COVID-19 RELIEF EFFORTS: Vegan food distribution in Kathmandu, Nepal, and Luang Prabang, Laos for people and animals in need
Due to the Coronavirus global pandemic, a lot of countries have issued a lockdown order. Nepal is one of those countries. A day after our vegan tour in Nepal ended in March 2020, the country enacted a full lockdown. Zac, one of our co-founders, decided to stay on in Nepal as we all agreed that if we could help and make a difference there, we must. By March 31st ,2020, the VegVoyages Foundation teamed up with local vegan activists in Kathmandu to prepare and provide free vegan meals to people in need in the capital. This included many day laborers and their families from villages in Nepal (and India) who could not get back home due to the lockdown, people who had become homeless due to the lockdown, and cancer patients and their supportive family members living in makeshift homes near the places they were receiving treatment. Also, many street animals, including dogs, monkeys, cows, and cats, that normally relied on kind people for survival began to go hungry as the streets became empty and people stayed inside their homes.
In addition to the vegan food relief in Nepal, the foundation also assists in Luang Prabang, Laos. Luang Prabang’s main economic means for young adults is tourism. Restaurants, hotels, and other forms of hospitality provide income for youth when they come in from the villages to go to higher secondary school and later diploma and vocational institutes and colleges as these educational institutions are few and far between in the rural areas in Laos. Since most of them come from lower-income families they need to work to cover their expenses while in school. With COVID, most businesses had to close as tourism came to a halt making already difficult circumstances even more difficult.
VEGAN FOOD RELIEF FOR CANCER PATIENTS & THEIR SUPPORTING FAMILIES – Kathmandu, Nepal.
The VegVoyages Foundation, from April 2020 to this day has continuously provides a complete weekly vegan food supplies for 8 cancer patients and their 24 family members in Nepal who cannot go back to their villages as they need to continue their treatment in Kathmandu. The patients and their accompanying family members stay in small makeshift accommodations near the cancer hospital. The patients range from 12 and 14-year-old children with blood cancer and a 12-year-old child with a brain tumor to a grandfather with throat cancer and a mother with backbone cancer. To help them with their battles, every Saturday the VegVoyages Foundation delivers a week’s worth of healthy, well-balanced food supplies including a variety of colorful veggies, fruits, pulses, and brown rice for the patients and their families.