The Recce Team

At a volunteers meeting in Lalitpur, a stranger eyes the motorcycle helmet in my hand and comes over. He says a supply team heading to Jalbire in Sindhupalchowk district needs someone with a motorcycle to lead the relief convoy; as an afterthought he adds that I will be part of the 'recce team'. I don't fully understand what he means, but say yes anyway. After talking to another person for a minute, he informs the group standing nearby that the supply truck is being loaded and we will have to wait a while before we can get on the road.

Since the April 25 earthquake, a feeling of volunteerism seems to have seized Nepal. Citizens have been organising themselves and providing aid to those not reached by the government or organised NGOs. Everyday individual volunteers gather in hubs across Kathmandu Valley to coordinate operations, bring in relief supplies, and transport them to villages and township not yet accessed. As these groups push further into the interiors with their limited relief materials, reports of desperate communities fighting amongst themselves, with the relief teams, or in some instances, blocking supply trucks from further entry, have also begun to stream in. In response, the citizen volunteer group operating out of Yellow House market in Sanepa – who travel without official security escorts – are employing a number of strategies that help them safely deliver aid.