After a landslide destroys her village, a woman rebuilds her life in a changed landscape

‘What can I say? Is there a God or not?’

On 25 April 2015, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake triggered landslides in the Himalayas of Nepal, killing nearly 9,000 people. Some 300 residents and tourists in Langtang village were killed, including roughly half of its permanent residents. Those who survived found their homes – and lives – almost entirely destroyed in an instant. Gyalmu’s House traces the perseverance of one survivor, Nima Gyalmu Lama, as she struggles to come to terms with her tragic new reality a year later. With a great many of her relatives, including her daughter, lost in the landslide, Nima, along with her husband and other surviving villagers, work to build a new home, brick by brick. While she still approaches life with grace and humour, Nima wonders what, if any, God could have allowed such a tragedy to befall her village.