PAGE – Mid-life crisis for a Page local sprouts into a nonprofit organization and has bloomed into life-saving efforts in Nepal.

Before moving to Page in 2011, J.J. McMahon lived in Scottsdale, Arizona.

“In (2009), I was kind of going through a mid-life crisis … in my late 30s. I was working down in Scottsdale in the orthopedic sales industry. I loved it. Fantastic. I was making good money, and everything was great. I woke up one morning and didn’t find the value in what I was doing anymore,” McMahon said.

In an attempt to find the value his heart was looking for, McMahon started searching out for opportunities to help those who desperately needed it. His moral compass directed him to the dZi Foundation, which helps “Nepal communities prosper on their own terms.”

McMahon joined a dZi philanthropic endeavor/trekking adventure in the Himalayas where volunteers would deliver aid to the remote villages surrounding Mount Everest.

“I jumped on this trip to the Himalayas that was going to take clothing and school supplies to Solukhumbu, which is the Everest region. It was part of this philanthropic effort that sounded really cool, and I thought: ‘Man, I’ll be able to figure (myself) out when I get up into the mountains.’”

It is a one-hour flight from Katmandu and takes several days of trekking – depending on how well the group adapts to the altitude – in order to reach the targeted villages. “Now, there is a road being built, but back then it was by donkey,” McMahon said as to how they were able to get the supplies to the villages.

The group spent 15 days trekking and dropping supplies to villages with elevation gains ranging from 9,000 to 18,000 feet above sea level. Once the humanitarian expedition was completed, the team loaded up and flew home. However, McMahon and fellow team member, Don Moore, stayed behind. Moore is out of Colorado.

“Don Moore is a lawyer basically turned philanthropist and he decided he wanted to start doing philanthropy work. We had about eight days in Nepal after everybody flew back home to the states. We thought: ‘What’s a project we can finish while we are here on the ground?’ Everybody says they’re going to bring in electricity,” McMahon said – a feat not possible at the time. “What is something we can start and finish while we are here?”

Moore and McMahon noticed the school of their adopted village, Chhulemu, where their main Sherpa guide lived didn’t have any playground equipment.

“It’s not going to change the world or anything, but that was something pretty cool we could do,” McMahon said. Sherpa is a Tibetan ethnic group native to the Himalayas and Nepal.

During McMahon and Moore’s eight-day layover, the children of their adopted village went on a three-day Buddhist retreat. The duo jumped into action.

“We had a carpenter come in and we built a teeter-totter, sandbox, pull-up bar, balance beam, stuff like that … real simple apparatus.

“This was equipment these kids had never seen before. When they came back, they loved it. It was fantastic,” McMahon said.

The two returned to the U.S. after their 2009 mission was completed.

Moore called McMahon the first quarter of 2010 and said, “Hey, I’ve been looking through my journal and the pictures, let’s take this up a notch. You want to do something a little further in-depth?”

Out of money and time, McMahon was still on board. The plan was to find a project that was sustainable, high-impact, and low-cost. They created the 501(c)(3) Himalayan Development Foundation and went to work.

“I thought, ‘Hey, you know what? It was so cold and there wasn’t any light in any of those classrooms we went into. How about a skylight?

“We obviously can’t bring in electricity. We don’t have the money or the infrastructure for that,’” McMahon coaxed.

Over the next four years, the HDF installed over 200 skylights in the one village where their original Sherpa guide was from.

Out of money from the skylight project, the HDF conducted a thorough-needs assessment. Rather than assuming what the Sherpa needed, McMahon returned to Nepal and asked each villager what they needed.

McMahon said the two main priorities were agriculture and air-borne disease.

“We were doing our due diligence and found this system called EcoSan. It separates the feces from the urine. It’s not glamorous stuff, but it’s great,” McMahon said about the EcoSan composting toilets.

Once dried, the feces can be used as fuel or fertilizer and the urine as a pesticide for crops. EcoSan systems are more hygienic and environmentally friendly than the traditional pit used before, according to McMahon. About 25 homes were equipped with the units, which cost $300 apiece.

An earthquake, with a 7.8 magnitude, hit Nepal in 2015. The HDF shifted its efforts of EcoSan installations in order to help rebuild Chhulemu.

Fortunately, Chhulemu wasn’t at the epicenter of the earthquake, however, roughly fifteen homes had to be rebuilt.

The HDF procured a pliable mesh from Japan, designed specifically to help structures absorb earthquake damage, all brought in by 30 volunteers and donkeys.

“We took all the rubble down and rebuilt them. It was a lot. The beautiful thing about us was that we had been there for six years by then. We had a really good relationship with the villages. We actually got more done than some of the big NGOs that can throw millions of dollars at projects, which was really cool,” McMahon said.

Before reinstating the EcoSan program, HDF brought a team of dentists to Chhulemu and the surrounding villages where they conducted exams resulting in nearly 300 teeth being extracted.

McMahon said he would be in Chhulemu at this time if it wasn’t for the pandemic.

“I miss going back because, now you can imagine, 10 years later, these kids are all growing up … like my nieces and nephews.”

Since moving to Page, McMahon has worked as a wilderness guide in between his HDF responsibilities. For more information, visit the Himalayan Development Foundation page on Facebook.