Hello everyone!! I just realised that the blog I wrote after meditation never got published! I am publishing it now, so sorry for the delay!! Anyway, after meditation, I went trekking on a trail called Langtang! It was sooo beautiful, but really tiring. I started out at a little village called Syabru Besi, and basically followed the trail up to the Himalayas from there. It took three days for me to reach my final destination, Kyanjing Gumpa, a village in the middle of the mountains, with the most amazing views. It was excellent but at points, my legs felt like they [View Full Entry]

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Hey everyone! Just wanted to write a quick one to let you know what I have been doing. To be honest, the title really says it all! For the past half a month, I have been living the life of a Buddhist nun (except for the shaved hair). It was brilliant. I was living in a meditation centre, where you meditate for almost 11 hours everyday, waking up a 4 in the morning! there was no talking, no reading and no writing. It was extremely difficult, as I hardly got any sleep- the thing i slept on resembled an abnormally flat [View Full Entry]

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Hello everybody!! Just to give you an update on my activities here in Nepal! Last weekend I went to 'Chitwan National Park'- a huge wildlife reserve. It's quite far away from where I live- about 7 hours, so the bus journey itself was like an adventure! When I arrived in Chitwan, I went to a resort called Rainbow Safari Resort- it was really nice, with little cottages with thatched roofs- no electricity, but then I think in Nepal thats a fairly normal thing!!! Anyway, the next day, we went on a canoe ride down the river Rapti, that runs through the [View Full Entry]

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Hey again! I have a little bit of extra time, so thought I would write a little about some of the students I have met at Snowland. Karma Lhamo- a cute little girl! She has a bright red hat which she wears alot, but it has a hole at the top. She doesn't have any hair (because of lice), so it looks really funny- it's very endearing. She loves writing- sometimes I give her words like 'apple' and 'grasshopper' etc, and she will literally spend hours writing them out on a piece of paper! I am also proud of the fact [View Full Entry]

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Hey everyone! Sorry it's been so long since I've written in here, although I haven't really done anything very exciting in the past couple of weeks. I thought I might just write about two festivals that took place here! Shivaraatri, Lord Shiva's birthday, took place at the beginning of the month. Its really nice because everyone lights bonfires and sits around it together. In Pashupathi, an area where there are loads of temples dedicated to Pashupath, a form of Lord Shiva, there is a huge celebration. Although apparently it gets quite dangerous, as all the holy men start to drink and [View Full Entry]

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Hey everyone! This weekend was brilliant, as I went white water river rafting on the Trisuli River! I'm not completely sure what area,as we rafted about 40km in total, so just put the Himalayas... On Saturday, about 20 of us made our way to the shores of the Trisuli River to begin our adventure. We were all given a paddle and equipment, and given a brief about how to raft, and so got into the little rafting boats and started! First of all, the rapids were really gentle, so there was plenty of time to admire the beautiful scenery! There were [View Full Entry]

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Hello again! Wasn't planning on writing today, but have a little extra time on this ridiculously slow computer! life here is generally very good. There is a shortage of everything, but I'm getting used to it!! School is also going well, although the exams are coming up, so everyone is always studying hard. This weekend I went to the cinema to watch a Nepali horror film called Kagbeni- the sound was so loud (they have make it loud to cover up all the phone calls people get during the movie) so it was quite scary! On Sunday, I also went to [View Full Entry]

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Hello everyone! Finally I have had the chance to get onto the internet again. I thought I would just let you know what I got up to over the weekend... This weekend, I went to Nagarkot with a few other volunteers. Nagarkot is basically a region out of the city where you get amazing views of the Himalayas- there is also fresh air, which is something I have been missing for a while! It was such an adventure! We planned to travel from Kathmandu and intended to stop over in Bhaktapur, where we would be able to catch a tourist bus [View Full Entry]

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Hey again! I'm back... This week has been quite eventful- so much to talk about! I guess I will just do everything chronologically..... On Monday, I was supposed to go to my host family's house, but ended up not going, as they needed to do something or the other, and weren't prepared. Instead, I went to Darbur Square with a few other volunteers, which was great. It is soooo nice, and I really recommend it to anyone who is interested in Hinduism (yes that means you mother!). It is basically quite a small area packed with about 50 temples, many of [View Full Entry]

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Hello everyone! I know I've only been away since Friday, but thought I would write in here and tell you all how its going so far! I got here on Saturday at about 11.00 in the morning, but was completely tired, so spent most of the day sleeping at the hotel Excelsior in Thamel, a tourist area in Kathmandu. The journey from the airport to the hotel definitely waked me up for short time though! I think the roads here are very similar to what I've heard roads in India to be like! There are cars, vans, motorbikes, dogs, cows, monkeys [View Full Entry]

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