Dang

I haven't wrote for awhile. I returned from Dang at 11pm on Wednesday, and have spent the last couple of days writing and marking class tests for over 200 students! I've really been enjoying the teaching thing but don't think I'm cut out for all this marking! But as promised i will give the story of my trip to Dang.

Two other volunteers, Head Sir, the drivers wife and one of the kitchen girls set off at 4am in the morning on Saturday. Dang is only 400km away but the quality of the roads leaves alot to be desired and there are some quite significant hills in the way meaning that our estimated journey time was over 12 hours. As it happened we completed the journey in a little over 13 hours but we stopped lots for food breaks. Driving out of hte Kathmandu valley we followed one of only 2 roads out of Kathmandu towards the south west of hte country. The first part of the road winds round the edge of an incredibly steep hill while avoiding the river raging below in the valley. This is the most dangerous road in Nepal and we saw the wreckage of a couple of trucks and a bus as we travelled down the valley. At Mugeling the road spilts and you can either keep in the mountainous region and head towards Pokhara (the start of most treks) or head into the plains, towards India and the Terai (the bread basket of Nepal), we choose the later. In Mugeling we saw a group of Spanish game show contestants who were trying to get around Nepal spending no money. They climbed on our roof for 20 minutes of the journey until reaching Gorkha (the town from which the famous Gurkha regiment gets its name). From Mugeling onwards the scenery starts to change from breathtaking hills into never ending plains, the rivers that rushed down the valley start to slow down and join up with others to head on their way to India and to joint the Holy Ganges. At a junction of three of these rivers we stopped to pick up head Sir's mother -Ama.

The Nepalese belief that the junctions are holy and so the junction of three rivers all heading to the Ganges is an incredibly holy place. At this junction is what can best be described as a Hindu home for the aged. As the elders of the family increase in age, to lessen their contact with the family and hence their connection with the world, the older people spend more and more time on retreats and in meditation centers. It was from one of these centers that we picked up head Sirs mother from. We were greeted by tens of very old ladies stuffing bananas and sweets into our hands and placing tikas on our head as blessing. The village itself had an incredible atmosphere - not like the slightly sad and desperate atmosphere that is so prevalent in Western old peoples homes. Each and every person was approaching old age with such serenity and peace, having accepted that they will leave behind the body that they now occupy and will go on to another life ( Hindus believe in cycles of birth, death and rebirth). That is not to say that the folks were resigned and waiting for death more that they were enjoying their moments in these bodies but were not scarred or anxious about the next stage.

Moving onto the next part of the journey (rather uncomfortably wedged between Ama and the kitchen girl - with Ama stroking my arm as she couldn't believe skin could be so white!) we reached the Terai area. We were slightly nervous about this part of the trip, in teh last couple of months the Terai area has been paralysed a number of times by strikes which stop all movement on the roads and could have left us camping in scorching hot, humid weather until the boys (definately immature boys rather than men - more later) decide that they have had their fun and allow normality to resume. Although I am scaving of the strike perpetrators they actually have a point. The Terai area used to be occupied only by The Thauru ethnic group as this was the only group of people that were immune/ had herbs that cured malaria. However once malaria was eradicated from teh incredibly fertile land people moved in from the surround hills. The largely uneducated Thauru people were ejected from their homes and many ended up in a cycle of bonded labour... The strikes are part of the campaign for land rights, education rights and the rights to used their language. However a good cause does still not justify the means!

Finally we reach the area of Dang and the city of Gorahi where the Hindu Vidyapeeth school, Dang is situated. A couple of miles outside of the town is the small village of Parsa, home to the Children's Peace Home who were our hosts for the next 3 days. The CPH is a home for children from disadvantaged communities or orphaned children. They provide a secure environment and teach valuable life skills like organic farming, sewing, cooking and basic building skills. Never before have i been in such a place which has such a peaceful atmosphere. The children all work like a large family (despite some of the horrible stories that some have associated with them). There is such a sense of hope and gratitude for the opportunity they have been provided with. Each evening they get together for singing hymns (Hindu hymns) and dancing (Hindu hymns have a bit more life than the majority of English ones!). The buildings themselves are incredibly simple mud huts surrounded by farmland ( had a go at ploughing the land using the Ox's!). The children are all sponsored through HVP-UK and attend the local HVP school Dang. The CPH is still in its infancy (2 years old). I worry what will happen to the kids when they leave school as they have no family, so will rely on teh schools contacts to try and get scholarships to college or to find a small patch of land on which to farm. One of the students Sagar is just finishing his school leavers certificate and dreams of studying engineering. He's incredibly clever but will probably have to give up on his dream as he doesn't have the money to study in Kathmandu or apply for a visa to the US or UK (which would cost around 500 pounds) I promised him i would look into ways to help him but i think he is slowly giving up on his dream and accepting that maybe a teacher in the local school is as high as he can aim...

The next couple of days we attended a couple of programs in the local area. One day we were blocked from reaching our venue by one of the impromptu strikes set up on the road. Head Sir still wanted to go so we had to get some of the villagers to give us a lift on their motorbikes across the fields. It is considered immodest for a girl in this part of Nepal (quite a conservative area) to ride a motorbike the proper way - so we had the comical image of three white girls, dressed in saris trying desperately hard to look elegant while riding a motorbike side saddle fashion! I nearly fell off two times much to the amusement of the local children who chased by bike for the whole 5km journey... Oh well perhaps a career as a dare devil is not the best path for me!

In addition to the programs we were also privileged to be invited into teh Yogi temple in Ghorahi. Non-Hindus are normally not allowed inside the temples so this was a great honour. The head priest spent well over an hour explaining the Yoga philosophy to us which was really interesting and made a lot of sense... I particularly liked the willingness of the priest to admit when his religion did not have an answer for something - rather than resorting to answers which sound ridiculous in the light of modern science.

Finally it was time to head back to Kathmandu, this time the journey took 17 hours due to strikes and a visit to Lumbini - the birth place of Buddha. More on that in another post!

In other news a bomb went off in Kathmandu today, the target was a Christian church that had been converting Hindus. Two people dies including a 16 year old girl. It makes me so sad that in a country which is famed for its religious tolerance such acts can happen.

Also if anyone wants to make a donation to support the good work for the Childrens Peace Home they can do so by contacting HVP-UK http://www.hvpuk.org.uk/ .

More on Politics

You may remember I posted some time ago about the political situation in Nepal, in particular I used the example of the Chief of the Army Staff Katawal. Since that last post the situation has rapidly worsened. The prime minister (Maoist) forced Katawal to resign and put in his place a man more sympathetic to the Maoist cause. The President of the country then rang up Katawal and reinstated him. The President of Nepal according to teh terms of the peace process agreement signed last year is really only a ceremonial role and there to rubber stamp the constitution as it goes through parliament - understandably the Presidents intervention caused great anger in the lower house, ultimately leading to the resignation of the Maoist prime minister. So Nepal is now left with no prime minister and hence no government running the country! Interestingly as soon as the government fell the strike which was crippling food and duel supplies into the Kathmandu valley was called off, leading some commentators to suggest that the country would be better off without a government...

So where does this leave Nepal now? The main political parties are all canvassing support to form new coalitions to lead the government and the people of the city are sporadically organising protests in favour or against the main parties. What surprises me the most is the lack of interest that most Nepalis now seem to have in the whole political process. the politicians wrangling over issues that are just irrelevant to most people whose daily life revolves more around a struggle for clean drinking water, safe food and basic health care. the really sad thing is that all the political arguments and games have caused some of the major NGO's who invest in improving the lives of ordinary Nepalis to pull out or reconsider funding. Indian companies who are involved with a number of infrastructure improvement works have just announced that they wont be investing anymore due to the disruption caused by government interference. I was talking yesterday to a lady who runs a charity that educates women about the dangers of HIV who is also considering closing the branch of the charity on Kathmandu because she can't keep up with the ever changing regulations from a government which chances every 2-3 months.

In other news on Saturday i will be travelling with the Head Master to visit his family in the west of Nepal in Dang. We will also be visiting the Childrens Peace Home which is an orphanage for the children whose families were torn apart by the Maoist insurgency. the Orphanage is attached to teh HVP school in Dang - should be quite interesting and it will be nice to see another less touristy part of Nepal.

Festivals, parties and ceremonies

I am just back from 6 days trekking with Philipp which explains the long time with no posts! The trekking was beautiful again, we were lucky with some fantastic views and also got the chance to visit a hot springs, which was great for those aching trekking muscles... the only down side was after a whole month feeling very smug at having no illness I came down with food poisoning on the first day trekking - believe me climbing up mountains with food poisoning is not an experience I want to repeat or wish on anyone. I am all better now and looking forward to my last month in Nepal.

Upon arriving back with Philipp we have been invited to 2 ceremonies with friends and family of the school. First we attended a baby feeding ceremony. At 6 months of age the Newari people (traditional residents of the Kathmandu Valley) hold a big party to celebrate feeding a child his/her first solid food (this is usually rice pudding). We walked to a massive party palace on the other side of Patan filled with an amazing collection of colourfully dressed people. There we were treated to a feast of Newari traditional food which included Buffalo meat, various sweet pancakes and some lovely home made yoghurt - as well as teh traditional Dal Baht. The baby girl herself seemed a little bemused with teh whole event and was more interested in chewing the wrapping paper from presents than eating any rice pudding or greeting guests. It was however a great opportunity to meet some very influential people in Nepal, including a business women who organises loans for Nepali men to go work in the Arab Emirates (where they are usually treated appallingly but at least earn enough money to support their family back home) and various doctors who having all trained in Britain were keen to talk about their student days in Edinburgh or London.

The next day after a full days sightseeing we were invited to a ceremony to remember the one year anniversary of the death of the vice principals grandma. The Nepalis believe that one year is the same as one day for a soul, so every year on the death day anniversary they have special food to feed the souls. We all congregated in a marquee type construction in the families courtyard and ate (most gatherings seem to revolve around food). I suspect there is more to this ceremony that we didn't see... the heavens opened half way through with massive thunder storms and hail which made the last part of the event quite interesting (Nepali marquees are not waterproof!)

Oh well back to teaching now, class 7 English is calling - more soon.