Well I have finished my teaching for the day and as we still have power (a novel, brilliant event!) I thought I would write a quick post describing a typical school day.
5am Wake up and go for a 30 min walk. It is still quite unusual for Nepalese people to exercise, being chubby is considered beautiful and a sign of wealth. This attitude is slowly changing and in central Kathmandu and richer areas there are gyms and adverts for personal trainers. Balkumari has not seen this change yet, so the only time I can exercise is a morning walk with the junior maths teacher. Its actually quite nice to walk through the town watching everyone get up and go to the temples for their morning Pooja (prayer).
6am- 6:15am this is our allocated shower time. The water is pumped up to the roof when the electricity is running, we have to get in early otherwise the water is all used up by the boarders!
6:30- 7am Prayer and yoga time for the boarders. I often sit in on this, although i don't understand the prayers the Hindu hymns are really beautiful and its quite refreshing to do the yoga lessons
7-8: Study time for the boarders: I use this opportunity to finish off any last minute marking and lesson planning as well as helping the boarders with any homework trouble.
8-8:30 - get dressed in school clothes for the day. We are teaching wearing traditional Nepali tunics so i get changed out of my western clothes into the beautifully embroidered tunics. These are very comfortable, however I am still to find a way of arranging my scarf - it is considered immodest to be seen without it, but mine keeps falling off and getting in the way!
8:30 - Breakfast! My favourite meal of day :) Usually we have sweet tea, toast with mango jam and some form of curry or noodle.
9am - morning assembly. The children all stand in rows and do some exercises including standing to attention and about turning. The school song is sung and morning pooja done.
9:30-12:30 - Morning lessons. Each lesson is 40 mins long and there is a 5 minute break
12:30 - 1:15 - Lunch time.... Dal Baht (And I treat myself to a hob nob to satisfy my sugar craving)
1:15 - 4 pm - Afternoon lessons
4-7pm - Boarders study time. I use this time to volunteer at the Ashram which provides after school care and homework help to underprivileged children (usually from the Dalit, untouchable Caste - more on caste in later posts!)
7-8pm - More prayer and yoga, sometimes we do some dancing and singing.
8pm - Dinner - Dal Baht and curry. My favourite is potato curry and Aachar which is a spicy tomato pickle.
9:30pm - Bed...
In other news I am going to be a Nepali TV star! (Ok I will have a bit part in a soap opera) One of the ex-students has asked Sarah and I if we will take bit parts in a popular Nepali soap about college life (think Nepali Holyoaks). The program is broadcast on cable channels in 86 different countries. One of us will play a teacher and the other will play the part of a foreign student... very exciting.
Monday, 27 April 2009
Sunday, 26 April 2009
A Fragile Peace?
Some of you may know that Nepal is just emerging from a long Maoist insurgency that crippled most of the country and made travel around Nepal quite difficult. As part of hte peace process elections were held and a new constituent assembly has been formed to draft a constitution and develop a new government. However as with all these things, bureaucracy is slowing the process and fighting between the main political parties is causing problems. I thought I would recount one of these arguments that is being played out at the moment...
For the Nepali new year the 2nd National Games were held in Kathmandu. These games include every sport from swimming and athletics to football, badminton and chess! Each major group in Nepali society entered a team including the police, the armed police, the western states etc ect. However the games were shrouded in controversy as the Nepali Army (NA) refused to compete in events that had participants from the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA - Maoist). They claim that the PLA, which should be being integrated in to the NA as part of the peace process, hadn't entered properly and thus were breaking the rules. In reality the NA have spent so long viewing the PLA as the enemy that them both competing on an even platform was probably never going to work. General Katawal of the NA withdrew all his contestants from events with PLA competitors and in doing so angered the Maoist led political party the U-CPN (I think this stands for unified communist party of Nepal). General Katawal has also angered the U-CPN by reinstating 8 army generals who had didn't have their contracts renewed at the end of the last year, this was part of a process to shrink the army to allow space for the PLA.
The situation escalated to such a point that on Tuesday both sides were reportedly planning minor coupes to regain control. The NA plan involved sending the UN monitors of the Maoist cantonments home and seizing all the PLA weapons before overthrowing the government. the U-CPN threatened that unless Katawal steps down, retires and is replaced by a Maoist friendly general they will quite the government and start the agitation (terrorism) that thwarted the country for so long. I wonder if the army will ever accept responsibility to the government (whatever colour) and whether the PLA combatants will ever be able to accept joining the army who they fought for so long?
This example shows just how fragile the Nepalese political process is. Everyday there is political demonstration of some sort in Kathmandu center and large parts of the country are brought to a stand still by strikes which stop all movement along the roads and the airports.
I do not understand enough about the previous conflict to comment on which party or process is the best for Nepal (although my gut says that a party which still teaches children as young as 5 how to soot and still threatens families with torture for not supporting their cause is not ideal), I just hope that the country manage to sort their political process out as there is no hope for development until the situation is stable.
For the Nepali new year the 2nd National Games were held in Kathmandu. These games include every sport from swimming and athletics to football, badminton and chess! Each major group in Nepali society entered a team including the police, the armed police, the western states etc ect. However the games were shrouded in controversy as the Nepali Army (NA) refused to compete in events that had participants from the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA - Maoist). They claim that the PLA, which should be being integrated in to the NA as part of the peace process, hadn't entered properly and thus were breaking the rules. In reality the NA have spent so long viewing the PLA as the enemy that them both competing on an even platform was probably never going to work. General Katawal of the NA withdrew all his contestants from events with PLA competitors and in doing so angered the Maoist led political party the U-CPN (I think this stands for unified communist party of Nepal). General Katawal has also angered the U-CPN by reinstating 8 army generals who had didn't have their contracts renewed at the end of the last year, this was part of a process to shrink the army to allow space for the PLA.
The situation escalated to such a point that on Tuesday both sides were reportedly planning minor coupes to regain control. The NA plan involved sending the UN monitors of the Maoist cantonments home and seizing all the PLA weapons before overthrowing the government. the U-CPN threatened that unless Katawal steps down, retires and is replaced by a Maoist friendly general they will quite the government and start the agitation (terrorism) that thwarted the country for so long. I wonder if the army will ever accept responsibility to the government (whatever colour) and whether the PLA combatants will ever be able to accept joining the army who they fought for so long?
This example shows just how fragile the Nepalese political process is. Everyday there is political demonstration of some sort in Kathmandu center and large parts of the country are brought to a stand still by strikes which stop all movement along the roads and the airports.
I do not understand enough about the previous conflict to comment on which party or process is the best for Nepal (although my gut says that a party which still teaches children as young as 5 how to soot and still threatens families with torture for not supporting their cause is not ideal), I just hope that the country manage to sort their political process out as there is no hope for development until the situation is stable.
Tuesday, 21 April 2009
Finding the way.
"Chabhilchabhilpashtinatpathbaddnarthbaktipil...." The sing song of the bus conductor as the bus crawls past. This cry is muffled by the incessant beeping of the passing trucks and other buses, as well as the lady at my arm pestering me to buy a necklace 'Very cheap, only 50ruppees, very pretty, bring good luck miss'. 'ChabhilChabilPash...' Accepting that I will never be able to locate a singular place name in the cry of the conductor (although it doesn't stop me trying each time I neeed to catch a bus) I run to the door and questioningly ask Pashtinathpath (or Chabhil, or Boddnarth etc). This is a slightly risky business, firstly although I am trying Nepali sounds are really really difficult and although I think the the place name is right I can never be truly sure, secondly I think the bus conductors like to have westerners on the bus (this is maybe through curiosity at our dress, white skin etc or more likely they can charge us whatever they like and pocket teh difference because we are too dim to know better!), thirdly the Nepalis like to be helpful so will often answer yes just to be polite even if they have no idea what you just asked. Actually I'm not being entirely truthful, I have another weapon at my disposal... It appears that the buses on certain routes tend to be of similar colours, for example the ring road bus going east is always blue and white stripped, whereas the bus going to teh center of town has always been yellow and green. However I'm not sure on the reliability of the colour method for finding directions as I often see the wrong colour bus going along a road that I don't think it should be ?!? ( I asked Vishnu Sir about my colour theory and he had no idea, saying that the Nepalis just listen for the place names and its really not that difficult!) Once committed to a bus I carefully follow the route in the Lonely Planet map (where would we be without the wonder that is the LP), this is also complicated by the Kathmandu roads having no names and often there being no space on teh bus so we are squished in the middle without being able to see a window. Surprisingly more times than not we have arrived at our destination although not always by the most direct route.
The chaotic bus system is actually quite a good descriptor of life in Nepal. In that I have no idea how it works, and am often quite lost but somehow everything seems to work out. Take for instance a side project that I am helping out with. Head Sir also runs an organisation Santi Sewar Ashram which is an umbrella organisation for a number of projects including a street children feeding project, drug rehabilitation and an after school homework help club for the local children. I have volunteered to help with the homework help (although I will also be helping with the street children next week). The program starts with chanting and a spiritual direction all in Sanskrit or Nepali. Children sitting everywhere, no apparent order. Then the children come to me individually with various questions about science or maths (yesterday I had the whole of grade four acting out the solar system to describe how day and night come about - I was the Sun :) )yet still there is no order or method in the people who come one minute I am explaining how to form the past tense to a 13 year old and the next helping with basic counting for a 7 year old). Yet somehow the whole system seems to work!
Its actually quite harrowing helping at the Ashram, take one boy Jaggared who to look at you would guess his age at 7. He is fact just severely malnourished and is 15! Yet despite his situation he is incredibly intelligent, hard working and so polite. I have a huge sense of uselessness that teaching in English is just not going to help him that much.
Oh well I must get on, Maths with grade 10 in 15 mins. They are studying for the equivalent of GCSE and yet are doing maths that most English A-Levels students would struggle with (2nd order differential equations). Kind of embarrassing to realise that these students have better maths skills learning in a foreign language than most English people do learning in their mother tongue.
The chaotic bus system is actually quite a good descriptor of life in Nepal. In that I have no idea how it works, and am often quite lost but somehow everything seems to work out. Take for instance a side project that I am helping out with. Head Sir also runs an organisation Santi Sewar Ashram which is an umbrella organisation for a number of projects including a street children feeding project, drug rehabilitation and an after school homework help club for the local children. I have volunteered to help with the homework help (although I will also be helping with the street children next week). The program starts with chanting and a spiritual direction all in Sanskrit or Nepali. Children sitting everywhere, no apparent order. Then the children come to me individually with various questions about science or maths (yesterday I had the whole of grade four acting out the solar system to describe how day and night come about - I was the Sun :) )yet still there is no order or method in the people who come one minute I am explaining how to form the past tense to a 13 year old and the next helping with basic counting for a 7 year old). Yet somehow the whole system seems to work!
Its actually quite harrowing helping at the Ashram, take one boy Jaggared who to look at you would guess his age at 7. He is fact just severely malnourished and is 15! Yet despite his situation he is incredibly intelligent, hard working and so polite. I have a huge sense of uselessness that teaching in English is just not going to help him that much.
Oh well I must get on, Maths with grade 10 in 15 mins. They are studying for the equivalent of GCSE and yet are doing maths that most English A-Levels students would struggle with (2nd order differential equations). Kind of embarrassing to realise that these students have better maths skills learning in a foreign language than most English people do learning in their mother tongue.
Friday, 17 April 2009
Temples, festivals and paragliding
Happy Nepali New Year (2066) ! We brought in the new year in the Busy Bee bar in Pokhara serenaded by a Nepali rock cover band and surrounded by prayer flags... This was possibly one of the funniest events I have ever attended. It was completely surreal to be surrounded by Tibetan prayer flags, Nepali motorcycle clubs and the rock band. Apparently teh Nepalis love rock music, however the rock band was hilarious. Picture the scene, there is a young boy with long hair wearing traditional Nepali dress head banging to Pink Floyd (Dark Side of the Moon), surrounding him are a couple of other lads (they honestly looked no more than 12) in various degrees of western dress playing the guitar and the drums. In the audience stand women in saris and boys in jeans and t-shirts with the motorcycles club logo all head banging. Once Pink Floyd had ceased there was an awkward pause while the lead singer changed page to find the words to his next song - I'm afraid I couldn't contain my laughter when he started up with Chris Rea, Lady in Red! This was followed by Aerosmith and then Celine Dion... After I had got over the shock and the hilarity of the situation we actually had a really good evening. We met up with the paragliding instructors from earlier in the day and chatted about flying.
The next day we caught the bus back to Kathmandu which took 8 hours winding through the hills - I decided it was prudent to take the tourist bus this time to avoid 8 hours sat on teh roof! We were met with a traditional Nepali new years day celebration in the school. We ate a feast of Momos (dumpling like food with spicey vegetable filling and spicey tomato sauce), Paprika (I admitted that i had actually never eaten paprika before, much to the amusement of the children), mangos, coca-cola (a delicacy) and Dal Baht. We were made to feel so at home it was just wonderful. Then we progressed to dancing and playing Nepali games.
There are still a couple of days until we start teaching so we have spent them visiting various temples and the older parts of Kathmandu. My Nepali has now improved to the point of asking directions ( and understanding the answers), asking prices and boarding buses ( although this is still a little haphazard, today I managed to go teh wrong way round the ring road - twice!)
The temples are amazing, only in Nepal are teh Hindu and Buddhist faiths so closely related, you can be happily enjoying a Hindu temple and round teh corner there are hundreds of Tibetan Buddhists worshiping on the other wall. I think its really amazing how tolerant and understanding of other religions the Nepalese people are. Despite my wonderment at teh colours and the architecture of the temples it can also be quite a gory time. I have seen more animal sacrifices than I thought possible in such a small amount of days and today i also witnessed 3 Hindu funeral pyres. Teh Hindu people believe ( and I apologise for anything i have got wrong here I do not mean to offend anyone) that the cycle of life, death and rebirth can only happen if they are burnt on a pyre lit by the oldest son of the family. The corpses are carried to the temple on teh day of death and surrounded by incense, offerings and flowers and then placed on a stone pyre according to which caste the deceased belonged to ( the higher the caste the closer to teh temple the stone slab is). The fire is then lit by the son won walks around teh body chanting Sanskrit incantations. Quite interesting but also quite macabre to watch. Particularly macabre was all teh western tourists crowding on the bridges to get a closer look and shoving their telescopic lens in the faces of the deceased family - sometimes I am ashamed to be a western tourist in lands such as this.
It was also interesting to note that further DOWN steam from the funeral pyres people were washing their clothes and collecting water for cooking. It made me realise just how poor some of the people are here. It is very easy to forget that Nepal is very defiantly a developing country as everyone is so positive and friendly and there are so few beggars, but sites such as people washing and cooking surrounded by rubbish in a river really bring it home again...
The next day we caught the bus back to Kathmandu which took 8 hours winding through the hills - I decided it was prudent to take the tourist bus this time to avoid 8 hours sat on teh roof! We were met with a traditional Nepali new years day celebration in the school. We ate a feast of Momos (dumpling like food with spicey vegetable filling and spicey tomato sauce), Paprika (I admitted that i had actually never eaten paprika before, much to the amusement of the children), mangos, coca-cola (a delicacy) and Dal Baht. We were made to feel so at home it was just wonderful. Then we progressed to dancing and playing Nepali games.
There are still a couple of days until we start teaching so we have spent them visiting various temples and the older parts of Kathmandu. My Nepali has now improved to the point of asking directions ( and understanding the answers), asking prices and boarding buses ( although this is still a little haphazard, today I managed to go teh wrong way round the ring road - twice!)
The temples are amazing, only in Nepal are teh Hindu and Buddhist faiths so closely related, you can be happily enjoying a Hindu temple and round teh corner there are hundreds of Tibetan Buddhists worshiping on the other wall. I think its really amazing how tolerant and understanding of other religions the Nepalese people are. Despite my wonderment at teh colours and the architecture of the temples it can also be quite a gory time. I have seen more animal sacrifices than I thought possible in such a small amount of days and today i also witnessed 3 Hindu funeral pyres. Teh Hindu people believe ( and I apologise for anything i have got wrong here I do not mean to offend anyone) that the cycle of life, death and rebirth can only happen if they are burnt on a pyre lit by the oldest son of the family. The corpses are carried to the temple on teh day of death and surrounded by incense, offerings and flowers and then placed on a stone pyre according to which caste the deceased belonged to ( the higher the caste the closer to teh temple the stone slab is). The fire is then lit by the son won walks around teh body chanting Sanskrit incantations. Quite interesting but also quite macabre to watch. Particularly macabre was all teh western tourists crowding on the bridges to get a closer look and shoving their telescopic lens in the faces of the deceased family - sometimes I am ashamed to be a western tourist in lands such as this.
It was also interesting to note that further DOWN steam from the funeral pyres people were washing their clothes and collecting water for cooking. It made me realise just how poor some of the people are here. It is very easy to forget that Nepal is very defiantly a developing country as everyone is so positive and friendly and there are so few beggars, but sites such as people washing and cooking surrounded by rubbish in a river really bring it home again...
Sunday, 12 April 2009
Poon Hill Trek
I'm resting my aching muscles after a 4 day trek of some of the most beautiful walking I have ever done up to Poon Hill and Ghandruk. On Wednesday morning after eating a hearty breakfast of porridge and honey Sarah and I set about trying to negotiate a taxi to take us to Nyapol the entry point to the Annapurna Conservation area and the start point of most of the Annapurna based treks. We arrived into Nyapol and were greeted with the site of nearly 30 trekkers all layden up with enormous bags, shiny boots and beautiful down jackets all with their guides and team of porters. I had a moment of doubt- we had decided that as teh trek was a short one (and on the advice of another teacher) that we could carry our own bags and wouldn't need a guide... yet suddenly this idea seemed a little foolhardy. However after talking to some of the other trekkers and looking at the map again we decided to carry on with our no guide, no porter plan.
The first day involved walking through the villages of Nyapol and Birenthanti along the banks of the river before starting a rather gentle climb up to the village of Tikkedhungda. The path meandered along the edge of the mountain and we climbed only 500m that day giving me confidence in our plan. (My trekking companion however was ready to kill, she'd never walked far before and was exhausted by lunch time so I volunteered to carry most of her luggage as well!) The path went through some lovely forested areas, giving beautiful views of the hills, however the mountain views proved invisible due to the large amount of dust in the air. Arriving in Tikkedhundga we located a nice guest house advertising hot showers and good food. All the prices are set by local lodge management committees and I suspect that it doesn't really matter which lodge you stay at as they all seem to have the same basic facilities (all I really needed was hot food and a bed!).
The second day involved an impressive climb up 5000+ (I lost count at 5300ish) stone steps up 1000m to the village of Ghorepani. This is possibly some of hte most exhausting climbing I have ever done, the steps seemed to go on forever. We stopped a couple of times for a cup of Nepali tea (a great drink made by heating milk, cardamon, cinnamon, sugar and ginger and then adding black herbal tea.) to provide sustenance as well as the obligatory Dal Baht lunch stop. After the steps the path carried on through the forest following a small stream up to teh top of Ghorepani hill (2700m). The last part of the journey was conducted at great speed as I noticed the ever growing black looking clouds forming above us. We arrived at the guest house just 2 minutes before the heavens opened with monsoon like rains which quickly turned into hail and then snow. I felt very smug sitting by the fire drinking tea as group of trekkers trooped past wearing make shift coats made out of rice sacks and plastic bags! It turns out that their porters had rushed on ahead (I suspect they knew about the on coming rain!) leaving the poor unsuspecting tourist with nothing but their summer clothes as their coast were in teh bags with the porters!
The next morning we rose at 4:30am to trek up to Poon Hill 3200m to watch the sunrise over Annapurna 1, Annapurna south and Fishtail mountain. The torrential rain the night before had the effect of washing all the dust out of the air so we were greeted with one of the best sunrises I have ever seen ( A Nepali boy who had been walking with us for most of the way told us that this was the best view he had seen since October!) The trek down the hill was a little more treacherous - the rain the night before had all fallen as snow up here which mean that my descent was a rather ungraceful slide to the bottom. After a quick breakfast of porridge we set off for the climb up Ghorepani hill (3500m ish). This is possibly some of hte most beautiful walking I have ever done. Once at the top we walked along the ridge for 1 hour with the views of the mountains to our left. Every 5 minutes I stopped to take a photo... The path then descended gently though the forest next to the river to the small village of Deurali and then up some steep steps to Tadapani. We were then faced with the option of stopping the night in Tadapani or carrying on to our original planned destination of Ghandruk. By this stage we had been walking for 6 hours (including the Poon Hill climb) so were quite tired and the views from Tadapani were quite stunning. That coupled with what looked like building clouds for a downpour we decided to stop the night in Tadapani. Unfortunately ever trekking group on the circuit had the same plan. Although we arrived a the village earlier than most of the big groups they had sent ahead a runner to book rooms so we were left with no rooms available for the night. So armed with my Nepali phrasebook (I found the locals much more helpful if we tried to speak Nepali) I traipsed round the village to find a bed. After much negotiating and sign language we secured a room which was just large enough to lay two mattresses side by side! We then spent a very enjoyable evening and afternoon playing card games with a group of Belgium trekkers who were also travelling like us with no guide or porter. I found out later that some groups couldn't find any beds and ended up sleeping on the tables or trekking the further 3 hours to the next village!
Day 4 and our final day... We were faced with an 8 hour walk down the hill (mostly stone steps) in the bright sunshine to the bottom. The hillsides here would have been covered in trees, however most of these have been cut down for fuel to feed the huge amount of trekkers. Teh Annapurna Conservation area council is now trying to introduce solar power and other sources of fuel to stop this deforestation but it was obvious how much damage has been done on this last leg of the journey. The way was also complicated by lots of land slides - I suspect this is also due to lack of stabilisation from trees?!?
Once in Nyapol we joined the rather large queue for a local bus back to Pokhara. After waiting for half an hour I dug out my phrasebook again to try and discover the source of our waiting. (Most people speak exceptional English, however these are normally taxi drivers who are unlikely to tell you when the next bus will arrive!!) It turns out that there had been an accident further down the road and all the buses were stuck behind. Eventually a bus arrived and we rode the roof of the bus back to Pokhara enjoying incredible views of the sun setting turing the mountains a golden yellow.
It was on the bus ride that the triop was slightly spoilt. the bus driver obviously didn't like tourists - he tried to charge us 4x the normal price and we only managed to negotiate down to 2 x the normal price. He then made all the tourists get off the bus at the taxi stand on the outside of the city rather than letting us ride to teh bus stop like all the Nepali people on the bus. this is the first time I have encountered an attitude like this in Nepal where so far everyone has gone out of thier way to be friendly.... We didn't have enough money for a taxi into town so had to walk the last 5 km to our hotel - finally arriving at 9pm where we showered an fell into bed eating a highly nutritious dinner of crisps and a mars bar!
So another day in Pokhara - I may try paragliding over the mountains :) and then back to Kathmandu.
The first day involved walking through the villages of Nyapol and Birenthanti along the banks of the river before starting a rather gentle climb up to the village of Tikkedhungda. The path meandered along the edge of the mountain and we climbed only 500m that day giving me confidence in our plan. (My trekking companion however was ready to kill, she'd never walked far before and was exhausted by lunch time so I volunteered to carry most of her luggage as well!) The path went through some lovely forested areas, giving beautiful views of the hills, however the mountain views proved invisible due to the large amount of dust in the air. Arriving in Tikkedhundga we located a nice guest house advertising hot showers and good food. All the prices are set by local lodge management committees and I suspect that it doesn't really matter which lodge you stay at as they all seem to have the same basic facilities (all I really needed was hot food and a bed!).
The second day involved an impressive climb up 5000+ (I lost count at 5300ish) stone steps up 1000m to the village of Ghorepani. This is possibly some of hte most exhausting climbing I have ever done, the steps seemed to go on forever. We stopped a couple of times for a cup of Nepali tea (a great drink made by heating milk, cardamon, cinnamon, sugar and ginger and then adding black herbal tea.) to provide sustenance as well as the obligatory Dal Baht lunch stop. After the steps the path carried on through the forest following a small stream up to teh top of Ghorepani hill (2700m). The last part of the journey was conducted at great speed as I noticed the ever growing black looking clouds forming above us. We arrived at the guest house just 2 minutes before the heavens opened with monsoon like rains which quickly turned into hail and then snow. I felt very smug sitting by the fire drinking tea as group of trekkers trooped past wearing make shift coats made out of rice sacks and plastic bags! It turns out that their porters had rushed on ahead (I suspect they knew about the on coming rain!) leaving the poor unsuspecting tourist with nothing but their summer clothes as their coast were in teh bags with the porters!
The next morning we rose at 4:30am to trek up to Poon Hill 3200m to watch the sunrise over Annapurna 1, Annapurna south and Fishtail mountain. The torrential rain the night before had the effect of washing all the dust out of the air so we were greeted with one of the best sunrises I have ever seen ( A Nepali boy who had been walking with us for most of the way told us that this was the best view he had seen since October!) The trek down the hill was a little more treacherous - the rain the night before had all fallen as snow up here which mean that my descent was a rather ungraceful slide to the bottom. After a quick breakfast of porridge we set off for the climb up Ghorepani hill (3500m ish). This is possibly some of hte most beautiful walking I have ever done. Once at the top we walked along the ridge for 1 hour with the views of the mountains to our left. Every 5 minutes I stopped to take a photo... The path then descended gently though the forest next to the river to the small village of Deurali and then up some steep steps to Tadapani. We were then faced with the option of stopping the night in Tadapani or carrying on to our original planned destination of Ghandruk. By this stage we had been walking for 6 hours (including the Poon Hill climb) so were quite tired and the views from Tadapani were quite stunning. That coupled with what looked like building clouds for a downpour we decided to stop the night in Tadapani. Unfortunately ever trekking group on the circuit had the same plan. Although we arrived a the village earlier than most of the big groups they had sent ahead a runner to book rooms so we were left with no rooms available for the night. So armed with my Nepali phrasebook (I found the locals much more helpful if we tried to speak Nepali) I traipsed round the village to find a bed. After much negotiating and sign language we secured a room which was just large enough to lay two mattresses side by side! We then spent a very enjoyable evening and afternoon playing card games with a group of Belgium trekkers who were also travelling like us with no guide or porter. I found out later that some groups couldn't find any beds and ended up sleeping on the tables or trekking the further 3 hours to the next village!
Day 4 and our final day... We were faced with an 8 hour walk down the hill (mostly stone steps) in the bright sunshine to the bottom. The hillsides here would have been covered in trees, however most of these have been cut down for fuel to feed the huge amount of trekkers. Teh Annapurna Conservation area council is now trying to introduce solar power and other sources of fuel to stop this deforestation but it was obvious how much damage has been done on this last leg of the journey. The way was also complicated by lots of land slides - I suspect this is also due to lack of stabilisation from trees?!?
Once in Nyapol we joined the rather large queue for a local bus back to Pokhara. After waiting for half an hour I dug out my phrasebook again to try and discover the source of our waiting. (Most people speak exceptional English, however these are normally taxi drivers who are unlikely to tell you when the next bus will arrive!!) It turns out that there had been an accident further down the road and all the buses were stuck behind. Eventually a bus arrived and we rode the roof of the bus back to Pokhara enjoying incredible views of the sun setting turing the mountains a golden yellow.
It was on the bus ride that the triop was slightly spoilt. the bus driver obviously didn't like tourists - he tried to charge us 4x the normal price and we only managed to negotiate down to 2 x the normal price. He then made all the tourists get off the bus at the taxi stand on the outside of the city rather than letting us ride to teh bus stop like all the Nepali people on the bus. this is the first time I have encountered an attitude like this in Nepal where so far everyone has gone out of thier way to be friendly.... We didn't have enough money for a taxi into town so had to walk the last 5 km to our hotel - finally arriving at 9pm where we showered an fell into bed eating a highly nutritious dinner of crisps and a mars bar!
So another day in Pokhara - I may try paragliding over the mountains :) and then back to Kathmandu.
Monday, 6 April 2009
Bangkok and Kathmandu
I spent 1 day in the noisy, humid and very hot city of Bangkok - which was honestly probably enough! The city is hug with winding streets full of traders, touts and others trying to sell things, recommend temples to visit (only if going via a factory shop) and trying to talk about English football (I disappointed many by not personally knowing their favourite stars). However once I had got other the extreme humidity and the loudness of the place there are definitely some beautiful gems which I am glad I have seen.
I got on the bus from the airport clutching the name and address of my guest house neatly printed out in Thai script. It so happened that a British boy starting out his gap year was also going to teh same place and it was nice to have some company for the 2 hour bus ride through the rush hour traffic of Bangkok. The guest house was not too far away from Khao San road - the main backpacking hub of Bangkok which has everything from dodgy hostesl to upmarket hotels, and street traders selling everything from tailored suits to knock off DVDs and Thai souvenirs. Quite an interesting place but I have never been anywhere so manic (until the day after and walking through China town). The next day i started my Bangkok in a day tour -organised for me (and the English boy Andrew) by me, with teh trusty Lonely Planet as my guide. We started at the Grand Palace and Emerald Buddha temple. I have never seen so much gold and glittering buildings - every wall was adorned with something shiny and every room held at least 2 statues of Buddha with various offerings scattered around the edge. The Bangkok temples seemed like their city in someways - busy and loud (people were even talking on mobile phones in the middle of chanting) and yet so different in others - spotlessly clean and easy to get round! Teh Emerald Buddha itself is actually not made of Emerald, sits on a throne made of gold and mother of pearl and is housed in a building covered in tiny pieces of coloured mirrors. Next onto the Grand Palace which is one of the Royal residences. The Thais have huge respect for their royal family - an Australian author living in Thailand found this out recently when he was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment for writing a book which contained unfavourable references to a Prince who sounded a lot like the Thai crown prince (his sentence was later changed to deportation after appeal) - this respect means that the whole Grand Palace compound is closely guarded and watched over by photos of the royal family on every corner. After the serenity and grandeur of the Grand Palace we walked east through China town. China town is the are traditionaly used by Chinese merchants. Even today there are hundreds of street sellers selling Chinese herbal remedies, meals and Chinese tat on the streets. Add the prevalence of vendors to the massive amounts of traffic on the streets and the whole place has a very fast moving and busy atmosphere.
The next day I rose at 6am to catch a taxi to the airport and continue my trip on to Nepal. The flight over was quite nice, i sat on the right hand side of the plane and got fantastic views of the mountains coming into the city. Greeting me at the airport was Vishnu, who I arranged my stay at the school with. If Thailand was a culture shock then Kathmandu was a culture earthquake! The school is full of beautifully polite and friendly people- but I had to quickly get used to the idea of no hot showers for 2 months, only squat toilets and eating Dal for every meal. Actually after the initial feeling of arggh I have no settled in quite well and it has defiantly made me appreciate the finer things back home .
School is actually on holiday for Nepali new year for another week so i have taken the opportunity to travel down to Pokhara and get in some trekking before settling in to teaching. Feeling very brave and worldly wise I decided to take the advice of one of the teachers and shun the tourist bus for a local micro bus down to Pokhara. Armed with my Nepali phrase book and bottles of drinking water i set off through the city to the main bus terminal where i managed to find a mini bus to Pokhara and successfully purchased a ticket for teh 7 hour journey (it cost 250ru about 2.50 GBP!). My elation at managing this most simple of tasks soon faded when I realised that there were no seats on teh bus and I was pushed up onto the roof along with my backpack. The bus then set off at break neck speed along some of the most hair raising roads i have ever driven along. Along the way we passed no fewer than 7 busses that had driven off the edge of teh road or crashed into on coming trucks while overtaking on blind corners... To add to teh spirit of adventure the bus then had to stop for 3 hours as there were protests on the road between the Maoists and local people. I took the opportunity to chat with a Nepali girl sat next to me - who politely expressed amazement that I had reached the grand age of 23 without producing at least one child (preferably a male child!) - she then said ever so nicely that she was surprised that I hadn't had children because I possessed the figure of a lady who has had at least 2! (just lovely...) We finally arrived in Pokhara at 11pm and fell wearily into the closest guest house.
Today I spent the day exploring the lovely lake side town and organising maps etc for trekking up to Poon Hill a viewing hill to see the Himalayas. Now for a nap and to read my newly purchased history of Nepal 1990 - 2008 (incidentally the Nepali year is currently 2065).
I got on the bus from the airport clutching the name and address of my guest house neatly printed out in Thai script. It so happened that a British boy starting out his gap year was also going to teh same place and it was nice to have some company for the 2 hour bus ride through the rush hour traffic of Bangkok. The guest house was not too far away from Khao San road - the main backpacking hub of Bangkok which has everything from dodgy hostesl to upmarket hotels, and street traders selling everything from tailored suits to knock off DVDs and Thai souvenirs. Quite an interesting place but I have never been anywhere so manic (until the day after and walking through China town). The next day i started my Bangkok in a day tour -organised for me (and the English boy Andrew) by me, with teh trusty Lonely Planet as my guide. We started at the Grand Palace and Emerald Buddha temple. I have never seen so much gold and glittering buildings - every wall was adorned with something shiny and every room held at least 2 statues of Buddha with various offerings scattered around the edge. The Bangkok temples seemed like their city in someways - busy and loud (people were even talking on mobile phones in the middle of chanting) and yet so different in others - spotlessly clean and easy to get round! Teh Emerald Buddha itself is actually not made of Emerald, sits on a throne made of gold and mother of pearl and is housed in a building covered in tiny pieces of coloured mirrors. Next onto the Grand Palace which is one of the Royal residences. The Thais have huge respect for their royal family - an Australian author living in Thailand found this out recently when he was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment for writing a book which contained unfavourable references to a Prince who sounded a lot like the Thai crown prince (his sentence was later changed to deportation after appeal) - this respect means that the whole Grand Palace compound is closely guarded and watched over by photos of the royal family on every corner. After the serenity and grandeur of the Grand Palace we walked east through China town. China town is the are traditionaly used by Chinese merchants. Even today there are hundreds of street sellers selling Chinese herbal remedies, meals and Chinese tat on the streets. Add the prevalence of vendors to the massive amounts of traffic on the streets and the whole place has a very fast moving and busy atmosphere.
The next day I rose at 6am to catch a taxi to the airport and continue my trip on to Nepal. The flight over was quite nice, i sat on the right hand side of the plane and got fantastic views of the mountains coming into the city. Greeting me at the airport was Vishnu, who I arranged my stay at the school with. If Thailand was a culture shock then Kathmandu was a culture earthquake! The school is full of beautifully polite and friendly people- but I had to quickly get used to the idea of no hot showers for 2 months, only squat toilets and eating Dal for every meal. Actually after the initial feeling of arggh I have no settled in quite well and it has defiantly made me appreciate the finer things back home .
School is actually on holiday for Nepali new year for another week so i have taken the opportunity to travel down to Pokhara and get in some trekking before settling in to teaching. Feeling very brave and worldly wise I decided to take the advice of one of the teachers and shun the tourist bus for a local micro bus down to Pokhara. Armed with my Nepali phrase book and bottles of drinking water i set off through the city to the main bus terminal where i managed to find a mini bus to Pokhara and successfully purchased a ticket for teh 7 hour journey (it cost 250ru about 2.50 GBP!). My elation at managing this most simple of tasks soon faded when I realised that there were no seats on teh bus and I was pushed up onto the roof along with my backpack. The bus then set off at break neck speed along some of the most hair raising roads i have ever driven along. Along the way we passed no fewer than 7 busses that had driven off the edge of teh road or crashed into on coming trucks while overtaking on blind corners... To add to teh spirit of adventure the bus then had to stop for 3 hours as there were protests on the road between the Maoists and local people. I took the opportunity to chat with a Nepali girl sat next to me - who politely expressed amazement that I had reached the grand age of 23 without producing at least one child (preferably a male child!) - she then said ever so nicely that she was surprised that I hadn't had children because I possessed the figure of a lady who has had at least 2! (just lovely...) We finally arrived in Pokhara at 11pm and fell wearily into the closest guest house.
Today I spent the day exploring the lovely lake side town and organising maps etc for trekking up to Poon Hill a viewing hill to see the Himalayas. Now for a nap and to read my newly purchased history of Nepal 1990 - 2008 (incidentally the Nepali year is currently 2065).
Sunday, 5 April 2009
Bangkok and onwards to Nepal
I will keep this short as there have been lots of black outs in Kathmandu so I may be cut off at any second! I am keeping a paper diary of my time here and will update the blog properly when i get back to somewhere with more reliable power...
Saying that Nepal is amazing, the people are really friendly and the views incredible. I am leaving today for Pokahara which is the main trekking/ tourism center for a weeks holiday before school properly starts and then i should be going to Dang in the far west of the country for teaching English. More soon. (Possibly Pokahara will have better power?!?)
Saying that Nepal is amazing, the people are really friendly and the views incredible. I am leaving today for Pokahara which is the main trekking/ tourism center for a weeks holiday before school properly starts and then i should be going to Dang in the far west of the country for teaching English. More soon. (Possibly Pokahara will have better power?!?)
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