My Life in Nepal

I returned to Kathmandu, Nepal exactly one month ago today. As I mentioned before, I was feeling the need to exist in one spot for a while. I chose Nepal because I fell in love with the country immediately after first arriving November 6. There is a special energy here. The history and culture. The architecture and colors. The people. It's spiritual without being religious. It's calm and crazy at the same time. A few words that come to mind when I think of how to define life here are primitive, simple and old-world.

Before leaving for India, I had made new friends and developed interesting relationships with a small group of people. I'm staying at a guesthouse for free in exchange for helping them with some things like their marketing efforts and website. I occasionally work the reception desk and talk with guests about the tours and treks offered by the guesthouse. Let's just say it's a different world of Marketing. I (try to)help the staff improve their English and they're teaching me a bit of Nepalese. I've been told several times that how I say something is not how the English say it. Thank you bloody England! :-) It's a very family-type atmosphere.

The Nepalese government has mandated a schedule that leaves us without electricity for 12 hours a day...and most of it is during the day. That means no light or things that require plug-in, no computer, no hot water. There are only a few hours of the day when a hot shower is available due to the electricity schedule because once we have electricity, we have to wait for the Geezer to warm the water. There is no indoor heating...and with no electricity, there is no space heater option. The temperature ranges from 35F to 60F but the guesthouse stays about 10 degrees cooler because no sunshine or warm breeze makes its way in. So I sleep in a room that feels like it's 30F with windows and a door that do not completely shut. I've become very good at showering, reading, playing cards, cooking by candlelight. The cable in my room no longer works but I can watch movies via DVD. However, it's hit or miss with the electricity. And I rarely get to see the end of a movie because the black market DVDs I buy are usually damaged.

Every day is essentially the same but different. Some days I never leave the guesthouse. Other days I'll walk a bit around the area or talk with tourists...although it's the off season so they are few. I attended a Hindu wedding in a small mountain town. I've eaten wild boar, buffalo, local chicken, the liver of something, pork skin, etc. I spent one day at an orphanage. I help cook most every night and eat with the staff...although the owner, his 9-year old nephew and I eat before the staff. We use two old gas burners powered by a propane tank for all the cooking. There is no stove or microwave. Mongul, the cook, is deaf. So Gyano, the 9-year old and the deaf cook teach me how to cook Nepalese foods. I eat Dahl Baaht and curry every night. We eat with our fingers...and this includes fried eggs (at my request) on some nights...and it's showing in my curry-stained fingernails. For those unsure, Dahl Baaht is rice with a liquid broth poured over top. Combine that with a saucy curry and imagine eating with your fingers. Washing my hands usually means only rinsing them with water in the kitchen unless I go to my room for soap. Drinks are not typically served with a meal but rather hot water is drank after the meal. All dishes are washed outside the kitchen over the cracked cement from a rubber hose attached to the wall. This is the same cement area where an illegally killed dear was skinned/prepared for rooftop BBQ and a chicken was killed and drained of blood before it was used to make curry. And no, Clorox is not used to disinfect the area. It's amazing that I have not gotten sick. And it makes me wonder again just how necessary all the cleaning/hygienic products we are convinced to buy really are. I have spent a considerable amount of time thinking of Marketing...how it relates to my life prior to travel, what it means, what it could (or in my opinion) should mean. I trust I will carry these sentiments within me upon my return to the real world...or should I say my old world.

Vegetables we buy are laid out on cloths on the ground and sold by candlelight once evening approaches. Meat and fish are bought at separate "stands" on the street where the whole of the animal/meat is on display. We carry the items home in small plastic bags (that barely hold the items) without being first wrapped in anything. This also means they are up for grabs to the open air filled with dust, germs and pollution from the streets. While I'm on the topic of food, I can't resist but offer the information that many people here chew with there mouth open. Such a horrific smacking sound is made because of what we're eating. I'm close enough here to a few people that at times when I can't take it anymore, I reach over and clamp their lips shut with my fingers. At first, they didn't know what to do but now a smile appears. And if they're trying to give me a hard time, they come and smack in my ears on purpose when I'm not expecting it. I'll just say there's a lot less smacking going on around here at Hotel Poon-Hill.

My days pass slowly and at the end, I don't know where they've gone. Some days are noisy and so filled with distractions that I am unable to complete a thought. Other days are extremely quiet and peaceful. There is vast contradiction to what makes me long for AND cringe over the idea of returning to the Westernized way of life with its privileges and unnecessary expectations. I live in conditions that I thought would never be acceptable to me...and I quite like it.

Nepal is an interesting place to call "home" for a short while. Traveling has been exciting and provided many life lessons but staying in one place for a while is giving me irreplaceable insights. In this time, I've really had the chance to somewhat understand the Nepali life. My friends have shared stories that leave me speechless. The stories could be from books on the Best Sellers list for adventure books for kids or how to survive life in the jungle.

There is amazing strength in people. Yes, it's all relative to where we are born, how we are raised, what is fair and not fair, what is acceptable, etc. In the 10 countries I have visited and because I do my best to interact with mostly locals, I have seen and experienced hardships that for me are unsettling but is all that these people know in their lives. I'm not trying to sound over philosophical but it is a topic that consumes my mind lately. As I continue to wrap my head around what it is I'm saying and feeling, I'll put it into better words. But for now, I will say there is a rawness to life in Asia (as there is across the globe) and it has earned my tremendous respect and gratitude.

A few other thoughts about Nepal, Nepali life and its Nepalese people.
- There is a kindness in the rudeness.
- A smile fills the void of a "Thank You" and after a while, I understand the replacement.
- There are acts of appreciation that go unnoticed unless you string them all together to make sense.
- The simplicity of a task that seems complex really is that simple.
- The record keeping and procedural way of doing business is so inefficient but it works here because of the level of advancement that is Kathmandu and Nepal.
- There is an old-world and traditional lifestyle that has been infiltrated with enough Westernisms that it seems two worlds have collided and are stuck in time with its existence.

I leave day after tomorrow for West Nepal with a close friend. We will stop in Pokhara for two days which is said to be a beautiful small town centered around a lake with amazing close views of the Himalayas. We will then spend four days in a small village where Gyano's family lives. (Note, he lives with his uncle here so that he can have a better life.) They are of the Tharu cast and their New Year is celebrated on the 14th. I will help the village people prepare for the festival. I haven't asked too many questions but I don't want to know what to expect. I do know though that I will have to shower outside the hut in a three-walled bathing area (kind of in public) while wearing a sarong. The "shower" will consist of a bar of soap and using buckets of heated water to pour over my head to rinse. Yes, I've done this here at the hotel when I really wanted to bathe but didn't have hot water. Doing it in a village...with probably children staring to see how I do...will be a different story.

I promise to update you and finish sharing Nepal with you before leaving for Istanbul on Jan 18th.