My encounter with Satan

I ran into some local thugs during my walk last night; by thugs I mean I sweet group of boys ranging from Grades 3-5 who were very curious about where I was from and where I was going; as everyone seems to be here in Nepal. They directed me to the river and said goodbye, then followed me there on their bike and proceeded to show off by jumping off the river’s edge and into the water and sand below. When I went to say goodbye, they followed me again down the road and wanted to know where I was staying and asked if they could come swimming in the swimming pool. I offered my toilet as the closest thing to a swimming pool where I was staying; they declined and stopped harassing me after that but were still very concerned as to whether or not I would be back for a walk the following day at the same time ☺

This morning I woke early and helped Ama prepare breakfast by smashing some seeds to be used for the chutney and also peeling some vegetables for the curry.

I was invited to stay with Tara Nepal for the night and got to experience yet another interesting family dynamic.

We arrived at Tara’s home, which was a small, two-room apartment that she shares with her husband and 3 year old son in the town of Pasaro. We were making introductions when her initially cute and playful son started to turn on me. The first ‘love tap’ I received was a full-armed smack across my ass. As the evening progressed, I was beaten in the back, the legs, the arms and even had my right breast grabbed; not the kind of action I was hoping for. It was clear that this behavior was going to continue as both son and father laughed with glee after each attack. Tara was only slightly firmer but still with an affectionate smile on her face as she would grab him to pull the clawing demon out of reach of its victim. A number of times she said, “He is a very naughty boy.” It was difficult to argue with this assertion.

This child was a menace, and not just with me. Thankfully, we didn’t stay long enough to see what other kind of torture he had in store as we drove close to where Sita’s family lives to visit Tara’s mother and father and the entire extended family plus half the people who live on the street that surrounded the front porch to catch a glimpse of the foreign visitor. There were at least eight children, each of whom either willingly or through force from an elder grandparent, introduced themselves to me as “Something Nepal, Amir Nepal, Christina Nepal, Nepal, Nepal, Nepal.” Clearly, they were very proud of their last name. I’ve begun to realize that people ALWAYS introduce themselves by their first and last names, which is why I am having such difficulty remembering them. Plus, they say their names so quickly that it is impossible to discern where the first name ends and the last name begins. I really enjoyed my visit with Tara’s family and after I finished some nice black tea, we returned to the torture chamber.

Tara and her husband prepared a huge feast for dinner. I was ravenous as it was almost 9pm before we sat down on the floor of their bedroom/living room with the previous days’ newspapers as our table to enjoy about 10 different dishes. My servings were larger and included more various foods than theirs, either in an effort to provide variety and assurance that I would have at least a few things to eat that I liked, or to fatten me up so that the beatings inflicted by their devil child wouldn’t be as visible.

Regardless, I was blown away by the spread; curried aloo, cut and tasting similar to, but much better than, curry fries, a big bowl of dhal, sliced cucumber, roti, chopped cabbage and onion salad, an omlette, a curried bean and potato dish, tomato chutney and at least half a kilo of rice served with curd for dessert. I thought I was going to bust. As we ate dinner in silence, Tara kept eying my plate. Unsure as to whether or not she was resentful of my extra portions or just interested in how I eat, I stared back at hers.

Finally, with a distressed look on her face, she said “You do not like the food?” I honestly cannot think of what would have caused this conclusion as I tried to match their pace and eagerness in eating and had devoured practically everything that had been put before me. Becoming defensive and a bit exasperated at her paranoia and accusation, I said “I don’t know why you would think that. I am eating everything. It is all very delicious, thank you.”

She continued to eye my plate, but a little less obviously until we finished and I had eaten almost everything and thanked them profusely for the amazing meal and offered to help with the cleanup.

When it was time for bed about an hour later, Tara’s husband had disappeared and she directed me to turn off the light when I was finished with the computer. “Where is your husband?” She motioned to the kitchen where there was a small couch. “Tara, he doesn’t have to sleep in there, I can go sleep there.”

But she was insistent, so I rested my head down on the firm mattress of the single bed beside the large double bed she was sharing with the baby.

I awoke around 2am, my mind ablaze with thoughts and weird meaningless concerns. “I wonder what facilities are available in the Istanbul airport?” I wondered to myself after realizing I would have 4-5 hours to kill there before my flight to Italy. Was it really necessary to know whether or not I would be able to get a hair appointment in three weeks at the Istanbul airport while lying awake at 2 in the morning? Probably not, but to ease my jumpy mind, I decided to take a look. Tara woke up and said “Sophia? Are you not sleeping? What are you looking at?”

“Just can’t sleep Tara, sorry, I’m just reading something.”

Fearing the brightness from my laptop had awoken her, I closed it and tried to get back to sleep. Between the insufferable heat, the puddles of sweat rolling down every crevice of my skin, the 250 tiny, itchy little bites all over my arms and legs and the odd cry and wail from the demon who was sleeping next to Tara which caused me to fear that he would wake up and come slap me across the face if I closed my eyes, I could NOT get to sleep for another hour.

I woke up numerous times, either from suffocation, itchiness or fear for my life and finally to Tara choosing the noisiest cleaning activity possible, sweeping the carpet with a stiff, straw broom, around 6am.

Please God, don’t let it wake up.

She had assured me that usually it goes to sleep around 8:30 or 9 pm and stays that way until 730 or 8am which was a fact I took great comfort in knowing, but you can never be sure. They can smell fresh meat. After what little sleep I’d had, I knew I wasn’t going to be in a mood to tolerate this child’s abuse all morning.

The icing on the cake was when Tara’s brother arrived the next morning for a visit before he too headed off to school. As he sat down on the bed beside Tara, I looked up from my book to see the little hellion wander into the room with his empty plastic lunch box. He had removed the lid and wound up and threw it at poor uncle teacher, landing in his lap not far from his privates. “Baaaabbuuuuuu” he chuckled good naturedly.

Why do these people keep laughing at this little hellion whenever he tries to hurt them?

They continued speaking closely which was not the reaction the demon was hoping for, before it could be stopped, it brought it’s arm back around behind it’s head like a major league pitcher and biffed the thicker bottom part of his lunch container at poor uncle teacher, catching him square in the temple. “Ohhhhhh Baaaabbuuuuu!!!” He exclaimed, grabbing his surely throbbing forehead. When he went to pick him up to control him, the thing tried to bite his arms and then actually SPIT in his face when he became frustrated and realized they weren’t playing around. I was speechless.

“What do you call kids who are like this in Canada?” Tara had asked me the night before.

Hmmm…sociopaths? fit-to-be-tied? offspring of satan?

My diplomatic side said “Rambunctious”

“Ramboo-nox-ee-ous…what does that mean?”

“Uhhhmmm…like energetic and active. Really, really active.”

I had asked Tara about going to the supermarket store just a few doors down which she took as her cue to come as a guide, really I just wanted to grab a snack for lunch and a new toothbrush and just get out for a quick walk. She appeared while I was out on the balcony chatting to Dad before he went to bed. As it was almost midnight in Canada, he was giving me a brief recap of Aunt Bunny’s funeral and burial that had been just a few hours before.

“Sophia, let’s go to the supermarket now.”

“Ok, just a minute Tara, I’m just talking to my Dad right now.”

She came back again, more insistent, saying “We go to the Supermarket, and then you can talk.” 3 hours of sleep had left me with little patience,

“Tara, it is very late in Canada, and my father is going to bed soon, I am going to talk to him right now for a few minutes and then I will go to the store myself. You can go ahead if you would like.”

Breakfast (after an early morning sweet black tea, biscuit and banana snack) was as hearty as dinner had been. No wonder these people never eat during the day when morning and night is an all you can eat buffet! Again, Tara eyed my plate(s) and said “You don’t like omlette?” When I’d only managed to get through the first half when we had only started eating 2 minutes prior.

“Tara, the omlette is fine, everything is great, why do you think I do not like the food?”

She was very concerned on the drive to school about my time at her house.

“Sophia, you sleep ok?”

“Well, not really, but I just had a lot on my mind and maybe I just wasn’t in the mood to sleep.”

“I wake up at midnight and you are on computer.”

“Well, I was hoping to get an email from my father to hear how things were going at home so I wanted to check, I hope I didn’t disturb you.”

“The bed was ok for sleeping?”

“Everything at my house was ok? Was there any problem at my house?”

“You will come back again? If you need to do more work or use the internet, you can come to my house tonight.”

“When you come back to Nepal, please don’t forget us.”

Elephant Sushi and Sad News from Home ~ Saturday, September 21, 2013

This morning I was up before the sunrise, despite not getting to sleep until after midnight the night before. I had a feeling the news from home would not be good, and I was anxious about not being able to contact anyone in the past week. Ranjan said we would go to an internet café in town after we visited the elephants in the morning. It was a short ride on his motorbike to the area where the elephants are kept; two males and a female, Lucky.

The elephants seemed to be well-cared for, although I don’t agree with them carting people around on rides and being used to for an income, but such is the world we live in. They were acquired from somewhere in India where they were used as working animals, carrying wood and other materials. Now, they go on 1-3 safaris a day, carrying up to 3 people at a time for about an hour before being returned to their home for a bath and some food. It seems like a decent deal.

Lucky, the female, was quite friendly, if not a little disinterested. She didn’t mind a little trunk-rub and stood patiently as her keeper and I rolled up her elephant sushi rolls (long, sharp grasses twisted and bent into little boats which held a palmful of rice and then wrapped up like sushi) for her breakfast and some extra for lunch later on. Weighing in at approximately 200kgs each, they consume about 15gk of food and 1000 litres of water a day. Good thing the monsoon is upon us.

There were two large males also there but I was cautioned that they aren’t quite as friendly unless their handlers are right there so we spent most of our time visiting with Lucky. As they had to leave to pick up some guests from a local hotel, we said goodbye to Lucky after Maru had a quick ride on her back. Hopefully, I’ll have to opportunity to visit again when they are bathing them in the river. The location is only about a 5 minute walk from the school, which is only about an 8 minute walk from the house, so I might jig some morning and go hang with Lucky, if I’m lucky.

After the elephants, we drove around the small community of mud huts that are adjacent to their little clearing. Ranjan pointed out several toilets that had names and various countries painted across their doors. These were constructed by him with money donated from past volunteers and their friends and families who have contributed some donations. It would be nice to try to do the same when I go home, so I am thinking of preparing a video presentation, perhaps an iMovie (note to self – start taking more videos) with interviews from Ranjan, some of the local people and also the teachers to describe the community and what their needs are.

Ranjan stopped the bike to show me one of the Bio-Gas containers; a small concrete tube-shaped hole in the ground where the cow and buffalo dung is dumped. There is a small lever that can open a little drain after the dung is mixed which allows it to flow into a larger container where the ‘gas’ can be fed into the homes so families have a source of fuel for cooking. While these devices seem simple, they provide a great source of independence and improved nourishment for the families. They cost approximately $1500US to install and the government has given subsidies to some families who can pay 7-800Rs (around 70-80$).

We stopped for chai at the little ‘vegetarian’ restaurant which brings our lunch to the school each day. There were hardly any women around and I felt like I was intruding on man-time at the local gas station, but Maru and I sat as I sipped my chai and we looked at our photos from the morning with the elephants. Ranjan ran around like a chicken with its head cut off, buying one that had had its head cut off for dinner later, as well as some cauliflower, potatoes and tomatoes for lunch. I was hankerin’ for another chai so Ranjan ordered me another and drove the produce home for Swapna to prepare for lunch. He returned to find a small crowd gathered around Maru and the foreigner and then we hopped back on the bike and headed home.

I hung out a weeks’ worth of barn-smelling laundry (real-world – 25 items, Nepal – 8) and reluctantly sniffed my garments as the animal soap smell wafted from them. God I can’t wait to have Sammy wash my stuff and hang it out to dry!

Ranjan was going to make breakfast/lunch so I had an hour to do some Yoga. After lunch we set off for the town where many souvenir shops, safari-themed hotels and National Park guided tours were available. Ranjan dropped me off at a cyber café and left his cell for the manager to call when I was finished.

I rapidly opened my Email and Facebook accounts to check out what was going on in the cyber world and felt my stomach drop as I read the first line of an email from my best friend’s mom “So sorry to hear of your Aunt Bunny’s passing…” to be honest, this was not the way I wanted to find out, but I guess it makes no difference. I stopped reading and went right into my Facebook to see if there was a message from Dad. Fortunately there was. Messages starting from last Tuesday that I skimmed through as I couldn't focus on what they were saying. I wished I could have been online at a better time to chat with someone live, but as it was 12:30am in New Brunswick, so no luck. It’s kind of numbing to read these things and not really get to experience it and so easy to just push it out of your mind. Then I feel super guilty because it’s like it isn’t important or doesn’t matter, but when you can’t properly feel something, it also doesn’t seem right to ‘fake’ it. Maybe I’ll just have to have some time once I’m home to let these losses sink in and become real. Or maybe it will hit me at some random moment. But this morning, it just wasn't sinking in.

I proceeded to write some messages to people, Beth and Andrea included and upload some photos and comments from the past week. Also read and replied to a bunch of messages from some people with whom I am hoping to connect with in the next month or so of travel. I was really excited to read that Amy & Dave Lings are coming to Nepal (worked with them in China) and hope to be able to meet up with them in Kathmandu in a couple of weeks. Anna is going to be in Italy and I invited her to come crash with the girls for a night if she can make it to Florence.

I was also looking into hiking options and think I have an itinerary figured out. Ranjan phoned a friend of his in Pokhara which will be the better option for doing a short hike, to Poon Hill. Pokhara is about 7 hours from Chitwan to the North, which would mean taking the bus there, staying the night, hiking for a few days, getting a taxi back to Pokhara from wherever the hike takes me and then a bus to Kathmandu. If Amy and Dave are going to be in Kathmandu on Friday, the 4th, I would like to get there by Thursday night which would mean starting the hiking on Sunday (a week from tomorrow) and leaving here on Saturday (a week from today) so I’ll have at least 4 days to hike. After seeing how uneventful the day has been, I don’t think it’s necessary to spend all day next Saturday sitting around doing nothing when I could be on my way to Pokhara and start hiking on Sunday. He said I could hire a guide for about 1,400 a day ($14) which does not include my own food or accommodations. This seems accurate as my research online informed me that one could expect to pay around $25/day if you hire a guide. I mentioned that I might consider heading out on my own as the trails are marked, there would be other people whom I am sure I could fall in with if I wanted to and by God if those girls from “Wild” and “Becoming Odyessa” could hike the PCT and the AT on their own with little to no hiking experience, I sure as hell can handle four days in Nepal. I think Ranjan was a bit disturbed by this notion and may have mentioned it to the next friend he called (he seemed to have a different friend capable of answering every different question I had and would call each one as soon as I asked it).

“So in general, it’s ok to hike alone?”

“It is ok to hike alone, but maybe not for women.”

“And why is that?”

“Women maybe should not do the hiking alone. Because they cannot.”

“Why can they not?”

“They just can’t do things. They don't know how, you know with the directions and the trails and the hiking.”

Well, that just about settled it right there for me, Sophia would hike alone.

The next day, on the bike ride to the elephants, Ranjan mentioned that he would like to join me on the hike, but has he has so many projects on the go, including getting the organic farming business up and running, maybe he would ask his cousin, Mouise if he could join me.

“Oh, that’s really ok Ranjan, I think I’ll be fine on my own.”

“Well, he can come with you and help you and hike with you, it’s ok I’ll ask him.”

There are very few individuals on this planet that I can tolerate for extended periods of time, especially on a hike. One needs to understand the appropriate times for quiet, for keeping either a little ahead or a little behind so that one may enjoy the sounds of nature, and just be in that meditative state of oneness with nature.

“Look Ranjan, I would really prefer to do this myself and I’ll see about getting a guide when I get there. I don't really know Mouise and I am a bit uncomfortable with the idea of spending four days alone him.”

“Ok, ok, no problem.”

After the internetting, we rode back to the house and Ranjan was off somewhere else again. I was left to chill with the girls (Swapna, Ama, Maru and Gorima who was napping). There seemed to be little to do so I have taken the opportunity to write. Now that I’ve had a chance to focus a bit and sort through some thoughts and events of the day, I am encouraged to interview some people and get some movie footage so I can put together an iMovie.

And with that, I am off for an evening stroll. Hopefully I don’t get any bows and arrows pointed at me, perhaps I’ll choose a different route tonight.

Delhi Belly; You Found Me! ~ Thursday, September 19, 2013

Well the Delhi-belly has finally reared its ugly head; though Boracay-belly was a far worse infliction. I tried to be environmentally conscious and tougher than I am by cutting the plastic bottles of water out of my life and switching to the well-water that everyone else uses. I’m pretty sure they just keep a two-week supply of bottled water in storage at the shops for the odd foreigner who visits. I was ready to pass out from the heat and the thirst on Wednesday at school and didn’t have any more water, so I bit the bullet and went down to the well where one of the polite young men from Class 6 pumped some water into my bottle.

“Ok that’s good!” I said after he’d only filled it about a third of the way.

Some of the girls from class 6 with the container they fill each morning from the well for water in the classroom.

I inspected the bottle for floaties, wormies, and any other strange microorganisms that may be wriggling around but it looked clear…as if microorganisms are visible. I don’t know what I was expecting to happen, but the water tasted fine, and I was satiated, so I continued to drink it throughout the day, and then that night at Sita’s house. By this morning at school, the rumbly tummy was in full force and I realized with horror that I had no toilet paper. I thought I could hold out until noon, but no chance, especially after the bumpy ride to school on the back of Sita’s motorbike. Tara Nepal was leading me off to join her in Class 8 and on the way past the bathrooms, I realized I wasn’t going to make it through the next 45 minutes, let alone until lunchtime.

“I’ll meet you there, Tara Nepal.”

I scurried into the toilets (squatters, like China) strategically placed my flip-flopped feet in areas that appeared to be less questionably wet and rolled up my pants. T.P. or not, this was happening. As I tried to figure out how the hell these people deal with cleaning themselves after a poo/how I was going to configure myself to accommodate a proper wash with the bucket and the little plastic measuring cup inside that is used to ‘flush’ the squatter, I decided maybe I’d solved the mystery of the barn smell.

For the next four classes, I joined Tara Nepal and helped out when I could. She would do bizarre things like circulate through an entire class either showing some pages from a book to the 8s who were studying Australia, or physically making charts in the books of every single student in Grade 3 for them to copy new vocabulary terms underneath, while leaving the rest of the class (30-40 students) unoccupied and growing more and more restless and noisy as they sat for 20+ minutes with nothing to do.

I tried not to be condescending with her when I asked what her game plan was and offered to write some questions on the board/give an activity for the waiting students to complete. If that were my class and some new person was coming in and trying to run the show, I would not be pleased, but this woman needed help and I had to do something to keep all hell from breaking loose, which it did a few times.

A couple of little boys from Class 3 were completely off their rockers half way through and were throwing things out the windows and standing on the tables and clawing at each other like a couple of rabid hyenas. I sent one boy outside and told him to stay there after the third offense and when Tara Nepal eventually caught on, she went out, yelled at him, grabbed him by the ear and paraded him back and forth in front of the class and then threw him into his seat (by the ear) where he sat with his head down for the next 10 minutes. Policy 701 alarms rang out in my ears, but something told me that neither the police nor the district office would be coming after Tara Nepal. She asked me on a separate occasion what we do in Canada to discipline the children.

“You slap them across the face?” She inquired.

“We imagine that we slap them across the face, but if we actually did, we’d probably lose our jobs and go to jail.” I replied.

“Lose your job? Jail!?” She was perplexed.

Life must be horrible for a teacher in Canada.

I have seen the teachers do this very thing to students who do not have their homework complete, or are misbehaving. A light smack across the face, a bitch-slap to the head, a yank to the ear; the kids seem to accept this form of punishment and offer no retribution. They usually lower their heads in shame and sit down, but it does not seem to encourage the completion of the next nights’ assignments. Over half the class failed to complete the crossword puzzle I’d given to the Grade 8s the day before, so Tara had them all line up in front of the class to do their pushups (word has spread throughout the school, and now the classes are requesting to do pushups during homework rounds...what have I done?).

The adolescents were far less enthusiastic about dropping for 12 when it came time to actually do it. A few of the boys cockily pounded out the required reps, but the girls were mortified and after several attempts to goad them, we resigned and let them sit down.

“The students who did not do their work or the pushups, will be punished.” Tara Nepal announced, giving me a knowing glance that seemed to elude to a secret tactic that I was supposed to know about. I deferred to my signature nod and smile and pretended I knew what this punishment would be.

By fourth period, I was really starting to feel uncomfortable and the little voice that told me that I wasn’t going to be missed if I went home and took a rest for the remainder of the day was starting to have a hand up over the voice that told me to suck it up and power through. A final trip to the restroom sealed the deal. Again, without tissue, I spent a good part of the 45 minutes eliminating what seemed to be the contents of every meal I’d eaten in the past week. To my horror, I discovered that the rinsing bucket was empty.

That was when I decided that I was going home for the rest of the day.

I spent the afternoon drifting in and out of naps and old episodes of Breaking Bad as Ama and her husband peeked their heads into the window above my bed every so often to see if I was alright, and to bring me tea.

Gorima arrived with Ama at my window after school to translate and find out what was wrong with me. To be honest, aside from being tired, I didn't feel terrible, but I was so stinking hot and sweaty that I felt feverish (perhaps I was) and the tummy rumbles would still come every so often so I just wanted to be in bed. They offered biscuits, which sounded like a good idea, along with more tea. I changed into more appropriate clothes (God forbid someone saw my knees) and spotted Ama on her way back to the house with two packages of purchased biscuits in her hands. She’d walked to a shop, or a neighbor’s house to get them for me. God love that sweet little old lady.

I sat at the kitchen table as the sun was setting and talked to Gorima as she made tea with some dried black balls that looked like coffee beans, a squeeze of lemon and some sugar, the same tea Ama had made for me, that was delicious (I wish the cups here were bigger!) and alternately dipped and chewed the biscuits along with the tea along with Gorima who poured herself a cup also.

She is such a sweet girl and her English is quite good. When she doesn’t understand a question, her voice raises several octaves as she looks me square in the eye and says “WHAT?!” like I’ve accused her of drinking or something equally as scandalous. I watched and helped chop as she prepared some squash-like, cucumber-looking vegetable, potato, and soybean (large puffballs that I’m not sure were actually soybeans), tomato chili mixture, spinach (sag) and dhal as well as rice. I asked Gorima about boy friends and she giggled when I asked if she had one. I told her that my nieces who are around her age have/had boyfriends, which she found equally funny. She said she knows one girl who has a boyfriend at her school, a different one from the one I am at.

Very excited about tomorrow; ELEPHANT DAY! Ranjan informed me this evening that we will be leaving at 6:30 am to go help with feeding and cleaning the elees!