The Project
About 110,000 Nepali-speaking Bhutanese were forcibly exiled from Bhutan beginning in 1990. They have lived in refugee camps in southeastern Nepal for 18-21 years. In 2008 The United States agreed to resettle 60,000 or more of these refugees and the first group arrived in the US. As of March 2011 more than 37,000 have been resettled in 210 cities and smaller communities across the US. Australia, Canada, Norway, New Zealand, Denmark, and the United Kingdom are also accepting thousands of these refugees.
For the most part the arriving refugees know little English, especially the older generation. Their native language is Nepali. As refugee resettlement agencies find housing and employment for the adults and as the children are enrolled in schools, there has been a need for a single dictionary with both Nepali-English and English-Nepali sections. Prior to 2008 no such dictionary was printed in the U.S.
This project was created to meet this obvious need. We arranged for the publication and distribution of such a dictionary. The book, "A Concise English-Nepali Nepali-English Dictionary" has now been printed in the U.S. and sells for $16.00.
Beginning in the fall of 2008 local resettlement agencies, volunteers, and school districts where the Bhutanese have arrived have purchased and distributed over 3,450 copies. In addition donations have allowed us to distribute more than 840 for free directly to Bhutanese families.
We continue to seek donations to underwrite the printing and shipping costs to get one book for each Nepali-speaking refugee family and other books for the social service agencies, schools, and health facilities that will be working with these refugees all around the U.S.
We will sell copies of this dictionary to anyone who would like to purchase a copy. We hope, however, that those who place such orders also donate at least an additional $16.00 to allow us to provide a book for free to a refugee family.