Mosh in Nepal

2009-05-24T01:15:00.000-07:00

Cows in the middle of one of the busiest intersections in Kathmandu. All these pictures are in reverse chronological order, pretty much, and the captions haven't been given a lot of effort. Sorry.

Riding on top of the bus on the way back from Dhading.

Graduation. The last get-together in Dhading Besi.

Partying on our rooftop. Daal bhat was served there that night, then we partied. You can tell it was a good time, as the groom showed up from his own wedding party next door.

There was a wedding going on next door this past week. Above, dancing. One picture below: the joys of an arranged marriage. Three pictures below is of the three of us eating at the wedding earlier in the day, before the bride and groom arrived from the bride's home.

Our farewell ceremony at the school.

New clothes! Courtesy of my host family.

At our year-end Green Club picnic.

2009-05-10T03:19:00.000-07:00

A shot of the highway running through Gajuri, the village which I live in and which had no electricity the last ten days. Which means our fan was not working. And it's hot.

Emerging from the cave out by Nilkantha, one of the other placement villages. We were told it would be a couple hours walk each way, but we ended up gone for over 14 hours.

Andy dropping through one of the claustrophobia-inducing tight spots. The cave was (obviously) dark, and we were a little short on lights, but we made it.

Anish, our host. He was the one who told us it would be a two hour walk to the cave, allowing me to think I'd be home in time to see my Aama on Nepali Mother's Day. Sleeping another night at their place wasn't so bad, though, as their village is a bit higher up, and much cooler than ours.

The cave entrance.

I told Mom that I'd only be wearing white t-shirts once it got hot, so she sent me a pack of five for my birthday. I already had a few, so I decided to share with Saroj, Rajesh, and Suraya. They were a big enough hit that Saroj and Rajesh organized the family picture.

Family photo! Again I'll remind you that they are not as unhappy as they look, they just don't smile in pictures. Gotta love the symmetry amongst the kids, though.

In our 'kitchen'. I should mentioned it was recently remodelled, meaning it was built again with bigger sticks after the first one was blown over in a storm.

2009-04-16T10:38:00.000-07:00

Bananas do not come in regular sizes in Gajuri.

Putting up my first mosquito net.

The Green Club kids enjoying Cokes on the SPW dime.

Finished the drama. Waiting for food. These pictures are pretty well in reverse order, but I don't feel like fixing them. Because I don't really know how.

The whole cast and crew after the Adamara performance.

Sandesh from the Green Club was taking pictures during the drama in Sundrapur. The one above shows most of the audience, including my new friend, who didn't leave my side the whole time. I think that goat got in like twenty pictures.

Most of the time Nepali people pose for pictures like they are mug shots, or something to be approached with that sort of seriousness. But you can always count on Santosh.

Captions

2009-04-15T02:36:00.000-07:00

I had meant to add a few more captions to the trekking photos while I was still in Pokhara, but that fell through, so I added some today. We've since had two Green Club events, where we've staged street dramas about School Enrolment in Sundrapur and Adamara, the two communities that we do work in. I'll put pictures up of those soon, as well.

In response to questions: Mike, the prayer flags are everywhere, and like you said, they are often in places that I can't imagine people going to. Most bridges you cross are covered in them, and as you can see, the mountain pass had them all over, as well.
Marie, we weren't close to Everest. That's in the Eastern part of Nepal, or at least east in relation to where we are. It's apparently an absolute chore to even get to a place where you can see it. I didn't know much about mountains coming here, so I assumed you could just walk up to the base of the thing and take a picture. I've since learned the path to a specific mountain ususually consists of many other mountains, and those aren't the easiest things to traverse. Apparently Everest is particularly hidden, so it doesn't seem like I'll get there this trip. Ah well.

Trekking the Himalayas

2009-03-25T03:25:00.000-07:00

This picture needs to be on the blog, because that man standing in front of his 'hotel' (read: restaurant, sorta) makes the finest chow mein in the land for 15 rupees per plate.

This begins the trek pictures...

Those are huge metal pipes that those guys are carrying. They are wearing flip flops. Seeing them made the backpack feel a little lighter, and allowed me to realize all the jobs I've ever had weren't all that bad.

E boxed in by donkeys. We'd pass these guys all the time, as they carry goods over the mountain from village to village. They all wear bells, so every time they approached I'd think of Christmas.

Beers after a hard day of trekking. The owner of the hotel we were drinking at told Andy he was looking for a business partner, meaning he wanted someone to help him get weed to the U.S.

Our first dreadfully cold night was in Bagarchap, but waking up with this view out your window provides motivation. On the previous days the sky had been really hazy, so we hadn't seen any real mountains yet.

Spinning the prayer wheels.

Another spectacular view the next morning.

On the way out of Chame. My brand new rainbow colored mittens were tucked in to one of the straps of my backpack, ready to provide warmth and color for the rest of the trip.

The higher you climb and the closer you get to Thorung La, the more the villages show a Tibetan influence. This is one example.

The 'Gateway to Heaven'. Well put.

The frozen water fall above was the first ice or snow we saw. With a little encouragement from Andy, I ventured to check it out. Just before seeing this we saw our first Americans of the trips, a couple walking back from when they came, with a man admitting that he 'wasn't thinking'. Turned out altitude sickness had cost him his consciousness on the way over the pass, after he hadn't admitted to having a headache for five days.

We'd been looking everywhere for a bridge to cross the river so that we could head to Upper Timang instead of Lower. This was the bridge we found, and when we reached it we saw that it had previously had a barricade in front of it. We made it across, though.

A Buddhist monastery in Bryaga (just before Menang) that is over 1100 years old, more pictures of which are below. It was absolutely breathtaking. It doesn't have the sheer size of Westminster or St. Peter's or anything else, but it needs to be taken in to consideration that it is built in a place where building materials aren't exaclty readily available.

The monk's bedroom. Later, in the main hall, he tied strings around all our necks for good luck crossing the Thorung La (the pass). He didn't let E in the bedroom, though.

Goat traffic jam.

The last three or four nights before crossing the pass were frigid, so we'd push all the beds together, get in our sleeping bags, throw the blankets over top, and share the heat.

The morning we set out to cross the pass.

The beautiful struggle. While these pictures aren't quite genuine, the climb was really tough. Because of the altitude we'd be sucking wind after three steps uphill, and our legs were really feeling it. Fortunately, though, we were on Diamox the wonder drug, so we never really had any major altitude sickness issues. We were so prepared, in fact, that part way up there pass we were able to hook up some lady with some medicine to stop her vomiting, and we indeed saw her safely on the other side later that day.

At 5,416 meters. Can't imagine too many people were higher than we were at that point.

Hanging out with the Hindu holy men at Muktinath. It's a major destination for both Hindus and Buddhists. I'm going to throw all caution to the wind concerning who may be reading this blog and admit (read: brag) that we smoked weed with them. Sorry, Grandma. It's not a habit.

Andy walking around the Temple grounds at Muktinath.

The views on the walk from Muktinath to Jomsom. It was a pretty boring walk, as we were all tired and hungry.

Our transportation from Jomsom to Pokhara. Small plane, short runway. Scared the crap out of me initially, but it was a beautiful flight. Some uninformed cop told us there weren't any flights out on the day we wanted, so originally we believed we'd have to take a Jeep back. Real glad that didn't happen.

This computer is incredibly slow, so I'll edit this post and try to throw up a bunch of other pictures sometime today. For now, look at the pretty mountain!

Holi

2009-03-25T02:28:00.000-07:00

After one of many water balloon attacks.

Just before we set out on our trek was the Hindu festival of 'Holi' on March 10th. They call it a holiday of colors, so everyone has tika, and kids are armed with squirt guns and water balloons. It was awesome.

Random pictures!

2009-02-18T21:55:00.000-08:00

The top of Swayambhunath Temple.

Walking up to the temple. Many stairs, and many monkeys, had already passed.

These two monkeys were hanging out while I took the picture of Andy below, but when I went to have a picture taken of me, the one monkey jumped on to the top of the statue's head (while the other just chilled with his water bottle), a short distance from mine. When I had first arrived at the temple I had a juice box in my hand, and the first monkey I saw walked right up to me, and I tried to play it cool, until he started pawing at it, and when I pulled my hand away he started jumping after it. Someone told me not to tease them, although that hadn't been my intention at all. However, I decided to take all necessary precautions from that point forward, so when the monkey in this picture made a move towards me, I got the hell out of there.

Gathering outside in Adamara.

The boys at the swimming hole that Surya, our host brother, showed us.

This is the street we walk down to the school. From where I'm standing it's about a minute or two to the highway, and about four or five to school.

These bananas are my first step towards my very own 'tiny town'. There are regular sized bananas in Nepal, but mostly you find these little guys. Rajesh took this picture. For whatever reason, he likes to hold the camera at weird angles. I don't understand the kid.

The well our water comes from.

Our school's girls volleyball team.

Saroj and Rajesh at 'the tap', where we shower and wash clothes. It's about a three minute walk from the house.

Saroj washing a kid in Adamara at our Personal Hygiene presentation. I remember thinking, "I don't know if this would fly at home", and as he proceeded, thinking, "Okay, that definitely would not fly at home"

Classroom in Adamara.

Adamara.

Setting up for a Nutrition presentation in Sundrapur. On the far right is Surya, and the guy in the green shirt is Yogendra, one of our Green Club students.

Green Club Activities and a Trip to Gulmi

2009-02-01T22:10:00.000-08:00

Rajesh and his family. They're not unhappy, Nepali people often don't smile for pictures, despite the majority of them seeming to have pretty nice smiles.

Rajesh's house.

Rajesh and Saroj 'fishing' in a pond near his house that isn't much wider than that net they're using. They caught 10 fish, which I didn't eat. I told them I don't eat things that I've met when living, and still look the same when cooked (Nepali people prepare fish in a less-than-appetizing way sometimes).

Dodgeball! Pretty impressive game faces.

A realization that I've come to during my last few trips out of Gajuri is that I miss the village when I'm away, it's become home. I miss the guys, I miss my host family, I miss the kids, and I crave the chow mein at the 'hotel' (restaurant... sorta) we usually hit for kajaa, our afternoon, between daal bhat meal. I was especially ready to get back after the language training, as I'd been out of school for so long. On the Friday I returned we had an epic Green Club reformation meeting, where we officially reassembled the committees after the elections we'd held a month before. The kids told us at the meeting that the next day was the anniversary of the Green Club, and that they wanted to celebrate, so we set up a day of games. It went incredibly well. On a Saturday, the one day these kids don't have to be at school, over fifty of them showed up and stayed all day as we ran relay races, played dodgeball and volleyball, and did other activities. It was such a success because each and every student was completely involved and got the same chance to play every game, and that doesn't always happen.
After another week of classes, we learned that there was going to be another 10 days of exams. I was looking forward to some relaxation time at home, but Rajesh decided that he wanted to take Saroj and I to the village he was from. I wasn't extremely excited to go at that particular time, but I didn't know when I'd get another chance, so that Friday we set off. First was a 5-hour bus ride to Butwal, and then another, much more uncomfortable, 3-hour ride to a village in Gulmi, Rajesh's home district. From there, we walked another hour to Rajesh's home, finally arriving for a late daal bhat. While we sat in the kitchen, Rajesh's dad invited Saroj and I to share a 'hard drink' with him, and we went on to spend a few of my favorite hours in Nepal so far. For traditional respect reasons Rajesh was unable to drink with us, but it was very cool to spend time with an older Nepali who speaks capable English. Rajesh's father, a high school teacher, and a Brahmin (a high caste) talked about education and how lacking it is in Nepal, and about an organization he has set up that provides textbook for poorer and lower-caste (virtually one and the same) children. That evening alone was worth the trip, the return leg of which involved a 2-hour uphill walk (that Rajesh used to make every day for school... and you complain about your commute), a terrifying 20-min hitchhiked ride, and an 8-hour bus ride from a town called Ridi back to Gajuri.

Language Training in Kathmandu

2009-02-01T21:33:00.000-08:00

Andy eating Froot Loops. My only picture that came out of our department store trip, although hopefully Elizabeth has more.

Two twins pushed together to accomodate the three of us.

Durbar Square in Kathmandu.

Before I'd had a chance to get back in to the classroom in Gajuri, we found that our language training was scheduled for four days in Kathmandu. Unsure whether it would start on the Sunday or the Monday (Jan 11 or 12), I was told to be in Kathmandu by the Saturday. On the way there I got in the same microbus that Elizabeth and Jessie had caught out of Dhading Besi. Micros are similar to 15-passenger vans, with the biggest difference being that Nepali people see the '15 passenger' classification as a wholely unnecessary limitation. Jessie was on the back bench, with Elizabeth, myself, and another girl crammed in to the aisle with our knees jamming in to the backs of the person in front of us, bobsled style. I should mention that the two things that frighten me most in Nepal are its roads and its drivers. Many of the roads are cut in to the sides of enormous hills, and are rather narrow and wind all over the place. The drivers will pass at any time, with little care taken even when going around one of the many blind corners. Before coming around the corner they'll sound their horn-which usually has multiple notes and sounds like an old school cell phone ringtone-and just hope for the best, often having to slam on the brakes and duck back behind whomever they were passing. Fortunately, they typically travel quite slowly, although not slow enough to keep inexperienced Nepali passengers (of which there are many) from being carsick. In the future, bus and airplane travel will be easy for me, while cars and trains will feel better than I can possibly imagine. But anyway, back to the subject at hand.
Our language training was taught by Karuna and Prakash, the two more capable of the three instructors that we'd had our first month here. The third, Siddhi, wasn't always accurate with his translations and was quite lacking in English, making it a little more difficult to put things together. For language training they usually split us in to small groups, and Rachel, Elizabeth and I spend most of our time during the first month with Siddhi. To be honest, I missed him this time around, because he was absolutely hilarious, although I probably learned a little bit more during our second round of training.
However, the third day of language training I learned less than in any other day, because I got sick again. I learned later in the day that Rachel had, as well, although much worse than I. She went to the clinic and learned that she had a 'feces-to-mouth' sickness, meaning an unclean person or insect touched something she ate. The strong belief is that we got our sickness from an Indian-style sweet we'd eaten the previous day, which irritates me because it didn't even taste good. We'd bought the sweets for Hari, an outgoing SPW employee, who'd had us over for daal bhat. At the shop, we each chose a type of sweet and bought two of them, and we figure when Hari served them to us that Rachel and I ended up with the same kind. The sick day wasn't too bad for me, though, as I spent most of it sprawled across the super bed we'd made in the hotel room, two beds pushed together for Andrew, Andy and I. This bed, while cool, should not be confused with Roach and JW's superbed in the yellow house on Regent street, although the setting should be taken in to consideration when evaluating the overall awesomeness.
Besides missing the training, the downside of the sick day was missing out on The Lion King. The eight hours of electricity that day were from 4 to 8 a.m. and p.m., so a few people went to Cheer's to watch the DVD which Elizabeth had bought. I made it out later that night and caught the end of Schol of Rock (which Cheer's had) and a bit of food, and was okay for training the next day.
Other highlights of the week included a trip to Durbar Sqaure, and a trip to a department store. Durbar Square was very cool, with some huge, interesting temples. The department store was a much stranger experience. Since we've arrived, all of our shopping has been done in villages or in small stores in the tourist area of Kathmandu. All these stores are smaller than convenience stores at home, or are shops that you don't really walk in at all. For example, if I want soap, I walk to a shop and tell them I want soap. I'll either be handed what they have, or am offered a choice between two or three. That's how we shop. As Elizabeth, Andy and I walked in to the first floor grocery area of the five-storey department store, it was Andy that first realized we might not have really understood what we were getting in to. As much as I've heard about reverse culture shock, I didn't really think much of it, but we proceeded to be steamrolled by variety and taken aback by the availability of things like Keebler cookies, taco mix, canned frosting and bubble bath. While the walls of toothpaste and shampoo were overwhelming, we made the biggest scene in the cereal aisle after discovering Froot Loops and a Cinnamon Toast Crunch knockoff. Store employees were watching us by that point, and I'm sure it looked like were overreacting, but it was weird. I can't really explain why. With the cereal, we just don't eat it here, we eat daal bhat. I don't even drink milk, except in tea, and I love cereal and milk. Before we'd gone to the department store Elizabeth had discovered that the place we usually got breakfast near the hotel served Corn Flakes with cold milk. So we showed up there the next two days to order an empty bowl and a glass of milk, with Froot Loops in our backpack (although I only made it one day... damn sickness).
On the fifth floor of the department store Elizabeth bought here DVD (her host family has a player) and then we headed out the back of the store, to the first parking lot I'd seen since the Kathmandu airport in early November. It's funny to think about reverse culture shock because the first two Western cities I'll be in are London and New York, both of which I am a huge fan of. So while I'm a little wary of the shock, I still wouldn't mind a couple days in NYC, seeing as that I'll be there, anyway. If I'm going to go toe-to-toe with culture shock, I might as well take its best shot right away.

New Year's/2001 Massacre/Saroj Gets Sick

2009-02-01T21:03:00.000-08:00

It's been a little while since I've done a proper blog entry, so I apologize. I'm hoping these next few entries will be a nice balance of pictures and text, but I've gotten a little lazy with the picture taking of late. I didn't write a proper entry about our Christmas festivities, but I can sum it up by saying it was an absolutely fantastic weekend that however felt nothing like Christmas. I'm not complaining, though, as we saw cool things and ate great food.
Not only were we able to spend Christmas together but New Year's, as well, as our monthly District Meeting was held over three days in Dhading Besi, the district center. On New Year's Eve we stocked up on Pringles, party hats (that read 'Happy Birthday'... close enough) and booze and hung out with all the internationals in the hotel room of Andrew, Andy and I. To get an idea of how cheap it was compared to your New Year's, we guys each bought three bottles of Bullet Whiskey (probably 8 oz or so) for 40 rupees each, along with an 80 rupee 1.5 liter bottle of Coke, totalling 200 rupees, or a little less than $3 USD.
The next day we had a picnic with all the volunteers to celebrate. The picnic, combined with typical SPW Nepal disorganization helped stretch the meeting from a two-day affair in to three days, although I'm not really complaining. It is difficult to make any NGO run like clockwork, particularly in Nepal where punctuality and firmly established plans don't ever seem to be expected, and are rarely even considered. That said, we international volunteers were quite pleasantly surprised when Guru, the SPW National program co-ordinator, responded to our suggestions for future language training by immediately promising us another week of classes.
Not knowing when or where the language training would be, I went in to Kathmandu that weekend with Andrew so that I could put some pictures online and spend an iTunes gift card that I'd gotten for Christmas (on the new Killers and Bloc Party albums, 'Trashcan' by The Delta Spirit... and the Music Man soundtrack). On the first night in town we hit a pizza place called Fire and Ice, which used to be a favorite of the crown prince and his girlfriend, before he allegedly massacred his family in a drunken rage in 2001. You can read about that here. What is interesting about the prince is that no one in Nepal seems to believe he did it. The version I've heard is that the King's uncle, who succeeded the prince as king (the prince sat as king for mere hours while reportedly in a coma, although it is believed he died at the scene) was behind it all, and that's easy to believe seeing as that his immediate family, who were also at the picnic during which all this occurred, left with their lives. Whether I have that summary correct or not, I don't know, but I do know it was reported by all news outlets that the prince was the gunman. Nepalese disbelief of this had a lot to do with the revolution that happened over the following years and eventually lead to the elections that saw the Maoist party coming to power last year.
Undeterred by history and motivated by the delicious greasy pizza, we returned to Fire and Ice the next night. I had decided to extend my stay because our students in Gajuri were in exams and thus I had no classes to teach the next day. It worked out extremely well, because Andrew found out later that afternoon that he had been accepted in to Cambridge's medical school. He chose Fire and Ice for the first portion of the celebration, and Cheer's for the rest. Cheer's and it's Tongbas have already been mentioned in this blog, and it has become our favorite Kathmandu hangout where, appropriately, they know our names.
I returned to Gajuri the next day to discover something quite surprising: a volunteer was sick, and it wasn't me. Saroj had come down with something at the picnic three days before, and wasn't feeling any better. Our aama (host mother) pulled out a Nepali home remedy, having Saroj sit on a brick that had been heated up in the fire. Many Nepalese seem to believe that when it comes to being sick, hot is good and cold is bad. In fact, when Elizabeth caught a cold, she was told by many different people that the cause was surely all those oranges she'd been eating, what with oranges being a 'cold' food. When our aama pulled out the bricks, I asked Rajesh, who studies health, what he thought, and he was pessimistic. Indeed, it didn't work, and Saroj was off to the hospital in Kathmandu the next day. Rajesh went along, but our district co-ordinator said only one of us could join Saroj, so I stayed home without them for two days. While I love Saroj and Rajesh, those two days of privacy were awesome. When the guys got back and we were out around Gajuri again, people were always asking where we'd been for the past week. It was funny, because when we'd explain that Saroj had been sick and had to go to Kathmandu, everyone would ask, 'Not Ryan?'

Pictures!

2009-01-03T00:35:00.001-08:00

We had a picnic here on New Year's Day.

Fiamma is not petting the elephant's tongue, but if you don't put the banana in their trunk fast enough, they just open wide. This is how I fed my elephant the first five bananas I had.

Before the elephant races. Apparently they get dressed up Nascar-style.

Elephant ride. Rhinos. Cool.

Before our canoe ride, Christmas morning.

Christmas Eve dinner. Notice the Christmas tree in the background, decorated by the other six. I was next door for 15 minutes checking email, and it was then the restaurant folk had the SPW volunteers put the decorations on.

Our Green Club's drama. I have to learn 'Face the audience!' in Nepali.

Putting tikas on award winners.

Our host sister, Rita, is on the left.

This is Cheers Bar, the place we'd gotten the Thongba's before.

In to the new year...

2009-01-02T23:07:00.000-08:00

Sack race during the school's anniversary celebration. I introduced dodgeball to them, and it was a big hit during the trial run a few days before. Unfortunately, we ran out of time to do it during the celebration. If you are Nepali, or have been here long enough, you recognize that things around here run on 'Nepali time', which means everything and everyone is always late.

A few of the boys get after it on school clean-up day. This is toilet is the most disgusting one I've seen since Renton's bout with Edinburgh's worst in Trainspotting.

This is how you cross the river behind the school. In a basket. There are a lot of suspension bridges around, but I've seen quite a few places where this is how they do things.

Green Club Elections.

A game we played on World AIDS Day. Passing the ring of a condom from pen to pen. These girls are Santi and Laxmi, both Green Club Executive Board members.

Sandesh (Sawn-dess) and Rabi (Rah-be), also Green Club executive board members.

Our World AIDS Day Rally.

Our first Green Club meeting. The Green Club is our extra curricular group which help us get our message out to the school and community. The one at our school is quite big, and there's a lot of great kids in it

Group shot of a bunch of us in a closet-sized hotel room. This was the day when we all headed our separate ways, beginning our village stays.

My handkerchief. All the Nepali's carry them, and most of them have Titanic graphics on them. When I was shopping for one, shopkeepers would always pitch them to me, saying, 'Jack and Rose! Jack and Rose!'. Britney is usually found on t-shirts, and along with Avril Lavigne and pro wrestlers (usually John Cena), that's almost all these kids wear. It's pretty funny.

I should mention that when I upload pictures, the first one that loads is the one that ends up the bottom, so my captions may seem a little out of order, because sometimes they just aren't written in order.

I was looking at some old posts of mine and I realize that a lot of them are largely incoherent, so I'm going to work on straightening that out. A lot of the time when I'm on a computer I'm in a huge rush, either because there is a lot to do in Kathmandu, or because I'm in Dhading and don't know when the power is going to go out. Some of the girls have gone as far as writing their blog posts ahead of time, but I don't really have any desire to be that organized. I'll try a little harder, though.

I'm in Kathmandu now, and it's just Andrew and I. My school is in the middle of exams, so there isn't a lot for me to get done in Gajuri, so I came in to have a chance to blog and actually put up pictures. I also need contact solution, which is impossible to find outside of this city because Nepali people pretty much don't wear them. Whenever I'm putting mine in they stare at me like I'm levitating.

Other than a few things being unavailable, and the odd sickness, I'm adapting to village life quite well. Really, it's not quite what I expected when I began thinking about SPW this summer, or maybe it's just become normal to me. I have a cell phone (977 984 900 7241! Holler!), and I can charge my iPod, and everything that is different is getting easier. The tap I shower at in Gajuri is a couple of minute walk from our house, but it's not as popular as it once was now that the weather has gotten significantly colder, so as long as I head to it before 8 in the morning, it's all mine. In that sense I'm certainly benefitting from being Canadian, but things will get much more interesting when March hits and the weather gets stupidly hot. I've even been told that Gajuri and the other highway communities of the Dhading district get especially hot because we're a little lower, so there's no doubt in my mind that the heat will be the toughest thing I have to adapt to.

Fortunately, our house is completely concrete, so hopefully the sleeping is still okay. I may have mentioned before that our situation seems to be among the best ones of the eleven placement villages in the Dhading district. A lot of people are in mud huts, so are house is a definite perk. What I'm happiest about, though, is that I have a host family that didn't have SPW volunteers last year. A lot of the other volunteers have great families, I really can't say that anyone doesn't like their host family, but a lot of the families (and schools, for that matter) have a tendency to mention what their international volunteer did last year, and in many cases that is completely unfair. In some situations the volunteer used their own money to buy a lot of gifts for their family, or to do some very ambitious things at the school or in the community. Any by ambitious I mean expensive. It's hard to say that volunteers shouldn't make those sorts of contributions if they can, but it places certain expectations that just can't be met. What's important is making sure we teach the community groups and Green Clubs to do their own fundraising, which will actually be a fairly difficult task considering Nepal isn't exactly overwhelmed with disposable income. We have some ideas, though, including selling greeting cards made of recycle paper, and tea mats, plates and baskets made of straw and plastic wrappers. The wrappers make the plates colorful, so it's a pretty cool idea that we picked up from a former SPW volunteer while we were on vacation in Chitwan (more on him later). These things are great ideas, because waste management simply isn't a priority for most of Nepal. Garbage is typically burned or thrown in the river, which is a shame considering the beauty of this country.

I want to pause to note that I realize there should be two spaces after a period, but this space bar is sticking, or the computer is taking out the spaces without my realizing it. I mention this because some of my friends, while wonderful human beings, are quick to point out such errors. They know who they are.

I'm going to end this post with a virtual tour of the house. I think I'll do one more post with a bunch of vacation pictures, and then head out of Kathmandu, but I'll probably do another text-only blog in the near future.

A day in Dhading

2008-12-22T03:11:00.000-08:00

Not sure if I'll be glad I did this or not, but I ducked out of school early today to catch a bus and come to Dhading, the district center, so I could stay in a hotel tonight just so that I can get up tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. to watch the Monday Night Football television in my room. I know the Packers are bad, but I want to see why. Besides, two bus rides for a total of 100 rupees plus a hotel room for 300 equals a grand total of $5 US. So it's a Christmas present to myself.

Wednesday we take off to Chitwan for a few days for Christmas. We're riding elephants. The rest, as far as I'm concerned, is just details.

Today's bus ride was nice, but not nearly as nice as my last two. We came up to Dhading last Saturday, and we went to and from on the bus. On top of the bus. The first time was just Saroj, Rajesh and I on top of a full size bus, but on the way back it was the three of us plus Andy and Ashish who were coming to visit. This time, though, we were on the roofrack of a smaller bus, and we were joined by two goats, one of whom hid his head under my leg, which was fine, except when he decided to lift his head. At that time I'd get the horn. I remember hearing about riding on the top of buses and thought it sounded pretty cool, but damn, some of those roads get pretty high. The first ride I was on the outside, and I'm not huge on heights, so I threw my earphones on, turned Bloc Party all the way up, and just looked forward. I'd lean in when we were going around corners, like I would on a roller coaster or something. It turned out to be a pretty good time, and it was a beautiful day, so it was worth it.

In other news, I've been sick twice more. The most recent was easy, but the time before was terrible. I couldn't keep anything down at all, and the cramps were brutal, so I ended up taking a nice ambulance ride to a nearby hospital-type thing (I'm not quite prepared to call it a proper hospital). They gave me some good stuff, though, so I felt alright after a few hours, but the doctor had me stay overnight, with an IV in the entire time. Saroj or Rajesh would follow me around holding the IV if I had to hit the bathroom, and one time they both came with me, as we were talking and whatnot. Seemed like a good idea until we couldn't get the door open to get back out. Fortunately we were on the ground floor, so out we went through the window, IV and all.

This week our school had their anniversary where parents and other locals came, and we made a 10,000 rupees donation to a kid in our Green Club who was recently diagnosed with cancer. It worked out nicely, because the crowd donated 27,000 more. I'll try to write more about him (Namarach) soon, he's a great kid.

Anyway, the hotel I'm staying at serves french fries (or finger potatoes, if you will), and the little kids playing GTA behind me keep bumping in to me, so I'm getting out of here. Daal bhat is tasting good again after a few rough days post-sickness, but I love getting some different food. I just finished 'The Odyssey', which I picked up for 25 cents, and the book drove me crazy. They feast every two pages in that book.

Sorry there are no pictures this time, as this computer is a joke, but I may have a chance later this week. There's plenty more to hit on, as well. Hope everyone has a great holiday.

First week in Gajuri

2008-12-05T19:38:00.000-08:00

The roomies in our room before we got it all sorted out. While other volunteers have complained about rodents in their rooms, we've only had salamanders.

Our house. I'm kind of disappointed that I don't have a better picture of it, but oh well. Our room is on the right on the second floor. We have as nice a house and as nice a room as any of the other volunteers in other villages.

Daal bhat! This is what we eat everyday, twice a day, at about 9:30 and 6:00. That's the first helping of everything before our 'aama' comes around trying to put more on the plate. The bowl in the top left hand corner is for daal, a broth with lentils in it. The top left and right corners of the plate have different chili-type stuff, and the top is a mixed of steamed veggies. Our family does a really nice job of rotating through different chillis and veggies, so it hasn't really gotten boring yet. On top of that, it's really good, so I don't think I'll have too much problem eating this for the next six months. I figure it's pretty much like a burrito bowl at Chipotle, but the meat only shows up now and then. We actually eat at a kitchen table, too, and it's always just me, Saroj and Rajesh. I was given the option of using cutlery, but I declined.

Our school in Gajuri.

Andy and I doing laundry in the river in Dhading, where our district office is and where we had our last week of traning.

I finally have a Nepali 'home', and so far so good. I can't really figure out where to begin, but I'm going to have to wait forever for pictures to load, so I'll probably just ramble and hope I hit the proper topics.

I can hit the basics first. My host family has four kids, but only three of them live with us. Their eldest daughter is married and lives elsewhere, leaving two daughters and a son sharing the room beside mine. The youngest daughter is in grade 10 at our school, but I have no clue how old she is, probably 16 or 17. She also has a friend who stays at our house because she lives too far away from school. The son is probably about 18, and he doesn't go to school anymore because he failed his exam for whatever grade he was in and decided not to go back. As you may expect, the education system here is a little out of whack, so in order to move on to the next grade you have to pass an exam at the end of the year, which from what I understand isn't the best-written test in the world. Because of this, kids can be all sorts of ages in any given grade. I was in a grade 8 class two days ago and I think the kids probably ranged from like 11 or 12 to 16 or 17. The eldest daughter in our family is probably in her early 20s, and I believe she exited school the same way.

All in all, our family is very nice. Our baabu (Dad) and aama (Mom) are both quite nice, as are the kids, but none of them speak a lick of English. That became a bit of a problem on Wednesday, when my weak Western stomach decided it wasn't cool with the undercooked buffalo-meat from the night before. I decided to stay home from school, and at around noon I was woken up by some guy I'd never seen before. He starting asking me questions in broken English, and I could see aama and baai (younger bro) at the doorway. I told him I was feeling fine and just needed to rest, but he wasn't getting it and kept talking about going to the hospital and other jibberish. He asked where Saroj and Rajesh (the roomies) were, and then asked for their cell numbers. I figured that was cool, because they could tell him to relax. But when he got off the phone, he told me they'd be home within 5 minutes, and they ran home because the guy had told them I was seriously sick. Now, I understand that there was a lot lost in translation, but I was sitting up in bed talking to the guy so casually that I can't believe he didn't clue in to the fact that I was okay. Apparently it's the Nepali way to over-worry about people, which is too bad, because it's the Ryan Mosher-way to want to be left the hell alone. I'd been looking forward to having a few hours to myself, but oh well. The bug passed quickly, as I was eating full daal bhat at six. Aama didn't want to give me any of the spicy stuff, but that's the best part, so I had her pile some on.

School is going quite well, too, although we're not doing a lot just yet. We go in to free classes and play games and talk about the Green Club (our after-school program) with kids. It's pretty odd, because during these free classes the kids could be running around in the school yard, but they all run to class when we ask them to. Kids that aren't in the class often try to look through the windows, and then beg us to come to their class next, it's pretty cool.

Anyway, I'm being called to head to Mike's Breakfast, the greatest restaurant in the world. While I enjoy daal bhat, getting a break from it is very nice. French toast and a banana pancake today, I think.

Still in Kathmandu, so more pictures

2008-11-19T07:31:00.000-08:00

Andy was on the phone, so I walked across the alley way to the bar. These two guys were drinking 'Tongbas', so I figured I'd get in on it. The Tongba was a rather weird drink, with hot water and some sort of liquor poured over seeds or berries or something, I don't even know. I switched right back to beer afterwards.

My side of mine and Saroj's room. The room was great, I'll be ecstatic if the next one is as nice.

When I first saw the thumbnail of this picture I thought it was of my host family's house. But it's not, it's Jessie's.

The tap, on the road in front of the house I stayed in last week. This was my shower, and place to do laundry.

We're in Kathmandu again tonight because there was a strike near Dhading, so the roads were closed. Not really sure what the strikes consist of, but they used to be quite frequent, I'm not sure how often they happen now. But people block the road, so we can't head up there. We're not entirely sure of the circumstances surrounding this one, but it sounds pretty bad. Apparently there were a couple of people missing for the last couple months (I've heard that they were students and I've heard that they were politicians... perhaps neither is true), and the body of one was found today. Sounds gruesome, but I can assure you we're in no danger, so don't worry about it.

In other news, you should check out Elizabeth's blog, who is putting up pictures, too.... ewray123.blogspot.com.

2008-11-18T04:08:00.000-08:00

The SPW office in Kathmandu.

Kathmandu. More specifically, Thamel, the touristy district. We ate dinner the first night we were here on the deck/terrace area below the Carlsberg sign.

Post #2 of the day

2008-11-18T01:29:00.000-08:00

The house I stayed in the past week. My room is the door on the left.
So I'll keep going and see if I can add a couple more pictures. The one above is a picture from around the campfire. Rajesh, holding the drum on the right side of the picture, is one of my two roommates for my placement.
Another campfire picture. Saroj, my other placement roommate, is the guy furthest to the left.

Above is the view from the terrace of the training center.

After a week at the training center we moved to a nearby village, which was about a twenty minute walk away. I was staying with Saroj, a 19-year from the Eastern end of the country that is probably one of the best couple English speakers there. He is ridiculously polite, as most of the Nepalese are. We stayed with a family that had one young daughter. Their house was great, and if my placement house (and room) is anywhere near as good (or if the daal bhat is as good), I'll jump through hoops. It was real village living, sitting on the floor to eat daal bhat, using the toilet Nepali-style (though with toilet paper), and cows and goats walking all over the place. In fact, I was walking with Guru, the program coordinator, back from a hike up the top of the hill, and two cows ran by, followed by a bull, who took a few quick steps towards us before heading back in line with the others. Scary.

The week at the village was pretty similar to the previous one, besides the change in living conditions. Last night we found out the people we will be living with, and where we'll be. I'll be with Saroj, and Rajesh. Rajesh is 21, and he's been taking medical training, so if a snake bites me he'll hook me up. If a leopard bites me I'm not so sure. Our placement is in the Dhading district, which is to the west of Kathmandu, and our village is Gujari, which is 23 miles from Dhading, where our district center is. We are a few kilometers off the highway, and we are fairly close to Kathmandu, which is nice. My village is an easy walk from both Rachel and Fiama's, and Andy, Andrew and Elizabeth are all close to Dhading, so they'd be easy to visit, as well. A funny story about the village is that Cody, last year's volunteer you all know from the pictures, said Gujari was the only place where the volunteer wasn't allowed to use toilet paper. However, we'll be in a different house, so I think I'm fine.

Anyway, we're in Kathmandu tonight and then we head for a week of training at the district center tomorrow. After that it's time for our placements. Tonight, beers.

Hope you all enjoyed the updates. Glad I got the chance to write at length! Time to go find a donut or something. May try to sneak in here later and give more pictures a shot, as well.

2008-11-18T00:47:00.000-08:00

This is me with two kids from the village near our training center. They were using a bamboo stick that they folded in to a triangle to push along a little ring, which you can see the one kid holding. I tried, and was terrible at it.

Okay, this picture took like 8 years to load, but these are the international volunteers for this year. This is just after we finished our whopping two weeks of language training (past volunteers have gotten like 4... not sure why we were shorted). The guy on the far right is Prakash, one of three language trainers, and the girl three from the right is Korona, one of the others. The third guy, Siddhi, was gone that day, which is too bad, because he was hilarious and the skit we had to do that day was completely geared towards him. The rest of the cast of characters are, from left: Elizabeth (from Tennessee), Andrew (London), Fiama (Milan), me, Laura (Philly), Andy (Baltimore), and Jessie (Atlanta).

Not sure where to begin. We spent the first week in a hotel/hostel of sorts at a training center. I shared a room with Andy and Andrew, and our neighbors were 5 of the Nepali guys who got up MUCH earlier than we did, but that was never a very big deal. It took me three days, but I finally decided to jump in to the shower, which was frigid. But by about the third time I was used to it, so I showered every day for the rest of the week there. There were two shower stalls for everybody, and four toilets -- two of which were proper Western-style toilets, while the other two were the 'long drop' ones, which are in the floor and you have to squat for. Didn't use those that week.

The food is always 'daal bhat', which is a mix of lentils (daal), rice (bhat), curry, veggies, and which sometimes features chicken. The curry is usually a mix of a number of things, including potatoes, beans, peas, cauliflower, chicken or whatever else is available. I'd say it's similar to Indian food, but isn't anywhere near as spicy. It's spicy enough for me, though, so it has the right amount of flavor. At the training center we ate daal bhat at 1 and 7, and we had breakfast everyday, as well, which alternated between toast and jam and cereal and milk. The toast and jam was awesome, although the toast wasn't all that toasted, so I'd always grab a few slices of that and a hard-boiled egg (which was available every day). Cereal days were more iffy, because the milk has to be boiled to get the bad stuff out of it, so that was a weird experience. The water is typically boiled, as well, and I've drank it at all temperatures, and to be honest the warm water really hasn't bothered me. The food has been good, overall, too, although when we get back in to the city we hit the Western food pretty hard. Today, for example, Andy spotted 'Mike's Breakfast' on the way in, which is owned by a former Peace Corps volunteer. I had Eggs Benedict, a milkshake, and shared a plate of bacon.

We spent the days at the training center with four two-hour sessions. Three of them would be language, and for the last one we'd join the national volunteers (the Nepalese) for whatever they were doing. Usually it was largely in Nepali, but we got out of it what we could. Every night there would be activities, too, which usually was kicked off with a bonfire (usually when the electricity was out, which happens for a few hours every day). Nepali people know song after song after song, and they don't need to be around a campfire to sing it, but it's there that they specialize. I'm trying to include a couple campfire pictures, but they are currently loading, so we'll see what happens. The most interesting songs are like a battle, where they figure out a tune, and a girl and a guy take turns singing verses that pretty much make fun of each other. Over the last while I'd be sure to cozy up to someone who knew what was going on, because when the Nepalis would roar you'd know you missed something funny. When we'd see that the lights had come back on, we'd go to the training hall and play games.

This has been a very long post, and I managed to get two pictures added, so I'll continue on about my next week with another post.

Finally in Kathmandu

2008-11-03T09:21:00.000-08:00

After a weekend in London, and then about 12 hours on a plane, I am now 11 hours and 45 minutes away from the Central Standard Time Zone. Not really sure why the 45 minutes, but hey.

I flew Qatar Airways in to Doha, Qatar, had a three-hour layover and then flew QA again to Kathmandu. The visa process was a bit of a pain in the ass, as everyone that gets off the plane flocks to these 9 or 10 tables lined up along a wall with information to fill out. It took us a while to find the right sheets, and as I filled out my visa form I realized I had left my passport-size photos in the bad I had checked. Fortunately, they take pictures there, so I exchanged my Canadian $20 bill for 1145 Nepalese rupees and got my picture taken there

Anyway, I am now getting booted out of the internet cafe. We just finished eating here in the Thamel area of Kathmandu, a somewhat touristy area. Our hostel is here, but tomorrow we head out to a training village, so I won't be able to post for a couple of weeks. May get time tomorrow, though.

Anyway, if you wanna check out where I'm at now... I didn't have my camera... but here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thamel

More Pictures and SPW info

2008-10-25T10:29:00.000-07:00

Looks like I can only post a certain number of pictures per post, so here' s a few more.

Also, here's the Students Partnership Worldwide website: http://www.spwusa.org/
There's a lot of great information on there, whether you just want to have a better idea of what I'm doing or if you're looking to do something like this yourself.

A view of the village Cody lived in.

The village where they trained last year.

Pictures from a former volunteer

2008-10-25T10:05:00.000-07:00

So I've finally set up a blog. I apologize for taking so long, but hey, at least I got it set up before I left. I am getting on a train in Portage, WI at noon on Tuesday which will get me to Chicago at about 4:00 that day, Washington at 1:00 on Wednesday, and finally Newark at 7:00 on Wednesday. I fly out of Newark the next morning (the 30th), then spend three days in London before flying out of there on Sunday evening (November 2nd). We have a layover early the next morning in Qatar, and then finally arrive in Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, at 4:00 on Monday, November 3. That is, of course, local time. I don't have a clue what time that is compared to here, but it's a fair assumption that my biological clock will be shot.

In the meantime, I've gotten some pictures from Cody, one of last year's volunteers, so I can show you what things will look like when I get over there. These pictures include some of the village where Cody lived and worked, his house, his host family, and the other volunteers from last year.

One of the other volunteers sitting in the doorway of their bedroom. In each village there are typically three volunteers, one international along with two from Nepal.

The bedroom.

All of the Volunteer Peer Educators (VPEs), the more specific term for what I will be.

Overlooking the village.