Posters of missing people line the wall of the hospital, the glue still fresh beneath. A schoolgirl smiling in her uniform; a beaming, chubby-cheeked baby; a couple smiling on their wedding day; a young man, hands on hips, atop a mountain peak; a young girl with flowing hair, peaking out from behind a door. These faces are just a fraction of the thousands who have not been seen since deadly flash floods coursed through the Himalayas and wiped away entire villages.
By Saturday morning, the toll of the missing had risen to almost 3,000, in both Nepal and Tibet. So far, Nepal has recovered 669 bodies, but many remote areas have only been accessed by army helicopters on the hunt for survivors. Rescuers said it was too difficult to assess how many more people might be buried beneath the mud.
The task of identifying the dead is also gargantuan. In the Nepalese city of Chitwan, the morgues have been overrun by the sheer number of bodies and a makeshift building has been set up to house the dead. Some of the bodies were carried so far down the river by the force of the floods, they were recovered in neighbouring India.
At Tribhuvan University teaching hospital in Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu, desperate relatives gathered in the hope of news. Four days on since the disaster struck, people continued to crowd round the police desk to register the names of missing family members. Hundreds of the injured are recovering in the hospital’s wards and people were frantically checking lists of patients, desperate to find a sign that their loved ones were still alive.
In the absence of information and with affected areas almost completely cut off, many families have resorted to making posters to appeal for information. Yavraj Lama said his sister, her husband and their two children were missing after their village of Jaydada, in Rusawa district, had been entirely washed away. His eyes filled with tears as he glued a photo of one-year-old Sijan Tawang, a baby in the arms of his mother, to the hospital wall.
A picture of 12-year-old Sahil, his brother, hung next to it. He was so sweet and innocent; it’s impossible for us to think he is not with us any more. They had married six months ago and his work as a driver regularly took him to the border between Nepal and Tibet.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
