Villages Library Projects

Part of Ten Friends’ Villages Library project is to provide libraries for those villages in which a book is a rare thing.  In 2009, we established our very first library in the village of Lingham and dedicated it to Diane Jacobsen, a revered teacher from Sisters, Oregon.  Over the years more libraries were established and dedicated to a number of individuals from Central Oregon.  Throughout the years the program has continued to grow and we now have more than 35 libraries in place!

A typical village in which we place a library has from 100 to 400 residents.  The cost of one book placed in a library is around $5 – roughly $2 for the book and $3 to transport the book by plane and/or porter.  Bookcases are constructed by village carpenters and the village provides the building for the library.  The average total cost of a library is around $6,000.  

Student Library Projects

Over the years, Ten Friends has taken high school students to Nepal and over 60 students have had the experience.  As part of the trips students and their chaperones work on library projects in remote villages of Nepal.  

2023 Larry's Library Project

Our most recent library was created in the village of Khokatak in the Makalu region. The library was dedicated in October 2023 with Ten Friends Board member Larry Weinberg in attendance.  He was accompanied to the dedication ceremony by Sunita Gurung, Director of the Himalayan Education Center. The library is located in an elementary school, but the library itself is a community library, open to all the villagers. A large number of village residents, including the teachers, staff and students at the school and the school board, were present at the ceremony.  There was music, dancing and speeches to inaugurate the village's first library.