Rosalie Hughes
Rosalie Hughes is an information fellow for International Rescue Committee in Kathmandu, Nepal. Her responsibilities include writing grant proposals and donor reports and supporting IRC Nepal's field staff. She will be in Nepal through April 2009.
Nepalese women free from war but not violence
Six months ago 16-year-old Ashmi was preparing to put red mud on the floor of her hut in Western Nepal, a chore she does each month. It was a holiday and her family was gathering firewood for the village bonfire. She was about to smooth down the first glop of mud when she heard the door open. "My cousin was standing at the entrance," she said. "By the time I stood up he'd already locked the door." ...
Simple op opens new world for Nepalese women
Mandari Buddha is leaving her Nepalese village in the Himalayan foothills for the first time in her life. She is traveling to have an operation that will end the terrible pain and isolation caused by a condition in which the womb falls out of the body. The International Rescue Committee (IRC), a humanitarian organization, is arranging this trip for Mandari and 20 other women who suffer from uterine prolapse, which is said to afflict nearly one in three women in rural Nepal. Treatment for this condition, a hysterectomy, has not been available for rural Nepalese up to now. ...
Nepalese hill women embark on life-changing journey
Tomorrow Mandari Buddha will leave her home in a remote village of the Himalayan foothills for the first time in her life. She'll say goodbye to her young children, an aging buffalo and the two-room mud house she helped build. She'll walk 10 hours to a town where the first bus she has ever seen will take her to an urban hospital. Mandari suffers from uterine prolapse, a condition in which a woman's uterus loses its moorings inside the body and drops, leaving it hanging out of the vagina. She is travelling to the city for a hysterectomy, an operation to remove her uterus. ...
Nepalese villagers take in Indian flood survivors
"It was 10pm and I'd just laid down to sleep," Purna, a 29-year old from India's recently flooded Bihar district tells me. We sit on a grassy patch overlooking the dry riverbed where just two weeks ago the Koshi River flowed. Purna has a boyish round face and dimples. His skin shows through the holes in his weathered blue t-shirt. He speaks slowly, shaking his head. "First I heard my mother scream, 'Water, water!' Then I felt my blanket get wet. A minute later, the water was five feet high." ...
