Suryamaya Thapa was knitting in secret, hiding her craft expertise from her husband and her disabilities from the surface world, when a last-minute choice modified the trajectory of her life.
Suryamaya lived within the bustling hub of Kathmandu however she most well-liked to remain indoors – when she went out, she was typically mocked for her disabilities. So, she’d keep in, knitting whereas her husband was at work.
Naturally, when her neighbour urged she accompany her to a free workshop that taught ladies promote garments and different merchandise they’d made, she was hesitant to hitch her.
However, with some encouragement, Suryamaya went alongside and met a younger Australian, Steph Wollard, who’d organized that coaching day. The opposite ladies who’d joined the workshop made garments and different craft items, similar to Suryamaya. They usually all tuned in to learn to hone their expertise and promote their items for revenue.
After assembly the ladies that day and listening to their tales, Steph wished to supply extra ladies in Nepal with expertise coaching and training to generate an revenue and energy their independence.
She went on to discovered Seven Girls in 2006 and spent 17 years serving to to teach and make use of hundreds, each in-person and with digital coaching, earlier than handing the organisation over to native management in 2023. Whereas staying true to it’s authentic mission, Seven Girls morphed into it’s subsequent part of philantrophy and have become Sungabha Nepal.
Suryamaya began working with the organisation – making garments and incomes a gentle revenue as an worker – shortly after its inception in 2006, and he or she’s nonetheless there as we speak. However she’s hardly the identical particular person she was when she joined virtually twenty years in the past.
Discovering energy amid materials scraps
As we sit collectively on the ground of a tiny workplace above the stitching room at Sungabha Nepal – fragrant, freshly brewed chai in hand – Suryamaya quietly explains how completely different her outlook was earlier than she got here right here. ‘I had a mindset that I can’t exit, or I can’t work,’ she says.
She paused momentarily earlier than inserting her heat mug on the small espresso desk in entrance of her. ‘More often than not, folks round me additionally used to tease me, like, bully me. So I most well-liked to remain inside my dwelling.’
She advised me she would come to the advanced, hidden within the coronary heart of chaotic Kathmandu, on daily basis. She’d concentrate on enhancing her knitting and studying new trades like stitching, crocheting and felt weaving earlier than she came upon her ardour for tailoring.
Like many different ladies who discover hope within the form of the quaint two-storey advanced stuffed with stitching machines and craft items, Suryamaya got here to study new expertise. She didn’t count on that she’d additionally discover confidence, independence and energy.
‘Due to my bodily incapacity, my legs weren’t sturdy, my fingers weren’t sturdy. So, my thoughts was additionally not sturdy. I used to really feel very scared when folks would come to speak to me,’ she confesses.
She smiles, ‘After getting concerned right here, I felt I received a form of confidence. I needed to face lots of people. And since I had some expertise in my hand, I used to be actually empowered.’
Small steps, massive impression
Nepal remains to be, for probably the most half, a patriarchal society so ladies are anticipated to remain dwelling and full family chores whereas the lads exit to work.
Add bodily disabilities to an already hefty checklist of limitations for ladies coming into the workforce, and the revenue that grants them independence appears almost unattainable to realize.
‘I really feel like I’m not disabled anymore as a result of I’m handled effectively, like different ready folks.’
However Suryamaya was decided to construct a brand new life free from stigmas and gender inequality.
‘I actually wish to encourage different ladies,’ she says. ‘Let’s not rely upon anybody else and attempt to study one thing so that you simply’ll have the ability to be impartial and dwell the life that you really want.’
Schooling and job alternatives can change the lifetime of a person. However, greater than that, it helps change society’s notion of ladies and folks dwelling with disabilities.
‘I really feel like I’m not disabled anymore as a result of I’m handled effectively, like different ready folks.’
A style of Nepali tradition
Crammed with inspiration after sitting down with Suryamaya, I made my strategy to the massive kitchen out the again the place the workforce run conventional cooking courses for travellers, one other one of many methods Sungabha Nepal creates employment alternatives for ladies. I threw on one among their hand-made aprons and chef’s hats, every matching with maroon and navy patchwork, and did my greatest to observe together with their native cooking teacher.
In the identical method the comfy craft workshop helps assist ladies with expertise coaching and employment, these cooking courses give native ladies an opportunity to share a bit of their tradition with travellers whereas incomes an revenue with their expertise.
With a small group of simply 5 different ladies on Intrepid’s Nepal Girls’s Expedition, I chopped greens, added spices and stirred steaming pots of liquid till my coronary heart was content material. On the finish of the category, we sat down collectively and loved the standard dahl bhat and sticky rice pudding we’d created beneath the steerage of our charismatic native trainer.
On my method out, I handled myself to a bit hand-made retail remedy within the small present store of their courtyard. The entire items right here – hand-made garments, crocheted toys and candy equipment – are made with love by the ladies working there, together with Suryamaya. Now, that’s a memento with a distinction.
You possibly can go to Sungabha Nepal, be a part of a cooking class for your self and get your fingers on some hand-made presents on Intrepid’s Nepal: Girls’s Expedition or Premium Nepal.
Be aware: Suryamaya and I swapped tales with the assistance of a translator who shared my questions with Suryamaya in Nepali and her responses with me in English. All pictures by Yvette Scott.
