Deja vu!

Two years ago, nearly to this day, the Giants clinched the NLCS.

At that time I was studying abroad in Botswana and by some freak coincidence in scheduling (and good choice in hotels), I found myself in the capital, Gaborone, for one night in-between host family stays at a place that had internet access (one of my first exposures to it since arriving).

At around 2 AM, I woke with the two other Bay Area natives on my program, Karen, now in Malawi and Ian, headed soon to Malaysia on a Fulbright, along with Jessie from Phoenix, also headed to Malaysia in January who was there in solidarity with the NL West. Thanks to some help stateside, we were able to arrange to get the KNBR broadcast of the entire game in all of its glory.

The final out was recorded just as the sun was beginning to creep over the horizon. Ecstatic but exhausted, we shuffled ourselves to our beds for quick naps before meeting our new host families later that morning. The rest of the day we were as jovial as zombies could be. Completely worth it. I remember uttering the words to Ian “once in a lifetime.” Little did I know…

This year I find myself again abroad during a Giants’ playoff crusade. Luckily, I have been able to stay semi up-to-date on their (so far) epic run thanks to irregular internet access and texts from home.

As I mentioned in a previous post, Nepal is currently in the middle of the biggest holiday of the year, Deshain.  Although the holiday itself and most of its traditions are foreign to any of those which I have experienced before, there are some commonalities I have noticed. These staples are part of the foundation that makes up nearly every holiday and they are primarily centered around being with the people you love, and of course, food.

I have spent the past several days visiting relatives and friends, sharing meals and good times. Enjoying the company of those that you love is pretty much as universal as you can get.  I truly miss all of you back home (and around the world), but without the love and support from my family and my community here I would be wishing to ship off much sooner. 

A few nights ago I stopped by my co-teacher’s house just to wish her and her family happy Deshain before heading home. Nearly two hours later, lots and lots of plates of salted and spiced peanuts and even spicier sukuti (dried buffalo), I headed back to my house with Kalapna’s husband, Sham,  where he was treated with just as must hospitality as I was.This is not a rare occurrence. 

Two of the pillars of holidays are being with those you care about and food, and since I have been given so much by the Nepali around me, I decided to introduce a staple of American holidays to them. Sports.

Originally, I had worked out a grand scheme to wake up early head down to the hotel which has Wi-Fi and convince them to let me camp out there drinking milk tea and eating biscuits (my substitute for beer and hot dogs) listening just like in Botswana, to KNBR for the NLCS.

Right as I was leaving I was struck by some unknown inclination to check our tv in case by some strange technical mishap they were broadcasting the game.  I turned it on, navigating my way through the plethora of Bollywood films and cricket matches, and then stumbled on what I can only describe as truly a holiday miracle.

I saw, for the first time since early summer, Caine on the mound! By some inexplicable reason the stars had aligned for me. ESPN India (it’s past ESPN 8 ‘The Ocho’ for those of you looking on Direct TV) must have run out of cricket highlights, shots of the same goal being scored somewhere in some European league by the umpteenth alternate angle, and commentators to discuss the “earth shattering effects” of said goal in said European league which allowed for the greatness of the MLB to be shown here, in Nepal.  Not just that, but the FOX broadcast, in ENGLSIH! 

I spent the next three hours glued to the tv, teaching my 9^th grade host brother, Nischal, and Aama about baseball, trying to convey the importance of the game to them.  

I don’t think I could possibly dream of a better holiday gift (read: I can think of a better gift, but I just don’t want to jinx it). ESPN India must now have caught onto their mistake, and undoubtedly the person responsible for them receiving their lowest viewership ever has been terminated.

 I am forever in their debt.

 

GO GIANTS!

On a side note:

In the spring after Botswana, I was able to share my experience with one of the key players who made it possible. Thanks to an alumni baseball game, Brian Wilson showed up to the Pomona-Pitzer field to watch one of his former minor league teammates play.  I’m not normally one to get star shocked (not that that is saying much considering my celebrity sightings pretty much consist of being in the same sandwich shop as the black guy from Ghost Busters, watching Ludacris’posse drive around a corner, and sharing several beers with a guy who can be seen in the background of some party scenes of Laguna Beach).

But this was different. I stood in the shadows with several friends watching the Beard himself. By the way we were acting; we might as well have been 13 year old girls waiting outside of Justin Bieber’s dressing room, all giggling and trying to build up the courage to ask for an autograph.

People gradually filtered by asking him to sign things and eventually, after giving myself a pep speech that Patton himself would have been proud of, I ventured over.

Trying to maintain my cool, I stuck out my hand and told him I simply wanted to thank him, and that listening to them in Botswana was one of the highlights of my year. To which I received one of the simplest yet most gratifying response I have had in my life so far, “Wow, cool!”  

Holidays

Thanks to some morning walks, I have found even more Pings!

This may have been the craziest thing I have ever been on. It is made entirely of wood and stands nearly two stories tall! Also with the colder weather, the Himals are becoming more frequently visible!

Also with the holidays, obviously comes this.

One Ping to Rule Them All

Deshain is in full swing, literally. The festival is the biggest of the year and lasts for fifteen days. My family, in respect to my host grandmother who passed away this past year, is not celebrating any of the holidays this year; but fortunately, I am sharing the holiday with neighbors, co-teachers, and other Fulbrighters. 

One of the staples of this holiday are the giant Pings (swings in English); that have been constructed in nearly every open field. These contraptions are made by the community solely from bamboo and rope and most tower to be at least two to three stories tall.  It is something that would never be allowed in America - from its creaky structure with no construction oversight, to no one over seeing it throughout the day and monitoring the children at play on it. But from my room I can hear laughter from people playing on it from when the sun comes out to late into the night. And hey, they’ve had many more hundreds of years to test and perfect this art than most of the medicines we put in our body.

And it is not just the children, adults of all ages throughout the day come for their turn.

Today also was the great goat sacrifice day. This morning, I walked up to the palace with my 32 year old cousin who lives in Kathmandu. On the way up, we passed hundreds of people returning from the palace after making their offerings on the hilltop. As we climbed higher and higher it became more and more packed, with a huge line leading into the palace. Around that back the tension from the goats, who by the screams of their fellows knew their end was near, was palpable in contrast to the jovial Nepali who were milling about them. Several hundred goats were tethered. I didn't care to stay too long there, but in the evening I did enjoy a great meal of rice, lentils, and some of the tastiest and freshest meat one could imagine.    

The postmaster's daughter in her festival clothing. 

The Ping right by my house.

 This is what holds the bamboo together.

Everyone from babies to grandparents have been taking their turns on the Pings.

Amaa (Nepali for mom) with her niece and younger sister watching the festival procession on the hill from our rooftop.

My rooftop / laundry room. To the back left of the photo is the tap I use, although it took me over a month to finally convince them that I knew how to do it myself. I kept trying to tell them that I learned how to while living in Botswana and even then, after I received a full lesson (which consisted of me watching my host sister Sajana washing my clothes) Amaa still keeps creeping up to watch to make sure I am doing it right. When I last went to Kathmandu, she snuck into my room and washed a few shirts. They are so nice!

A goat's last march. On the way up to the palace to be sacrificed.

 Just part of the Himals I can see from the Palace.

 Some of the several thousand people who were at the old palace in the morning.

 This is a photo I took from my porch, these goats were being taken to the start of the over 1,500 steps to the palace.

Rachel's family drying out some of their meat.

Rachel's Amaa preparing the goat for dinner.

As the sun set, we sipped on some of the home brew, appreciated the view and then began to enjoy our meal.

Story time with the family.

Rafting

In celebration of Rachel’s birthday last weekend, we went rafting on the Bhote Kosi River, Northwest of Kathmandu.  It was the first time since we had orientation back in July in Kathmandu that all eight of us had been together. We were also joined by a fellow Pitzer graduate, Dean, who is spending his year after school researching Neuroscience and Art on a Watson Fellowship, and Erin who is in Nepal on a Research Fulbright  based around the effects of migrant laborers on the family. She  graduated last year from Pomona College. This past weekend, the three of us made up the 2^nd largest concentration of Claremont College students in all of Nepal, second only to the Pitzer in Nepal Program.

 Friday night we slept at Ayumi’s host family’s house in the southern part of the Kathmandu Valley. We stayed up late into the night with her extended family teaching each other our respective cultural dances and songs. "Aint No Mountain High" and "Build Me Up Buttercup" are my two go to’s.  Made me feel almost as if I was back at one of the garage dance parties in Arnold.

Early in the morning we made the winding climb north out of the valley on the Chinese-made ‘Friendship Highway’ all in the shadow of the Himals, stopping at our camp a few km south of the Tibetan boarder. 

We spent the next two days rafting on the river where (thanks to some friends) I believe, I spent more time outside of the raft than in, playing beach volleyball and cards, and trading teaching stories. 

We then spent a few days in Kathmandu, doing some holiday shopping for our host families, attempting to fill our fix of western food (milk from a goat is not a suitable substitute for goat cheese), and meeting with Robin and Laurie the two directors of our program.

I have spent the past few days playing a lot of Badminton and planning for our upcoming Access classes. Next up is our Halloween Carnival then our create-your- own theater program.

The view from Ian, Dean, and my tent.

The crew getting stoked for our first day.

Ian and I.

Sorcha, Rachel, and I (before I got through in on nearly every flat water section).

Bundha!

I write this after having slept in the longest since I have been in Gorkha, 7:30. We left Kathmandu yesterday early in the morning, but midway home we got stopped by a Bundh, which is a strike or protest resulting normally in a road stoppage. The reasons for these vary from being hosted by one of the over 93 official political parties, or groups for ethnic or workers’ rights, or more local issues appealing to the authorities. Considering how few major thoroughfares there are here and how vital they are for the transportation of people and goods, these can be at least very effective at stopping the flow.

There is only one main road that goes west from Kathmandu and yesterday there was a Bundh. We were traveling in our minivan, which impressively only can be described as a clown car with the sheer number of bodies they manage to cram in these things using a mixture and real life tetris and yoga skills, when we arrived to a line of stopped cars, our driver, who was wearing what one would not be criticized for believing was the national uniform due to the sheer number of people wearing them, and Angry Birds t shirt, cut the engine and placed the emergency brake, a rock behind the back wheel.

For him along with the other Nepali on the bus, there was no questioning of what was going on and they seemed fine with it. In Nepal, Bundhs are fairly common and it was only a matter of time before we ran into one. The next two hours were spent drinking milk tea, milling about the town that was ‘hosting’ the bundh while eating the locally picked guava, and watching the helplessly outnumbered Nepali Armed Police Force try and calm down a crowd of young males who had taken the center of the road.

Eventually, while sitting near the van, we saw a wave of people running back to their respective vehicles, the Bundh had finally been broken up and it was time to leave. Now began the slow game of inching our way out of town. During the 2 hours or so of stoppage, on arguably Nepal’s busiest road outside of Kathmandu, on one of the heaviest travel days of the year (the first day of Deshian, a 15 day holiday), cars loaded with people and gifts for the upcoming festival, trucks over flowing with goats and other livestock unknowingly living their last few days before they are scarified (one of the days of Deshian is dedicated to sacrificing an animal, to cope with the need over 89,000 goats were shipped into Kathmandu during these past few weeks, in about a week, I will be walking up the over fifteen hundred steps to the old palace, along with mostly everyone else in Gorkha to participate in the sacrifice), and busses filled with a mixture of Nepali heading back to their villages for the holidays and tourists enjoying the high seasons weather heading to or from the Anapurna Region, where the majority of treks and climbing take place. These vehicles had jockeyed themselves into every possible orifice in an attempt to save some time, and thus a long unraveling process began, with surprisingly little use of the horns.

By late afternoon, I made it home to where my host father and uncles made up for lost time and poured me several glasses of our home brewed alcohol, Roxi. Soon I will be making it with Amaa (Nepali for mother). I asked them why there was a bundh today and they told me it was over a football game! Eventually, like many of my conversations with Nepali, I discovered through Napenglish and some elaborate pantomimes that the Bundh was in fact over football, but not as first suspected, an argument between two teams or supporters, but rather friends trying to petition the government to take action because their friend had been stabbed by supporters from the other team.

Today is the second of fifteen days I will have off for Deshian. Festivities kick into gear next week so this week I am planning of hanging out a lot with the family, trying to convince them to let me learn to cook (I am still struggling with getting them to allow me to clear my plate and have to plays games like “look over there” to distract them to give me time to secretly put the plate in the sink, I’m not even attempting to wash them yet). All of us Fulbrighters are also planning upcoming teacher trainings and different holiday celebrations for Access class. Halloween in Nepal!

Time to play some badminton I will fill you in more soon about this weekend’s rafting trip.

Thanks to the upcoming holiday there will be a lot more of this:

Gurus

Niraj our Headmaster and Math teacher

Durga one of my English co-teachers

Some School Photos

      I have found myself the past two days doing something I never thought I would do in Nepal, and something that I dread ever having to do at a job in the US, making graphs and spread sheets. It is the class 11, and 12 exams (referred to here as 'plus two' or 'college') this week and because I am the fastest typist I have been entrusted with copying all the handwritten exams written by the professors, onto the computer. I never thought that in Nepal I would be learning intricate the functions of Microsoft word.

This is some of my students at a recent assembly. Every morning we gather in the assembly space/ soccer field to sing the national anthem, which in infinitely easier to sing than our own.

Did I mention that the assembly space  / soccer field also serves as our tug-of-war competition space?

This is a photo of my 5th grade class. The women in red is Kalpana, one of my co-teachers, who also happens to be a relative of mine, not entirely sure what her exact relation is, but that is the norm here.  The students here are doing our daily warm-up. I choose a letter, and then they have to write 10 words that begin with that letter. After making sure that their words are correct, the students then have to write a sentence using each word.Which many struggle with. This is a problem throughout grades, students have been developing vocabulary since they started school, but their practical application for many is very limited. Even just from the few weeks I have been doing it I have seen good improvement with the students, helping them build their confidence and speaking outside of the text book's phrases.

My first day in uniform

I write his now as my host father flips through the channels trying to find what program the family will watch tonight.  Over the past few weeks, we have been watching a lot of the Cricket Championships in Sri Lanka (my take on cricket will be saved for another post), a show called Little Masters, which can best be described as an American Idol-esk show with 8 year old dance contestants all done with a Bollywood twist. My favorite competitor is a boy who does all his dancing in slow mo, it’s called ‘the cockroach dance’ no clue about the origin of the name. Oh and how could I forget Bollywood films! The one that we have been watching while I write has had a shootout fight scene that has been long enough and with enough death to rival the opening of Saving Private Ryan.

Due to heated debate between the teachers' union and the Ministry of Education, the teacher uniforms have been purchased, but no one has been allowed to wear them yet. But today, I was instructed to wear my uniform for the first time to school. I already attract enough attention on my walk to school without wearing a two piece pinstriped suit; but thanks to today, I am pretty sure I am known by everyone on my route to school now.  I arrived to school all decked out only to realize that I was the only teacher who was wearing his uniform. I spent the first two periods of class doing photo shoots with the teachers.

 For some unknown reason, they didn’t seem to like my California twist on the suit and sent me during 3^rd period to buy some dress shoes to replace my Chaco sandals.

Shot day.

Today at school, the Gorkha chapter of the International Lion's Club came and provided shots for the students. Students, willingly, and several unwillingly lined up for their injection by our cement stage. Although I have been at school for nearly two months now, this was one of the first times I was able to interact with my students on a more personal level. Most of the time here, I have been whisked classroom to classroom, trying to share my resources as a Native English with as much of the student body as possible. But that has given me little time to interact with my students outside of the classroom setting.  Today though, we were able to chat, and I tried to distract the scared ones as the needle went in their arms. I am feeling more and more part of the community here.