💔 STAY STRONG, NEPAL

Timure was a village of small houses huddled against the mountain, on the border between Nepal and Tibet. A stopping place for pilgrims making their way toward Kailash, the sacred mountain that Hindus, Buddhists, and Jains walk around once in their lives to purify the soul.

At a quarter past nine on Wednesday morning, the Bhote Koshi River stopped being a river. It came down like a wall of water, ice, and rock, sweeping away houses, bridges, markets, and roads. No one had time to run very far.

Today, no figure can capture what happened. Authorities speak of dozens of confirmed deaths, but warn that the true toll could be much higher. And there is something more frightening than any number: nearly 400 people are still missing.

Among them are foreign pilgrims who only wanted to reach a sacred mountain.

Helicopters cannot land where the water is still high. Rescuers walk across the mud, searching for something, someone, among what remains.

The landscape that once attracted thousands of travelers with its beauty is now an unrecognizable territory. The Himalayas, which both give and devastate, have once again reminded us that they are greater than any of us. Nepal does not need our pity. It needs the world not to look away while it searches for its people.

Today, from afar, there is only one thing we can do: hold them in our thoughts and pray that those still being searched for are found alive.