Notes on various subjects

VOLUNTEER HOUSE

Volunteers used to stay at the boys' house, but just prior to my arrival, a separate volunteer house was opened. It is on a dirt road and you step up onto a broken curb to get to the gate. The house itself seems relatively new and is in good shape, however. We not only have running water, but also hot running water (the house is solar powered), which makes me very happy. Not looking forward to using an outhouse and bathing in a river at Lawajuni.

Right now, there is only one other volunteer living at the house besides me and he is a boy. This means that I have had a room with four beds in it all to myself and somehow, I have managed to spread out over three of the beds. One is the bed that I sleep in, one is my dresser/closet, and one is my office (i.e., where I sit to type on my laptop computer). My bed is very hard as I am sleeping on a wooden plank covered by a thin mattress. The pillow is not that soft either. I've been trying to use my travel pillow, which is more comfortable, but a little too high to use as a bed pillow. Consequently, I don't sleep very well. On the other hand, until last night, the power went out at 8:00 p.m. and there wasn't anything to do after that (too hard to read by candlelight or flashlight), so I was going to bed at 8:00 and getting up around 7:00 -- a rather long night.

WEATHER

When I got off the plane from Seoul, I went from winter to summer. I couldn't believe how hot it was. I soon learned, however, that it is still the tail end of winter and, despite the heat during the day, it gets freezing cold at night. For some reason, it is also much colder inside my house than it is outside. Michael had told me not to even bother bringing a sweater (what was he thinking?), but I was thankful that I had brought some cold weather clothes for Seoul. The first night, I only had one wool blanket and I was absolutely freezing. By the end of the night, I was wearing a short sleeved shirt, a long sleeved polyesther hiking shirt, a three-quarter length long sleeved nightgown, sweat pants, loose fitting travelers pants, and fleece socks, with a blanket and my winter jacket over me -- and I was still cold! The next night I got a couple of extra blankets, but still had to wear layers of clothes. Although it starts getting warmer at 5:30-6:00 a.m., I still need a jacket or long sleeved shirt until about noon, when it gets really hot. The temperature range in a single day is quite amazing. It seemed to start getting a little bit less cold after the first couple of nights, however, and tonight it seems significantly warmer. So the winter may have reached its end. Anyway, I should be moving to Narti on Saturday and I understand that it is warmer there. So I will probably be complaining about the heat very soon.

OTHER VOLUNTEER IN HOUSE

The other volunteer, Chris, is very nice, but he isn't around much. He is a journalist soon-to-be medical student from Ohio and he has been here for four and a half months already. He's done several different things while here and is currently doing a surgery rotation. Actually, he's volunteering at a hospital, but he was allowed to be in an operating room during a surgery. Not something that I'm anxious to do, but he was pretty excited about it. He was also impressed by the equipment that the hospital has. Anyway, he usually leaves at 6 a.m., isn't around for lunch, and has dinner with his Hindi tutor. Chris is of Indian descent and he eventually wants to go to India to use his medical skills to help children or the poor or something like that. He was actually in India before Nepal and is going back to there in March. So he's been around for a few meals and we've talked a few times, but we don't see each other often.

MEALS

The volunteer house has it's own didi ("sister") who cooks for us and cleans the house. Our didi is Bobitta, a very sweet 18 year old girl who is charged with the responsibility of supporting her family. Bobitta cooks rice, vegetables, and a lentil sauce for me three times a day. At lunch yesterday, we had a big change: The rice was fried. Bobitta also gives me tea and biscuits (as in cookies, not bread) when I get up in the morning, which is always very nice. Unfortunately, she speaks little English and I speak even less Nepali, so our attempts at communication do not go very far. In the beginning, Bobitta would serve me a huge plate of rice with little bowls of vegetables and lentil sauce and then stand at the counter watching me eat, which was a bit disconcerting. As soon as I had eaten most of my rice, she would take my plate to give me seconds and then she would serve herself. Sitting down at the table, she proceeded to eat her food Nepali style: mixing all of the food with her right hand and then scooping it into her mouth. In the beginning, I found it difficult to watch her eat this way and, even though I intellectually understand that it is a cultural difference that I need to respect, I had to fight the urge to tell her to eat with a fork. I have now gotten used to it, however. In the beginning, I tried to wash my own plates, but she got very upset as that is her job. I still don't feel entirely comfortable being served like this, so I at least like to clear my own plates and she tolerates this, though I think that she would prefer that I didn't.

Starchaholic that I am, I actually enjoy the meals and am not at all sick of rice yet (though I have also had a few meals out, which has broken the monotony). The plates of rice that I am served are huge, so I was having a lot of trouble eating seconds, but didn't want to be rude, so in the beginning I did. Bobitta now realizes that I only want one serving, so, thankfully, she no longer gives me seconds and has started eating at the table with me instead of watching me. I suspect, however, that she is putting more rice on my plate now because I am finding it more and more difficult to finish it. In fact, I left quite a bit on my plate at the last two meals.

At home, I am always hungry -- or at least I always want to eat. Since I have been in Nepal, however, I find that I never really feel hungry and I'm always completely full and sated after I eat. I'm not sure whether this is because I am eating 85 servings of rice each day (rice never seems this filling at home, but I also never eat so much of it) or if there is some other explanation. Anyway, I mentioned this to Michael the other day and he told me about an even more bizarre phenomenon: He said that, without exception, every single man over 50 years old who has come here has told him that as soon as he arrived here, he suddenly stopped having to get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. They have all been excited about the fact that for the first time in however long, they were able to sleep through the whole night. So if you have to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and you'd like a break it from it, you might want to consider volunteering at Nepal Orphans Home for awhile. I don't know whether this will work if you are female or a man under 50, but you could try it and see. It also remains to be seen whether eating 85 servings of rice a day with vegetables and lentils is a good weight loss program. I understand that I will only be getting two meals a day when I am in Narti, so maybe cutting down to 65 servings a day will help.

LAUNDRY

The first time I tried handwashing my laundry attracted a lot of attention and was a little unsettling. First, my nice, but nosey, landlady (the woman who owns the house and rents it to NOH lives here also) came out on the balcony to observe what I was doing. "It's difficult," she said, "slowly, slowly". Then she climbed the spiral staircase to the second level of the balcony, apparently to inspect the few items that I had already hung on the clothes lines up there. After she left, Sushmita, the volunteer coordinator appeared to find out what I was doing and see whether I needed anything. After I assured her that I was all set, she watched me for a couple of minutes before departing. Finally, Bobitta showed up and asked whether I wanted her help. I told her no, that I was fine, and she walked a few yards away. I'm not sure whether she wanted me to finish so that I could walk over to the girls' house with her or if she just couldn't stand the fact that I was doing it wrong, but about a minute later, she came back and demonstrated the proper way to scrub clothing. Then she announced that she likes washing clothes and proceeded to do all the hard scrubbing while I rinsed and brought finished items up to the clothes line (I was glad that I had already done my underwear). I wanted to pay her for helping me, but was afraid that I might offend her if I tried to do so. It was late in the day and getting cold, so I had to leave my clothes out over night. Oddly, the next morning, I found a pair of my underwear hanging from the doorknob of the sitting room next door to my bedroom. Rather embarrassing, but I think that Bobitta just saw that they were dry and brought them in for me.

NEPALI LANGUAGE LESSONS

For the past few days, Sushmita has been coming by after breakfast -- or while I am still eating it -- to give me some language lessons. For the past two days, I have been very distracted because the power was on while she was here and I wanted to be taking advantage of the chance to use the internet. Also, because I am busy all day and either go to bed at 8:00 p.m. or am on my computer at night, depending on when we have power, I have had no time at all to study. So at this point, I can usually remember pani ("water") and baht ("rice"), and I have completely mastered candle, biscuit, shampoo, conditioner, body powder, glass, chair, and table; which loosely translated into English mean "candle, biscuit, shampoo, conditioner, body powder, glass, chair, and table", respectively. Other than those few words, I can't seem to retain anything.

CULTURAL ACTIVITIES

On Friday, Vinod took me to Pashputi Nath ( a Hindu temple) and Boudha Nath (a Buddhist temple). At Pashputi Nath, there is an area where elderly people who have no families to take care of them live. It was very sad to see. On Sunday, Sushmita, Swastika, and Bobitta all took me to Swayambhu Nath, which has both Hindu and Buddhist temples. Both Pashputi Nath and Swayambhu Nath had lots of monkeys roaming around and I was warned not look any of them in the eye or they attack. Also, Vinod warned me not to eat fruit at Pashputi Nath and told me a story about a woman who was eating a banana there (he saw this happen): A monkey came over and took not only her banana, but also her purse. He then climbed a tree and started throwing down her money, but would not release the purse. Finally, the woman bought another banana and threw it up to the monkey. In order to grab the banana, the monkey had to let go of the purse, so the woman finally got it back. Today, Sushmita took me to a museum, which turned out to be an old palace, but not the one that the most recent king lived in before the monarchy was abolished. Apparently, the newer palace is also a museum. Although all of these things were very interesting to see, there isn't anything of interest to report about them.

TRANSPORTATION

Kathmandu is a scary city to move around in. Cars, motorcycles, bicycles, and pedestrians all share the often narrow streets (and sometimes the sidewalks) -- going in two or more different directions -- without any rules. Traffic lights would be useless since there is no electricity for 16 hours a day and Nepalis apparently see no reason to use signs or anything resembling standard traffic patterns either. Ostensibly, I think that people are supposed to drive on the left side of the road and this does happen some of the time. In general, however, people just do whatever they want and somehow everyone manages to move up, down, or across the street. Everyone is aggressive and, at the same time, everyone has to yield to others. It's like an elaborate dance whose steps are difficult to break down. Really, the Nepalis in Kathamandu should get some sort of Academy Award. After seeing Nepali pedestrians seemingly randomly crossing the streets weaving in and out of cars and motorcycles that seemed to automatically know when they had to stop, I tried a couple of times to just start crossing the street and let everyone work around me. Apparently, however, there actually are right and wrong times to walk in front of cars because each time I did this, Vinod grabbed my arm, pulled me back, and said "not yet". Oh well, I never was a good dancer.

Unfortunately, when I have to get from one place to another, there are only three options:

1. Walk -- which means watching out for cars, bicycles, and motorcycles that might come at me from any direction and frequently dodging several vehicles coming at me from multiple directions at the same time

2. Ride a motorcycle driven by someone I trust, but without a helmet and on the road with zillions of drivers whom I do not trust, as well as many pedestrians who have no problem walking in front of moving vehicles

3. Wedge myself into a 2 inch space on a microbus, a/k/a a battered old toyota minivan that is way over capacity, without a seatbelt and possibly with the door wide open. On one microbus, I counted 27 people, though two of them were actually outside the van hanging onto the doorway. My entire leg fell asleep and there was nothing that I could do about it because I literally could not move. Luckily, neither the bus nor any other vehicle on the road was going fast enough to inflict any serious damage -- or so I hoped. In addition, I was comforted by the fact that, although I was in a position where I could conceivably fall out the door if there was a really sudden stop, a number of other bodies would have fallen out before me and likely would have cushioned my fall.