Heroic Teen Saved 55 Orphans During Nepal's Earthquake, Then Built Them Shelter

Amid the chaos of what's happened to Nepal, stories of unlikely but courageous heroes are starting to emerge...

Ishwor Ghimire is 19 years-old. He just happened to be visiting the Nepal Deprived Women and Children Upliftment Center orphanage in Kathmandu on April 25th when the earth began to shake.

Children began screaming as the quake, which authorities measured at a magnitude of 8.1, split the pavement and cracked the orphanage walls. Ghimire could have fled the building to save himself, but instead he sprang into action.

ll the kids were so panicked and started screaming and crying," Ghimire told Mic in a Facebook message. "I asked everybody to get out from the building."

According Ghimire's Facebook page, he personally carried a number of the smaller orphans, who range in age from 4 to 16, to a flat vegetable patch outside.

"The earth was still shaking but I was running here and there to rescue all the kids and take them to the safety place," he told Mic.

Ghimire and the children initially took shelter in a small church but for some reason weren't allowed to stay. Now they're sleeping outside while the aftershocks continue...

..in a makeshift shelter with a plastic covering that Ghimire and others helped build for them. "Kind [of] a tent," he told Mic. "But it doesn't keeps us warm."

"We are coping well but one boy has fever since yesterday. Hope everything will be fine sooner," Ghimire reports on his Facebook page. 

And why would a teenager go through all this trouble for a small group of Nepalese orphans? Because Ghimire was once an orphan at the very same facility.

"...he came to the facility when he was 4, and over time assumed the role of the older brother to the younger orphans there. He attended Australia's Pulteney Grammar School on a scholarship in 2013, and today, Ghimire mentors other young orphans while he prepares to attend university," Mic reports.

"There's lots of cracking at the school and the orphanage building but all the children and the staff at school and the orphanage are safe and survived the earthquake," Ghumire wrote on Facebook Monday. "Will post about the situation that has happened and will happen in details soon. Until then please pray for life of people in Nepal."

Touched by Ghimire's compassionate act, friends from around the world have set up a fundraising page to help the displaced orphans. Consider helping if you can.