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‘Endurance’:  The Nepal earthquake 1 year later — the struggle for recovery

On April 25, 2015 an earthquake of 7.8 magnitude shook Nepal. Almost 9,000 people died, more than 22,000 people suffered injuries and more than half a million houses were destroyed.For months aftershocks rocked the country. People occupied the streets and open spaces in fear. Chaos dominated daily life.

Photographer Omar Havana tells the story:

One night, after running all day, photographing, as aftershocks struck repeatedly, I finally fell asleep, hugging my cameras. Someone touched me. I immediately thought they might want to steal my cameras, but I turned to find an old woman, a woman who had lost everything, covering me with her quilt. She said, “We need to take care of you. You are telling the world the situation in our country. At that moment, I began “Endurance.”

At first the world was interested and the media published a river of pictures showing the destruction, but within weeks other stories took the headlines. Nepal vanished little by little from the news while the Nepali people continued their struggle, fighting as they did from day one, to help each other and rebuild out of the devastation. “Endurance” tells their story.

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Omar Havana is an award-winning photojournalist, represented by Getty Images, who was living in Kathmandu, Nepal, when the earthquake turned many parts of the country to rubble. His work from the immediate aftermath of the earthquake was published more than 1,000 times around the world. He followed the story long after media interest waned, taking trips around the country to document both the destruction and the recovery as a testimony to the endurance of the Nepali people.

Havana and FotoEvidence are collaborating on a book of Havana’s photographs, “Endurance,” with a foreword by film director Bernardo Bertolucci. The book, which is currently seeking funds via Kickstarter, focuses on the remarkable spirit with which the Nepali people responded to this devastating natural disaster.

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Visit the Kickstarter page for video and more about this story.