Day 67 - Chovar, Nepal

Day 67 – His.

 

Okay so I was nervous about the meeting this morning. I was supposed to meet the Quest and school bigwigs and spend ages convincing them that the idea of saving the old building and renovating it instead of demolishing it was a good idea. But, like so many of these things the idea of it was worse than the reality. It turns out most of them had heard of the idea on the grapevine and though it was great. They took next to no convincing. The meeting lasted for well over two hours but most of it was how can we do this. It was so cool – really I had nothing to be nervous about. So we went off in a jolly mood to buy some bits and pieces for the roof with the rest of the Big wigs chatting about organising a village meeting on Friday to get the villagers involved too. Nothing around here happens without tons of discussion and the whole village being involved. It’s kind of cool – but a little intimidating.

For the few bits of roofing materials i needed we went back up to Kirtipur. It turns out that builder’s merchants are the same the world over. Rough, a little arrogant and respond well to being shouted at. At least that’s how it is in England and a similar approach worked well here too. Sanju went with me – to be honest I am not sure why as I think I did most of the talking – but it was fun to have him around. Patti, i think is in her element. Just before dinner ‘the girls’ came round and they took Patti off, in fits of giggles, to dress her up in traditional Newari dress – I think it was our host mother’s wedding dress. When she appeared at the door she looked lovely – I am sort of jealous. Not that I want to wear a Sari particularly – but rather she is really fitting in here and seems to be having a whale of a time. I am glad – I don’t think her last volunteer project was a lot of fun for her and this one most certainly seems to be.

The whole atmosphere of our home stay house was most party like today. The family have bought a dining room set and the arrival was something akin to the arrival of a new baby. We all helped carry it up the stairs and set it up and ooohed and aaahed over it. It was so cute and dinner was certainly a more comfortable – well for us- affair than squatting on the floor. I wonder if the neighbours will talk about them – probably will – a dining table seems to be a pretty big deal around here.

But given the dressing up, the table and the rum they were pouring out for everybody from a big brass ewer the whole evening was a lot of fun. Our Host mother declared in mime and tears that she was really going to miss us – and we have only been here a week – she is such a sweetheart.

 

Day 67 – Hers.

My lessons were fun this morning.  Year 10  - in groups – made up lists of things that volunteers could do to help the school.  We then discussed how to attract volunteers to Nepal – preparation for the next two projects.  I gave Year 9 a lesson on eating a meal, English style.  They then laid the table and demonstrated how to use a knife and fork to eat.  Their homework is to write instructions for eating a meal Nepali style.  They seemed to enjoy it – we all laughed a lot.

I then went back to my sorting of the library.  The old woman who keeps everyone on their toes at the school – I have no idea what her actual job is – She sits in the staff office/library and glares at anyone not doing what they should.  She also rings the bell at the beginning of classes. – seemed quite disapproving of our efforts to tidy the library so far.  There had been several years worth of newspapers piled on three of the four tables, making it difficult to actually use the library at all, so on Friday, Steve and I had piled them into neat piles at the edge of the room, out of the way.  However, what I took to be disapproval may have just been some other emotion – because today she arranged to have all the newspapers sold for recycling, benefitting the school to a tune of 2000 rupees.  Perhaps she was just waiting for someone to take any sort of interest in the place.  It seems I can take it too far though – Steve and I had rearranged the desks, grouping them to make them a bit more less formal for the library.  This morning, the old woman indicated that I needed to help her put the desks back into rows.   Ooops – that told us.....

As Rob mentioned, this afternoon was quite a party.  In the process of emptying a cupboard that had to be moved to make room for the new dining room table, Camilla came across her wedding sari.  She and two of her friends took me off to the bedroom and dressed me for a wedding.  I had the little red blouse, full sari – yards of red fabric, embroidered with gold, wrapped and folded around me and then sewn into place – bangles, necklace, red lipstick, suitable hairstyle and tikka spot on my forehead.  We then went up to the balcony, took photographs and enacted parts of the wedding ceremony.  When we went back downstairs to change, Camilla told me that I must keep the tikka spot.  It feels a bit weird – and I don’t really know what it means so I’m not sure what to do about it.  It’s stayed on for this evening anyway....

Dinner was another delicious combination of rice, lentils, chicken and spice.  We sat at the new dining room table – it does make it much easier to eat.....but I think some of the cultural experience is lost.  I’m glad they didn’t have it when we first arrived.