Gurkha History and Culture website - Nepali production assistant/s (and your support) needed. Please help!
Namaste and dhog to all at Gurkhas.com and to all our Gorkhali Daju-Bhai Didi-Bhainiharu,
My name is Roshan Rai. I am the son of an ex-Gurkha and I live and work in East London. In 2008-2009 my organisation, Believe Collective, produced an educational exhibition about the history of the British Gurkhas for Brecknock Museum in Brecon, Wales. The project was called 'Ayo Gorkhali!' and we worked closely with local schools (where many Nepali children study), Gurkha Company Mandalay, the Gurkha Museum Winchester and the Welsh community to develop the exhibition and a short film which you can see on our website along with more information about the project: http://blog.believecollective.net/projects/ayo-gorkhali/ . You can also see how some people responded to the project on its website (http://www.ayo-gorkhali.org/) - now a bit out of date.
The Ayo Gorkhali exhibition was a great success - helping to bring the Welsh and Nepali communities closer together and fostering greater understanding between them (the BBC report about it is here: http://bit.ly/aIsSiX). We are now developing a website to put the content of the exhibition online as an educational resource for all to share. We are also linking up schools in Brecon and with schools in Nepal, to support understanding and friendship between children in the UK and Nepal. This is a non-commercial, non-profit educational project.
For the new Ayo Gorkhali website we are creating an interactive timeline of Nepali and Gorkhali history, starting in 800 BC, the time of the Kirati Dynasty, and running to the present day. We also have short articles about the different regions and peoples of Nepal and their cultures (you can see some video clips we produced for the Gurkha Museum on youtube: http://bit.ly/b1m8GC) and we have filmed interviews with serving and retired Gurkhas, their children and Gurkha Rights campaigners, including Ms Joanna Lumley, which we will slowly add to the site over the coming months.
I'm writing to ask you all if anyone might be able to help us with our project. We need one or more production assistants who are IT literate and can help with with Nepali-English/English-Nepali translation, proof-reading and sub-titling. Ideally they would be able to come to our office (in Dalston, London E8) but it is also possible to do this work from home/elsewhere, anywhere with an internet connection. We have a small budget to pay for the work, so we are not asking for volunteers: this is paid work, but we do need people who will be committed to the project as we still have much to do!
Please contact me if you think you might be able to help.
Once the Ayo Gorkhali site is launched I will write another post to the forum inviting you all to help us improve the site by contributing your knowledge, views and photos - if you would like to share them. I am not a historian or an authority on Gurkha history, although we have consulted the Gurkha Museum, the historian Tony Gould and many other sources, so we would welcome your support in making the site into something that truly represents 'Gorkhaliko ithihaas'.
Dherey dhanyabad.
Roshan
-- 4/5/2010 2:28:18 AM: post edited by RoshanRai.