tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86895030166663607522024-02-02T15:17:22.581-08:00Nepal 2013Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.comBlogger27125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-76438629456954584292013-09-09T10:06:00.001-07:002013-09-09T10:07:46.096-07:00Yatsa Gunbu <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXMo7w-67o2VpmTYVMuPQNcu1UPQKiZ887z_I8NW3S1nTdChmYIhregYqn17koXtUzsHIGU-2kbofL5IliwpMXvnvbxjF1EfB7zbq5OPc6RNgY8LaakIOhHSTnOqQGWe_GylaIDkU2Mog/s1600/DSC_9319.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXMo7w-67o2VpmTYVMuPQNcu1UPQKiZ887z_I8NW3S1nTdChmYIhregYqn17koXtUzsHIGU-2kbofL5IliwpMXvnvbxjF1EfB7zbq5OPc6RNgY8LaakIOhHSTnOqQGWe_GylaIDkU2Mog/s320/DSC_9319.jpg" width="320" /></span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At our school, we have a really nice guard, who has travelled the world, worked in so many professions and is really interested in plants. Around 10 years ago, he decided to settle down in Pokhara and since than takes care of the security of the school. It is always nice to have a chat with him and from time to time he comes with some plants he likes to show us and tells us their medical purposes. </span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A while ago, he told us about this 'animal-plant' and we couldn't really believe it. According to him, it grows high up in the mountains and at the beginning it is a</span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">caterpillar and than suddenly it turns into a plant. People would pay a lot of money to get this plant because when you eat it, you would become really strong. Well, a nice fairy story, we thought! Quite curious, we researched a bit in the internet and actually, we found such a animal plant!! </span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is also called caterpillar fungus and it is a fungus that parasitizes the larvae of a moth. </span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial;">We than also remembered that years ago, there was an article about this fungus in the magazine "National Geographic". When we are back in Europe, we really need to dig out this story. It's so fascinating!</span></div>
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<h1 class="firstHeading" id="firstHeading" lang="en">
<span dir="auto"><i><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;">Ophiocordyceps sinensis</span></i></span></h1>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> (Redirected from </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Caterpillar_fungus&redirect=no" title="Caterpillar fungus"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Caterpillar fungus</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">)</span><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<tr><th colspan="2" style="background-color: lightblue; text-align: center;"><i><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ophiocordyceps sinensis</span></i></th></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center;"><a class="image" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img alt="" height="132" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8f/Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg/220px-Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8f/Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg/330px-Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8f/Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg/440px-Cordyceps_sinensis.jpg 2x" width="220" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;"><i>Ophiocordyceps sinensis</i> (left) growing out of the head of a dead caterpillar</span></span></td></tr>
<tr><th colspan="2" style="background-color: lightblue; text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_classification" title="Biological classification"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Scientific classification</span></a></th></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Kingdom:</span></td><td><span class="kingdom" style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fungus" title="Fungus"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Fungi</span></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Division:</span></td><td><span class="division" style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ascomycota" title="Ascomycota"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ascomycota</span></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Class:</span></td><td><span class="class" style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sordariomycetes" title="Sordariomycetes"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Sordariomycetes</span></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Order:</span></td><td><span class="order" style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypocreales" title="Hypocreales"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hypocreales</span></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Family:</span></td><td><span class="family" style="white-space: nowrap;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordycipitaceae" title="Ophiocordycipitaceae"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ophiocordycipitaceae</span></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Genus:</span></td><td><span class="genus" style="white-space: nowrap;"><i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps" title="Ophiocordyceps"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ophiocordyceps</span></a></i></span></td></tr>
<tr><td><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Species:</span></td><td><span class="species" style="white-space: nowrap;"><i><b><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">O. sinensis</span></b></i></span></td></tr>
<tr><th colspan="2" style="background-color: lightblue; text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binomial_nomenclature" title="Binomial nomenclature"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Binomial name</span></a></th></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;"><b><span class="binomial"><i>Ophiocordyceps sinensis</i></span></b><br /><small><span style="font-size: small;">(</span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berk." title="Berk."><span style="font-size: small;">Berk.</span></a><span style="font-size: small;">) G.H.Sung, J.M.Sung, Hywel-Jones & Spatafora (2007)</span></small></span></span></td></tr>
<tr><th colspan="2" style="background-color: lightblue; text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synonym_(taxonomy)" title="Synonym (taxonomy)"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Synonyms</span></a></th></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;"><i>Sphaeria sinensis</i> </span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="color: black;"><small>Berk. (1843)</small><br /><i>Cordyceps sinensis</i> <small>(Berk.) <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacc." title="Sacc.">Sacc.</a> (1878)</small></span></span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;"><i><b>Ophiocordyceps sinensis</b></i> is a </span></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fungus" title="Fungus"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">fungus</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> that </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parasite" title="Parasite"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">parasitizes</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> larvae of </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_moth" title="Ghost moth"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ghost moths</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> and produces a </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mushroom" title="Mushroom"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">fruiting body</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> valued as an </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbal_remedy" title="Herbal remedy"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">herbal remedy</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">. The fungus germinates in the living larva, kills and mummifies it, and then the stalk-like fruiting body emerges from the corpse. It is known in English colloquially as <b>caterpillar fungus</b>, or by its more prominent foreign names (</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caterpillar_fungus#Taxonomy_and_naming"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">see below</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">): <i><b>yartsa gunbu</b></i> or <i><b>yatsa gunbu</b></i> (</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Tibetan" title="Standard Tibetan"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tibetan</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">), or <i><b>Dōng chóng xià cǎo</b></i> (</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_language" title="Chinese language"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Chinese</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">: <span lang="zh" style="font-family: sans-serif;" xml:lang="zh">冬虫夏草</span>; literally "winter worm, summer grass").</span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The moths in which <i>O. sinensis</i> grows are ambiguously referred to as "ghost moth", which identifies either a </span><a class="mw-redirect" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_moth" title="Ghost moth"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">single species</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> or the genus <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thitarodes" title="Thitarodes"><span style="color: black;">Thitarodes</span></a></i><span style="color: black;">,</span> and the species parasitized by <i>O. sinensis</i> may be one of several <i>Thitarodes</i> that live on the </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_Plateau" title="Tibetan Plateau"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tibetan Plateau</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> (Tibet, Qinghai, West-Sichuan, SW-Gansu & NW Yunnan), and the Himalayas (</span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India" title="India"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">India</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nepal" title="Nepal"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Nepal</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhutan" title="Bhutan"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Bhutan</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;"><i>O. sinensis</i> is known in the West as a </span></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicinal_mushroom" title="Medicinal mushroom"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">medicinal mushroom</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, and its use has a long history in </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese_medicine" title="Traditional Chinese medicine"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Traditional Chinese medicine</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> as well as </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Tibetan_medicine" title="Traditional Tibetan medicine"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Traditional Tibetan medicine</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">.The hand-collected fungus-caterpillar combination is valued by herbalists and as a status symbol; it is used as an </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphrodisiac" title="Aphrodisiac"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">aphrodisiac</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> and treatment for ailments such as </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatigue_(medical)" title="Fatigue (medical)"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">fatigue</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> and </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer" title="Cancer"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">cancer</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, although such use is mainly based on traditional Chinese medicine and anecdote. Recent research however seems to indicate </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ophiocordyceps_sinensis#Research" title="Ophiocordyceps sinensis"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">a variety of beneficial effects</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> in animal testing, including increased physical endurance through heightened </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adenosine_triphosphate" title="Adenosine triphosphate"><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ATP</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> production in rats.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-62033702457028395772013-08-24T01:34:00.001-07:002013-08-24T01:34:49.530-07:00Cooking for 40 hungry Nepali… why not?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhECoHsDMY0fLjTQNeXf2TxrQ-Vpo2VJxMNaZ9Rf46Qi33t_h_ZAyzh_7y3WG3l5JOEBX1jp74LSlMBheGvYo24JljdASxHfVushjafQ435DJaNcfT1fw6vy2bnlzM7As9h4Fu2wbmu-zY/s1600/DSC_8953.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhECoHsDMY0fLjTQNeXf2TxrQ-Vpo2VJxMNaZ9Rf46Qi33t_h_ZAyzh_7y3WG3l5JOEBX1jp74LSlMBheGvYo24JljdASxHfVushjafQ435DJaNcfT1fw6vy2bnlzM7As9h4Fu2wbmu-zY/s320/DSC_8953.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Arriving back at school at three pm after our walk you would think some general relaxation was in order, but far from it. What better way to rejuvenate aching muscles than throwing a dinner party for 40 people? </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjGbh9nLEASjVFLuZ-D5hJXn_WSu9rwZsVKexpRpn5wBUFWupqh-U1gMFgS7x2UhlcXRrTTEn8pruT5rNO6zm1FO8-5_Heuety2uM95K19QsektaDzAatGVQBXsSunMGz8_48mq42FJjE/s1600/DSC_8965.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjGbh9nLEASjVFLuZ-D5hJXn_WSu9rwZsVKexpRpn5wBUFWupqh-U1gMFgS7x2UhlcXRrTTEn8pruT5rNO6zm1FO8-5_Heuety2uM95K19QsektaDzAatGVQBXsSunMGz8_48mq42FJjE/s320/DSC_8965.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">This was the culmination of a rash comment made by Wiebke a few weeks ago that we should cook everyone some European food in exchange for all the Nepali food people were urging us to try. </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPkwYR2CbQvM8E69L6bmpVocl2y1m5pGExxjx5mRz1RY8FLmALBPN63zfsEiPylzJWQwU6tK5fGQYbhpHa5gq9z1tmlRnTNFuV9PaQ9fj-a6yVGCEMagJv30WtwmBYnKuktJG497qpapM/s1600/DSC_8954.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPkwYR2CbQvM8E69L6bmpVocl2y1m5pGExxjx5mRz1RY8FLmALBPN63zfsEiPylzJWQwU6tK5fGQYbhpHa5gq9z1tmlRnTNFuV9PaQ9fj-a6yVGCEMagJv30WtwmBYnKuktJG497qpapM/s320/DSC_8954.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">The principle seized on this idea with zeal, and the next thing we know we are in a basic kitchen with one chopping board, three gas burners, some gigantic pots and mounds and mounds of vegetables. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Bravely, we were planning to cook a meal without rice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To understand what a radical idea this is, bare in mind that all present would have eaten mounds of rice twice a day <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">every single day of their lives</i>. Our menu was as follows:</span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm-SgQEhJrUQv7hGVZCzs61gjyJFsWxPWLay3ps-_IE6YwtWNIcm1rIuUuK3KWVhrAKUn5Zsw9VmTjNWTJ_dWDUHDcmAs9D4lWVhV1bCGsbaib3ZSjQjwkFtbZBfaLaBDJn3dS7ZpjxfI/s1600/DSC_8968.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhm-SgQEhJrUQv7hGVZCzs61gjyJFsWxPWLay3ps-_IE6YwtWNIcm1rIuUuK3KWVhrAKUn5Zsw9VmTjNWTJ_dWDUHDcmAs9D4lWVhV1bCGsbaib3ZSjQjwkFtbZBfaLaBDJn3dS7ZpjxfI/s320/DSC_8968.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">To start, creme crackers with a tomato, cucumber, lemon and coriander relish. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">For main, ratatouille made from aubergine, onions, tomatoes and a strange Nepali vegetable, almost, but not entirely unlike a courgette, served with boiled potatoes. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">To finish we provided fruit salad (apples, pomegranate, pineapple and bananas) served with yoghurt and nuts; toasted and mixed with honey. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';"><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Luckily we had lots of help with the chopping - it took 6 people over two hours to prepare all the ingredients, but we were ready for the 7.00 start with a punctuality that can only be described as Germanic.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">So it was that 40 Nepali boarding students, school staff and teachers sat down to their first taste of European ‘cuisine’. The starter was an unreserved success – wolfed down by every table. Next, the main course. In the end we had bottled out of only providing potatoes and also cooked some rice – fearing some sort of uprising if we didn’t. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">The ratatouille was immediately rejected by the boarding students as utterly disgusting and although the teachers were very polite we could tell that they too had some reservations, although we thought it had rather a good flavour. The desert, however, saved the reputation of European food at the school. It went down very well indeed and one of the teachers, smilingly commented that “this is better!” After helping a little with the clearing up, we retired to bed in a state of utter exhaustion!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-26267805416336627222013-08-24T01:13:00.000-07:002013-08-24T01:13:49.018-07:00A walk with friends<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSfauZjSDNImuw7tJH3yE4-XLiGSbU5ENYkdAWWRN0GTEKHXwYEwsiSdxK7BU-OLdDJ8_pE6rZ5UHuRoK_WHEsR1sc7I85-MsN2ByaJC6xRH5t0Z9UjIPi5MOrf5KckiC3XvL0Yrkauu4/s1600/DSC_8890.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSfauZjSDNImuw7tJH3yE4-XLiGSbU5ENYkdAWWRN0GTEKHXwYEwsiSdxK7BU-OLdDJ8_pE6rZ5UHuRoK_WHEsR1sc7I85-MsN2ByaJC6xRH5t0Z9UjIPi5MOrf5KckiC3XvL0Yrkauu4/s320/DSC_8890.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">From a low pass we walked up a good path through a lush, mixed forest, pleased to be able to keep up with a Nepali sports teacher fairly easily. We passed an agricultural research station build by the British, with lots of little cottages looking like a 60s seaside development in the west country. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">After only an hour of climbing, at one point glimpsing the red behind of a deer through the trees, we emerged onto an open hill top with excellent views of the <st1:place w:st="on">Annapurna</st1:place> range, although now partially obscured by developing cloud. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">We stopped in a village for a traditional Nepali ‘daal bhatt’ lunch where it was decided we should have chicken as a celebration. This meant we had to wait well over an hour for our food, presumable as said chicken was caught and prepared, during which time the two of us embarrassed ourselves by failing to grasp the local rules of rummy. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYjhbb4By3E0bKJ6G0Zxg3tRSwv6AjLct7xGKofiMmPRFDaFqvF0HkYlak_mpd_k96nNIiWRfKLmUbn7dUe1pGfyJSnXKrNf1p9ZSshQnVM5dCZx4Sp2bE48At1h48YEUmG-_doO5VXmY/s1600/DSC_8926.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYjhbb4By3E0bKJ6G0Zxg3tRSwv6AjLct7xGKofiMmPRFDaFqvF0HkYlak_mpd_k96nNIiWRfKLmUbn7dUe1pGfyJSnXKrNf1p9ZSshQnVM5dCZx4Sp2bE48At1h48YEUmG-_doO5VXmY/s320/DSC_8926.JPG" width="320" /></a> <span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">The main vegetable with the dish when it arrived was a juvenile fern – I had no idea you could eat such thing, but it tasted quite good. After this it was a steep decent, with many hundreds of steps, passing some buffalo delighting in a muddy wallowing hole, back to the road and the bus to Pokhara. The bus traveled at a maximum of 10 mph, trying to maximize the distance between it and the previous bus and thus the number of customers, but at least it felt safe.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-35386005519728674442013-08-24T01:01:00.002-07:002013-08-24T01:01:45.477-07:00Oratory, handball and yet more holidays…<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">On Tuesday we found ourselves unexpectedly relieved from teaching duties and invited to an oratory contest at the local Krishna Mandir. As normal at these occasions we sat through a lot of incomprehensible Nepali but it was rather pleasant to relax in the shade of the temple rather than trying to keep control of overly enthusiastic class 4! One of our students did very well in the contest, coming second overall. <o:p></o:p></span><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAMO9yzgNmNssuLJ3LhGaHg6QQIXUXcUGjP7AlmWU0EpBFyy5unJSesz-W0BFwSjMUk_dwoXDRIi-u1u1Nca8SlPuCSIIpxXnZ4U8ePVhay5rEaJqXVE83sG0Gwqr4cwPUASWFUmLic7I/s1600/DSC_8823.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAMO9yzgNmNssuLJ3LhGaHg6QQIXUXcUGjP7AlmWU0EpBFyy5unJSesz-W0BFwSjMUk_dwoXDRIi-u1u1Nca8SlPuCSIIpxXnZ4U8ePVhay5rEaJqXVE83sG0Gwqr4cwPUASWFUmLic7I/s320/DSC_8823.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Before the contest was over we were whisked away by taxi to the local under 12s handball competition being held at a school in the centre of Pokhara. We ascended the state and collected our second ceremonial scarves of the day (now feeling rather like living mascots) and listened to yet more Nepali men droning on and on while no one paid them any attention whatsoever. Eventually the handball started, and we were treated to some excellent refreshments as we watched. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">Alastair had never seen a handball game before, and was surprised at what a fast moving game it is. Our school team won their first game with the impressive score of 14 – 3, which so terrified their next opponent that they ran away home and we got a walk over for the second match.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">That evening everyone was preparing for the next day’s festival, where sisters give their brothers a sacred thread to protect them and high caste Hindu’s replace the sacred thread they have been wearing looped over one shoulder for the past year. There seem to be a multitude of these festivals where the women folk perform acts of worship of self-sacrifice for the protection of their men: either by giving gifts, preparing special food or fasting. Of course there are no reciprocal acts of sacrifice by the men, but these customs are so engrained that nobody seems to mind, although the unfairness is openly acknowledged. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq3apamGTaSxlxvjT2HkpQEJjplRH7q1pQu2f_u1ClzzOoy8KkGxkSRqIptFRAr7OrpXI1rN5uwBXWBiTcwVg6LD-ixGRJsixzgMIsH4-81Re832FiyL31I3b0Jxg0zw5yi1ijl_qxHcM/s1600/DSC_8880.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" qsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjq3apamGTaSxlxvjT2HkpQEJjplRH7q1pQu2f_u1ClzzOoy8KkGxkSRqIptFRAr7OrpXI1rN5uwBXWBiTcwVg6LD-ixGRJsixzgMIsH4-81Re832FiyL31I3b0Jxg0zw5yi1ijl_qxHcM/s320/DSC_8880.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Arial','sans-serif';">As we went for our customary evening stroll down the street there were whole teams of men carrying racks coated in colourful thread and jewelry for sale. On the dark street corners (the power was off) there were stalls covered in Indian style sweets of all shapes and sizes. One we tried tasted distinctly of cheese (very odd!) but we bought some others which were almost edible as long as you didn’t think of them as sweets. Along with the festival comes (yet more) holiday – four days off in total.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-90816235329791043632013-08-17T22:35:00.000-07:002013-08-17T22:54:52.621-07:00Snake in bed<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Two days ago, Alastair and I took class 4 to the science lab and showed them there some pictures on of animals that adapted to their natural environment. One of them was a picture of a rattle snake. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">This evening, when we came home, Alastair was the first to enter our room and put his school bag onto the bed. Somewhere, in the darkness under the bag as he placed it on the bed, a great rustling and rattling sound emerged. Alastair screeched and ran out of the room and Wiebke shouted “snake!” This was all much to everyone’s amusement when some crinkled plastic was discovered to be the source of the sound.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-22242266422909385752013-08-17T22:17:00.000-07:002013-08-17T22:55:14.843-07:00What a day (continued...)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">The result of this whole day was, that leaving the internet last Friday (being exposed to a tantrum, screaming kids, and screaming pig (because it was going to be killed)) I got such a headache that in the evening, I felt quit miserable. When we went to bed and I started to close my eyes, I only saw raw meat and scenes of slaughter. I was really stressed and my headache started to become worse and worse that at one point I thought my head will explode. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">This headache didn’t stop for the next 72 hours; I got really sick and couldn’t move out of bed. Unfortunately, Alastair couldn’t help except trying to sooth me and hoping that my headache stopped. Due to the pain I even started vomiting and I almost went to see a doctor (I really try to avoid this here!).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Finally, I got better but then Alastair got suddenly a headache! At least, one of us was feeling ok to take care of the other! He also suffered for 3 days. Therefore last week was not the best but both of us are doing better now. During our time of being sick, our neighbors and also some of the teachers took really care of us. As soon as I felt better, some of the male teachers, who normally don’t say hello to me when Alastair and I appear together, came to see me and asked how I was doing. I really appreciated it and I think sometimes they just don’t know what to do around me being a western female and are really shy.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-24879784405972928802013-08-09T05:37:00.001-07:002013-08-09T05:37:09.204-07:00What a day<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
What an awful day! Today is a holiday (the government decided yesterday that we will have one) and therfore today, we decided to do washing, create new lessons and also spend some time writing emails. In the afternoon, we went quickly to the canteen to have some tea and became part of a tantrum scene. Two boys started to fight and only one of them got then punished. He had to sit down and then stand up again several times. However, he got then so angry because the other boy got away with it so that he started to kick other boys and started screaming. At the end he lay on the ground and started hitting his head on the floor. The teachers then started to scream at him and tried to get him on his feet but he just got worse. In the end I really couldn't stand this anymore and had to interfere. Talking to him in a calm voice and stroking his back and head really helped then!<br />
Now sitting in the internet cafe, there were two small children starting to scream like hell and nobody seemed to care. They were just tired.<br />
And a minute ago, after the kids had left a pig started to scream. If you have ever heard a pig screaming, you know how awful it is! They just killed one outside the cybercafe!<br />
Tonight, we decided to eat in our room with no children around!<br />
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-70268784169432398122013-08-08T00:19:00.001-07:002013-08-17T22:56:01.296-07:00Invitation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggHAQRl-hslmAZ_s21mSILVCRq4SKhnkOb9KhyphenhyphenJHSbsaas8wGRpeB4OoUirw3Ookq94B8VARsTVigeggthvokVyN53QFnjQI2chJvUxrkQNRN4cPkply0bNV2d6SA_XBpgyFA0ea8ErH0/s1600/DSC_8636.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" ksa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggHAQRl-hslmAZ_s21mSILVCRq4SKhnkOb9KhyphenhyphenJHSbsaas8wGRpeB4OoUirw3Ookq94B8VARsTVigeggthvokVyN53QFnjQI2chJvUxrkQNRN4cPkply0bNV2d6SA_XBpgyFA0ea8ErH0/s320/DSC_8636.jpg" width="211" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Last Saturday we were invited to spend the day with one of the teachers and his family. We had possibly the best food we’d eaten in Nepal – an amazing Dal Bhaat with beautifully cooked vegetables which melted in the mouth as well as chicken and yoghurt. Afterwards we were treated to a Jack fruit. The flesh is orange and slimy and tastes like a nice combination of banana and mango, but cannot be chewed to any effect so one savors the taste for a while and then has to let the prune-sized lump of goo slide slowly down the gullet. Alastair quite liked it, but Wiebke wasn’t so keen. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our host then had to go to a meeting at the school, the arrangements for which give you an insight into the Nepali attitude to timekeeping. First of all the meeting wasn’t called until late the previous evening, and then was arranged for 11.30 on Saturday morning. However our host was enjoying his lunch and didn’t set off until nearly 12.30, which apparently is entirely acceptable – no one else will turn up for the first hour anyway. While he was away, we went for a walk down to the hydroelectric plant, where pipes carry diverted river water a couple of hundred metres down into a spectacular gorge. Big rivers go at an amazing pace here – a sign we really are in the Himalaya. After lunch we returned to the house and played with children before our host returned for a final cup of tea and we headed home.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-65124711745301690032013-08-08T00:19:00.000-07:002013-08-08T00:19:02.253-07:00Escalators<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Pokhara has recently gained its first department store, where you can by anything from food to cloths to upholstery and kitchenware. The store comes complete with escalators – the first in the region – which have become a bit of an attraction in themselves. When we visited we found a lady at the top of one, contemplating the steps appearing at her feet and trying to pluck up the courage to descend. With some encouragement and a deep breath she made it on with hardly a wobble. At the bottom a group of giggly ladies were trying to make it onto the up escalator, each jostling to be the last to take the plunge. Eventually they all jumped on simultaneously and promptly fell over, clinging to the disconcerting moving banisters.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-10745330675708889102013-08-07T23:56:00.000-07:002013-08-07T23:57:15.064-07:00School festival<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEile-DXG6h6GYlXNgcmdhdvmG_trGXY-_lKjcu_V1Vndi2SixAb9_9oco5UpHiZuO68skb2vpJ4-nZQjudPhzTXsrEY4u7GZRCLYtpyGJDYkbSihnz6vu686Dpp62j0plY_v5njXsDVuew/s1600/DSC_8634.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" jsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEile-DXG6h6GYlXNgcmdhdvmG_trGXY-_lKjcu_V1Vndi2SixAb9_9oco5UpHiZuO68skb2vpJ4-nZQjudPhzTXsrEY4u7GZRCLYtpyGJDYkbSihnz6vu686Dpp62j0plY_v5njXsDVuew/s320/DSC_8634.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Calibri;">A few days ago we were treated to another ‘cultural program’, this time associated with the school. Some 600 teachers, parents and students packed the newly build ‘party palace’ hall next to the school and watched dancing by the students and speeches by religious leaders of various faiths. One lady was a Hindu leader who sang songs about Krishna (they were call and response – so we all joined in) and advised people to be vegetarian, because then you will get a longer gut. Do I want a longer gut? The length I have the moment is quite enough of a handful as it is here in Nepal!
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-80867478410540418082013-08-07T23:48:00.002-07:002013-08-07T23:48:44.505-07:00Culture<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One notable cultural difference in this part of the world compared with Europe is that men are very fond of holding hands. Male friends routinely sit and walk around hand in hand, and even sit on each other’s laps for the fun of it – even if there are plenty of chairs. Alastair’s especially glad he’s managed to escape this treatment so far since we saw two of the male teachers holding hands when one of them used his ‘engaged’ hand to have a good scratch of the crotch. The ladies also have come up with novel ways of passing the long evenings when there are power-cuts and the TV doesn’t work. We observed one of the female teachers having a good spot-popping session, surrounded by several friends and students all working on different carbuncles.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-46538271622282617912013-08-06T00:21:00.000-07:002013-08-06T00:28:03.707-07:00Magar <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_H2A3XkBH5VUREHVqG8Zdn4Al9qUpD4_y_qKK7JOpsafZZHzrxvOZpw3G8RP3emKL4rmRHO9-iDktvtNEefCwFKr4D1NGgAH4s6sCC_K2p-cvXgcULWuQI9q3tmkIlG8IOJnHrXS74B0/s1600/DSC_8445.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" jsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_H2A3XkBH5VUREHVqG8Zdn4Al9qUpD4_y_qKK7JOpsafZZHzrxvOZpw3G8RP3emKL4rmRHO9-iDktvtNEefCwFKr4D1NGgAH4s6sCC_K2p-cvXgcULWuQI9q3tmkIlG8IOJnHrXS74B0/s320/DSC_8445.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Last weekend, our neighbour kindly invited us to a Magar cultural program – the AGM of the society of the Magar people of Nepal. These people are very proud of being ‘indigenous’, as compared to some other castes such as Brahmin and Chitri, who originated in India. Brahmin and Chitri families who have lived in Nepal for hundreds of generations unsurprisingly find this attitude a little exasperating. The Magar people hold a strong sense of indignation that they are not well represented in government office, so the meetings of their society are intended to raise awareness of this issue and encourage high achievement amongst their members.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The gathering took place in a large hall with a stage at the front and fragrant toilets at the back. We were not expected at the meeting, but we had not been sitting in the audience for more than a few minutes when we were invited on stage to receive scarves and rosettes and to join the guests of honour. The introductions of Magar luminaries went on and on while we sat sweating on the stuffy stage, with hundreds of eyes staring back at us. Eventually we risked being rude and returned to our seats next to our neighbour in the auditorium. The program started well, with some lovely dances performed by girls and boys in traditional dress. Strangely, a key part of the boys dress seemed to be a tartan scarf. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Next c</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ame the speeches. They averaged at about 20 mins each and were either delivered in a low monotone or haranguing, evangelical tones. The greater the heights of the oratory to which the speaker seem to aspire, the less attention the audience paid them, merrily chatting amongst themselves while the speaker’s amplified voice reverberated around them. Mercifully for us, this meant we could talk to other people in the audience and chat with the children since we couldn’t understand a word coming from the lectern. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The talking was interspersed with entertainment, including an emotional piece of dance in which 6 lonely boys met 6 lonely girls who fed them and gave them hats in exchange for hankies. Then all tearfully parted, because the men had to move on to find work. Although a traditional dance, this situation has special poignance for the present because so many men here leave their wives and young families for years at a time to go and find work in Qatar, Dubai or Malaysia. Men between the ages of 25 and 35 were almost entirely absent from the audience. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The lowlight of the entertainment was an astonishingly bad comedy routine in which a man in a silly hat crept about the stage making funny ‘ahhh’ noises and repeatedly saying ‘namaste’ when meeting invisible people or talking on the phone. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The sequence involved a young boy whole followed close behind the man most of the time and occasionally slipped round into the man’s field of vision, eliciting no reaction whatsoever. There was only one laugh in a routine of 15 mins: when the man pretended to snore.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">At this point we were asked if we would like to address the audience about our experience of their cultural program. They insisted, so Alastair made his way to the lectern and spent a couple of minutes saying how much we enjoyed the singing and dancing and admired their sense of community. The final humiliation of the day came when Wiebke decided it would be a good idea to join the small group dancing on stage to music provided by a singer. So Alastair’s first attempt at Hindi style dancing (all writst and wavy hands) was also horribly public. There is video evidence.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu5Ee2ExxKsDOfdLGlb9TuZ1fpJ2OSFqQUWpqYHZl-FJ3zjqZ3xZJ_NF92k8Np3K8shBbsFAYlJrxh32ZPI0M8D5QPUOGdo1FErTPfdVNLDbRlT8po_sTEqbDaNOYN6ounBOXTi47DqCU/s1600/DSC_8568.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" jsa="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu5Ee2ExxKsDOfdLGlb9TuZ1fpJ2OSFqQUWpqYHZl-FJ3zjqZ3xZJ_NF92k8Np3K8shBbsFAYlJrxh32ZPI0M8D5QPUOGdo1FErTPfdVNLDbRlT8po_sTEqbDaNOYN6ounBOXTi47DqCU/s320/DSC_8568.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After 5 hours, the speakers still breathing hellfire into the microphone, we decided to beat a retreat and returned home to a very welcome lassi.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-23178831859673237112013-07-29T22:28:00.001-07:002013-07-29T22:28:22.357-07:00Cockroaches<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Tonight was again one of these nights...!!! Yesterday, Alastair and I just talked about how nice it is that we havn't seen any cockroaches for a few days. Big mistake, just to mention the topic!!! We had to pay for it last night. Aroung midnight, I had to leave the bad to get something to drink. We always sleep under a mosquito net and when I untagged it to get out of bed, I found two huge cockroaches at the inside of our net- IN OUR BED!!! For the next 30 min we were hunting theses biests and at the end we killed 10! After this cliening session, we actually managed to go back to sleep. However, this morning, we found another 5 in the room. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial;">So, we will never mention them again!</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-62691207636761277492013-07-29T21:54:00.000-07:002013-07-29T22:03:51.938-07:00Walks around Pokhara<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Friday, we started at 6 am on a bolder adventure, to climb to the local beauty-spot and mountain viewing theater, Sarankot. We found our way out of the city, and climbed on a narrow path through increasingly<br />dense vegetation. Occasionally we passed clearings containing abandoned or half-finished buildings, one of which contained a rather frightening looking man who didn't answer our Namastes and watched with what we hoped was disinterest as we passed. There were many butterflies of all colours and some strange flower munching stripy things - bees or beetles?</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-48667398049071526762013-07-24T01:51:00.000-07:002013-07-24T01:51:39.768-07:00Football<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Yesterday we were invited to watch the boys football team in their 3rd round match of the Pokhara region school's cup. We gathered, on a small, concrete stadium stand, very grateful of a the shade because the sun was beating relentlessly on the pitch. On the other side of the dusty football field, young men training for the Gurkha soldier entrance exams ran up and down the steps of the other stand (no shade there), with weighted baskets on their backs. I was chatting to one Gurkha hopeful in the stand and he said that among other tests, they have to do 70 sit ups in two minutes and run 800 m in under 2.45. There are around 4000 applicants each year for 63 places in the British Gurkha army.</div>
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Eventually it was the turn of our school to play, and they put up a sterling performance in the 30 minutes each-way game. The other team were bigger and stronger but our boys made up for it in skill and strategy, comfortably winning two - nill. They were also helped by a large supporting crowd of particularly vocal girls who probably did some long-lasting damage to their vocal chords and our eardrums! Next, it's the quater finals, and if they win the Pokhara contest, they enter the all-Nepal competition in Kathmandu.</div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-50380155285278633362013-07-24T01:38:00.000-07:002013-07-24T01:39:03.282-07:00Food<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Food! This topic is at the moment not Alastair's favoured one, so it's me giving a short summery of our daily meals. First at all, it's rice, rice and rice again! Did you hear! RICE. I still really enjoy it, we can get it (if we want) for breakfast, lunch, tea time and diner! And in addition to the rice, we always get dhal (lentel soup) and a cooked dish with vegatables (such as beans with tomato and potao / other beans with tomato and potatoes) and a lot of garlic!! A lot!!! We are already afraid that when we come back to Europe, everyone will smell our arrival miles in advace. And not to forget, all the spices! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, we decided really early on, that we prefer no rice for breakfast and therefore, we get always black or milk tea (really good!) and either white bread, cookies or, really fancy, popcorn! I love this!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">These meals we get in the cantine at our school and from time to time, we sneak now out to have a different meal out. We found a really nice restaurant around the corner, where we can vary our diet and Alastair can also get a non-rice meal, such as pancake, nuddel dishes or the famous momo's (see earlier blog post).</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Today will be again such a sneaky day! After finishing writing our blog, we will have a loveley diner in our 'Stamm-Restaurant'! Guten Appetit!</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-87358348831530583272013-07-24T01:10:00.002-07:002013-07-24T01:10:32.170-07:00Mountains!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoXn_fjfixm380chgh9O-GHb6rBzckark-pM6GFn9pBIldnl4846h0OCrqt7ovyRJS9ebe4bCb8GAtsq5kNx_IVlBtPbKDF932739NH85AeWv1jB3fJh5-QLQXciz16BNzipNESnHUZSU/s1600/DSC_8117.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img bba="true" border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoXn_fjfixm380chgh9O-GHb6rBzckark-pM6GFn9pBIldnl4846h0OCrqt7ovyRJS9ebe4bCb8GAtsq5kNx_IVlBtPbKDF932739NH85AeWv1jB3fJh5-QLQXciz16BNzipNESnHUZSU/s320/DSC_8117.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Three days ago there was a great storm at dusk. It had rained hard all day, but as the light drew in a great sheet of lightening illuminated the whole city and then plunged it into power-cut blackness. Pokhara is surrounded by hills so the rolls of thunder echoed round the valley. The storm continued to rage for over an hour before it gradually took it's wrath elsewhere</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mountains!!!!! :-) We woke to see towering, icy summits where there was only cloud before. The 6000 m Machapuchare rises in an impossibly steep cone whose summit is only 30 m as the crow flies behind the city. The still greater peaks of Annapurna make up the backdrop behind.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-34669767466382900022013-07-22T06:50:00.002-07:002013-07-24T01:11:10.147-07:00Diner Invitation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip3uzvamX36KwiDu4uEjBmrMJLBLFee5a4uFLnx7yX7Wo4Bdou3EtJxGkPQ2RDcEjCa5-uSyXXu-O3mirsGZ6J2hwmXvDDShH7_hPdevClRhcZUSUJwI7gykoFrdXyncYu7ZJ60lETAT4/s1600/DSC_8035.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip3uzvamX36KwiDu4uEjBmrMJLBLFee5a4uFLnx7yX7Wo4Bdou3EtJxGkPQ2RDcEjCa5-uSyXXu-O3mirsGZ6J2hwmXvDDShH7_hPdevClRhcZUSUJwI7gykoFrdXyncYu7ZJ60lETAT4/s320/DSC_8035.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjsnttHVLbTscQpYQ5S6f4rxPckv4kvnLyDeIwFAiqB7DBKNXtsCL8KoWp3V5Le7q_IgmLquTluaXE1Vm7eOIwcaebRrDy7ptmAzQ7AySCJyoLX4c4tIPASvBAYvJfIw98U6nYZbLOdZM/s1600/DSC_8037.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjsnttHVLbTscQpYQ5S6f4rxPckv4kvnLyDeIwFAiqB7DBKNXtsCL8KoWp3V5Le7q_IgmLquTluaXE1Vm7eOIwcaebRrDy7ptmAzQ7AySCJyoLX4c4tIPASvBAYvJfIw98U6nYZbLOdZM/s320/DSC_8037.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Last week on Tuesday, we had a holiday. It is the start of a new month in the Nepali calendar and in this month, people rest and the plants (rice, maize) that were planted in the previous months will just grow. On this day, families come together and lots of animals will be sacrificed to the gods and then later eaten. Women dress in green and red saris and they wear green arm rings at their hand wrists. Also really typical are the mendis that are painted at the female’s left hand balm. On this day, Alastair and Wiebke walked in the afternoon along our street where we meet Rashem, one of the science teachers. He invited us spontaneously to his place where we met his wife, daughter, sister and parents. It was really nice and we spend 2 hours there, getting some nice food and tea. Wiebke was then also asked to get a painting on her left hand and now she is a proud owner of her first mendi.</span><br />
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-64888957635737189082013-07-21T06:29:00.001-07:002013-07-24T01:11:40.459-07:00Hospital<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUqpm7AfWpPUcYcnMzzrgvBc-mbbpDCao3Lf4qgnjYrdT8xOPk-x5vWv4nXFkJ7RYPK-W6X2K5Blhw9TUWWFgnjaCUvhDmTM0Dhwn2QKone1WnDU_JwtaC1TcApqOrgsctIZoFJGuW6ls/s1600/DSC_8063.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUqpm7AfWpPUcYcnMzzrgvBc-mbbpDCao3Lf4qgnjYrdT8xOPk-x5vWv4nXFkJ7RYPK-W6X2K5Blhw9TUWWFgnjaCUvhDmTM0Dhwn2QKone1WnDU_JwtaC1TcApqOrgsctIZoFJGuW6ls/s320/DSC_8063.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">A couple of days ago we got some first-hand experience of the Nepali medical system. Alastair started feeling ill one evening and then vomited all night. The next day he couldn’t keep down any fluids for more than a couple of hours and was getting dehydrated, so we decided we’d better go to hospital. A lovely teacher, called Kim, kindly accompanied us and translated when necessary.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">We went to Phewa City Hospital which is a private clinic – one of about 20 hospitals in Pokhara. The entrance hall / reception to A&E is also a ward containing six beds, and Alastair was lucky enough to get the one next to the window. A medical orderly came to see me and took his blood pressure (rather low) and soon the nurses were hooking up a drip and giving him intravenous fluids and antibiotics. Everything was sterile-packed, but you had to pay for each item as it was provided. A blood sample was sent to the lab and the results (unsurprisingly) confirmed a bacterial infection, but no other issues.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">There were a couple of other patients on the ward, also on drips, receiving treatment for the infections which abound in the monsoonal climate. Later, an old later was brought in an her wrists and ankles clamped will giant crocodile clips to what looked like an ancient fax machine, which turned out to be an ECG. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Eventually, sometime after four O’clock, the consultants arrived. Nepali consultants spend most of the day at state hospitals and then retreat to their respective private hospitals in the late afternoon, where they see patients until about midnight. The consultant who saw Alastair was very jovial and spent an efficient couple of minutes with each patient. He proscribed a pharmacopeia of drugs to be taken for five days: gastric enzymes, two antibiotics and an anti-amoebic drug amongst others. All in all the visit was very efficient: four and a half hours spent in the hospital and no queuing at all – beats the NHS!</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Now Alastair’s recovering and relaxing back at the school – all those drugs really knock it out of you.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-38294176731469589252013-07-15T22:42:00.003-07:002013-07-24T01:12:31.260-07:00Scary creatures<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Last night was quite a challenge. Before going to brush our teeth, we found 2 cockroaches in our room and Alastair was so brave to remove them (I think he removed so far around 50 since we arrived!). However, after coming back from the toilet area, we found next to our bed a massive spider on our wash bucket (big as a hand). Well first of all, Wiebke jumped onto the bed, Alastair put some solid shoes on and then we thought about a good strategy to remove the monstrous thing. In the end we managed to throw the bucket with the spider out of our window. </div>
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Well, to cut a long story short, we found 4 more cockroaches this night, outside there was a massive thunderstorm and we heard some bats at our window. That was one of our best night! Grrr!</div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-32245247690743397202013-07-15T22:13:00.001-07:002013-07-24T01:13:00.499-07:00Children entertainment<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Since we moved to the roof top apartment the rumors are spreading that up there on top of the guest house a foreign couple is living. How exciting! Well, we have now every late afternoon small and also taller visitors who come to say hello. The last two days we had an art workshop running. </span>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Between 3-6 children came and drew / copied animals from a work sheet that Wiebke’s mum gave her for school lessons. The children really love copying these pictures of elephants, tigers, camels…. And some of them are really talented. However, it seems to be that they prefer copying things to being creative. Maybe over the next few days we can encourage them more and more to draw their own pictures. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_-gNDfzMyMT8rod-f3tIbJBalyQSta-LVo1rB7nuHwLBlaCtV9EVE0MBBgw005cIYcnFMp7tgSpVZs0dFM5koaS12FKjDRlsrL2nAsDHEeg3nb0H59gyN4-6dEPfTfgG4mMj7-qRrH3Y/s1600/DSC_7999.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_-gNDfzMyMT8rod-f3tIbJBalyQSta-LVo1rB7nuHwLBlaCtV9EVE0MBBgw005cIYcnFMp7tgSpVZs0dFM5koaS12FKjDRlsrL2nAsDHEeg3nb0H59gyN4-6dEPfTfgG4mMj7-qRrH3Y/s320/DSC_7999.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">As well as the art project, we also had a microscopy workshop running. That even attracted the adults and so we looked at dead cockroaches, live ants and flies and a dead salamander using our 4x magnification glasses. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN6wf8piabbidENtHNohRBs2Oz2JG0UlGEZE1vwjEl6uiwMwA-j53QJa0EAMIsiLDz7Gs99LwyYcGATVT4-xnDhPI18EHwLDQpW2CyWgwxWtmwMdPb3lxMhpDEtcyghJgbVK0-2OvxyvA/s1600/DSC_8011.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN6wf8piabbidENtHNohRBs2Oz2JG0UlGEZE1vwjEl6uiwMwA-j53QJa0EAMIsiLDz7Gs99LwyYcGATVT4-xnDhPI18EHwLDQpW2CyWgwxWtmwMdPb3lxMhpDEtcyghJgbVK0-2OvxyvA/s320/DSC_8011.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Young and old are so excited to see these things magnified. Later, this workshop turned into an english-nepali lesson and Alastair and Wiebke learned some new words and phrases.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Our neighbour, a 6 year old boy, always comes and wants to play with us. He got so excited about the 8 m long skipping robe we bought a while ago and it is fascinating what different games you can play with it. This of cause attracts the other kids and we had some really nice circus evenings where they tried to walk the tightrope. The youngest participant is 9 months and she gets really excited holding the rope at one end as the other children are jumping over it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif;">Having to deal with all the school children during the day, we thought that maybe it will be too much to have children around our living place. But it is a really joy to have them around us and especially during the drawing time when we can read and they play next to us in silence.</span></div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-84508690000813289042013-07-15T21:54:00.003-07:002013-07-24T01:13:29.455-07:00Wedding<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwq8leueB6sdEMy0YfKB2iC4tU4c1SrUAlJ9u1O0k08MB6fQHvzh7cdb_8jwxv3wllr31bJYz_hipHRST2N41Q6pgwZXsY9ecodV3rrY6vVrNCLJjUT2ux2aGXuVPOqZ2TDObkvfSKlX0/s1600/DSC_7950.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwq8leueB6sdEMy0YfKB2iC4tU4c1SrUAlJ9u1O0k08MB6fQHvzh7cdb_8jwxv3wllr31bJYz_hipHRST2N41Q6pgwZXsY9ecodV3rrY6vVrNCLJjUT2ux2aGXuVPOqZ2TDObkvfSKlX0/s320/DSC_7950.JPG" width="320" /></a>The courtyard (ie rocky, muddy, wasteland) next to our house is currently being developed for a ‘party palace’ to be hired our for weddings and other celebrations. Things seemed to be moving along pretty slowly, but one day last week the area was a hive of activity. Holes were dug, the bare breeze block walls were faced with cement and we gathered a wedding was going to take place the next day. The following afternoon the guests arrived rapidly trampling a green ceremonial carpet into the mud. The ladies were beautifully dress in red, pink and orange saris threaded with gold, and the men mostly wore European style suits with a Nepali hat. We looked down from our rooftop as they paraded past; first the women, carrying platters of luridly coloured food and then the men, heralded by a traditional Nepali band. The musicians took their place under the tarpaulin: two played an oboe-like instrument, two sported large horns which curved back behind their heads, while others played drums and cymbals. To the untrained ear, each tune sound quite identical to the previous. The oboes played the melody, generally on the same scale, interrupted occasional by blasts from the horns, all underpinned by some complex percussion. Alastair’s hoping to learn more about Nepali music from the school music teacher while he’s here.</div>
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The bride and groom mostly stayed inside performing the elaborate ceremonies of a Nepali wedding while outside, one by one, men got up to dance. Classical Nepali dancing must make you dizzy. It involves rapid gyrations punctuated by fluid and wave-like movements of the hands and wrists. Even the old men manage some elegant moves. Eventually the bride emerges, looking demurely at the ground. Our neighbor says this may be shyness, or an attempt to conceal her emotions if it is an arranged marriage she is not entirely sure about. Love matches are increasingly common in Nepal, but are still not the rule. Weddings here generally go on for two days, so tomorrow it’s the brides turn to host the party.</div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-80103087722566218722013-07-15T21:48:00.000-07:002013-07-24T01:14:15.649-07:00Walk around Pokhara<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifwmhpgI61wKlv11Frz1KFu8C2tNg2-OKx-wPt9oBMAikmiThhkNckuyngKMKhzzdaIx64B-b8VaEqjBAZ_-mxaL8fq4DcWWN5oxnJ89dlKhKCNDqqGdhMakZQb_B2_avTAc2O4kH0sds/s1600/DSC_7891.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifwmhpgI61wKlv11Frz1KFu8C2tNg2-OKx-wPt9oBMAikmiThhkNckuyngKMKhzzdaIx64B-b8VaEqjBAZ_-mxaL8fq4DcWWN5oxnJ89dlKhKCNDqqGdhMakZQb_B2_avTAc2O4kH0sds/s320/DSC_7891.JPG" width="320" /></a>Last Thursday we set out early on an excursion to the world peace Stupa: a Buddhist temple perched on a hill above the lake. After a one hour walk through the town we came to the fast flowing river running out of Phewa lake. Our way across was via a rickety suspension bridge with many rotten planks and some missing entirely. You didn’t want to be the unlucky person who finally broke through the wood, although only your leg would fall through. Probably. On the far side, we were accosted by a young man, a little smelly, who, uninvited, took on the role of guide. He pointed to a dubious looking sign post saying that foreigners must have a guide to enter the forest and warned us of difficult route finding, bandits and snakes. Walking along the edge of the forest, trying to block out the guides prattle about how many friends he had in Europe, we saw some beautiful butterflies dancing above the paddy fields. We followed the guide up the forest track and past a temple on a massive, easy to follow track and then managed to persuade him to leave us alone, although he seem upset and claimed that we didn’t think him a ‘good person’.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_moCfFEu2k87d53wCXTKLZzT1RHZY3tqhtuLdxVJKD2zzVOWQJXBzXO5CWvawWnEpdV3183-5ZXJ3_x2k52FXc7vdk_bEpuALj5N7_dM_OxOMAPeUZfGy5NAI4f0Kdm8xgyLxox4-Sa4/s1600/DSC_7901.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_moCfFEu2k87d53wCXTKLZzT1RHZY3tqhtuLdxVJKD2zzVOWQJXBzXO5CWvawWnEpdV3183-5ZXJ3_x2k52FXc7vdk_bEpuALj5N7_dM_OxOMAPeUZfGy5NAI4f0Kdm8xgyLxox4-Sa4/s320/DSC_7901.JPG" width="320" /></a>Bandits and snakes seemed to be on holiday that day, but we were frequently troubled by a much more slippery adversary: the leach. They were everywhere amongst the leaf litter at our feet, some a good two inches long, and stood on end, swaying gently as though trying to hypnotise their victims. When they latch onto your shoe they loop steadily upwards in search of exposed flesh and a bloody meal, but in our case they were foiled by a cunning tactic borrowed from the British rambler – our trousers were tucked into our socks. Despite this protection, it was still necessary to stop every five minutes and flick, pull or prize a few leaches off our shoes and socks. Thankfully it seems the Pokhara leaches hadn’t learnt all the gorilla tactics Alastair experience before when trekking in the Helambu area. There the leaches will hide in trees and, on sensing your approach, drop onto the back of your head and neck. It makes you paranoid about every drop of water which lands on you.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPZlcAd-nrXgX_oF3lSx_8Lp1fZnS3C2ND_zHLZ1Vc5DPToi4McrsNX7YK3SXwwcu8V0s3BXmwcavol6rWpZgHPrDIBsBIdU95t_nkBY8M6p2nN3KRd85w5WuNak-s6Rz90biFhMXbCg0/s1600/DSC_7920.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPZlcAd-nrXgX_oF3lSx_8Lp1fZnS3C2ND_zHLZ1Vc5DPToi4McrsNX7YK3SXwwcu8V0s3BXmwcavol6rWpZgHPrDIBsBIdU95t_nkBY8M6p2nN3KRd85w5WuNak-s6Rz90biFhMXbCg0/s320/DSC_7920.JPG" width="320" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1bMQy3cx54Pa_NMR2WZojvV21YEgutY5CtNfG1H5UOWdQ_NAOl54BhKwySI8QvVIvnrjoyQBp8AB-LB3gEg80ToNT-vJvDpzML2L5BDK5adHP0IHVZzdPGADO35q9WKiQJWd1PhjJhIU/s1600/DSC_7923.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1bMQy3cx54Pa_NMR2WZojvV21YEgutY5CtNfG1H5UOWdQ_NAOl54BhKwySI8QvVIvnrjoyQBp8AB-LB3gEg80ToNT-vJvDpzML2L5BDK5adHP0IHVZzdPGADO35q9WKiQJWd1PhjJhIU/s320/DSC_7923.JPG" width="320" /></a>After about an hour of walking we emerged onto the ridge top and strolled along a delightfully leach free path to the stupa. The building of the Stupa was a Japanese led project in collaboration with Nepal and other countries, but was halted by planning restrictions for many years: a sure sign Nepal is slowly moving up the development ladder. The Gompa itself (the word stupa is not used by locals) is a two story white dome, with four golden statues depicting the Buddha and his wisdom, spaced around it’s circumference. The views over the Pokhara valley are spectacular, but we can only imagine what it’s like when the high Himalaya emerge from the clouds.</div>
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We walk down the hill into the valley and explore a famous local cave cum temple. It’s not especially spectacular compared to the caves at Ingleton for example, but the fact that it’s lit by Nepal’s notoriously unreliable power supply (power cuts occur every other evening and last hours) adds an extra frission to the experience. Across the road from the cave is a spectacular slot of a gorge into which a river turbulently disappears, mining strange shapes out of the local conglomerate. To complete our day, we make out way back through the paddy fields to Pokhara, stopping for a well earned drink and watching some boys diving and somersaulting into a stream running through the city.</div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-21791893252421561772013-07-11T05:08:00.001-07:002013-07-24T01:16:09.048-07:00Our new home in Pokhara<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9xuVfGXera5N4VSb_fA0Ship4enjv7XfLRM9gvXIBMqCLkscxPgGgYFWExJjmnsWcnigPCOsDjFzubMG976u5AJdUQndFH0mQqbo7gkEZT_CvHNcWy1snIw_Ke7IgqK720mTR6qBSEgc/s1600/DSC_7883.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9xuVfGXera5N4VSb_fA0Ship4enjv7XfLRM9gvXIBMqCLkscxPgGgYFWExJjmnsWcnigPCOsDjFzubMG976u5AJdUQndFH0mQqbo7gkEZT_CvHNcWy1snIw_Ke7IgqK720mTR6qBSEgc/s320/DSC_7883.JPG" width="320" /></a>Today, it is the last day of school exams and tomorrow 10 days of holliday begin. Thus, today is our last day of relaxing and tomorrow we start teaching Class 10, the most scenior class, who will stay over the hollidays. We hope to use the time to develop a peice of theatre with them, writing a script and then using it as a platform to improve their english pronounciation and increase their self-confidence. Hopefully it will be fun! </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgquyy4QwbAOO8o3NUJenAtdpYswEoV2h5Ur8srap_7CELiykf2lbortfbArbWRCSElGgKgWp9CRNvFm6jR783j9flFafjeF46boRph5jc-fuYrh_xS3n58jIH7rRJfmBIJU4PWeH871_g/s1600/DSC_7884.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgquyy4QwbAOO8o3NUJenAtdpYswEoV2h5Ur8srap_7CELiykf2lbortfbArbWRCSElGgKgWp9CRNvFm6jR783j9flFafjeF46boRph5jc-fuYrh_xS3n58jIH7rRJfmBIJU4PWeH871_g/s320/DSC_7884.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgvK_UK6fDnp7Hlof-OT-JOAiKYkmnLwR-DTdtqQTwz89fROdcZ3m6tKDPChkwnZKr8xSLrkKiU3ytTgEex5olZri6spExNex41s_jTNLcNixM_IKODhQWZ_cbSp5B8hbOtK88PqFC2ak/s1600/DSC_7885.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgvK_UK6fDnp7Hlof-OT-JOAiKYkmnLwR-DTdtqQTwz89fROdcZ3m6tKDPChkwnZKr8xSLrkKiU3ytTgEex5olZri6spExNex41s_jTNLcNixM_IKODhQWZ_cbSp5B8hbOtK88PqFC2ak/s320/DSC_7885.JPG" unselectable="on" width="320" /></a>Today, it was officially decided (and accepted) that we can stay in the school hostel instead of the principle's house. We were quietly preparing our lessons this afternoon, then suddenly our room was full of people., moving our things around, cleaning and rearranging. As a result we now have a proper bed (replacing the 100+ year old bed that was full of cockroaches), a table, two chairs and curtains. So we have a really nice, clean room on the roof of the school hostel with a really nice view over the hills that surrund Pokhara (see pictures). This will be our home for the next 3 months! </div>
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Wiebke and Alastairhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11036349170054357345noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8689503016666360752.post-62570608929765555792013-07-09T04:48:00.001-07:002013-07-24T01:15:53.808-07:00Arriving in Nepal - Kathmandu<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPnYGxIgZwrjqa4-1QeuSz5BOtTmkq5qMgZNySBPlrWSfVzIpuWLUaXPWLmSRZAaMaQBjNslJXzGGDnWh2wYO3gqnrWaORyvlezbrDqfoWIKAAW-H6wjFBdfQwB2oK6c2jyA1ePhsQlE8/s1600/DSC_7476.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPnYGxIgZwrjqa4-1QeuSz5BOtTmkq5qMgZNySBPlrWSfVzIpuWLUaXPWLmSRZAaMaQBjNslJXzGGDnWh2wYO3gqnrWaORyvlezbrDqfoWIKAAW-H6wjFBdfQwB2oK6c2jyA1ePhsQlE8/s320/DSC_7476.JPG" width="320" /></a>A long but uneventful flight with a stop in the fiery desert of Qatar (34 degrees at 7am) brought us safely to Kathmandu. Alastair could immediately pick out of the crowd one of the widest grins known to mankind – Sandeep come to pick us up from the airport. Driving out through Katmandu is a bit overwhelming; there are cars, bikes and trucks whizzing by on all sides and a chocking dust in the air, but after half an hour we’re on the altogether more pleasant road leading to the hilltop temple of Changu Narayan.</div>
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Changu is where Alastair spent 11 weeks in 2008, so it’s strange, but lovely to be back. The village is made of reddish brick and mud houses, either thatched or with tin roofs, and the main street, cobbled with brown stones, winds it’s way up the hill towards the temple. </div>
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As we climb, Alastair greets faces he recognizes, especially Kamal; the owner a shop selling traditional paintings. We agree to have tea later and continue to the guest house which is beautifully situated right next door to the world heritage site temple. Here we are greeted by the owner, Sarita, a beautiful lady in her 40’s wrapped in a red sari and Anish, her son. It’s especially wonderful to see Anamika (12) and Isha (9), two little girls from poor families in the south of Nepal, who have been living with the family and getting a good education in the nearby town of Baktapur. We all go for a walk round the temple for old times’ sake and admire the view of the luscious green paddies of the Kathmandu valley. It’s extremely humid and Alastair exhausts himself racing Isha up the steps back to the temple.</div>
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The following day is for recovering and visiting. We walk down the hill to have tea with Kamal, the painter. He specialises in a particular Nepali art of from the Buddhist tradition; the thanka. These are complex and finely detailed designs, often in bright colours and edged with gold paint, which commonly represent scenes from the life of the Buddha, the cycle of reincarnation or sometimes even the ineffable mysteries of the universe with a never ending temple or a large circle of swirling blue. Tea this time means ‘milk tea’ made of thick buffalo milk, a little tea and a lot of sugar. We’ve brought Kamal a small present from Europe, but this disappears into his draw, unopened and without a word or thanks – funny how cultures differ in these things.</div>
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<o:p>Later that afternoon Sarita’s daughter, Anisha arrives back from college and we spend a couple of hours catching up. She had the misfortune to be in a bus accident 9 months ago which broke her jaw and cut her face up badly, but the Kathmandu surgeons did and incredible job and it’s impossible to tell. After a game or two of UNO when the girls come home from school, we set off for dinner at Sandeep’s house. His mother (gnarled from years working in the fields) looks highly suspicious at the sweet thing’s we’ve brought, but is soon rapturously munching. Before dinner they perform a Pooja to celebrate Sandeep’s recovery from a motorcycle accident and one of his nephew’s success in his college application. The ceremony starts with the preparation of the red paste and the tearing up of flowers before everyone has a Pooja mark plastered to their forehead and a petal placed behind their ear. They’re very matter-of-fact about the whole process, pausing to make a joke or have a belch whenever they feel like it. Next everyone tucks into curried eggs and a sort of lentil dumpling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dinner itself is Daal Bhatt (daal, rice and curried vegetables). We eat quickly and make our excuses – it’s an early start tomorrow.</o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipEArz15FiOnKUu7Fxh6CxdGNLZSp-rjH4-idb1zt-TAOqVTGkUTCbox6o3V8tGIwroeDc4SMLPHNenYvA-z8ljGcdL5znb5T1r-eOWQ8ZPnGp1nUNJvrrCeK9EIFUshmJA_8ehrAbV38/s1600/DSC_7549.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipEArz15FiOnKUu7Fxh6CxdGNLZSp-rjH4-idb1zt-TAOqVTGkUTCbox6o3V8tGIwroeDc4SMLPHNenYvA-z8ljGcdL5znb5T1r-eOWQ8ZPnGp1nUNJvrrCeK9EIFUshmJA_8ehrAbV38/s320/DSC_7549.JPG" width="320" /></a><o:p>The taxi takes us to Kathmandu at 5 am to meet our bus which belongs to the luxury coach firm: Swiss travel. For about four pounds we get a full day’s journey, a seat each, and a relatively cautious driver. The journey is sticky and bumpy, but we pass through some interesting landscapes mostly traveling along the banks of tumultuous rivers made brown with Himalayan sediment. On arrival in Pokhara we walk 200 yards to the Social Public School and make the acquaintance of one Min Gurung, the principle. He is rather talkative and excited and gives us a tour of the school. Tin-roofed, but well equipped (they have whiteboards!) classrooms line a central dirt courtyard and accommodate the 700 students aged 4 to 16. There are also two hostels for about 40 boarding students. We have dinner and stay the night at the principle’s house, but suffer somewhat from a smell of petrol emanating from a locked metal cabinet in the corner.</o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh72t5vangEhXbZW7tKnPIjxqtivQ1k_aFg1A-wZVygj5GLVZuJv4w_tMAqsFKxsb8ngd46M-iKH9nN3DVsElUG3uMtAIv7CT1JzDs6lmI6b9WSuwT_qucCfCmF5ICAaw9XGE-duPQnt7E/s1600/DSC_7886.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh72t5vangEhXbZW7tKnPIjxqtivQ1k_aFg1A-wZVygj5GLVZuJv4w_tMAqsFKxsb8ngd46M-iKH9nN3DVsElUG3uMtAIv7CT1JzDs6lmI6b9WSuwT_qucCfCmF5ICAaw9XGE-duPQnt7E/s320/DSC_7886.JPG" width="320" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWzATE6bi4pNBydF8ycX6D0AJUDyKQZJfWmunzxGoO1jYpsKLIgUT8qLq_3lOZWopf4E5WR5MitLpsTbPRVyApE9KF1_D4sIobCiLC456nvliE6zXbj0vQn9z9_eegIFk-wWydDmDZpaE/s1600/DSC_7888.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWzATE6bi4pNBydF8ycX6D0AJUDyKQZJfWmunzxGoO1jYpsKLIgUT8qLq_3lOZWopf4E5WR5MitLpsTbPRVyApE9KF1_D4sIobCiLC456nvliE6zXbj0vQn9z9_eegIFk-wWydDmDZpaE/s320/DSC_7888.JPG" width="320" /></a>The next day we arrange to move to a room at the top of the school hostel so as to avoid the smell. Are new accommodation is literally on the roof, so we step out of the door onto our own spacious balcony, shared only we the lady and her son in the next room. Today is officially a school holiday, but class 7 is being taken to the local rice planting festival, so we tag along too. The bus ride is cacophonous, the boys singing, screaming, shouting and egging on the driver to attempt every more extreme overtaking maneuvers, sending motorbikes scattering into the ditch for shelter. By the end of the journey the driver seems to have entered some heightened, trance like state, eyes transfixed greedily on impossibly small spaces between advancing vehicles and the truck in front, his left hand working the horn as through his life depended on it.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygngX5jfSfL8CR3W6mEBMuvigMClXQ0ts5TDz4i4tb0ZLW6eX8pStZjdfOCaV-ONR0qud8bJCflWu_SdVA08DaHMaEbLx8560kZUYXnUF0CW_KAEb_Wrqs1_K_xfRoCCn1_XgYZOB-DA/s1600/DSC_7579.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjygngX5jfSfL8CR3W6mEBMuvigMClXQ0ts5TDz4i4tb0ZLW6eX8pStZjdfOCaV-ONR0qud8bJCflWu_SdVA08DaHMaEbLx8560kZUYXnUF0CW_KAEb_Wrqs1_K_xfRoCCn1_XgYZOB-DA/s320/DSC_7579.JPG" width="320" /></a>On arrival, we find hoards of people surrounding an area of newly ploughed up paddy fields with a man making announcements using a megaphone. One large muddy field is dedicated to buffalo team racing. Men test their balance to the limit, standing on a plough pulled by a pair of stampeding buffalo which they egg on and attempt to steer with whacks of a rubber tube. A neighboring field is reserved for mud fights, and a number of tourists are having the time of their lives, caked head to toe in sticky goo. We decide to take the plunge, not here, but in the neighboring fields where women are planting out the second rice crop. Alastair is shown the technique – you take two to three seedlings and push them into the mud about a hands width apart, tessellating in the approved manner. At first his attempts are tut-tutted over but, nearly and hour and a whole field later he eventually earns a ‘that is good!’.</div>
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Sunday is the first day of the school week, and our first day of teaching. After a welcoming ceremony involving some military maneuvers by the students, speeches and the presentation of scarves and flowers, we are given our timetables for the day: six 45 minutes classes for Alastair and five for Wiebke to improvise on spot… go! With class nine, Alastair addresses the question “can plants do maths?” and with class 10 he copies a TEFL lesson he saw once on a video. The younger classes are much harder to work with and keep entertained, but somehow we both make it trough the day. Monday, we just have four classes each; yet more improvisation. Wiebke has a really good interactive class with year 4 and Alastair has a terrible last period class with year 7 – he can’t get them to shut up and his voice is rapidly disappearing. We’re then told that there will be no teaching the next 8 days due to exams, and none for the subsequent 10 days because of holidays – it might have been nice to know this before we arrived! At least it gives us a chance to acclimate to the sticky monsoon climate and the change in diet. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrD9lyw2qWezkCN0pHEleBid_J9NeUzRKt0nLLKNtRlqAnU4LF73DKiQ8ht1iCaq8mlzuoXZ4y10Tyq5ic_WH3r1t4H5GwpnYYedC6KegVvI1aL0JZXo3affAgMq4igbMEWNEFRq4rLvM/s1600/DSC_7659.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; cssfloat: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrD9lyw2qWezkCN0pHEleBid_J9NeUzRKt0nLLKNtRlqAnU4LF73DKiQ8ht1iCaq8mlzuoXZ4y10Tyq5ic_WH3r1t4H5GwpnYYedC6KegVvI1aL0JZXo3affAgMq4igbMEWNEFRq4rLvM/s320/DSC_7659.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">On our first free day, we take a trip down to touristy, lakeside Pokhara. There are lots of colourful rowing boats and people trying to escape the heat by lazing under a tree or swimming in the take. We wonder slowly around, admire the scenery and then find our way back, managing to get less ripped off on the bus than we did on the way there. This is mostly thanks to Wiebke’s expert haggling – flying in the face of reality, refusing to admit we have more than 30 rupees when she’s holding a 50 rupee note</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_lLastnpVfjgURdWiIDCeGq8GzZu3Nz7g2rzEtmqshWylA0Uco04OuKQhdYhvptHSKEKn6Zl3jNTsJs_goUOTQSebp_XwurLpLgvbFsVk5u8ilazJ9-UosBZhMhWWyQ-x3lDYHV9FWbM/s1600/DSC_7679.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; cssfloat: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="212" nya="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_lLastnpVfjgURdWiIDCeGq8GzZu3Nz7g2rzEtmqshWylA0Uco04OuKQhdYhvptHSKEKn6Zl3jNTsJs_goUOTQSebp_XwurLpLgvbFsVk5u8ilazJ9-UosBZhMhWWyQ-x3lDYHV9FWbM/s320/DSC_7679.JPG" style="cursor: move;" unselectable="on" width="320" /></a>Unfortunately, the next day Wiebke goes down with a fever so the next few days are spent recovering. When she’s better we take a trip to the international mountain museum, which is a very modern building with exhibitions on the Himalayan people as well as the ascents of the mountains. The visit is capped off by our first taste of buff mo-mo of the trip. These are steamed dumplings filled with buffalo meat and herbs and are absolutely delicious. We walk back along the Seti River which at one point races through a canyon only 2 m wide, but at least 50 m deep. We can hear it charging below in the darkness glimpsed through cracks in the rotten boards of the bridge.</div>
</span><img height="63" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_lLastnpVfjgURdWiIDCeGq8GzZu3Nz7g2rzEtmqshWylA0Uco04OuKQhdYhvptHSKEKn6Zl3jNTsJs_goUOTQSebp_XwurLpLgvbFsVk5u8ilazJ9-UosBZhMhWWyQ-x3lDYHV9FWbM/s320/DSC_7679.JPG" style="filter: alpha(opacity=30); left: 502px; mozopacity: 0.3; opacity: 0.3; position: absolute; top: 4345px; visibility: hidden;" width="96" />
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So, now holiday’s starting, but the top class, class 10, are staying because they have their important national exams (the school leaving certificate) this year. We’re planning to give them some theatre based English lessons over the next few days and well as getting on with planning for the lessons to come!</div>
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