May 2024

H.E.L.P. is Building a Women Community House in Samagaun.

The house is built by H.E.L.P. and will be managed by Samagaun’s biggest community group, Dharma Ghyan which was created by Khenpo Gyaltsen, a lama from Samagaun and teaches women Tibetan scripture, Dharma, Buddhist prayers and rituals.

The house is designed to be a safe haven for women to share, grow, learn, and conduct all of their activities. It comprises of: a community meeting room for the village political women’s group (Ama Samua), a shop and store room for women to sell their products (handicrafts, vegetables, rose hip tea etc.) a prayer hall big enough for Dharma Gyan to conduct village religious ceremonies such as yearly fasting and prostrations ceremonies (“nyungne”) a kitchen and more store room to welcome villagers, high lamas for any kind of event.

The house is built with local stones and minimizing cement to make it environmentally friendly, yet it has pillars and a cement slab for earthquake resistance. It was designed to be a model of insulation and inside warmth and mud plastering both inside and outside, ply, and local yak wool tapestries will be used to make it best insulated, inspire others and complement H.E.L.P’s reforestation/reducing deforestation project in Samagaun.