Little Princes: One Man’s Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal

Grennan connects with Anna Howe, an American who has lived in Nepal for 15 years. She has traveled to Humla, the district where all the children originally grew up and can help Grennan with his plans to reunite the families. Grennan wants to locate the parents of the 18 children living at Little Princes and the 6 children currently residing at NGN’s Dhaulagiri House. Locating the parents means taking a long, dangerous journey outside of Kathmandu Valley into the district of Humla, a mountainous region without many roads, airports, or telephones.

Howe connects Grennan with a Humla man named D.B., who is working on behalf of another organization to locate families. D.B. and Grennan decide to team up on their journey through Humla. Grennan and D.B. put together an eight-man team, including porters who will help carry their supplies and navigate. Two of the men, D.B. and Rinjin, speak English and are able to translate for Grennan.

During Grennan’s preparation to journey into Humla, he continues to correspond many times a day with Liz. Although they have never seen each other in person or spoken on the phone, Grennan is aware that he is developing strong feelings for her. He desperately wants Liz to visit Nepal during her pre-scheduled trip to volunteer in India. Liz promises to visit Nepal on December 23 through December 25, just a few days after Grennan plans to return from his trip into Humla.

Grennan recounts his journey into Humla like a travel narrative. Extremely dangerous mountainsides, cold weather, skeptical locals, food poisoning, and belligerent Maoists present dangers on a daily basis. One particular problem is Grennan’s injured knee, which slows down his pace and thus the pace of the entire group. Without doctors, roads, or phones anywhere near, Grennan must suffer through the pain and continue hiking.

Having collected photographs and information from the 24 children in Kathmandu—including the 18 at the Little Princes and 6 at the Dhaulagiri House—Grennan hikes long distances from village to village attempting to identify their parents. Grennan successfully finds the parents of all 24 children in Kathmandu. Most of the parents have shocked and emotional reactions upon hearing that their children are alive and living in an orphanage in Kathmandu. The author shares photos of the children, takes photos of the parents, and records notes about each family’s story. Grennan is tough on the parents, however. He tells one set of parents that “[w]hat they did, sending Anish away with Golkka, was reckless. It was a miracle Anish was alive at all, let alone safe in the children’s home” (177). Grennan admonishes the parents out of fear that they would be naïve enough to trust another Golkka-like figure again.

The parents experience a complex set of emotions, including grief, guilt, and utter happiness that their child is still alive. “I watched them come alive when I told them their children were safe. I watched them die a little as they relived the loss of their child to a child trafficker” (193). Often, the parents gave Grennan any spare food they had as a token of their appreciation for caring for their child. Understanding that their children are being kept safe, well-fed, and protected at a children’s home—more resources than they could offer their child in Humla—most of the parents indicate that they want their child to stay in Kathmandu. For the time being, all of the children will stay in Kathmandu unless their parents can afford or want to make the journey to retrieve them.

At the last town on his journey through Humla, he plans to take a helicopter from this town to the nearest airport, but after days of waiting the helicopter never arrives. He and another aid worker decide to hike to the nearest town with a helicopter pad, which will take multiple days. When they arrive at the village, they have missed the helicopter by just an hour. Grennan is desperate to get back to Kathmandu to reach Liz in time for her visit on December 23. The author decides to hike on through the night to find the next town with a helicopter pad, but he does not have enough food, proper lighting, or sense of direction. Despite his recklessness, “[t]here was no other plan, because no other plan included Liz” (208). Grennan is able to catch a small plane from a village called Simikot, which will begin his journey back to Kathmandu and to meet Liz. After just a few hours after arriving back to Kathmandu, Liz is standing at Grennan’s doorstep. “She was beautiful,” he recounts, “just as I had imagined” (220).