Written by Alison | 12 January 2011

Ke - nang - ge   ma - re

Welcome

AVIF would like to introduce Tashi Yang Zoom, the tibetan English teacher responsible for our newest placement. Situated 4000m up on "the roof of the world" is a community in rural Tibet, 160km from Lhasa, the capital city.

Tashi was born in Nyemo in 1981, the youngest of 12 (now 8 !?) children; 4 older brothers and 3 older sisters.

Tashi studied Tibetan in elementary school then helped on her parents farm until 2000 when she travelled to Lhasa against all odds and found work at a Tibetan restaurant. There she saved 3000RMB, enough to study English. After marrying in 2003 and the arrival of her son she returned to study English at the Tibetan Academy of Social Science and in Nov 2007 opened the New Vision English Language School in Tsedang prefecture. By 2008 she was able to begin a second school in her hometown of Nyemo too.

Nyemo lies SW of Lhasa and Tsedang in the area shown as Shannan to the SE.

From Lhasa to Tsedang or Nyemo takes 2-3 hours by bus.  Nyemo means "Wheat Ear" in Tibetan Language. Nyemo County is located in the middle south of the Tibet Autonomous Region and north of the middle reaches of Yarlung Zangbo River.

 

It covers an area of 3272 square kilometers, with a population of 28,000. The average altitude of the county is about 4000 metres and contains many kinds of fauna and flora. Farmers here grow barley, wheat, broad beans, peas, corn, buckwheat, and rapeseed, making it one of the major grain and oil producing regions in Tibet. Agriculture and farming are booming in the county and handicraft products; pulu (woollen fabric), Tibetan incense, Tibetan paper and potteries are also flourishing.

Help us to help Tashi help poorer Tibetan children to learn English, giving them a much better chance of a decent paid job. Its hard to ignore the treatment Tibetans have received for years and years at the hands of China but Tashi has around 80 students right now who are all very enthusiastic to learn English and how to retain their Tibetan culture.

 

Some of the children are pictured here with sweet tea and noodles. On the right is Tennor, he is ten years old.  To his left, in the red/blue/white hat is 9 year old Tenzin Lhamo. Tashi trieds to take them to restaurants on occasion where they can get a meal and practise English together. If you'd like to visit  or to simply help online please contact us: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it