‘No land left at all’: Nepal flood survivors face a transformed landscape

“The river is flowing right where our houses used to stand,” Pabitra Lamsal said as she waited at a government food distribution centre in Nepal’s Nuwakot district. “There is no land left at all.”

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The river is flowing right where our houses used to stand.

Lamsal, 45, had lived with her family in Dhunge Bazaar for more than 40 years. The floods swept away the family’s two homes and its rice paddy fields, leaving nine relatives uncertain about where they will live.

Survivors are sheltering with relatives or in temporary camps after the floods violently transformed the landscape. Lamsal said her family had rented two rooms, but lacked a stove for cooking and was relying on a relative’s home for meals.

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There is no land left at all.

“You can’t think straight in a situation like this,” she said. The immediate focus for displaced families is survival, as they retrieve belongings and look for shelter after the disaster.

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You can’t think straight in a situation like this.