Residents of Competa are looking for sponsorship and help to raise funds for volunteer work in Nako.
In May this year a group of residents from Cómpeta will be going to the Himalayas in Northern India to help build a prayer house for the Buddhist villagers of Nako.
Like the pueblos of Axarquia, Nako is a village in the hills surrounded by beautiful scenery. However, Nako is small, a village of less than 500 inhabitants, and is 3660 metres high in the Indian Himalayas. The people are almost exclusively Tibetan Buddhists of the Kagyu tradition; peaceful, poor and devout. At the altitude they live, only a limited number of crops grow – mainly barley and some vegetables. Their houses are flat-roofed and normally have two floors, the lower for cattle and the upper where the family live. Again, because of the altitude, wood is scarce – dung is used for winter fuel.
A few years ago, Lise Løkke, a Danish resident of Cómpeta met Ani Lhamo, a Tibetan nun from Nako. The Kagyu Buddhists have no place to practice their religion in Nako. Ani's father had promised to build a prayer house, but died before he could accomplish his dream. Last year a small group of Cómpeta residents, led by Lise and
Her son, Karsten travelled to Nako to help the people build their simple one-room prayer house. They laid foundations and built walls to a height ready to receive windows before time and the money ran out. The building will be 4 meters wide by 8 meters long, simple but robust enough to withstand the winter blizzard
s common in the area.
Again, this year, in May, Lise and Karsten will be leading another group of Cómpeta residents, to Nako to help complete the work, BUT MONEY IS NEEDED FOR BUILDING MATERIAL and its transport to this remote village, both of which are expensive. There is no building machinery in the village, everything is carried and mixed by hand. Bricks and cement have to be transported in. Stones for concrete (chino) are chipped by women, often with babies on their backs, from large boulders for €2 a day.
The Cómpeta group are paying their own travel and accommodation expenses and working voluntarily to help complete the prayer house. Please help us raise the necessary €3000 to provide materials to complete the work.
We will be carrying out fund-raising activities during March and April. If you would like to help us or make a donation of money or goods for sale, please contact one of us.
Each month, the Grapevine will include an update of progress, both on the fund-raising and later on a diary on the building of the prayer house. Business sponsors of the project will, if they wish, have their names and logos printed each month with these articles. We hope there will be many private sponsors as well!
Our first thanks goes to Helen of 'The Grapevine' for her support.
Let the people of Axarquia be included in the first prayers of thanks offered by the people of Nako in their new prayer house.
Lise & Karsten Løkke
952 11 59 90
John & Linda Blackburn
699 61 77 54
Ron & Mary Lott: 952 03 07 33
or via email: nakoproject@hotmail.com
Nako Project Supporters
We would like to thank the businesses and individuals who have already given their support to this project. At the time of going to press they include:
Cómpeta Properties
LC Training
E.G.O. Hair Studio
Sugar & Spice
Venta Real Estate
Some of our sponsors prefer not to be named, but we thank them for their support too.
We hope that next month we will have many more supporters to thank.
Mary Lott
