damaged buildings and those cracked buildings could come tumbling down, so people wanted to get out of buildings and into open spaces. this time however, the epicenter was nowhere near kathmandu. it was in the high mountains, in the himalayas, not far from a town called namche bazaar namche bazaar is one of many stone sherpa villages in the valley, and, jose it will be well known to people who have gone trekking in nepal, hiking or those who have attempted to climb mt. everest. we re in the region now, where this earthquake took place, a very high elevation, namche bazaar around 10,000 feet. there are no roads whatsoever in this area. it is not a heavily populated place. there are a series of these small sherpa villages where people mostly live from the trekking industry. they sell supplies to backpackers backpackers, they provide lodgings, and it is a stop on the way to everest base camp.