Door to door service, Nepali style

One of the things that made my parents most nervous about my joining the peace corps, is the transportation in Nepal. I can't count the number of times my dad said: "just don't be the last person on the roof of a crowded bus with the goats." This warning is not an exaggeration, but genuine advice I would give a tourist in Nepal. The bus boys, or bhai, will try to convince you to climb up or if you're lucky, make space for you on top of a woman and wedged between her vomiting baby, and a peeing goat. 

It is that scenario that I found myself in two weeks ago as I tried to get my stove from my district capital to my village. I mentioned in the last post that I am now cooking for myself. What I didn't mention is the process that it took to get my materials to do so. A process I think bears mentioning as it speaks to the challenges of transportation in Nepal, as well as how much people look out for me here and are eager to try to help the struggling foreigner, bideshi. 

After talking to my family about cooking for myself, I set about to buy the things I would need to build a little kitchen in a spare room and headed to the capital of Lamjung, Besi Sahar. I made the hour and change trip down my mountain to the road and met the bus, siting next to a teacher who despite the many times I said "I am not a teacher" kept asking me what school I worked at. After about 30 minutes, I arrived and bustled around town finding a stove, gas tank, regulator, and numerous ingredients and cooking utensils. Besi Sahar is the city that people leave from to hike the Annapurna Circuit trek, one of the more popular treks in Nepal so the site of a young white woman with a backpack is no strange site. What did boggle people's minds however is why does this girl speak Nepali, and why on earth is she buying a stove!? Usually when I am in capital it is to eat different food and see other Lamjung friends, and it felt good and different to go about and buy things from stores foreigners never go in. I now can't walk past the store where I bought my utensils without the owner running out and telling me sit with her for a moment. 

Around noon, I call my mom and tell her I have my things, and ask what time the last bus to our village is going. I usually avoid taking a bus home, because it takes just as long or longer as walking up the mountain and is infinitely less comfortable. There are at least three that come to our bazaar daily, about half an hour walk from my house. But I need the last one, "Dubar gadi"  that on its way to Dubar, passes my house because I can't carry my stove and gas 30 minutes. She tells me the bus never left Dubar this morning so it won't be coming back this evening. A little frustrated I go to the bus park director who tells me that no, the Dubar bus is going today. I call my mom to tell her I'm getting on the bus, she says okay she was mistaken. I check in with the store owner I bought the stove and gas from to make sure he can bring it to my bus, and feel satisfied and sit down at a snack shop to marvel at my ability to purchase things and feel thankful for such an easy day. Transportation in Nepal is great! I'm great! I'm cooking for myself!

That's not where this post ends though. The bus director, Khussi, comes and joins me at the snack shop. He says he's calling the Dubar driver over and over but he's not picking up. Can I come tomorrow? If I come tomorrow I can get my things. He points to a bus that's pulling away and tells me to get on that cause it's the last bus to my bazaar. I gather my bags and run toward the extremely crowded bus, get a lot of laughs and confused faces as I get on. I'm lucky this time, the bus makes truly record speed, the driver refusing to stop for passengers on the side of the road, and we make it back to village before nightfall. A woman gives me a snack of "chaat put" which is a mixture of dry ramen, something akin to rice krispee cereal, and an assortment of cucumber, chilli pepper, and sour sauce. Delicious. A man offers me drinks of raksi, a locally made liquor. It's a good bus ride. In my bazaar, I make moves to get off. The driver asks why, and I say where I live and he says oh I'm going right past your house, I'm going to Dubar today to meet my wife's brother. I regret not having my stove, confused at why I couldn't figure this information out beforehand. I arrive at home feeing a little dumb, but ready to go back the next day. 

The next day, I don't end up going. My friend tells me he's bringing mushroom seeds for me the day after, and I decide to make a garden at home instead. The day after however, I proceed down the mountain but not before my neighbor calls the Dubar driver to make sure he is going back today, and that he can bring my stuff. He assures her that he'll meet me in Besi, and we'll go back. Long story short, I arrive to capital, meet the driver, and he tells me the bus is broken. It will be fixed certainly (said in English for emphasis) tomorrow. I buy more things, get on a bus back to village, and feel at a loss, disappointed at having to try yet again to get my stove, feeling bad that my family has to cook yet another night for me after I said I would begin cooking for myself. The bus ride back is brutal. The woman next to me is throwing up, I'm sitting on a chair with a woman and her two kids,  a man keeps hitting me in the head with his elbow, and I'm fending off marriage questions. There's even a few chickens, whose poop lingers on my pants long after I've gotten off. 

 It's 4.5 hours, and we arrive after dark. 

I go back. You know the story. No stove. I eat momos- a delightful Nepali dumpling snack and drink blended ice coffee from an old man who learned to make it from European tourists. I talk to Khussi and the Dubar driver who tells me that the bus will be fixed tomorrow, and that I should come back again. When I look at him skeptically he suggests I don't have to come back, that he will put it on the bus for me! He talks to the store owner where I bought my stove and gas and arrange the exchange.  

The next day, I call Khussi. He's delighted to hear from me and assures me that my stove and gas will be on the bus today. My brother is home from Kathmandu, and willing to help me carry it up the stairs from the road into our village. We eat and sit on the porch exchanging Nepali lessons for English lessons until the bus comes from Dubar, driving quickly past our house. My brother starts yelling and sprints in the pitch darkness off the porch down the slippery stone stairs to the road, and I follow, slowly stepping down with a flashlight. He chases the bus down the road only to hear that my stuff isn't on it. Khussi laughs and says he forgot! He's sorry. Tomorrow. 

The next day, at last my stove and gas come and my brother and mom help me carry it to our house. Alls well that ends well, and I go to bed and dream of delivery men, but wake up thankful to my own type of door to door service, and the Nepalis who made it happen for me. 

January Ramblings

Sunsets serve as a good distraction from politics

One of the benefits and the disadvantages of Peace Corps is the sense of disconnect from the America. January found me feeling that in a big way. The inauguration of Donald Trump blissfully passed me by, and the subsequent women’s marches filled me with a sense of pride for the strong women in my life, both those who marched that day and those who march for human rights every day of their lives. Thank You. The other side of that disconnect is the difficulty of translating my experience of living in Nepal back home to friends and family. Yesterday was a really hard day for me. At the end of the day I spoke to my friend here, who told me “Nepal is a country which wears its challenges on its sleeve.” I felt overwhelmed with sadness for people who I’ve come to deeply care for, witnessing them struggle through things that would be challenging in the States, much less in Nepal. At this time, I am still processing things that I have seen, things that people have told me. I’m happy to talk about it with those who may be interested, but for now I am not going to go into that in this blog.   I’ve been thinking a lot about how I want to present my experiences.  I feel that is a valuable opportunity to answer some questions about a country and that is so foreign to so many, and I welcome any questions or topics that may be of interest. I have noticed recently that I am pretty used to living here at this point. Experiences that once struck me as strange, have now become mundane as I have fallen into the Nepali pace of life and that can make it challenging to find focal points for blog posts.

Mushrooms at my house

One the work front, this past month I led several mushroom trainings, and have continued working with the pregnant ladies on nutrition and cooking classes. On the more fun front, I've been reading a ton, and went to a soccer game with my little host cousin. I'm not usually a big sports enthusiast, but it was a pretty big deal in my village, everyone every single day asked me if I had gone to this multiple day long tournament. So I figured I would give it a shot. It ended up being a really cool day, I spent most of it talking to people I hadn't spent time with in a while and tracking down snacks at booths that were set up for the occaison. Another big development in my life is I started cooking for myself! This has given me more freedom in my cooking, as well as the opportunity to get to know how to cook Nepali food for myself. Possibly the most important advantage however is getting over my fear of pressure cookers.  My host mom had to come in and teach me step by step how to make rice in the pressure cooker, and watch me carefully lift off the little top to let the steam out. She does it with her hand, I do it with a spoon because I’m still not there yet bravery wise. My family makes a lot of fun of me for not cooking my vegetables to the point that they lose any sort of structural integrity, and not using enough salt.

I realized I'm more into sports when there are Himalayas to look at

Today, I had a site visit from our country director, his wife, and the Peace Corps doctor. It was nice to have them in village. On the way to my bazaar three different people called me on the phone to tell me that my mom and dad had come to meet me! The country director and his wife are both American and don’t speak Nepali, and it was funny to watch my friends talking to them in Nepali, forgetting that it’s a pretty weird thing that I speak this language that is only spoken in this very tiny country. One of my most outgoing friends started telling them that I have a boyfriend in our district capital (I don’t, for the record) and that I am going to marry a Nepali and live here forever (also not in plans). I teased her back saying that she hasn’t found any men for me yet that meet my high standards, and she told my country director that I expect so much from men and that with my weird habits I can’t expect much I have to settle soon. She then proceeded to start pointing at things and saying what they were in Gurung language. I don’t speak any Gurung either, the country director certainly doesn’t, but this woman suddenly felt the need to hold a language lesson. She ended the conversation by telling me that my pimples are clearing up because I am eating less oranges. An old woman who had been listening the whole time told us that “Ali hamro gau ko mache ho, hamro dherri kaam garne manche” which translates into Ali is our villager, our very hard worker. That was the only part that the doctor translated for my country director.

Continue fighting the good fight my friends. I’ll keep fighting off marriage proposals.

Meet Shova

Here's a blurb I wrote about Shova Pariyar for a competition about volunteers who work to better communities in Nepal. Shova is one of my best friends in Nepal, and one of the most inspiring women I have met.

Shova is part of the lowest caste in Nepal, but the respect that she has gained in her village thanks to her work in community development is palpable. Her family are seamstresses, received very little education. Her mother studied through class 4, but speaks of the importance of educating girls and allowing them the same educational opportunities as boys. Despite this, Shova acknowledges the discrepancy in love toward sons and daughters in Nepal. In Nepal after the son marries, his parents live with him. After a daughter marries, she moves out and lives with her husbands family, only returning to her "maiti" for holidays and occasional visits.  Due to these customs, women are pressured to have a son, and more resources are put toward his success as he will be the one to stay in the family. Today in Nepal, many men seek work abroad, earning money which they send home to their wives and parents. Shova hopes to go abroad herself and delay her marriage until she has achieved some of her own goals.

Shova Pariyar is a leader in her community, dedicated to raising awareness about the importance of educating girls and stopping  child marriage. She has been a volunteer for 3.5 years with Global Action Nepal, a NGO which identifies girls in the community at risk of dropping out of school and encourages them to continue to pursue an education. Global Action Nepal partners girls between the ages of 9-18 with young women in the community through a mentorship program and leads trainings ranging from empowerment to reproductive health. The organization has monthly meetings, in which Shova often suggests projects which she believes will be both fun and useful for the girls in the program such as making reusable sanitary pads and taking about menstruation.

        Shova is a "big sister" to 4 girls in her village. In this role, she meets with the girls at their homes, helps them with homework, and checks in with their teachers to see how they are doing in their classes. Shova also talks with the parents of her "little sisters" to discuss the importance of educating heir daughters as well as their sons. Recently, Shova helped secure funding to get toys for government schools in the community to allow children the opportunity to play rather than work, and encourage them to attend school. She is passionate about the community she is a part of, and will continue to volunteer her time with the girls. Her vision serves as an inspiration for the future of Nepal.

Pheri Namaste (Namaste... again)

Well, dear readers. I have procrastinated this day long enough. The people have complained, they have rallied, they have cried out “why have you not written! Where is your blog! It sustains us!.” By people I mean mom. This is for you, I am recommitting to my blog in the New Year. It’s a long one, so grab yourself a steaming cup of chiya (nepali tea).

Since I last wrote, a lot has happened. Since I last wrote, nothing has happened. During the first three months, we are not allowed to leave site. This was really valuable time to get to know my community, be present, and adjust to the much slower pace of Nepali life. During Pre Service Training, my friend Becca, a girl in the group above me, told me that it is probably going to be the longest time you will have at site during service. I scoffed, thinking this couldn’t possibly be true. But since September I haven’t had more than two weeks in a row at site. So, what have I been up to?

Teej in the bazaar with Shova's mom, sister, and nephew

After I last wrote, we celebrated Tij, the women’s festival. The women worship Shiva and Parbati, the divine couple who epitomize marital bliss in Hindu religion. The first day of Tij is called dar khane din, meaning the day of feast. On this day, we ate a lot of sel roti (fried dough) in preparation for the next day where everyone fasted except for me, my younger brother, and the two children under 4. The fast is in reverence to Parbati who fasted to obtain Shiva. My host sister, her daughter, and bunch of aunts came to our house for a few days to celebrate. I live about 30 minute walk from a fairly big (by rural nepali village standards) bazaar. On the main day of Tij there was a huge festival in our Bazaar. We all got dressed up in red saris and paraded down to the bazaar. PCVs from other groups had made me somewhat nervous about this holiday. Despite my many attempts (ballet, Irish step dancing, African, modern) I have never been a good dancer, and Tij is all about the dancing. But sure enough, soon after arriving in the bazaar, I met up with my friend Shova and her family, and Shova whisked me up on stage where I found myself dancing in front of hundreds. People who I’ve never met still approach me on busses, in capital, in village, on the road, and tell me that they saw me dancing in a red sari on Tij. Throughout the day, women sing songs about their husbands, lost love, being a woman, inequality, the pain of raising a family alone if the husband is abroad, and how hard they work.  It started out as a holiday to celebrate husbands, but in recent years has turned into much more of a celebration about womanhood. Women return to their maiti ghars, home where they were born, to spend time with the women in their own families and commiserate. The day after fasting and partying, the women all bathed together and conducted a puja (worship) to bless their marriages and clean their souls.

Mandalas for Tihar in Kathmandu

Soon after Tij, I went into Kathmandu for our two week long In Service Training, IST. My whole group was looking forward to being together again. On the second night of being in Kathmandu, I broke my foot. During our pre service training, the doctors told us that no one in Peace Corps Nepal had ever broken anything. They must have jinxed it because I was the second person in my group in only 4 months to break something. I tried not to let breaking my foot hold me back much, I still attended all the trainings, even when it required some fancy crutch-work to navigate thin paths through fields, and muddy paths. I recruited the help of some especially kind strong friends who carried me up hills, over streams, and down some pretty narrow paths over cliffs. The training was really interesting, and provided us with some really good ideas to take back to site. We learned about mushroom cultivation, tree pruning, grafting, and some techniques for saving water. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to return to site after the 2 weeks were up because I had to let my foot heal. I missed the two biggest holidays in Nepal, Deshai and Tihar. Thankfully, Peace Corps was very good to me, and set me up at a really nice hotel, and allowed for me to have friends stay with me to help out in my wobbly gimpy state. Celebrating Deshai in Kathmandu was uneventful, as most people return to their villages during this time, the city was a ghost town. Thankfully we had stock-piled some peanut butter and bananas, or else we wouldn’t have eaten, everyplace was closed. Celebrating Tihar on the other hand was a fantastic experience!  Tihar is a five day celebration, and on each day something else is worshipped. The first day is crow puja, then dog, cow/goddess of wealth, ox, and on the last day the relationship between brothers and sisters is celebrated. I wish I had bene home to celebrate this last day with my brother, and give him tikka (red powder on the forehead). On the third day, Laxmi the goddess of wealth, as represented by the cow, is celebrated by giving malaas (garlands) and tikka to cows. Nepali people clean their homes and make a design with colored powder outside their doors (called mandalas) to lead Laxmi into the home. Outside people’s homes in Kathmandu there were extremely elaborate mandalas that were strikingly beautiful.

Receiving tikka and tending the flame for a long life during mahar puja

 Another neat opportunity I had in Kathmandu, was the chance to celebrate Maha Puja, which is known aas the self-puja, to purify one’s own body and connect families. It is particular to the Newar community in Nepal. It is also the first day of the Newari new year. Since I don’t live with a Newari family, this was a really unique opportunity. My friend and I met a lady who lives in Spain, but was back in Nepal to visit her family. She invited us to her house, fed us an amazing Spanish omelet complete with cheese (!!!!) and prosciutto from Spain (!!!) and then to her family’s house where we did the puja. I feel so lucky to have met this lady and experience this puja. Her whole family was incredibly welcoming, and knew a lot of English. Her father and mother live in America now in fact, and had really insightful comments to make about American culture. It was really interesting to talk with them about challenges they face in America, and trends they notice in the states. A refreshing contrast to the many comments we hear in Nepal that glorify the United States. In maha puja, each member of the family sits on the floor in a line in front of a mandala. In front of us we tended to a long thread representing our lives as it burned in a small bowl. This represents a long life, and caring for one’s self. Next, we were presented with Sagun, a plate consisting of eggs, fruits, sweets, meat, fish, lentils, and pastries. We were instructed to eat this, while taking sips of Johnny Walker. The mandala represents the universe, the wick represents our life and the hopes that we should tend to our souls and spread light for others. We were given tikka an enjoyed more delicious food. At the conclusion, all of our mandalas were swept together in one continuous brush of the broom, bonding the family (and me and my friend) together. This ceremony is probably my favorite holiday I have celebrated in Nepal. It felt meaningful to celebrate my own life and body, and I was especially thankful to have so many English speakers there who were eager and interested to explain all the aspects of the ceremony to me. Usually these types of worships are largely a mystery to me, and when I ask for an explanation, I am told that it is Nepali culture.

Soon after this holiday, I returned finally to my village!! I was really ready to be home after so much time in the city, so much time unable to walk, and after missing out on so many important holidays with my family. My bus ride back to Lamjung was beautiful, monsoon had ended and after leaving the smog of Kathmandu, the Himalaya shone through clear and piercingly white against the blue sky. I spent about two weeks at site, bustling around to different people’s houses after being away for so long. I went to a training at the school about reproductive health. I celebrated my birthday with my closest friend here, who made me a beautiful woven shawl. I ate a lot of multiple week old sel roti, which people had saved for me from Deshai and Tihar. Sweet thought, but I am not a big fan of sel roti when it is fresh, so two week old roti pulled out of a dusty suitcase was often not the tastiest. It was nice to see how concerned my village was about my foot, everyone was amazed that I run every day on the muddy monsoon slip-n-slide roads, and then go to the paved streets of the city. I amaze myself too sometimes.

In mid-November, all the PCVs gathered together for a Thanksgiving in Pokhara, under the guise of attending a conference to talk about Let Girls Learn, my girl Michelle Obama’s initiative that partners with Peace Corps to encourage girls to stay in school and pursue careers. Thanksgiving was a fun affair complete with pumpkin pie, chicken, and lots of delicious sides. I definitely missed being home for this holiday though, as it has always been my favorite. Right after that conference, we had PDM, project design management. Each PCV in my group was allowed to bring their government counterpart, and one member of their community to this training. I brought my friend Shova, an inspiring young woman as my counterpart. Stay tuned in the next few days for a post wholly dedicated to Shova. She kept me in check and was great to talk through project ideas with. We talked about how we can create income generating projects for women in our community, and talk about financial literacy with families. We’re planning on making some nursery beds and doing mushroom cultivation soon together.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Note the tree behind my head.

Thanks for staying with me, as we zoom into December. December brought several mushroom trainings, a lot of downtime, and the initiation of my project aimed at improving nutrition in nursing and pregnant mamas. It started through some of my friends, one of whom is pregnant, one nursing, who asked me some really pointed nutrition questions. Since, I have been working with a small group to talk about what women need nutrition wise, and why some practices, such as only eating rice after a girl is born, or the thought that fruits and green vegetables shouldn’t be eaten at certain points in the pregnancy, can really harm a woman and baby’s health. The month ended with me going to visit friends in another district for Christmas where we watched Elf, cooked a not terribly exiting Christmas dinner of some sort of root vegetable that we thought was sweet potato but wasn’t and ate it with mustard, drank eggnog, sang, and wore Santa hats. It was a ton of fun and very festive. We even had a Charlie Brown Christmas tree to tie together the room. Our boxing day meals were more delicious, we made pancakes in the morning, and chicken and kale from my friends’ garden. Between Christmas and New Years, a friend and I went to a beautiful lake outside of Pokhara, where people were fishing and the air smelled like beautiful clean lakes. A smell that makes me pine for Minnesota and the Adirondacks. New Years was spent back in Lamjung celebrating Gurung (an ethnic minority in Nepal) New Years called Losar, and American New Years back to back.

Sporting some wildly applied Tikka at the Losar (Gurung new Year) festival in Josh's village

Now I find myself in the beginning of January, facing a full calendar year in Nepal. I am 2017 off feeling more secure and happy here, confident that I am finding my rhythm in Peace Corps.  I feel so lucky to have this opportunity. With that, I leave you for now. Stay tuned for more regular updates (promise!).