Mumbai and Amsterdam!

So incredibly sad that india is over already, but now i am in amsterdam about to head into the city for the wild and crazy queens day festival.

Mumbai was a wonderful day, Yogeeta's aunt let me keep my bags at her house, and i got to meet yogi's family and see the house she lives in when she comes to india. I spent the day sightseeing which was really good in a city that has a metro system and some sort of map, it was a good precursor to Europe.

Left india at 2 20 in the morning and arrived in brussels last morning at 8AM (withe the time difference), immediately got ona train for amsterdam and spent last afternoon completely lost in the city that on paper seems like it should be really easy to get around in. Last night was "Queen's night" and everyone was decked out in orange and basically just really drunk and messy on the street, a lot like Fell's point in baltimore or times square for new years.

Today i am meeting Mackenzie's past nanny for lunch and spending another day losti n the crowds. Heading back to brussels tomorrow to spend two days there before coming home!

Coming back to a western country after india has its very own culture shocks and i stil am finding things strange, i am not used to being the ethnic majority, and people not staring and trying to speak to me on the street, consequently i keep thinking people are talking to mew hen they are not (you just have to go to india to understand, i feel like i sound really full of myself)

i miss curry

i miss curry

things at the orphanage are not doing great since i left, political situation in nepal has just turned sour (need to read up on it when i get back) and the kisd now have more time off from school than was expected (which trust me is not a good thing lol). Didi is having troubles with Rajendra and things are a little unstable right now, which has made me even more sad about leaving them, but i guess it was best to be out of nepal right now.

Will give another update from Brussels before returning home on May 4th.

europe is expensive, i miss things being the equivalent of 15 US cents . . . those days are gone.

Arambol

Arambol is amazing . . . it's the complete end of the season so the beaches are deserted, prices are low ,and the people here are more "traveler" type and less obnoxious touristy type

Had some delicious freshly grilled shark last night while sitting on a table on the beach overlooking the ocean. Havent seen a glorious sunset yet but i have two nights left here for the evening clouds to clear which i hope they will .

just a short walk from the beach i am on, past some rocky cliffs, is another EVEN MORE deserted beach (that i am headed to right after this update) with a lake that comes up to the backside of the sand filled with fish and bordering green hills . . . incredible.

just booked my ticket to mumbai for the night of the 27th, and will wake up in mumbai o nthe 28th to spend the entire day there, and then head t othe airport at about 11PM to catch my 2AM flight to brussels . . . where i will then RUN from the airport to the train station to catch my train to amsterdam . . . where i will then probably get absolutely no sleep that night or the night after that due to this crazy queen's day festival that just happens to be going on there when i am there.

thats about all . . . i am browner (color wise) than most of the indians on this continent

Delhi and Paradise

Leaving Pushkar was really sad . . . it was the first chilled out place I went, and the population of people there is just amazing . . . men in all white and bright colored turbans, women in ridiculously bright sarees and huge arm bangles that come up to their shoulders, and a sense that not EVERYONE was trying to scam you, which was really refreshing.
Getting up to Delhi was an experience all together, with some waiting time at the town with the train station called Ajmer turning into the white kids being a spectacle for no particular reason. We had some time before our train was supposed to leave so we plopped down at a random building to later find out everyone was waiting there to meet the superintendant of the Ajmer police. While we were there we were the center of much attention minus any actual english conversation, its hard to describe why it was so magical and entertaining, but it just was.
Train to delhi was incredible . . . Air conditioned, only 7 hours, and there were two meals and a snack served . . . that really is the best you can ask for.

AND NOW

I AM IN GOA!!!! at a ridiculously small beach in the middle of no where called arambol, living in a bamboo hut right on the sand for the next four days. This is paradise. Last night i had fresh grilled squid and shrimp during a beach barbaque that is apparently held every night :). The ocean water is almost too warm and the waves are pretty big. Just to the right of the sandy part of the beach are some rocky cliffs which are extremely beautiful, and i plan on completely chilling out here until i head up to Mumbai in 4 days to catch my flight to europe for my extended layover before heading home.

I love Pushkar

This is such an amazing place!

No annoying rickshaw drivers
No cabs
Desert mountains surrounding a small town with a dried up lake in the middle
(okay some people still trying to scam you, but that's everywhere)
Hilltop temples surrounding the town
The old women here have these ridiculous bangles that go up their upper arms all the way to their shoulders, and ridiculously huge nose rings and earrings that have sagged their skin so much

waking up at 5 tomorrow to hike to the second temple (bigger one) for sunrise!

bought ridiculously cool shorts :)

heading to Delhi in two days

oh i love pushkar

visited the bramha temple today here, one of the only hindu bramha temples in the world!

I give you good price

so many things to describe and so little time to do it.

FIrst of all, the Taj Mahal was absolutely wonderful . . . no more words, want to understand, go to India

afterwards mackenzie and I wandered into a local market outside of the tourist quotas which was amazingly refreshing (the streets were too small for annoying rickshaw drivers who pester you to no end) and the people werent looking to scam or annoy you, everyone just wanted you to take a look at their shop and havey ou try something.
After that we wandered out of the market down a more industrial street where we were mobbed by children screaming hello and demanding that we take pictures of them . . . usually the public harassment here is totally annoying but on this street it was pretty obvious that it has nothing to do with taking your money and they were just excited to see a white person, so we amused them and took pictures . . . we were called into one house with this gigantic and awesome woman who just had us sit down and attempted to talk to us for a few minutes, even though she knew no english, i really liked her

Second house we ended up in was because we were watching people fly kites from the roofs. . . we were beckoned up to try which turned into Tea, swarms of neighborhood children talking to us, free henna, and hindi music transferred to mackenzie's pen drive.

Unfortunately these amazingly good experiences are completely shadowed here by people trying to scam you, pester you, leave no room for your personal space, stare at you, shake hands with you as you are walking down the street, and pretend to be really nice to you until they finally reveal why they really have started talking to you (want a tip for being your unofficial guide, want you to see their shop. ect)

The only way to deal with this has just been to let it be and go with the flow and laugh about it. . . because in India the more you fight the system, the worse it kicks you in the ass.

Heading to a small quiet town called Pushkar on the edje of the desert in Rajasthan, and then heading up to delhi for one day in a few days to catch the Flight to GOA !!!!!

GOA = Bamboo hut on a beach!!

so much more to explain and describe, but honestly its too much for words, india is amazing and ridiculous, annoying and beautiful, fragrant and putrid, kind and cutthroat. Someone could come here and have the time of their life, or the worst time of their life . . . not to say i have not been pissed off a few times here, but i am definately doing more of the former.

Ganges feet

okay i did it, gross, i washed my feet in the ganges. I stepped on the ashes of thousands of indian grandparents and possibly previous important politicians . . . my feet are now holy. Left last night and am now in Agra (change of plans, jaipur tomorrow) going to see the Taj Mahal today!!


Short and sweet might be the new theme of the entries because computer time is limited to space in between running around.

Varanasi

not that much time to really go into things but varanasi has been amazing

extremely spiritual place that many hindus go to to see the holy river, many people come here to die because it is the holiest place to be creamated.

The Ghats are openings to the river where people bathe, pray, are creamated,

people BOTHER THE CRAP out of you way more than in nepal, for boats, tea, jewlery, hash, anything yuo can think of.

off to jaipur today!

Varanasi!

arrived in varanasi at 4 45 AM this morning after taking a train that left Ghorakpur, India at 10 30 last night. Before this we spent 12 hours on what was supposed to be an 8 hour bus ride through nepal to the indian boarder. We BARELY made our train and had to pay extra for a taxi to take us 1.5 hours away to the train station because a bus would have taken too long

its been a long day (Mackenzie inserts that it is currently 9:30 am)

BUT, we're here, and have 36 hours to see Varanasi . . . . We've already seen the ganges river and are just heading out now for breakfast and to get ourself some money

nothing the bank could have done about my debit card, but i can take out money on my credit card so thats what i will be doing for now (bitches are charging me 3% of whatever i take out for foreign transaction fee, oh well)

off to Jaipur tomorrow . . . update soon!

crap

SERIOUSLY the one thing i forgot to check was that my ATM card was going to expire on 03/2010 . . . god has smitten me. Crap. have credit card so im not totally screwed but who wants to pay ridiculous international fees to withdraw money from a credit account. BOO.

I need major input . . . brown people listen up . . . from jaipur i have a bunch of days until i have to catch my flight to delhi. Its looking like i dont have enough time to see the taj mahal AND other parts of rajasthan west of jaipur . . . so . . . i need a poll from the audience . . . Taj mahal, or another city like jodhpur (i think thats how you spell it) . . . in more western rajasthan (Rajasthan is liek the state) there is desert and amazing and beautiful things and it might provide more to do than just running to see the taj mahal and then to delhi, because i heard agra is kind of lame other than the taj.

Mackenzie is here now and we just visited three temples today and have plans to go out to kareoke tonight . . . trying to fit everything i know here into two and a half days is going to be exhausting

Really sad that the my last day at the orphanage is tomorrow, and im really going to miss the kids a lot :(. Sunday morning bus, bus, and train will have mackenzie and I in Varanasi by monday mornning to start INDIA!!! (my unofficial homeland)

if you dont have a google account or something to post a comment with PLEASE e mail me and tell me everything you know about agra, rajasthan, or things to possibly do FROM delhi for a day or two because i have heard spending too much time in delhi is just too much.

Blessed in a Cave

okay so Pokhara plans didnt quite happen in the order i predicted, but this is for the ABSOLUTE best

Friday: got up decently early and started my hike to the world peace pagoda. As i was walking i was tapped on the shoulder by a girl named Carolyn, a PHD student from toronto studying women and religion (specifically buddhism) in India. Needless to say we had a lot to talk about. Devi's falls is obviously a sight to see in the MONSOON season . . . it was a decently cool waterfall that plunged into a cave-ish looking cavern, but the pictures of the falls during the wet season were tumultuous and 500 times better than what it looked like now, but it was still cool. Across the street was pokhara cave # 1. 100 rupees (mahango chha) got me a look at a flourescently lighted cave with a few stalagmites that the locals worship as the god Shiva's Penis. The hike up to the world peace pagoda was hot, with no shade, but only took about an hour, and the top was very nice. I dont know how a large white stupa with a few statues of different buddhas is going to bring about world peace, but its a nice thought. As i got back and tried to nap there was a knock on my door and some guys i had e mailed that i went canyoning with had actually found me and invited me to go out with them. These were very high class nepalis who had major connections and had a private car that i was shauffered around in. Very nice. After about 2 hours of snacking and drinking one of the guys recieved a call and they said they needed to leave because they were going to pick up two girls and bring them back to their apartments to "have a good time." keep in mind two of these three guys were brothers. they told me to knock on their hotel room door in just an hour. . . needless to say i did not.

Day 2: 4 45 AM wakeup to see the sun rise at sarangkot, a mountain that looks over the lake on one side and to the mountains on the other. Sunrise was exciting, the sun peeked out from the corner of one of the mountains and made a pretty dramatic entrance. the mountain view was hazy at best. After breakfast a little bit down from the top we decided to take a look back at the viewpoint. THANK GOD WE DID. the clouds cleared, the gods bellowed "tada" and the moutanins came into clear view, one of the most spectacular things i have seen in my life. And then they disappeared again. Carolyn and I walked down from the peak, through peoples properties, on a path that definately was sometimes a dried river, sometimes a path, and sometimes nothing really at all. Afternoon was spent at a tibetan refugee camp

Day 3: Morning, rented a boat and paddled across the lake, by myself. Reached enlightenment. Saw the reflection of the hills (not the mountains like all the tourist photos show) in the water, which was really nice. Afternoon i went on a cycling/caving tour. cycled up to an area about 45 minutes uphill away where there were three nearby caves. The first one, Kumari cave, was guided by about 5 small boys who showed me everything there was to see. They were actually very concerned guides, CONSTANTLY telling me to walk slow, watch my head, and crawl when it was totally not necessary. They were pretty cute, and i saw a few cool structures in the cave that resembles things like the buddha and crap like that. After the cave i went swimming in a nearby river with one of the kids who i thought was only being nice to me because he wanted money, but actually ended up being a really good kid who was just looking to hang out with someone. Second cave was the Mahendra cave. Here is where i was blessed. There was a huge Shiva penis (I mean stalagmite) that was decorated with red tikka powder, money, and necklaces. 20 rupees bought me a tiny sweet, a rockin tikka (third eye, hindu dot), and a blessing in english which went something like this "good mind, intellectual, good luck, safe travels" . . . it was a good attempt. Third cave was the bat cave, hundreds of bats clinging to the ceiling of a gigantic room. . . pretty cool, denied the guide that they reccomended so im pretty sure i saw some parts of the cave that not many other tourists see. Alone all of these caves were not as awesome as our JHOC cave . . . but it was cool to see three different ones in one day.

Heading back to Kathmandu tomorrow!

POKHARA

the next time you're on an 8 hour bus ride through rural nepal, DONT SIT IN THE BACK ROW, thats all i will say

POkhara itinerary:
Tomorrow : Pokhara by foot- see devi's falls (waterfall), the bat cafe (self explanitory), and hike up to the peace pagoda ( some buddhist shrine for world peace, like thats going to work)

Saturday: Pokhara by bike: ride up to the tibetan refugee villages surrounding pokhara, and ride into old pokhara, a part of the city untouched by tourism (says the lonely planet, we'll see)

Sunday: Pokhara by boat . . . oh right, there's a lake here, and hike to sarankot, a sunset/sunrise mountain top view point

havent actyually seen the mountains yet, but supposedly it is clear in the morning, so wish me luck!

oh and im alone here, so first solo traveling!

leavng for india on the 11th, more details about that coming soon!

Coke factory: Take three

first time . . . . holiday
second time . . . . holiday
third time . . . . strike

seriously? it has become a personal mission to make it to this damn coke factory

change of plans, going to the "last resort" tomorrow for canyoning and mountain biking to Tibet boarder, staying over night

Thursday--- coke factory (we have a nepali man's number and a guarentee of a good tour) and swimming pool in the afternoon (its clean i PROMISE . . . 50 rupees to get in so thats a barrier to the majority of nepalis)

Friday - - - leave for pokhara, come back tuesday. wednesday is the last free day for only me at the orphanage, and mackenzie comes thursday

phew so much organization, too much for nepal

went on a "jog" with didi this morning to the monkey temple, which surprisingly is way closer than i thought . . . yea i bought us doughnuts on the way back, so much for excersize

the kids all put henna in their hair to dye it red???? it only really worked well with one of the girls, aakriti, who now has crimson red hair . . . good thing no school :)

we "cleaned" the entire playroom today, which entailed throwing out MASSIVE amounts of garbage that include puzzle pieces, cards, and all kinds of other crap that volunteers get for the kids and they end up ruining. We are having a massive garbage fire tonight . . . sorry environment

oh right, i wont be here for the garbage fire because i will be getting my L'Chiam on at the LARGEST PASSOVER SEDER IN THE WORLD (i think) . . . its at the raddison hotel and its 900 freaking rupees (mahango chha)

rented a bike the other day and took a GIGANTIC bike tour of the whole city, got lost several times . . . ended up in the same place SEVERAL times . . . but it was a great day, and i should havej ust invested in a bike the first day i got here . . . like all things the traffic looked really daunting when i first got here but now its really fun to ride in it . . . it looks completely deadly but in a way it's kind of comforting and safe feeling because everyone is WAY more comfortable and alert about people on bikes, since they are everywhere and are generally assholes who dont ever move out of the way. So i was NOT run over by a micro bus.

i stopped at KFC for lunch and almost died at how good fast food tasted . . . mitho chha

okay i swear this started innocently.
Dhanaraj was showing off his muscles to everyone, and i said "oh look you have a little banana in there" as i squeezed his arm
well me with my big fat mouth . . . now banana is the new word for muscle, and the kids are saying such as:

"OH MY BANANA IS SO BIG"
"OH NORA MISS TOUCH MY BANANA IT IS SO HARD"
"RAJ SAMAL (buff nepali actor) HAS SUCH A BIG BANANA"
"YOUR BANANA IS SOOOOO GOOD"

i am an aweful person, and i hope you laughed as much reading that as i did writing it

update from pokhara coming soon

Hello Hello!

Tried to take a tour of the coke factory today and apparently its another freaking holiday . . . its always a holiday . . . so we've been okayed for sunday for an official tour.

HOWEVER, they did sit us down and give us some free freshly brewed sprite in sketchy unlabeled bottles . . . YUMMMM

Just about two more weeks here in Kathmandu before Mackenzie meets me on April 8th and we will depart for India. In that time there are a few things i am going to do

Monday i will be going to Pokhara . . . the chilled out mountain view less crowded more touristy city about an 8 hour bus ride from Kathmandu. Coming back friday.

Also, definately going back to the bungee place. . . not to "make" bungy (as the freaking europeans call it) but to go canyoning and mountain biking
Canyoning is rappelling down a waterfall, and apparently i can do i mountain biking trip to the Tibet boarder!!!!

Yesterday we took the kids to Patan (neighboring city of Kathmandu also in the valley) to the square area there and then to the zoo . .. because of the holiday yesterday we got caught up in ridiculous human and vehicular traffic coming home and the kids were less than thrilled to walk about 2 miles after the ridiculously long day. However, it was one of the best days, it's really great getting the kids out of the neighborhood and out to do things they haven't done before.

I cooked curry this morning because Didi was busy washing sheets . . . I thought it was good, Didi thought it was good, kids said it was too salty . . . i cant win here,. their palates are SO sensitive from eating the same thing every day they know instantly if someone else cooks the curry, even if it tastes good.

I think this is the longest i have gone without shower (since friday morning) but the air here is so dry i really dont feel dirty (dont judge) and of course i have washed my head every day.

Its crazy to see the explosion of tourists here as the season has picked up, there was like no one here when i got here and now Thamel is teeming with white people (yuck)

Haha i'm really bad . . . i scoff at other white people taking pictures of things i have totally already taken pictures of . . . but somehow this handy volunteer ID card (a white peice of paper with my picture stapled onto it) makes me so different from the run of the mill tourist . . . Oh wait, the best part is im going to be them as soon as I hit india

The plan for india as of now . . . not much room for things to change . . . brown friends PLEASE LEAVE COMMENTS if there is something wrong with what i am doing or if i am passing by something that i need not miss

Kathmandu --> Varnassi (more burning dead people) --> Jaipur (pink city) --> Agra (taj mahal)--> Delhi (crazy ass city) ---> Goa (chilled out beaches) ---> Mumbai (city) ---> off to brussels

expensive internet, gotta go, update soon before Pokhara

The Jungle

thats right bitches, i front flipped off of an elephant's back into a river :)

okay short synopsis of the weekend, ive been at this computer for WAY too long because it takes FOREVER to get things done on this awful connection

Tuesday:

4.5 hour bus ride to Chitwan, out of the mountains and into the Terai, the flat lowlying portion of Nepal, very close to sea level, very humid, very hazy, very jungly.

found out we had a jam packed itinerary that alotted us about 5 minutes in between activities to use the toilet basically and nothing else.

swept off to "Jeep safari" . . . meh, not as glorious as it sounds, a large jeep riding down a gravel road through the jungle, and then we turned back and came back the same damn way we first went. Saw some deer, cool birds, a crocodile from FAR FAR away. that was about it.

Dinner: MORE DAL BHAT!!! but it was really good dal bat with chicken, and LOTS of white meat, i ate a whole lot

Wednesday:
Canoe ride in a REAL DUGOUT CANOE (yes like the native Americans made in the old days . . . very cool . . . very peaceful . . saw more cool birds, a few crocodiles from a lot closer up,

Ended the canoe ride and walked a short walk through the jungle to the Elephant Breeding Centers . . . thats right, elephant sex. Okay, so maybe there wasnt any barry white playing and mood lighting, more like thatched huts with elephants under them, but it was cool nonetheless. There were adorable elephant twins and one of the babies tried to hump its mother that was at least 5 times its size.

After that, we went back to the river for the elephant bathing!!! slip a dude 100 rupees and he'll let you ride on the back of the elephant as they bath in the water and spray water out of their trunks ALL over you . . . such an incredible experience. Every so often I would be sitting on top and the entire elephant would roll over onto its side, toppling me over . . . but fear not I was not crushed by an elephant.

Elephant Safari (lots of elephants that day)
this is where adam, me, and two dutch guys (the freaking dutch are taking over the planet) got onto an elephant and rode through the jungle. . . this was the "real" safari:

Animal count:
4 Rhinos
Lots of monkeys
Lots of deer
crocodile
Peacock
Wild boar
birds (duh)
umm that might be it

but the rhinos are obviously the coolest, we got REALLY CLOSE, like 10-=15ish feet, they could care less that there's a crowd of elephants standing around them with white losers taking pictures of them, actually, im pretty sure i saw a zoolander face come out of one of them :)

Thursday:

Jungle walk in the morning, very cool and different perspective to see the jungle from, lots of cool insects, some deer and antelope,

then, my body decided it was enough fun for me, and i got sick, but luckily there was nothing exciting for me to see in the afternoon

so yes, im on cipro now, and im supposed to limit my sun exposure . . . ha. . .
but i woke up friday feeling better and the bus ride home was only marginally aweful because this freaking nepali dude in front of me (who crazily spoke dutch, im telling you, they are taking over) kept putting his seat back and crushing me

Now back in kathmandu, going to take a tour of the coke factory that produces ALL of the coke for Nepal on monday (just happens to be a 15 minute walk frmo where i am staying)

More updates soon!

Making Bungee

We'll get to bungee and swing later, first thing's first

I got over the whole gross out factor of goat skin and just ate it. The night before i went for my bungee jump we had goat meat for dinner at the orphanage. Rather than being the wuss I had been and playing with every piece of meat to separate fat from meat from skin, i just ate it. Meh, goat skin is NOT like chicken skin, it's tough, a little rubbery, doesn't have too much taste, and isn't so incredibly awful.

alright i know i had other things to say but hopefully i will remember them after i talk about bungee!

thats right, i lept off the third highest commercial bungee jump IN THE WORLD, and the HIGHEST canyon swing in the world. Pictures are up on Facebook but i dont have the pics of me yet, those are promised from some nice tourists i met. The bridge for the bungee is over a gigantic canyon with a wild river rushing down below, not exactly a great way to land if things go wrong. Thankfully they didn't, and I flew 160 meters (thats around 480 feet!) into the canyon. The most free-fall anyone who hasn't bungeed or sky-dove has experienced is probably on a roller coaster, lasting about a second or two, so for the first second its exhilarating but semi predictable. The good part starts when your body says okay thats enough but you KEEP falling face to the ground and eventually slow down to bob back up three or four more times. All the blood pools in your head giving you a slight headache while the world spins around and you fill with a sense of euphoria you have never experienced before. That's the bungee. The swing is quite different, you are attached to a rope that is attached hundreds of feet AWAY from you to a wire spanning the canyon, so when you leap, you do a giant pendulum swing from the bridge across the canyon. The free-fall from the swing is about 5 seconds, way more than with the bungee, and it was absolutely incredible.

this was the most touristy thing i have done so far, and it was really nice to meet people and get to hear some travel stories. One Israeli tourist was a single deaf traveler traveling with lipreading in English and Hebrew as the only form of communication. . . incredible.

Went out that night for what was promised by Rajendra a "Nepali dance bar" which ended up being three Nepali men dancing by themselves watching girls up on stage dancing and taking pictures of them with their camera phones, pretty pathetic.

Tomorrow i am off to the jungle for my safari! will be back on Friday and give the update, but hopefully there are rhinos and tigers and elephant baths in my near future!

Subash has kind of stopped peeing in the bed! Thank god, although i will not hold my breath just yet.

Getting really sad that i only have another few weeks here before it's off to India.

After much pestering of my neighbor to cook me dinner i have been told by Rajendra that i need to give up the light harassment, because although the neighbor thinks its funny, I'm decently loud and it wouldn't be good for other people to hear me shouting in Nepali

"YOU, ME, DAL BHAT, TONIGHT"
"PLEASE, DAL BHAT, TONIGHT, ME, YOU, YOUR FAMILY"

It's incredible how much learning someone's name can change their attitude towards you, because before i spoke to her i had solely known her as the "sad looking woman that is always doing laundry outside my door" and now she is always smiling and always calling my name as I walk by. Really really wish i knew Nepali, damn Rosetta stone only had Hindi which hopefully i still remember some of by the time i get to India.

Random dude named Preston wandered into the orphanage the other day (hes from Alabama) and i think is now staying as a new volunteer . . . oh Nepal.

Eefje's friend and her will be in Chitwan (the jungle) at the same time as Adam and i, so that should be nice.

and a POOR POOR new volunteer is coming for JUST ONE WEEK here . . . they are going to be so shell shocked and will not even be halfway in the swing of things before it is time to leave, i feel awful, but i also agree with all the other volunteers that the new volunteer should clean the toilet :)

Kids/The slave

Last night the volunteers took didi out for a night on the town . . . caught the LAST bus from Boharatar into Thamel to listen to some live western music.

Needed to withdraw some money (10,000 rupees, about 135 dollars) from the ATM, and didi got really excited because she had never seen someone use an ATM machine before.

Ordered a whiskey sour at the bar we went to, which cost 240 rupees

An hour of internet at this cafe i am at costs 20 rupees . . . yes thats right, my drink was equivalent to a HALF A DAY of internet surfing

Kids have exams starting today,and the last three days have been HELL since Raj took the other volutneers back to Dhading (eefje hadnt seen the village bc she wasnt here at the time of the wedding), leaving me ALONE with ten kids with the responsibility of making them study. Needless to say I was a heartless bitch the past three days and all the kids ended up getting in trouble with "uncle" (rajendra).

Planning on renting a bike tomorrow and riding to bhaktapur, a more chilled out ancient city in the kathmandu valley that you have to pay TEN FREAKING DOLLARS to see. . . mahango cha (thats expensive!) I thought i would be horrified to ride a bike through the calamitous traffic here, but its a lot easier than i thought, and its kind of exhilirating!

Jungle safari next tuesday

The slave:

okay i know i mentioned that there's a slave upstairs, but we need to talk about it again. I cant remember if i wrote this previously or not, but they make her use the squat toilet OUTSIDE (like the one we all use from the orphanage) when there is a flushing western toilet inside! Eefje said she saw the slave giving the mother a massage the other day for like 30 minutes, and this woman is raising her kids to be evil, the kids completely disrespect this woman and call her names about her skin color and treat her like shit. It's absolutely awful. She's always up on the roof at night doing the dishes, and she walks super bitch's kids to school in the morning. Rajendra told me that they beat her and the best part is that she is some kind of relative of the family, i don't remember how, but she somehow was forced into this situation by the owner of our house, and is now stuck here washing dishes and taking shits outside. . . really really sucks.


think im going to take a walk back to the rock climbing place later today and see if i can find some nice tourists to invite me to climb with them

Totally Summitted Everest

I SAW IT, I SAW IT, I SAW IT
Imagine a jagged horizon, distant mountains forming a broken line like this WWVWWVWVWWVWWWVWVW
One mountain TOWERING above them all . . . . was not what I saw
Alright so I kind of knew this from the beginning, but the whole “everest view” thing kinda means teeny tiny bump on the jagged distant horizon. Everest is a lot farther away than the rest of the mountains on the horizon, so although much taller it barely cracks above the horizon line, and looks like absolutely nothing special. However, the view from Nagarkot, the second night’s stay, was incredibly beautiful and I did get a lot of other great mountain views with a lot more detail.
Highlights from the trek:
lots of really ridiculously hard uphill hikes through jungle, but also a lot of kind of lame road walking that was pretty much exactly what I saw in Dhading
a crazy old lady that scurried up past us on the trail/stairs as we were passing through a village. She was picking up rocks and throwing them off the edge of the trail onto the houses below us. Rajendra asked someone and she “gets upset when people hit her and then throws rocks at things.” We thought she was gone when all the sudden a rock came flying in our direction right past us.
Lunch the second day was in another small village. We had stopped with some other people on the trail, and another guide says to us “they have no meat here at the restaurant, but if you want we can all chip in and go buy a chicken over there (he points to the chickens clucking around on a nearby farm) and they will kill it and we’ll eat it” . . . . . OF COURSE I’ll eat a freshly slaughtered chicken killed 5 minutes before entering my mouth!
So I watched the entire process, from live chicken under a basket, to dead chicken running with its head cut off, to the old dude plucking and de-gutting the chicken, to cooking the chicken.
Worst part it, it didn’t even taste great, not much meat, pretty tough, meh, local chicken not all you would think it is. All though I did get a VERY strange looking organ in my soup, and im pretty sure I at chicken gizzard.
At Nagarkot we had dinner with some Philippino tourists that are currently living in Dubai. Phillip (yes Phillip from the Philippines) works at ski-Dubai, the indoor ski resort in the freaking desert of Dubai. They said they were going to stop by the orphanage today, we’ll see if they show.
That’s pretty much all the excitement for the Trek, had a really good hot pressurized shower at the hotel the second night, and there was a western toilet!!!!!

Getting Sick:
What the hell already, if im going to get sick, it just needs to happen, this whole thing going on for a few days where I like kind of have some stomach pain for a while and then it goes away is just not cutting it. The troops are mounting in the stomach, and they are planning their attack. The Nepali diarrheal extravaganza is coming, and there’s nothing I can do but hold on and pray for a mild case. I am okay though, and I still have the record for longest gone without getting sick. Maybe this will pass, will keep you updated
The name Didi:
Silly me for 4 weeks thought that the reason we all call Dewaki “didi” is because of the D for Dewaki . . . it’s not. When I heard strangers calling each other didi, bhai, dhai, and beheenay, it was explained to me that those names mean (respectively) Older sister, younger brother, older brother, and younger sister. These really are just neutral names that anyone can use for anyone else in society (for example Rajendra called the younger waiter at breakfast “Bhai”). Could you imagine if everyone in America just called each other “big bro, little bro, big sis, little sis”? It’s kind of cool though here that there’s a level of personable-ness between strangers they they all accept the names.
All of this being said, Dewaki still constantly calls me Pucchi (baby), and sometimes Bhai.
Kids have final exams coming up next week, so the next three days will be studystudystudy, but much more awesome things in the works that I will blog about as they become more solidified.
Jungle safari (elephant and jeep) is booked for March 16th!
March 13th is a local folk festival so hopefully ill see some awesome nepali dance and hear some good music!


OH, also, here below im copying a newsletter rajendra had me write for the previous volunteers to give them an update of whats going on at the orphanage:

Ramro Sathi newsletter:
The sun is shining most of the time at Ramro Sathi as of this minute, but parts of the day are still clouded by our proximity to neighboring buildings and the fact that we do not have unrestricted access to the roof. Soon that will all change. The days of irritable land-ladies, locked doors without a key and not enough space are on the way out. On the way in is a new house built especially for Ocean Nepal. The “New Land,” a three minute walk from the current house, is already purchased and building should begin in the coming months. As if the kids didn’t have enough places to dirty themselves, the new land has become another spot for relaxation, sports, and given the recent “Holi festival,” water fights with the other neighborhood children. The land is prime real estate, perched on a hill to provide perpetual sunshine to compliment the luxuries of having our own building.
Exams are quickly approaching (and might be finished by the time you read this, oh Nepali time), and the kids are entering study mode for the next three days to prepare for their finals. Math seems to be the topic of attention, and the abacus has become one of the most sought after items in the house, second to coconut biscuits. After exams are finished, the kids have a long holiday starting in the middle of March. Plans for this time are not concrete yet, but some of the children may get the opportunity to see relatives in their villages.
Our current volunteers (Ben from America, Nora from Austria, Eefje from Holland, Adam from Canada) have been trying to plan some new activities for the kids. Last week Suraj, Rajju, Dhanaraj, and Janga hiked with Ben and Eefje up to Jamacho peak in the Nagarjun Forest Reserve, the temple at the top of the hills visible from the orphanage. The volunteers were absolutely astounded that, against their devout expectations, all four kids made it up and down the 2.5 hour treacherous climb without one complaint. Highlights from the day include a monkey stealing noodles and grapes right from Ben’s bag after he turned his head, and climbing the rickety lookout tower at the peak with incredible views of the Kathmandu valley. Nora took the other children to Thamel that day for momos and other fast food. We plan to take a trip after exams all together to visit the Patan Durbar square, which the kids have never seen before.
And now for something a bit more personal, here’s a few lines/quotes/stories regarding the kids:
Subash: Knows exactly when to turn on the charm so that we can’t ever be that mad at him, even though he is still peeing in the bed! The volunteers are trying everything, from waking him up to pee at night (which mostly works but isn’t a permanent solution), to promising him stickers and bracelets for keeping dry, to telling him we won’t wash his pajamas, which resulted in him sleeping in his underwear.
Rajju: Recently lost her nose ring and arrived at home with a tiny wooden stick through the hole in her nose. Nora and Ben IMMEDIATELY removed the stick and took Rajju to buy a beautiful new gold stud, after some heavy bargaining with the jeweler.
Sarita: Won first place in the girl’s high jump competition at her school. She hurdled over 3 feet and 3.5 inches into a pit of sand and was cheered on by her entire school.
Ramesh: Will be performing in a school dance with Sarita in April. He also competed in the school high jump for the boys, but did not place. However, Ben can personally vouch for the crowd of screaming ladies cheering him on . . . yea Ramesh.
Aakriti: Also competed in the girls high jump in a different class than Sarita. Although she did not place, she was also well loved by the crowd.
Janga: Scraped his left lower palm pretty badly about two weeks ago when he fell and skidded on his hands. He bravely endured the repeated hand washings to clean his wounds, and is healing excellently.
Bhabishya: Lost her first tooth yesterday! She is proudly showing off the hole in the bottom center of her smile. Rumor is that her teacher pulled it out at school.
Ashmita: Just received the most stylish haircut of the century: the “lice remover” special. Luckily she looks incredibly adorable regardless of how short her hair is, and after one week it is growing back pretty fast!
Suraj: Does not like it when I throw a teaspoon of cold water on his face in the morning to wake him up.
Dhanaraj: Loves it when I throw a teaspoon of cold water on his face in the morning to wake him up.
Dewaki: Went shopping with Hanny Miss a few days ago and picked up a new sweater that has kept her smiling for days.

Happy Holi!

Before we get to holi:

there is wild marijuana growing ALL OVER my neighborhood . . . i cannot believe i didn't realize it until Nora (volunteer from Austria) pointed it out to me!

More photos up on Facebook (im finally in Thamel uploading where there's fast internet, a lot of pics from the stories you've heard)

Just last night had a wonderful dance party in the play room with the kids . . . took out my ipod and put on all the hindi music i have :) . . . although once jai ho came on thats ALL the kids wanted to listen to. The three little ones were SO incredibly cute though . . . and this is day 4 of no pee for subash :) . . . noe more day and he gets a handmade bracelet from me

A word on taking a poo:

you probably haven't ever thought about how much you take for granted when you take a nice luxurious seat on that toilet to do your business . . . but for a lot of the world there is much more to this little task than relaxing with the morning paper.

1) its all about the foot placement with squat toilets. . . there is the "shuffle" before the squat, to make sure you are on target

2) Dont get too comfortable: you may have shuffled correctly, but 2 minutes in, after you tire a bit, you may find yourself leaning back or forward a little. . . NOT A GOOD IDEA unless you are okay with a sliding bankshot (ill let you figure out the reference)

3) Swishes are preferable


HOLI:

Imagine all of society had a gigantic water fight, all the teenagers got drunk at 10AM, everyone threw bags of water twist tied up at each other, some clear, many with colored pigments in them, at everyone

to top it all off, people run around with the pigment powder on theirhands and smear it onto peoples faces (strangers faces) . . . cannot WAIT to get these pictures up they will be in the next batch

we exhausted ALL of our water reserves (there was no power so no water was pumping, so we had to use up all of our reserve water stored in big black drums)

it was so worth it, one of the best days here

everyone shouts "happy holi" as they throw things at you

people on the roofs have a HUGE advantage

all cyber cafes were closed because theres no way they were getting water anywhere near their stores


Trek tomorrow morning with views of EVEREST!!! ill be back thursday night, WOOT

thanks for reading,. next post ill let you know how the trek went!

School Revisited, Subash revisited

I came back with a plan

I succeeded

Made the kids put on mini "plays" for me

Scenario one:

mom/dad/son/son's girlfriend . . . mom and dad are nepali, son's girlfriend is AMERICAN!! i each gave them one line to say, and the rest they had to some up with on their own

Dad: "How can you marry a girl who is not a hindu!"
Mom: "This girl cannot even cook a proper curry" (i know this sounds so aweful and sexist, but trust me, it was TOTALLY normal and okay)
Son: " It doesnt matter where she is from or what she looks like, I love her"
Son's girlfriend: "I dont care what you guys say i am staying with your son"

These were age 10-13 boys/girls, it was hysterical

In one class, the boy said to his girlfriend "I am siding with my parents i am dumping you" and went and hugged his father, this may not seem so hysterical to read, but let me assure you, it was the last thing i was expecting!

Scenario two: Two backpacking guides, two tourist friends

Backpacking guide 1: "this is the best trek we offer, that's the reason it is so expensive"
Guide 2: "if you want a cheaper trek you can sleep in a cardboard box in the woods"
Friend 1: I cannot afford this trek, i have three hungry children at home (always caused a roaring laughter from the rest of the class audience.
Friend 2: Will the trek be cheaper if we only take one guide?

Nothing too ridiculous happened in this one

Scenario 3: car accident, driver, cyclist, bystander, and policeman.

driver: You ran straight into my car
cyclist: "my leg is broken, i am a runner, this is going to ruin my career" (to which one kid started hopping around)
Bystander: I saw the whole thing, it was the driver's fault
Policeman/woman: i suggest you solve this in 5 minuets or i am taking you all to jail

the compromise between the driver and cyclist always involed one gicving the other money . . . one class the girl said she had no money, to which the cyclist boy replied
"if you dont pay me my 5000 rupees i am going to fight you" . . . and they proceeded to wrestle . . . im some great sub huh?


Subash:

its really easy to assume he doesnt know what your saying, because his english isnt that great, but he is secretly a mastermind

Last night he slept only in his underwear and wouldnt tell anyone why, me thinking he was just being a cute silly kid said ehh whatever . . . the next morning, when i mentioned this to rajendra, he immediately said "yea you told him that you were never washing his pee clothes ever again yesterday" (i have been washing his cvlothes a few times because if i dont do it, they sit there and he has no clean clothes to change into the next night. I TOTALLY didnt connect the dots. . . at all. . . because i just figured that when i told him that he didn't really understand

color festival tomorrow, trek coming soon, excited!

oh and photos from a while ago are up on facebook, getting more up soon

Curry and School

Curry first:

A word on eating the same thing for breakfast and dinner every single day . . . its not as bad as i thought. Given my twice daily rice, lentil soup, and curried vegetables, i am learning to appreciate the smaller things about a meal that make it savory and delicious. The excitement of my days has now turned to questions such as:

Is there pickle (kind of like a spicy chili sauce made with tomatoes) at this meal?
Is it chicken curry night?
Is it spinach curry this morning?
Is it bean curry this morning?

yea its pretty pathetic, but i am really starting to identify with the truth of not having the concept of always eating different things if that was not how you were brought up. A few weeks ago Richard, another volunteer, made a curry for the kids and although i thought it was delicious, half of the kids didn't eat it because although it was "good" . . . it wasn't "right" . . . whatever that means. God knows what would happen if we took them to America and had them eating every ethnicity of food all the time like we do.

Schoool:

yesterday when i went to pick the kids up from school the principal saw me and asked me if i would come to school today, and after i realized i had absolutely NO plans i said surely. I was kind of prepared from what previous volunteers had told me: you are put in a room with the kids with no teacher . .. BAM teach them english. The principal likes the volunteers to converse with the students to have them practice . . . only one problem . . . NONE OF THEM TALK . . . it was painstaking, torturous,

okay i kind of didnt have anything prepared, so it was kind of my fault, but i just dont know how much i can plainly "converse" with students with no sort of lesson plan, i really wish i could teach whatever the kids were learning in school, which would be so much easier. With the older kids i tried doing an overview of how research works and why we should test drugs on animals like rats and monkeys rather than ants and butterflies, but that took all of 5 minutes, and in my teacherly panic, i ended up playing hangman during the last 10 minutes of class . . . i find myself typing the word "whoops" a lot on this blog.

im going to go back tomorrow with more of a plan, and see what happens, but i duno i don't think i can keep up this "just have a conversation" kind of teaching without actually getting across any material that is on their exams or will help them. gaah.

SUBASH, the 5 year old, keeps pissing the damn bed, and im tired of it. Every morning we have to find clean clothes for him (he has none), put his sleeping bag outside to dry (and yes i said dry, not wash), and i have to shower him (and that has now changed from hot showers to cold showers, as punishment). I would feel kind of bad for the kid under normal circumstances, BUT. . . and this is a big BUT . . . almost everyone in the house is convinced that the reason he pees himself is because he is TOO GOD DAMN LAZY TO GET OUT OF BED DURING THE NIGHT AND USE THE PEE BUCKET THAT IS RIGHT NEXT TO HIS BED. We were told that when there are no volunteers here (aka no one to shower him, wash his clothes, and pamper him), he doesnt pee the bed, and that he didnt pee the bed before he came to the house here. WTF? Who is that lazy??? It doesnt help that he happens to be the most adorable, cutest kid there, but i just cant let that win me over anymore, please post ideas as comments if you know what to do!!!!!!! I feel aweful for the four other boys that sleep in the room that smells like a urinal minus that wonderfully smelling urinal cake.

Next week going on a 3ish day trek with views of Mount Everest!!!!!!!!

okay before you get too excited, i get to see the TOP of mount everest IF its clear out :) . . . i could have done a 14 day trek to basecamp, but i decided against it.

thats all for now

Lets Learn Nepali!

PHEW!!! sorry for the delay . . .such a ridiculous few days and this has been my first time at the computer without impending breakfast to miss!

My Nepali language skills so far!

Ramro- good
Ramro china- no good
Sundaree- beautiful
Sundar- Handsome
MAHANGO CHA- THATS TOO EFFING EXPENSIVE
Ke Cha- whats up
Teek cha- im fine (also the ONLY answer anyone ever gives you when you ask whats up)
Hajjur- What/I didnt Understand you/ what did you say/the second word ANYONE says after hello when picking up the cell phone
Bhat- Rice
Dal- Lentil soup
Meeto- Delicious
Bhuk cha- I'm full
Dui manche- Two men (is what i repetatively said to Dewaki when i tried explaining that just because she has an alcoholic husband in Dhading, doesnt mean she cannot ALSO have a boyfriend in Kathmandu . . . she totally understood this, and i am convinced her boyfriend is the man she sees when she goes "shopping" for food)
Namaste- Hello/goodbye (kinda like shalom)
cant think of any more right now, maybe by the time im done with this post there will be more

Some more facts of life before the three stories ive been meaning to tell

A note on cleanliness:
Doesnt Smell = Clean
Dry = Clean enough
Wet = Not so clean

There is no electrical outlet in my room

I thought my room had a substantial ceiling . . . but that was a facade. . . in actuality it is a tin roof, and a pretty gigantic cheese cloth pulled tight under that to catch rain droplets that fall through

I got extremely proud of the Jews, because almost EVERY school here has a jewish star somewhere in its logo, so i naturally thought all the rich philanthropic jews came here, almost threw up at the poverty they saw, and then ran back to america and poured money into opening schools here . . . until i learned that the jewish star has significance in the hindu religion, and has absolutely nothing to do with judaism here . . . oh well

The Movie Love Actually:

Remember the scenes where the man stays in the country house in somewhereville and falls in love with the portugese maid without speaking a word of the same language to her . . . well take out the whole falling in love part and that is my life with Dewaki, the house mom. . . . the words above are ALL i hve to communicate with her, and we constantly squalk at each other in our respective languages, and i imagine we are talking about the same thing :). Its great, she loves me because i help out with a lot of the housework, and in return she is warming up to me a lot, pinching my side and smiling all the time at me. . . and i get to yell and lightly curse at her all the time without her having any idea what im saying, i love this

The biking story:
4k aint got nothing on this, little time before power cuts out so i will try to be brief:

rent bikes, bike guy tells us bikes have to be back by 6, sends us out 17 km away up 700 meters (do the math) out of the valley with the intructions "ask the local people" to get to the trail

we EXHAUST ourselves getting up there, SO MUCH uphill, finally find the tr4ail, no signs, no one speaks english, everyone nods their head yes to what you say regardless of if they understand
"are there signs to show us where the point is that we want to get off" = = = yes
"is it easy for us to get lost and not know where there are signs" - - - yes
" are there not signs on the trail" = = = yes

FRUSTRATING

trail starts off nice, then ENDS on a dirt road, get some shoddy directions from the nepali trekkers and ride 45 minutes DOWN AN UNPAVED ROCKY DIRT ROAD . . . only to learn that we had to walk our bikes 2.5 hours bACK up everything we just rode down because we went the wrong way, by which point it was dark, and we finally convinced a truck to take us back to kathmandu, and promised to pay them, although they didnt accept the money after we got there

Nepali nightlife:

Babylon discoteque- where the nepalis go, the place to go outside the tourist district, the real taste of nepali nightlife . . . we were told'

Actuality: half empty dance floor playing aweful music with a 70:30 guys to girls ratio. . . and among the girls a 2:1 transgender:actual girl ratio . . . .the place was shut down after 45 minutes of us being there due to the 13 year olds that were in there. thank god/

bijendra(brotther of rajendra, owner of orphanage) takes us back to thamel and asks every nepali he can find something that we cant understand . . . then. out of no where, a metal garage door half opens and we are ushered into the underground club that is the ONLY club that stays open, illegally, after 12pm in kathmandu, . . . kinda same thing as babylon club minus the transgendered women and plus more tourists because it was in Thamel . . . a ridiculous night

Hiking:

hiked up to one of the peaks that overlooks the kathmandu valley yesterday with 5 of the kids and eefge (pronounced ayfeeya, a volunteer from amsterdam), , , surprisingly there were no fatalities and NOt one kid cried, lathough the view at the top sucked because of the cloudiness, the hike was great, through the forest, and there were SO many monkeys at the temple at the top, one of which stole grapes and a package of noodles out of my bag after i walked away from it for ONE second!


phew, i think thats all, sorry for the bad grammar so much to say so little time to say it, thanks for the comments more coming up soon!

still being hit with water by the devil neighborhood children, color festival coming up soon!

yea ill get to the school eventually

been busy kids off from school since friday and there are strikes tomorrow and monday, so wont get to have a long post until tues probably, much to tell . . .

some quick updates:

dishes this morning done without running water, no power, pour water from a jug = sink

did laundry by hand this morning as well :)

longest day of my life two days ago (longer story something soon, 4k got nothing on this one

Nepali night life last night (enough said. . . okay maybe not still longer story coming soon)

]oh also, in this entire country, the largest bill that EXISTS. . . is 1,000 rupees . . . which is about 12.5 american dollars . . . yea. . .



color festival coming soon, everyone throws bags of pigmented color on everyone they see. . . days leading up to the festival kids start throwing just water . . .ive been hit a few times now by the local kids, our kids are engaged in a 24 hour full on waterfight with the neighborhood, its awesome

BRUNCH AT THE HYATT TOMORROW!!!!!! 15ish US dollars for all you can eat WESTERN FOOD. . . i cannot wait

volunteering at the school sometime . . . eventually . . . when i get around to it. . .

Few more facts of life:

grapefruits grow outside my door :) (no im not eating them)
had chicken curry for the first time at the house two nights ago, DELICIOUS!! thank god rajendra orders the chicken sans organs, so its just bones meat and skin, and the kids eat all the skin.

Learning slowly how to cook at the house and am helping the house mom whenever i can to prepare meals

Yesterday Bhabishya and Ashmita came home with their homework, which is to copy english words about 20 times into their copy book.

Next to a picture of a hot pepper was the word "chilly" . . . seriously!? the kids had never heard of the word chilly to mean cold, so when i explained it to them they thought it was hysterical that it could be chilly outside . . . i tried writing whatever retarded teacher a note but who knows where it will go.

Im pretty sure for Sarita's (the oldest) vocabulary words, they pick random words out of the dictionary, as the word "fornicate" was on her list once . . .

Nevertheless i am going to try to help out in the school sometime next week

Monkey temple and mounain biking to be done soon!

Story of the week:

Two days ago was tibetan new year. . . so we tried to go to the buddhist temple to join the festivities . . . on the way we see a smaller tibetan gathering and decided to go on in, assuming it was for the new year
saw that it was mostly just people sitting around, tried to leave
was presented with LARGE shopping bags FULL of bisquits, fruit, snacks, so we felt bad leaving after that
turned around went back inside
Found chairs in shade
sat down
tibetans rush over with a table
more tibetans rush over with tea
more tibetans rush over with cups and a bottle of coke
more tibetans rush over and usher us to the food. . . gigantic buffet of veggies, tofu, MEAT, yogurt, and lots of other stuff. .. one of the best meals
we eat like kings, all the time thanking everyone
no one spoke a word of english to us this whole time
as we got up to give back our plates, we found the one man who spoke decent english, and thanked him for the food and said happy new year

to which he replied:

"this is not for the new year, this is a funeral reception"

WHOOPS :)

oh well, i still love tibetans .. . nothing too special was going on at the actual temple, so we walked back and made a pit stop at the Hyatt. . . which im pretty sure is the ONE and only western luxurious hotel in all of kathmandu (i mean im probably wrong but it seems that way)

the hyatt was like steping into another country, it was incredible, met some crazy german world traveler who initially told us he was from khazakstan and had two wives and 10 children . . . the end

Facts of Life/ shiva festival

Life in Boharatar (spelling probably awefully wrong)

about 80% of the shops in my neighborhood do not accept 1000 rupee bills (about 12.5 us dollars) because they do not carry that much change

The kids in the orphanage have zero concept of going to hang out with a friend after school . . . it just doesn't exist for them

Laundry is done in a bucket

Teeth are brushed using water from a faucet in the shower . . . toothpaste is spat onto the shower floor, along with extra rice/curry when lots of people are washing plates and the outside faucet is occupied

Butchers kill their meat on the side of the road . . . i watched a goat get beheaded, de-haired, and chopped up . . .

it is FREEZING in the morning, i am warm under my blankets, but it must be close to 35 degrees in the morning . . . once the sun comes out it warms up

Power outages cause there to be times where there is no light in the toilet late at night . . .there is a bucket in the boys room for night peeing


Now about the Shiva festival:
meh, it was pretty cool, a lot more secular than i had imagined. Since we were tourists we shot past all of the lines of locals waiting to enter the main area, and it was just a huge mosh of people smoking a lot of weed and hanging out with sadhu men (holy men). These are men who have given up all of their possessions and basically everything in their lives to live a life of . . . im not really sure what, that includes wearing a sheet, smoking a lot of pot, and sharing the secrets of life with people. They are pretty awesome, but kind of pathetic at the same time. Three of the six volunteers "hung out" with a sadhu for a little and attracted a huge Nepali crowd. Other than that we just walked around, got smashed by a literal human mob of people, and ate lunch . . . with some deliciously "special" desserts. All in all it was alright . . . the Tibetan new year is coming up tomorrow so we are heading back to a Tibetan part of town to see what that's all about

thanks again for all the comments! more updates soon, going to plan some fun activities like rafting/hiking

Nepali Time

5 minute walk = at least 20 minute hike
1 hour bus ride = 3 hour bus ride through winding roads on the top of the bus
1 wedding = 6 days trapped in the mountains
a few hours in Thamel = all day spent in the office with no electricity

i am punctual . . nepali time has been a big adjustment

Tomorrow is Shiva Ratri (i think thats the spelling). . . a city wide festival to the god of destruction . . . should be fun! tried getting pics up on this blog but it has just been absolutely impossible! sorry everyone

its getting warmer, the tourist season is approaching (us at the house have deemed ourselves "volunteers" NOT tourists) . . . so things will change around here.

just handwashed my laundry today and took a much needed shower heated by a tank of gas sitting in the shower with me :)

There;s mountains just outside my backyard that i will be climbing next week, one has a temple at the top!

hopefully i will be posting more frequent updates now that things have started to settle!

Dhading

Sorry for the disappearance . . . I've been in a small village called Dhading attending a wedding!

Not too much time on the computer so here are the highlights:

2 hour bus ride smashed with nepalis through the winding himalayas . . . 1.5 hours in woman turns her head, pukes all over the seat in front of me, my bag, and another volunteer, and then turns her head back and doesnt look at us the entire rest of the time . . . the only thing to do was to laugh :)

the house we stayed at was actually in the mountains far from the actual town of Dhading (google map it!)so we walked up, it got dark, hitched a ride on a truck filled with sacks . . . of manuer . . . sat on the top of the truck.

House: hillside, kitchen cooking by FIRE only . . . goats, bulls, ox, chickens, rice, rice, rice, rice, fresh buffalo milk, curd, adorably cute grandma,

The Bar: Bijendra . . brother of man who owns orphanage, would not shut up about going to the bar to drink . . . the bar was someone;s house . . . we sat in their bedroom . . . on their bed . . . drinking aweful nepali wine called Roxy . . . which tasted like fermented toilet water . . . im not kidding

Wedding: Sat on top of a bus for 2 hours, walked up a mountain for another house (with a train of nepalis in suits getting ridiculously dirty) . . . it looked like a refugee train. . . we arrived with the groom so thats when the wedding started . . .

Dancing, rituals, lots of tikkas (indian dot above eyes). . . played the symbols for the band, ate curried goat (the nose was on my plate, didnt eat that)

Bride leaves her village with us after wedding to start her new life in Pokhara with her husband . . . arranged marraige ./ . . last time they had seen each othe was a month ago ./ . . younger brother was looking forward to marrying next year . . . . hes 19 . . . he doesnt know who he's marrying yet, or when he will find out . . .

Bus ride back was miserable, top of the bus, dark, crowded, rails digging into backs . . but made it fun by obnoxiously singing songs that the nepalis couldnt understand :)

got stuck in the mountains for an extra day because it rained, so no buses were coming to bring people down to the main town to catch a bus back to kathmandu. rain cleared the air though, it's been extremely poor visability bc of the dust, but now its better and i saw the snowy peaks in the distance.

thats all for now, thanks so much for the comments!

hard

this is going to be a lot more difficult than i imagined to keep this current and include all the info i wanted to. The internet computers are extremely slow around where i am, and getting into Thamel to use the office computer is a journey in itself, and on top of that the blackouts cause me to not be able to use the computer at the orphanage, while although it doesnt have internet it would allow me to at least write up posts so that i could easily copy and post them when i do have internet, bear with me ,so much to say, and you would think i have so much time to say it

Sensory OVERLOAD

Hello everyone!
I have so much in my head I have no idea where to begin. I guess ill start where I left off. . . After I got to the orphanage my eyes were opened up to my new way of life here, which is so different that I will be able to describe you just have to come to see yourself. The orphanage is in a quiet village like “suburb” right next to the busy part of the city. The orphanage itself pretty much has four rooms for ten people: Kitchen(no refrigerator, one table not big enough to fit all the ppl in the house, gas powered stove that uses red gas tanks, sink), Boys room (5 boys one room bunk beds, multiple kids sleeping in each bed), Girls room (same thing, 5 girls), Play room (one TV, one table, shelves with books), I will get pictures up soon.
Dinner was served the night I got here, Dhal Bhat (curried vegetables, rice, and lentil soup), and will be the SAME MEAL TWICE A DAY FOR TWO MONTHS. The only thing that changes are the vegetables. In true Nepali style we ate with our hands. This made eating Ethiopian food look clean, since there was no bread to grab things with. Yes, this means you swirl the rice and veggies around with your hands and use a scooping technique to get it into your mouth. It’s freaking awesome. After dinner there are some angry games of rock paper scissors and eating competitions to see who will be doing the dishes. The bathroom/shower are outside and are used by everyone in the building, including the families upstairs from the orphanage. My room is in the “building” right next to the orphanage, and is basically the equivalent to a freshman single dorm but there are two people in it. There are two beds, one coat rack, and a desk.
Garbage lines the streets, and the stenches change every ten feet when we walk the kids to school. There is an extremely dangerous mix of people, bicycles, motor bikes, and cars even in the quiet neighborhood that I am in. Somehow though, no one really gets hurt and the constant honking, bumping, and shuffling just magically works. The chaos is indescribable. On my first full day we walked the kids to school, headed to Rajendra’s (owner of orphanage) tourist office, and played some cards while drinking tea. We essentially played old maid except you have three jacks in the deck and the last person to get the jack loses. I couldn’t believe how much fun such a simple game was providing us. We then went to take care of a few errands, fixing up my phone, exchanging money, and buying awesome wool knitted socks, before heading to lunch OUTSIDE of Thamel (the crowded overpriced tourist district.) A few minute’s walk away I paid the equivalent of one dollar and was served an extremely delicious meal of curry, chick peas, and some potato pie, as well as desserts. Let me repeat, ONE DOLLAR, I like Nepal . We then headed into the main local market of Kathmandu (as if there is anything BUT a local market), which was even more chaotic than Thamel. Old appliances, used clothing, sprawled out dead chickens, live chickens, anything you can imagine was clucking, mooing, or ready to be sold. Yes cows really do roam the streets here, along with monkeys, goats, dogs, chickens, and other things.
Dinner tonight was MORE curried vegetables and rice. . . I’m lucky that I happen to love curry otherwise I don’t think it’s possible to survive here. After dinner I was handed a small glob of white paste from Diwaki (house mom) and told to try it. Thinking it was something that involved sugar, because t came out of a honey bottle, I popped it into my mouth and encountered what only could be described as . . . lard. Yes ladies and gentlemen I have eaten my first wad of Yak fat. I don’t know why they gave it to me to try, as it’s used like butter and really isn’t supposed to be eaten plain, but oh well it wasn’t terribly aweful. This week will be filled with tourist adventures, as Rajendra has waited until all of the volunteers were here (aka until I arrived) to take us around to the places here. Pictures to come soon!
OH WAIT, the busses! I took my first bus ride today which was the most awkward, friendly, and intimate experience I have had here. The “busses” are not busses, but larve vans that people PACK into. There were at least 15 people in the small van that took us to Thamel this morning. Strangers sit on each other’s laps, people hang off the sides of the van, it is absolutely CRAZY but for them just a fact of life that they think nothing of. I will try to post a video I made riding on the bus on facebook soon.

new post coming soon wrote a long one on thumb drive and need to figure out a way to get it onto a computer, so much to say i do not have time to write it all now

The Simple life: Paris Hilton aint got shit on me

HOLY CRAP

Lets start with plane #1 . . .. i love jet airways. Delicious Indian food and complimentary wine provided an incredible start to my trip. Then, i discovered all the free stuff on the monitors on the back of the seats. I was dubious at first and thought i was somehow going to be charged, but once i realized bollywood movies were free I immediately started watching "Love Aaj Kal" which was awesome since i pretty much knew all the music already. I sat next to a lovely Indian lady named Jan, and wed discussed religion and education in Jewish versus hindu families :). After Love Aaj Kal, one glass of wine, and delicious curry I then discovered all the free bollywood music at my disposal, and immediately put on "Duniya" even though i already have it on my ipod. The flight was extremely smooth and pain-free and i arrived at Brussels in blizzardy weather with a surprisingly graceful landing. Second flight was delayed three hours since the Brussels airport closed for a full huor due to the snow. This was a blessing in disguise as it shortened my stay at the New Delhi airport. Flight #2 was longer than the first and I sat next to a canadian woman on a free trip tp india with some rotary club. Stuck to water on this trip but decided to go vegetarian . . . good choice.

Here's where the shit starts flying. I was probably one of three people from my flight from Brussels to Delhi that was going on to Kathmandu . . . so they failed to tell me NOT to go through immigration . . . whoops. I thought this was the right thing since i was told at JFK that i would have to take my bags through customs at Delhi so it all made sense . . . until i saw an employee snatch my bag off the conveyor belt to learn that my bags would have been taken onto my next flight for me. Now that i was through customs however, the bags were mine until 6AM the next morning (it was 1AM). GREAT! So in the dingy lounge i sat for four hours twiddling my thumbs and attempting to build card castles (i learned my deck only has 51 cards so there goes solitaire). Finally morning came and i painlessly rechecked my bags and hopped on the flight to Kathmandu. the views of the Himalayan mountains were breathtaking and i was glued to the window most of the time.

However, i was TOTALLY unprepared for the car ride to the orphanage. Nepali streets are CHAOS. Many of the roads have no middle divider, and there are as many motorbikes on the road as there are cars. Somehow amidst the constant beeping, swerving, and near collisions no one was actually hitting anyone. It was pure magic. Lining the streets are little shops, tons of stray dogs, monkeys, ducks, cows, and garbage. Have to go meet the kids for the first time as they come home from school (yes on Sunday) so i will save descriptions of the orphanage for my next post . . . there is SO much to say.

Thanks for reading!

The Last Supper

Okay so i couldn't wait until early next week to write another post.

By this time tomorrow I will be sometime over the Atlantic Ocean headed for Brussels, Belgium. . . hopefully fully prepared for my stay in Nepal and travels in India. Today I completed my medicine cabinet (aka plastic bag) . . . that now includes Immodium, Pepto, Cipro, azithromycin, acidophilus pills, Malaria prophylaxis pills, and some cold medicine (please don't comment that I've forgotten something because it's too late and i don't want to hear it :)). My poor stomach is about to meet some friend's it never thought it would encounter, and hopefully it will fair well!

The owner of the orphanage, Rajendra, is supposedly picking me up at the airport in Kathmandu on Sunday morning (Saturday night for all of you, 11 hour time difference), although at this point I have no phone number for him to contact in case my flights are delayed . . . yay for trust in others!

Just checked the weather for the THREE destinations I will be flying into, and all seem clear and wonderful, so assuming all goes well I should have a relatively painless 28 hour travel experience. I am a bit worried about my overnight stay from 10PM to 8AM in India's New Delhi airport. What the hell am I going to do? Where am I going to pass out? Give yourself a mental picture of me sleeping in a corner of of the New Delhi airport on top of all of my bags so no one could loot anything out of them! Oh well, look forward to hearing what I ended up doing in the New Delhi airport, as it is bound to be a good story with 10 hours to spare.

Today I finished lesson three of unit one of Rosetta Stone for Hindi, which technically is NOT the language of Nepal, but the language of India . . . Oh well hopefully it will do me some good over there. I will probably royally embarrass myself because although I have a decent amount of verbs and nouns under my belt, I am still incredibly shaky with conjugating masculine and feminine tenses, as evidenced by my recent addressing of an Indian man as a woman when trying to ask "what's up"? Oh well.

I've got to be forgetting something . . . right?

Hello everyone and welcome to the blog of the century! If you care to read this over the coming semester you will be enlightened with the secrets of life, the fumbles of my travels, and hopefully hear about a lot of ridiculous and awesome things I will intentionally or unintentionally do.

Just in case you start wondering why I don't add another post until probably Monday morning, here's why:
Fri 6PM 8 hour plane ride to Brussels, Belgium
Saturday 10 AM (their time) 8 hour plane ride to New Delhi, India
Sunday 10 AM (their time) 1.5 hour plane ride to Kathmandu, Nepal
Yea . . . I know . . . Yay picking the cheapest way to get half way around the world

Kathmandu, the capital and pretty much only big city of Nepal, is where i will reside for two months, in an orphanage called Ramro Shati (http://www.oceannepal.org). If you pay attention to the address at the top right corner of their website, you will see that the address of my residence has neither a number or a street. Therefore, do not try to send me mail, because it will most probably not get there. Be sure to take a look at the page called "children" as they are adorable and they are the ones i will be caring for while I am there. More updates on that little mothering journey as it ensues.