Pretoria - “It’s a great relief; you journalists can leave me alone now, and I can go and relax and have a normal weekend,” said St Mary’s Diocesan School for Girls headmaster, Father Angus Paterson.
He was at the OR Tambo International Airport with pupils from the school in Hatfield who had just touched down in South Africa from earthquake-shattered Nepal on Friday morning.
All 18 girls and two staff members landed just after 9am and were met by Paterson, their parents, family and friends.
The Grade 9 to 12 pupils were in Nepal when the devastating quake hit the Asian country and left thousands dead and injured.
And on Friday night it emerged that a pair of missing South Africans, Mike Sherman and Kate Ahrend, have been found and were in the Gift of the Givers camp. They were exhausted and stressed, and could not speak to the media after arriving at the Kathmandu camp .
Gift of the Givers co-ordinator Dr Ahmed Bham said Sherman and Ahrends had requested time to rest.
“They need to recover because they have gone through an ordeal. Finding them was hard. Remember that they lost their backpacks when the earthquake struck so they didn’t have supplies and had to share supplies with other people who were stranded,” Bham said.
The death toll has exceeded 6 200, and, with thousands people unaccounted for, it was expected to reach 10 000.
The DSG pupils were part of the World Challenge Team, an organisation that arranges educational expeditions across the globe.
While the World Challenge Team was giving the parents regular updates, communication was limited as members of the group were not allowed to have cellphones on them during the trip. Confirmation that all the girls were safe was only received more than four hours after news of the earthquake.
During the hiking trail, the girls were divided into two groups, with one team being near Phokara when the earthquake struck.
The other group had reached their destination and was about 40km from Kathmandu but had been moved to another facility to avoid the aftershock.
There were
tears of joy from some of the awaiting parents and family members as the girls ran out to meet them at the airport.
Some in the waiting crowd were carrying balloons and banners bearing “welcome home” messages.
Emotions ran high and mothers and their daughters hugged and kissed inside the airport building.
Those who spoke to members of the media said their thoughts were with the people of Nepal who had gone through a lot.
“We were not at the epicentre, but we felt the tremors and it was hectic,” one of the girls said.
Paterson said all the pupils had made their way back to the nation’s capital, except one who decided to go home to Lesotho. “We can now stop worrying and give thanks to God,” he told the Pretoria News. “We will have a thanksgiving at the school on Tuesday and before the end of the week, we will make a donation to the Gift of the Givers.”
He said pupils who needed psychological help would also be assisted by the school.
It would all become clearer once they had settled in back with their families, he added.
The Facebook page of the school was constantly updated to keep parents and well-wishers abreast of the latest news.
In one post on Wednesday afternoon, 10 photos showed the girls in jovial mood with the message “group waiting patiently to fly home”.
Another, posted at 12.04pm on Thursday, stated: “All is on track to get our girls back from Nepal.
“They are catching an earlier flight so we don’t expect delays in Doha and they should be back, God willing, tomorrow (on Friday) at about 8am.” About 30 minutes later, there was an update reading “girls boarding the plane… all smiling”.
It was also indicated in a post that the group was given a diplomatic greeting by the South African mission in Doha, Qatar. The updates continued until the pupils eventually reunited with their families.
Pretoria News