My Teaching Uniform

Krista, Julia, Sorcha, and Rachel are in their Teej Festival outfits and I am in the Nepali Teacher Uniform (still trying to persuade them to allow the option of leather shoes or chacos though...)

Returned from treking, update coming soon

    I am back in Gorkha now. Just been catching up the the family and the neighbors for the past few days. All is well. Hope this gives a little more background on the photos (click on them to enlarge, also sorry that they are out of order):

 

 

Our hilltop view (11k feet), this is what morning greeted us with!

After the great leech war of 2012, we were in need of some chiyaa.

This was one of the countless waterfalls we waded through during our trek. Although we hiked sometimes of "roads" they were impassable, even by the biggest tractors and trucks until the monsoon season end. Which should have ended "any day now" for about the past month...

Some of my 3rd grade students. So damn cute, but sooooo hard to control. They are just beginning to learn English, so most of my instructions have to be in Nepali. The problem with that, is that my Nepali accent is so funny to them, that no matter what I say in Nepali they always bust out with laughter and amusement.

We celebrated at school the completion of of building, that has yet to be completed, but frying most types of living animals. Not cow though, they are regarded as gods here.

Some of my 9th graders, getting shelter from the rain.

The five of us Fulbrighters taught and election class to the Access class. Where I realized that teaching about the Electoral College to native English speakers would be difficult.

 

The Access students are taught about both Nepali and English culture and holidays, in a free English after school program. They are all local 9th and 10th graders, from lower socio-economic levels.

 

One of the tea houses we stayed at. The man standing up was our guide.

 

 It was fitting that after we sang the Sound of Music sound track, we stumbled upon this place on our trek.

 

Rachel walking through one of the villages on our second to last day.

The crew an hour in on our first day.

The path was carved into the hillside, wedged in between rice paddys as far as we could see.

Luckily my leg only looked like this at the end of one day. But with the help of some salt, the atrocities that I committed to these blood suckers, I should be tried at the ICC. I will spare you the photos of what my legs looked like after.

After the leeches, and after chiyaa, the clouds began to part to reveal the Anapurna range! Our first clear view of the Himals, since arriving to Nepal!

Krista on our last day admiring the way goods are moved about in these high villages.

Life in Gorkha

Life has been busy here, to say the least. Pair that with inconsistent internet and as you can tell it has been difficult to find time/the resources to update. But thanks to one of the many holidays, I have some time this morning to write. Probably the best way to get you guys up-to-date would be to give you a semi-typical daily schedule for me.

5:20 - I wake up to Taps being played from the Gurkha army base down the street.  Gurkha soldiers are famous for being one of the toughest fighting forces in the world; besides fighting for Nepal, they have been used heavily by the British for over a hundred years. They are also are in the Singapore Police Force and are the personal body guards to the Sultan of Brunei. The Indian army values them incredibly and several of the other ETA's host fathers are either in India currently or have served.

Then for the next hour or so I doze, with some sporadic interruptions by roosters, shops opening, or the honks of motorcycles, which consistently do that to alert pedestrians they are coming, or making a turn on these tight old cobblestone streets of my neighborhood.

Around 6:30, I am up and out of bed, in some state of dress and head downstairs to the mud floor kitchen that is the oldest part of the house. One of my uncles, who I met two weeks ago during the cow festival, gave me the brief run-down of my Nepali family house’s history. It has been in the family for over seven generations, whereas, the majority of people living in Gorkha have probably moved from the neighboring villages (read: villages within a few days walk) in more recent decades. It was the first house in old town to get stories added through reinforced concrete, but the old kitchen was kept. On the first floor is the shop, which sells everything from grains and eggs to soap and cell phone cards and fanta. I spend a lot of time there practicing my Nepali. When I practice the written language it always draws a crowd, all with their own opinions about how letters should be written. The second floor is a set of four rooms that each have a family of two or three living in them, and then the top two floors are us, with a kitchen as a side attachment and a small garden of corn and other plants out back. 

At this time, the family normally sits down (minus the person who is tending the shop; it is open from before I get up, right until dinner, every day, all day, even on holidays) for chiyaa (tea).  We either have black tea (khalo chiyaa), which according to my calculations is 1 part tea and 3 parts sugar, or milk tea  (dudh, pronounced dude, chiyaa) which has a good melody of spices added. Each family has their own recipes and own special spices they add. Julia gets her milk from her family’s water buffalo, which she regularly milks. We have this with either biscuits or bread.

Then I have a few hours before we eat our large meal. During these early morning hours, I normally split my time between reading, writing, studying Nepali, and watching badminton (emphasis on watching). I have been playing a lot with the afternoon crew - kids, ETAs, and men in flip flops - but one day I got invited to come at 7am to play. I strolled up in my cotton t-shirt, jeans, and Chacos (my typical playing wear) and was instantly even more out of place (which is saying a lot considering my pigmentation and that I am about a foot taller than most people here). These were the men who were ready to play, all wearing athletic shoes, shorts, and shirts; Premier League jerseys seemed to be the norm, and they divided the men into doubles teams (my dad here is on the black Chelsea jersey with orange hue squad). After watching their play, let us just say, I need a lot of work before I could even compete.

Also during this time, I have been walking a lot, the clearest time of day has been the early hours and that has been when I have gotten the best views of the Himalayas (photos coming when I can get good internet access)!

Around 9, we have dhaal bhaat which is a BIG meal of rice and lentils which I have too many stories to share about this and will save it for a following blog post.

My school begins at 10, so I spend these last moments getting prepped and making the ten minute walk down to school. My routine is becoming more regular and I am getting to know some of the shop keepers on the way, buying fresh fruit most days (best mangos I have ever had). Also on the walk, I pass the steps to the palace and the hotel and normally run into sweaty tourists on their way down from their morning hike up and have met some characters, to say the least.

School begins with the singing of the National Anthem for the whole school in the courtyard, which I have been told that I will lead very soon (I have already had to sing it in front of the entire teaching staff), then off to class.  I sit in the teachers’ lounge, which is a long rectangular room, with chairs lining both walls and a long series of tables in the middle with Niraj, the headmaster at the head. Some periods I have off so I just talk with other teachers, learning more about Nepal and practicing Nepali and in turn answering their questions they have about America. We also have more chiyaa, which I never can deny. The best way to describe my teaching role at school is through that of a "Utility Player". I wait basically to be "pulled off the bench", because I have no set schedule. So I wait for one of the English teachers to request me to go to their class with them, which I always accept. Sometimes for class, I just am instructed to sit and watch. But for most times, in the lounge, I am asked something like “Do you know rhymes?” or “Can you do introductions?” where I am put in front of the class for most of the period, providing native speaker (or as some call me a ‘Native American’…) pronunciations or insight.  My classes range from a 74 student grade 7 to a group of 11 of the cutest 3rd graders ever (reflecting on that, how could one not find a cute group of 3rd graders?). Still getting my footing in the classrooms, but the teachers seem truly excited to have me there, and in turn I am excited to learn from their far many more years of teaching experience.

Then around 4, I head home to normally have pre-dinner or pre-pre-dinner depending on things (I am still figuring out). This normally consists of either a bowl of noodles, veggies, an egg, or bread similar to naan, and beans. Then I normally study more Nepali and then either walk to a friend’s house or head to the courts. Then I get back and hang out at the shop until dinner around 9 and by that time I am so spent and in such a food coma that it is normally hard for me to keep my eyes open, even for the Olympics. To be fair though, it seems that all ESPN India is interested in is weight lifting (which I didn’t know there was more than one way to throw roughly your body weight over your head), men’s field hockey (which I didn’t know existed), air pistols (which rivals curling in the title for “sport” with most Olympic athletes who are overweight), and dressage (does it make me pompous just to know what that is?). Then I hit the pillow and start again - days mixed with new stumbles with practicing Nepali, more Nepali challenging the westerners to Badminton, and more fun.

This is a rough schedule for when I do not have holidays; which while I am here, more days have been holidays than not.  For those days, I fill in the time I would be at school with more exploring of the town, hanging at the shop, and gorging on endless plates of food.

The First Month

Moving Rachel in with her host family

The view from my room

On the walk to class

Some of our students

The view from Krista's school, the bazaar, near where I live is in the background

Prepping for the festival.

My host father, the one in orange at one of the many festivals

My favorite spot in Gorkha, besides the kitchen

Visiting my school

Me at my school, Shree Shakti

Some of the my neighbors

INTERNET!!

 

                                         The Gorkha Fulbrighters: Rachel, Me, Julia, Krista, and Sorcha

Festival with the Fam

Sorry to keep it so short, more to come once I can transfer my files from my laptop.

The Himals

I find it fitting on the day I begin reading the epic tale by Maurice Herzog, of his conquest of the first over 8,000m peak, Anapurna, that I got my first glimpse of the Himalayas. I was leaving a hill top Buddhist shrine one late afternoon, when my friend pointed out a cloud that resembled a mountain peak. We laughed about it, saying how stoked we would be when we actually could see them without the persistent clouds that taunt us during this monsoon season. As if responding to our request the clouds began to shift far off to the west and revealed that what we thought was a cloud resembling a snowcapped peak, turned out to be a snow capped peak resembling a cloud! A triangular peak poking out of the clouds as the setting sun cast a shimmering golden glow upon its southern face, towering above the rice paddies and hills that stood in between us and it. We starred in awe, at what we assumed was the highest in the region, only to discover a few minutes later, as the clouds continued to part that it was only a minor peak of a much higher range. I have tried my best up to this point, but I have come upon territory that countless others have reached previously, words cannot truly do justice to the Great Himals.


Anapurna was finished within days and this past week I have been constantly climbing new hills trying to get another glimpse of the Himals.


I apologize for the delays in posts, but internet here is incredibly scarce. In a week I will be heading to Pokhara to start a seven day trek, where before I start I will have a few days of reliable internet, so expect a full update and lots of photos, hopefully.

My address!

 Thanks to the State Department, I have a very pompous sounding address! A few warnings before you use it though, this is through the diplomatic pouch, so ONLY LETTERS CAN BE SENT, I will not define what a letter is, but is MUST be less than one pound, so please divide your novels of admiration and love you have written to me in properly weighing volumes. Also because it is through the diplomatic pouch all you need postage wise is to send it to DC, not international, which is the same for me. This method will take some time, especially considering that I am a five hour bus ride away from where the letter will finally end up, but letters are always graciously appreciated and penpals are always great. So here is goes:

American Embassy Kathmandu

Attn: Fulbright - Vincent Giannotti

Department of State

6190 Kathmandu Place

Washington D.C. 20521-6190