Nepal Trip - Philosophical Musings, Mothers Day and Thunder...

Day Fourteen - Another Day of Village Life

What a good night of sleep I had. Being "off the grid" certain appeals to my sleep patterns!

After our hearty breakfast we pile into Durga's long suffering car and head off down the valley to the village school of Durga's home town. It's a little village much further down the dirt road from Gyan's house but we make our way, past many corn field, water buffalo and protective dog.

This is a much more progressive school than the ones we visited yesterday. The feeling is immediate! Gyan is one of the head teachers, which probably explains it. His dealings with the guests from First Steps Himalaya would have opened his eyes to more modern teaching practices. The children here in the Mulkarka village school are all engaged and learning. Fionna is very excited as apparently it is is quite the turn around from the last time they visited. FSH is planning to open a year three classroom at this school this year. The ideas of learning are trickling up from their early childhood educational concepts. It's a process, and here it is very noticeably working. There isn't one classroom without a teacher or books and no one is shouting!

We get busy doing a bit of fun beautifying. Clara paints a hopscotch and spends hours teaching the children how to play the game. What an absolute hit! The other kids do murals. Liam is particularly proud of his abc snake for the little ones.

Clara's hopscotch is a huge hit!

Liam's ABC Snake mural for the preschoolers

I have one question that is burning through my mind on this trip. How do we debrief our children after this experience? It is always a tricky question, especially as I am not sure how I feel about rural Nepal yet myself, so how do I explain the things we are seeing to the kids. 
I mean, we are living with people who live more or less like our ancestors did thousands of years ago. Is it right to put modern day values on such a culture? To expect them to grasp our modern values? Or does it simply push them into a situation that they are not ready for? Or are they completely ready for it, and just need to be shown how? But I suppose, just like with most humans around the world there will be the bright sparks that take the ideas and run, and the traditionalists who don't embrace change.

Again, what to tell the kids? I think it is very much individual what each one will take out of it. For one thing they will certainly realize that kids are fun to be with, regardless of nationality. And that the world is not such a scary place. That it is just as possible to have happiness without all the trappings of modern stuff. But also that where we, the Douglas family, come from has changed more rapidly than this landlocked, uplifted nation surrounded by the worlds tallest mountains. And also that globalization is here to stay...

Should we feel guilt over the fact that Nepali don't have what we have? Not at all. They are just in a different stage of their journey. Also, should we help? That's always a big one for me to get my head around. One side of me feels that if someone is below me then it is my duty to lend a hand to pull them up. Of course that is my own westernized judgemental-ism about hierarchy, but I'm trying to be honest with myself about this subject so that I can figure it out. 

The other side of me has a bit more common sense. Help when appropriate, when possible, but it is not a duty. The people in Nepal are beautiful strong people who are on their own journey. Yes, their journey is linked to mine in the sense that we are all humans on the planet earth. We are all brothers in a way. But to suddenly advance a journey faster than it's meant to be on isn't right either. To every thing there is a time and a purpose. So our children hopefully will come away with a more global view on the world. With an appreciation for all those people who went before us to create the modern reality of the western world that we live in, but also for the journey of other people. And to respect that.

The projects that First Steps Himalaya are certainly something that I can get behind. It's about teaching the people to teach themselves. Teach the teachers to teach (not shout or beat) and the Nepali youth will find their own way. That way the future is placed in their own capable hands to mold it the way that fits them, not recreating something from another land.

Our children will always remember painting a classroom and teaching the local kids to play hopscotch. The big kids will remember the shouting of the non-progressive teacher and the time wasting of all the children sitting in classes with no teachers or books. If it inspires them to be a bit more thankful for what they have, then great. It will give us many a great dinnertime conversation that may not sink in, or may only percolate to come up later in life. But for me it has filled in a gap in the part of the world that I needed to see. And maybe that is all I need to say on the matter.

Enough of these philosophical wanderings.... back to the story. After all it is Nepali Mother's Day!

 

After finishing with the hopscotch we are invited to Durga's family's house to partake in a Mother's Day celebration. It's a spontaneous festival spirit. Durga only comes back to his village to visit his family a couple times a year. These people live in a little cluster of houses in the village, just down the hill from the school that we were just at. The houses are surrounded by their fields of corn, beans and onions. Next to their houses are shelters for their water buffalo, goats and chickens. 

His family, aunties, cousins, nieces are dressed beautifully in their traditional dress - happy bright red and green outfits dressed with smiling faces. There are no men here, they are all off working in the city or over seas. Many Nepali men leave Nepal for the Persian gulf taking the grunt jobs that no body else wants. Sweating on the tarmac in Kuwait to send home a few extra rupees, leaving the women to tend the fields, raise the kids and carry on with life.

We are invited into one of Durga's aunties houses. They sit us down and are so pleased to share their special feast day foods with us, treating us like visiting royalty. I am given a tikka, or blessing, for being a mother, complete with special red dot on my third eye. They serve us a mixture of baked sweat breads, sugar crystals and to drink, coca cola. Earthen floors with animals braying outside, it is a surreal experience!

One of Durga's nieces demonstrates how they grind rice into flour for cooking.

But soon we are off home to where our hosts have left us a lunch of vegetable soup and deep fried rice bread. Jin Kari, our hostess has gone to visit her mother to honor her for mothers day, one of only two days a year she will be able to see her. Sumi, the daughter of the house, plays hostess and the girls spend hours with her visiting friends, playing in the bushes and even getting their own Tikka's. Juliet gets so dirty that everyone jokes she has become Nepali!

Sadly for me this was my last meal for awhile....

Clara and Juliet receive Tikka's from Sumi, our host's daughter

Sisters

The Buddha's revenge that has plagued Randall on this trip hits me sudden and hard. Within an hour from when I was happily playing with the village kids to suddenly rushing to the out door toilet/shower where I make myself a home. Ugh. I'm a wreck. This would be one situation where it would be very nice to have a toilet in the room. Oh well, my reality morphs from fetal position on the bed, to the sound of the world coming in through the the cement walls and tin roof of the outdoor dunnie. As it gets dark I am only vaguely aware of the raging lightning storm in the hills around us, while the stars burn brightly above us. 

It's going to be a long night. Hello reality!