Nepali colleagues Basanta Subedi and Shiva Thipa (center and right in photo) observed that his approach to helping the children was different. They saw positive behavioural changes in children participating in his play therapy interventions.

Basanta and Shiva became the first people in Nepal to learn how to use a play therapy room and provide opportunities for children to engage with this modality.

Basanta and Shiva knew that when Nepali families living in poverty could only afford to send one or two children to school, they chose males. This left girls to stay at home or on the streets. They suggested creating a school for girls. After many years of laying the groundwork, and thanks to a special 14 year old American boy who raised considerable funds, Nepal House Kaski opened its Therapeutic School for Girls in 2011.

It started with one kindergarten class of twelve girls and has grown into a well regarded multi year school.

Nepal House Kaski began to support incarcerated boys, some as young as 10 years old, who were imprisoned for various crimes, many linked to dire poverty or mental health issues.

In the wake of the Nepal Earthquake, Nepal House Society mobilized funds to provide water, food and shelter.

Staff and volunteers rebuilt a small village of twenty-six homes in the District of Gorkha that had been levelled by the earthquake.

Counsellors began extending support to adults. This included the parents of the children at the school and any other adult that wanted or needed support.

Nepal went into lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Those who left their houses ran the risk of being arrested. Since the parents of Nepal House girls were mostly day labourers who get paid at the end of each working day and then buy their daily meal, they weren’t able to get food for their families. What’s worse, borders with India closed, which caused food and fuel prices to spike. The government provided some families with meagre one-time support.

Nepal House stepped forward two times during the year to provide its families the basics of rice, lentils, cooking oil, tea and sugar.

Nepal House Society hosted its first ever international Hike for Healing and raised $42,000 – enough to raise the salaries of NHK staff.

NHS and NHK commemorate fifteen years of service to the children and families of Nepal.

We are dreaming big! We aim to fundraise enough to one day build Nepal’s first dedicated mental health care centre.