second instalment 3-6th feb

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<strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Feb 3rd

I arose this morning and the sun was shining. Took breakfast at my own hotel this time. In their very own little back garden. Similar offerings of toast, jam and an omelette with a milky coffee. Except the buttery toast I was looking forward to with eat my savoury scrambled eggs, had already been smothered with jam. I ate it, I’m sure I was going to taste much worse on my travels.

I spoke with the manager again to ask if there was anywhere to buy an adaptor. I’d bravely wandered the streets (I feel at this stage I must mention that when you venture out in places like this that cars, bikes, buses, cows, carts, donkeys, chickens….etc., take precedence on the roads, you are a mere blob of inconvenience and it is advisable to be on alert at all times), but was too earIy at 9am and couldn’t find anywhere that sold them. He said he would show me, disappeared, re-appeared on a motorbike and gestered me to hop on the back of his bike (if I was going to be knocked down by anything, may as well go out in style) Found an adaptor.

Had a call from Laxme to say that she was heading off to Gorkha and that her hubby was coming over to the hotel to meet me to take me to their office. Totally unexpected. But being the curious creature I am, was looking forward to seeing inside a Nepalese office working environment looked like. They have a company which trains Nepalese students to use computer packagess. The office is a bit cramped not dissimilar to what you might find in an internet café at home. I sat there and spoke to the receptionist, Emeeta, who was very keen to know where I lived and what I was doing and that she would love to come to England.

Rumish then said that he and his brother would accompany me to Bhakpatur, I insisted that I would be absolutely fine, hoping that I wasn’t offending them but not wanting them to use up half of their day to show me around sure that they had much better things to be doing.

I’d asked the manager to organise a taxi and he said the hotel car would take me and organised it for 1.30pm. I took myself off to the roof terrace and sat in the sun with my headphones on for a glorious 15 mins. Caught the taxi at 1.30 and arrived at Bhaktapur. Awesome (spoken in true context of the word) sprang to mind, absolutely enchanting. It is an old heritage city. Llike walking into another world. It is 1100 rupees to gain entry and guides are all too eager to offer their services. I used the excuse that I had visited before. It did the trick.

I wandered around and got lost. No surprises there then. What I thought would be 30mins turned into 2.5 hours and I’m sure I didn’t event cover half of it, but it is on the agenda when I head back this way in March for a more thorough exploration and an overnight stay. Well worth it. I never tire of looking at places of historical interest. Buildings mostly. And the thing that was the most comforting was that there was no hassle, nobody looked at you like an alien. It was nice and easy. It helped that the sun was shining, it didn’t that I’d bought my portable quilt disguised as a jacket that you would take skiing, and had to lug it over my shoulder throughout.

As we drove back through Kathmandu city centre there seemed to be more western shops, even a mall. I had initially thought that is was the same throughout and that there certainly weren’t any big stores. But it seems there are. I also didn’t think it could get any busier. It does the more into town you travel!

Returning back to the hotel opened way to a whole host of new and interesting single roads strewn with stalls, restaurants, shops and this all on my doorstep. I had been heading a different direction each night. The driver pointed out to me some nice eateries that I might like to try later. I was looking forward to a nice Indian he pointed out and recommended to me (I also noticed Jimmy’s bar (a Bar!) that I thought I might have a swift half at. Literally 2mins in the car so at most five/ten minute walk.

Got back to the hotel to pack up my bits and pieces and start heading off in the direction of the nice Indian restaurant. I’ve taken my torch as the lane to the guest house is very dark. I switch it off as I reach the foot of the lane and head in the direction of all the lovely shops and restaurants. Walking about twelve minutes on the straight road and nothing is familiar, I walk back and take another direction and walk a further ten minutes, I must have dreamt that drive earlier! I reluctantly gave up go back to the guest house to pick up my laptop and head for my usual joint…It’s useful for the electricity. I sound mean when I say that. (I’m booking myself on an orienteering course btw)

Best meal of the week as it happens. Hot and sour soup and the special noodles. I’ve sponged all I can out of the electricity here to charge my battery so at least I’ll have an hour charge before I find another electrical source. Prior to leaving the GH, I had the foresight to ask the chap what time the gates closed and he said ten , and showed me to the bell. If only I had known where it was three nights ago! (If only I’d known my Guest house then). Benji walked me home.



<strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Feb 4^th

Arose about 8am, fell into the usual morning routine. Am Gorkha-bound today. The cab arrived at 10.30 and I hauled all my belongings into the boot and ensconsced myself in the back. We head off and I am totally blown away by the scenery. Gorkha is situated in the mid-mountain range of Nepal. You can imagine the sights, lush green mountains and valleys. Rugged landscaped snowcapped peaks and white water valleys. A true feast for the eyes.

It took us about four hours to get here. We pass a few villages enroute. Gorkha is one of the oldest (if not the oldest) villages in the mountains so quite sizeable. The buildings of the villages all sit on the sides of the roads, so you might drive 20 mins with just landscape and then arrive at rows of buildings, housing, shops and small cafés. We arrive at the Gorkha Inn, probably one of the best of the options of hotels in Gorkha and I can’t wait to check in so that I can get out there and digest my surroundings.

The first thing I did is order some spring rolls, thought if I have a quick bite here now, can opt for a restaurant later for evening meal. They weren’t the best, but as I found out later when speaking with some good English speaking Nepalese people, stick with the local dishes as they will be the freshest. So wandered up the hilly road lined with shops and no less than three ATM’s.

After the spring roll incident, thought I better stock up on some provisions, bought some bread rolls, tomatos, green pepper and an onion, went in search of some cheese to accompany them and it transpires that cheese isn’t available here. In fact I notice there are very few refrigeration facilities in the shops. There isn’t one, what we would call a mini-market. So I added crisps and a Kit Kat. (not to go in the roll). Took the groceries back to the room and headed in the opposite direction to a hotel which has a lovely garden terraced area with fabulous views, it is about 5pm and the sky is blue/whitish/grey with a red hue, the sun behind the clouds creating a beautiful sunset, silhouetted by the mountain peaks. (I must get some pictures posted, but I’ve used up all data download from Vodafone and now it will cost me something silly like £15 a bloody picture, so when I get around to it will download from camcorder).

I met a chap and two Nepalese girls who spoke very good English, also undertaking voluntary work but of an environmental nature, who invited me over later to dine with them at 8pm.

Headed back to the Gorkha Inn and met with Laxman who is the head teacher of one of the schools in the area. We had a chat about what I might do over the next month and it was agreed that I would go in tomorrow and sit and observe, and then decide what I thought I could bring to the English lessons to make them more engaging and creative in order that information is better absorbed.

We visit the mobile phone shop to purchase a phone, which will cost about £12.00, a top up sim card and it will cost 2 or 3 rupee a call to the UK! (Vodafone, you know what you can go do!). I need my passport and a picture, my mother’s maiden name and my grandfather’s shoe size before I can make the purchase (kidding about the shoe size). So will take them back tomorrow. Said our goodbyes and went our separate ways.

Forgot to mention, when I said to Laxman that I was meeting the guys over the way later, he said in a ‘thank-goodness-you-mentioned-that-to-me’ tone, you had better tell the hotel manager as they lock the gates at 8pm!! Everything shuts at 8pm! Also that there aren’t any restaurants as such as the Nepalese can’t afford to dine out.

Unpacked the rest of my stuff (still shaking my head and muttering to myself about the 8pm thing) and attempted to make the room as cosy as possible as this would be my home for the next month. Difficult when there isn’t a wardrobe, fortunately, the beds have a lot of space underneath. So I opted for the out-of-sight, out-of-mind theme. It was when I was deciding which bed to sleep in that I noticed that the mattress is made up of planks of wood! The two inch foam excuse for a mattress does little to disguise the harshness of it.

After informing the manager my intentions of going out and returning no later than 9pm, I meet with the others at the hotel. We tuck into a Nepalese mixed dish which includes, Dall, rice, japati, potato something, cabbage something and a really bloody hot something. As your man had said earlier, all freshly cooked and very tasty. Finish our food and say our goodbyes with another invite to lunch or dinner for tomorrow if I fancied.

I am alone in the street as I make the five minute uphill walk to my hotel and am met with the old, grey haired security guy at the iron gate who greets me with a ‘Namaste’, which I reciprocated and make my way to the front door. It’s locked! It’s 8.40pm…someone is there to open it though. It does make me wonder actually why the necessity to take such precautions…?

I get into bed and am dozing by 9pm! No wonder I have a fitlful night sleep, full of weird and disturbing dreams. I awake at 5.34, jeez, welcome to your new world for the next few weeks! Not an uncomfortable sleep surprisingly enough though.



<strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Feb 5^th
I wake back up about 7.30 and look over at the red Valentines card that is staring at me from it’s prominent place by the mirror. Noel had hidden it in my luggage, forget what I said about him not having a romantic bone an’ all that. I set about preparing for my day. First things first, the dreaded cold shower... I did notice that there is a heater in the room which was great, then I noticed that it didn’t have a plug. Was I that desperate that I would just attempt to place the two wires (earth and live or neutral (can’t remember which is which), straight into the socket? Or I could put my hairdryer on a towel on the floor and leave it running for ten minutes …I took the second option. It kinda worked. I had been warned that the time to shower is the afternoon when there is hot water, I will endeavour to adhere that schedule from hereonin.<strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">

It is raining, a first since I’ve been here. It’s like a foggy day in London but with rain. The mountains cannot be seen. Reminds me when I go back to the mobile shop, to steer clear of the part of the path that has a sheer drop.

I order breakfast, same menu as previous breakfasts except it arrived with the hash browns this time. Their interpretation of hash browns being kinda sautéed potatoes but hard in the middle. Half a teaspoon of butter and the same amount of jam. The bread must have been smacked at the grill a second each side, scrambled eggs gorgeous! Eggs here are lovely, the hens roam free (I’m not even going to start thinking about what they eat…freedom is good).

I am typing this now on the veranda after eating my breakfast and it hasn’t let up raining. I’m going to make my way to the mobile phone shop….

I am met with a warm welcome from Yong (mobile shop owner ex- English teacher I met yesterday) and he is busy in the shop so invites me to sit behind the counter whilst he sets about organising the paperwork preparation for my purchase. I hand him my passport and photo, he fills out the form and asks for my fathers full name, I place my thumb prints on the paper and that concludes the process. Each person has to do the same thing, there isn’t a computerised mobile network system to store numbers so it has to be done manually. If a Nepalese person doesn’t have a passport, they use citizenship papers as proof.

I thank him very much and make my way back into the rain back to the hotel. I call Laxman, he is at the school and attempts to give me directions to the school over the phone. Bad move. I end up walking on back to the mobile phone shop and ask Yong for further directions. He calls Laxman and he has someone come and collect me. I hadn’t expected the fifteen minute hike up the mountain. Jeez, the guy that had come to collect me must have been late fifties, he was bounding up the hill like a fifteen year old. Then came the steps, 200 of the feckers, it can only get easier.

My first impression is that the appearance of the school reminds me an army barracks. Plain grey buildings with windows (now this may sound more gloomy than it really is as it is so grey, rainy and foggy which tends to give a grim reflection, so forgive me) that have shutters. I hadn’t actually realised that the buildings could hold up to 1000 students. I was expecting a building that could hold max of 40! So was pretty surprised at the scale of the place. There are three storeys with four or five classrooms on each storey. A building adjacent had generously been donated by the French

I just have to interrupt a minute. I keep looking out of the window and the scene is ever changing, one minute a dark mountain silhouette contrasted by the white sky and fog wafting underneath. And the next minute, can’t see a thing. It’s stopped raining at least, which leads me to mention another thing, the heavy and hard downfall today is a signal that it is making way for the sunshiney season, yayyy!

I am in Laxman’s office which is the size of a classroom itself and houses one computer about 1000 years old. Adjacent to that is the staff room which has lockers and tables. On the topic of computers, Laxman says they pay 1000rps a month for the broadband which can withstand the usage of up to five computers at one time. They aren’t using it to it full capacity as they only have the one computer for the teachers use and on exception, by students.

We sit and have a chat a little about the history of the building which I’ll skim here for fear of re-writing history. Around approx.. 1996, the Maoists bombed most of the private schools which lead to an influx of students bombarding the state schools and meant that there was a lot of overcrowding and understaffing problems. The conflict between them ceased around 2006 and, ironically, it is the Maois that are re-building the schools now. (Names, dates and spellings haven’t been checked at time of writing).

He then takes me on a tour of the classrooms, there are three classes taking exams, I can hear murmuring, they obviously aren’t as strict as we are in England. The classrooms are sizeable, 40 to a class I believe. Pretty cold due to the stones walls and floors, good for the summer though. There are two columns of about ten rows of wooden benches that fill the classroom. A blackboard and a whiteboard are on the wall at the front of the class. The walls are bare but Laxman did show me a classroom that had been painted the pupils about five years ago.

In the front of the school there is a concrete area which about half the size of a football pitch. That leads on to a back drop of a small hill, going up in varying levels with trees dotted about radomly. I immediately enquire whether the land could be used for cultivation as a project for the school but unfortunately the hilly land is privately owned by a Nepalese chap who lives in Kathmandu. Enquiries have been made but he isn’t interested in donating, he is however, happy to negotiate albeit at a price. Which I think currently stands at per 2.5 feet wide at 50,000rps.

There are also a couple of other buildings, one is used to teach the mentally impaired kids who are taught there during the day and reside on the part of the building that was donated by the French. If I understood correctly, it was built as a school for the French, they used it for a couple of months then didn’t need it anymore so donated it to the community of Gorkha .

We then wandered over to the donated building and I spotted some youngsters peering shyly in a doorway, and a lovely looking older lady standing nearby who shyly attempting to get Laxman’s attention. He then introduces us and it is Laxme’s mother (Laxme, the girl I met in Kathmandu). If you do a bit of research before setting off for Nepal you will find it clearly states that the Nepalese do not demonstrate public shows of affection which is why they do not cuddle and the never shake hands. I gave her mum a huge hug and held her hands with both mine. It seemed the natural thing to do and she happily reciprocated.

Laxman said that the children were mentally impaired and Laxme’s mother took over the care of them after their day class to look after them and sleep with them in the room that she ushered me into for tea. The room a little bigger than the size of one of classrooms and had three couch-cum-bed pieces of furniture surrounding the room. A small kitchen area and some tables. There were some quilts and other bits that had been donated by various different people. This is where Laxme’s mother had cared for children like this full-time (after the day school) for ten years.

I said hello to each of the kids and shook each ones hand, they were delighted. I’ve never been so endeared. I know where I want to be spending the majority of my time in the coming weeks. I asked Laxman if we could get the permission from the teacher to take the kids out for an hour or so for a picnic or just some time out of the place, I’ll be sure to follow it up.

Laxman is heading off to sit an exam with one of his class at another school and we agree that we will meet later so that he can take me to a shop to get some stationary supplies.

Feb 5th
Went up to my room and had a call from Laxman to say that he was downstairs to take me to the stationers. So I came downstairs and it transpired that the President, Burushottam, of the GDS was attending the wedding of his son, Ashis Aryan, at the hotel function room. Laxman said that the chap would be honoured if I would come and be a guest as a representative of the charity which I duly obliged. I had bought a traditional Nepali outfit in Kathmandu which I ran upstairs and changed into as I thought it more appropriate than what I was currently wearing, my jeans and about four jumpers. (I kept the jumpers on underneath).



Burushottam ushered me into the room where he introduced me to his son, who has been living in Germany for the past eight years or so and his new wife. I had a chat with them about the charity and was offered a plate so that I could eat some of the food being served. It was the usual mix of Nepali food and tasted good. I said my farewells and was invite to Burushottam's home for a meal one night which I accepted with pleasure.

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Myself and Laxman then headed to the stationers where we could purchase some bits and pieces in preparation for the class tomorrow. He insisted on taking me to this particular place as they would give us a good deal being that it was for the GDS. We came away with eight colouring books and four packs of crayons. Some name badges and a notebook and two markers. All came to 1065rps.



I then went over to Laxmans apartment to meet with his wife and his son. He has a big apartment and a lovely wife and son. We had some tea and I spoke with his wife briefly who was busying herself in the kitchen. She teaches at the private school just down the road where his son is also a student.



I didn't want to intrude on their dinner so I paid my respects and Laxman accompanied me down the lane as it was very muddy by now after the relentless downpour today. I arrived at the hotel, managed to get a network signal and wrote a few emails. Made my way upstairs by 8.30pm and went to bed shortly after that.



I awoke at around 7ish and by the look of the drab outlook outside the sun wasn't going to make an appearance today. It was very foggy. I grabbed my laptop and started writing as it was too cold to get out of bed. I have finally started on the continuation of my book. I arose at about eight. I put on a thermal vest, a singlet (women will know what I mean), a long sleeved top, a polo neck jumper v-neck jumper over that, round neck jumper over that and a scarf. I ordered breakfast in my room. That arrived and I ate it with relish and washed to cutlery and utensils so that I could use them for provisions I would purchase later. Whilst I was writing my hands were going numb so I had a eureka moment – hopped downstairs and asked for some hot water to be put in my empty plastic water bottle, self-made hot water bottle. (amazing how one learns to improvise). That did the trick.



I set off to the school about 12ish and after puffing my way up the hill, by the time I reached the school I felt like I was in a Turkish sweatbox! I said hello to Laxme's mother and had some tea and Laxman came over. The kids in the sunshine class (my name for the class with the mentally impaired kids) were coming in to have some lunch. Lunch consisted of rice and some water. I then acquainted myself with the teacher and we wandered over to take the afternoon class session that afternoon. I was an observer.



An enthusiastic bunch of kids, who each have their own talents which I'm sure will blossom over time. I sat down and asked each of them their name and age and shook their hands by way of greeting. The teacher then wrote the names down in English so that I could pronounce them. I am glad I thought to buy name badges which I will dole out tomorrow, so that I can put the face to the names. The ages varied from between 9-12years.



They were all eager for my attention and there were a few strays at the window curious what was happening in the classroom. My main first impression of the class is that the teacher has a difficult time of getting the attention of the kids together at one time. Understandably because of their mental state, they have little attention span. An idea maybe if she could perhaps rotate the pupils having given them each a task of their strongest subject to concentrate on whilst she spends time with alternate kids. Easier said than done I suspect. I say my goodbyes as they are changing out of their uniforms getting ready for tea.

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