Advertisement
Published: February 1st 2007
Edit Blog Post
A day in Fishling! Great! The opposite of our days in Kathmandu! 6 o’clock in the morning, Kalu’s family wakes up, with a lot of noise, and we hear the whole village is starting the day! Kalu and I try to sleep a bit longer, but you never know suddenly they come in the room to wake us up, to get some rice, or just to have a look! People are very curious here, and there is no feeling of hiding that! We are lucky, today we can sleep till 8 o’clock, even there is a lot of noise, nobody cares people are still sleeping. But that doesn’t matter a lot; we go sleep early, so we are not complaining about not enough sleep! The day begins for us with tea, and watching how all the life starts in the morning. Lot’s of women and kids go get food for the goats (leafs), climbing barefoot in the trees, coming back like a tree, carrying everything with a rope on the head.
For the women in the village life is the most active. They are expected to take care of the animals, to cook, to keep the house clean, and to spoil
the guests (and I’m a guest here, getting lots of tea). I don’t have to help, they do everything for me, and that makes me feel a bit lazy, spoiled. It would be great to help a bit more sometimes, but doing the women tasks here in Nepal is not very easy for a western woman.
We have a few hours before breakfast, so what should we do? Study some Nepalie for me, or read a book, or walk around, or just sit and watch (lot’s to see!!)
The road to Pokhara is coming trough the middle of the village, so there is constantly a lot of noise from the trucks and buses with their horns (and those horns play whole songs and are LOUOUOUD!!!)
Very dangerous too, it happened before that people get killed by those trucks!
After breakfast we decide to go to the next village, to buy some medicines for Kalu’s mom, with one of these trucks. They are much better and safer than the local bus. No chance for the tourist bus that only passes once a day! And those trucks are beautiful! Lot’s of decoration in- and outside, lot’s of plastic flowers, self made curtains, and stickers and posters inside! And also on the front window (if there is still one), a lot of decoration, and one open spot in the middle so the driver can see something!
Good whether, we go sit on the roof of the truck, a better view, and if it gets of the road (daily accidents, some drivers are crazy, and very young), we have the feeling we still can jump off.
In the next village people are happy we come to visit, so in every house we are asked to drink tea. Milk tea, with the fresh milk from the buffalo! And that way your day goes fast! The plan to be gone for 1 hour becomes 4 hours!
On the way back we stop another truck, and climb in, with 10 other people, woman, and men, old, young …
The kids are coming back from school, also Kalu his brother and sister, Mitra and Putali. Some homework while the eldest sisters are making dhal bath again. I try to help a bit, but it takes me one hour what they can do in a minute!
Back in Fishling, there is no electricity, we are getting used to it, but you still get when you cannot find the flash light. And also the use of a Nepali toilet in dark is not easy. The Nepali toilet is like we know the “French” one, a hole in the ground.
No water, we have to share that with the neighbors, and now it is their turn, so I try to find my way to the other tap, between all the goats!
It is a very different life here, and my first times I thought I would never get used to it, but I do, and you know … I start liking it! But it is my last evening here, in a few days I have to fly back to Belgium! The family is watching some TV, some of them went to visit another family in the village where the son is getting his hair cut off for the first time (a whole ritual, a big festival). And I find some time to type this text, while Mitra is laying against me, enjoying all the attention he gets from his bhauju (sister in law). Aamaa is talking with Kalu, but I cannot understand a lot, and I’m too tired to try to. Next week I’m back in Belgium, what a strange thing to imagine. One side of me is happy, to see the nieces and so back, but the other side is telling me it will be hard to get used to it again. So different, and in 24 hours you get from the one world in the other. Again … but it is great to know we will get back here soon again!
And this time I don’t have to wait for Kalu too long, he is coming in 2 weeks, and we are already busy planning our next wedding in Belgium too.
We were hoping for a few weeks longer, but the plane ticket couldn’t be changed. Now in 1 weekend I will say goodbye to the family, to the kids from OHC, to all the friends we made, to Nepal, and it’s way of making us feel so good here!
Hoping we get another chance like this next time, maybe in a year, maybe in 2 years! But for sure we will be back soon!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.202s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 14; qc: 66; dbt: 0.0929s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb