Older people’s stories

We look at the survivors who now have to rebuild their lives, and at the humanitarian response of HelpAge's partner SEMA.

Stories of older people who survived the catastrophic earthquake in Syria.

Two years after the military coup in Myanmar, older people support each other and their families despite difficulties created by the new regime.

Robina Bughio, 56, is a widow living in the village of Hadi Bux Shah in the suburbs of Shahpur Jahania, in Shaheed Benazirabad District, Sindh Province.

Muhmmad Salih (75) from Shahpur Jahania village in Shaheed Benazirabad district, is now living with his family in the open air as they couldn’t get to the shelter provided in the community school quickly enough, and it was already full. The mud-plastered home he shared with his wife and four children was completely destroyed by the heavy rains and his livestock were killed. 

Haji Noor Muhammad (70) from Shaheed Benazirabad district in Sindh Province is paralysed down the right side of his body so when heavy rains destroyed his home, he struggled to make it to a safer place.

People have flocked to the city of Dnipro from all over eastern Ukraine, fleeing the war with Russia. Here are their stories.

I was born on July 12, 1941, as bombs were falling. My father named me ‘Viktoria’ for victory, anticipating a win over the Nazi invaders.

I am from Lyadova in Vinnytsia Oblast, near the Moldovan border, but I moved to a suburb of Kyiv with my daughter, Olga (46), and granddaughter Anastasiia (15), four years ago.

I was born in 1935 in Poltava, and when I was seven, we moved to Russia. For three years, we had nothing to eat, but my mother worked at an orphanage, and she gave us water mixed with flour, and that is how we survived. It was very, very hard.

My name is Alloise Fana Ngcobo, I am 72 and live in Clermont Township, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

I am 72 years old and originally from a remote district of Nepal but I now rent a house in the capital, Kathmandu, with my wife. My two daughters live here too while my son and daughter-in-law live in Australia.