On Coming Home

From February 24, 2014

My grant officially ends in 22 days. Although I won’t be immediately returning to the United States, it is getting close enough that I am allowing myself to think about the transition. I have loved my time in Nepal. I love my students. I love my host family. People often ask “which is better – Nepal or America?” and I can’t really answer that question. But here are a few comparisons I do feel comfortable making.

I love the word prefer. I love that in America when someone asks me a question there is a way to express my opinion without giving the impression that I absolutely hate one thing and enthusiastically adore the other. Maybe there is a word for this in Nepali, if so someone should have told me about it a long time ago because I’ve spent the past eight months feeling like my preferences are getting lost in translation.

I am excited to return to a land of options. There are so many wonderful things to do, to eat, to talk about, to enjoy. Here, someone might ask me if I like a particular food item and if I say yes I will get it at every meal from now on. If I say no, I’ll never see it again. It’s so permanent and unchanging. In the U.S., it is perfectly acceptable to like something but not feel like it on a particular occasion. Maybe I’m just wishy-washy, but I’ll accept that and enjoy returning to a society where wishy-washy is normal.

I can’t wait to cook for myself. I really miss getting home from school and thinking “hmmm…what do I want to eat?” Will I continue to enjoy daal bhat? Absolutely. Will I enjoy not eating it every day? You bet. But more than what I eat, I am looking forward to controlling how much I eat. The combination of American body image issues and the communication of Nepali love by heaps and heaps of food, just makes meal time uncomfortable. My host family has learned to accommodate my small stomach but I am quite certain Dr. Oz would not approve of the typical portion size in this country. And one more thing, I definitely prefer eating lunch around noon and dinner earlier in the evening. I am confident I will adjust back to the American breakfast-lunch-dinner time table very quickly.

Maybe my opinion will change when I start paying my own utilities, but I’m also looking forward to consistently hot showers with good water pressure. The thought of being clean on a regular basis is pretty appealing. So are washing machines. Can I live without these types of luxuries? Yes. But if I’m going to shower with cold water I’ll be moving to a warmer climate.

A mattress that is thick enough that my hip bones don’t touch the wood underneath. Cars with shock absorbers. Consistent internet access. Celery. A Christian church. Central heat. Strawberries. News in English. Going barefoot.

Nevertheless (just for you Rashmee!), there are of course things that I will be sad to leave behind.

The Himalayas. I wouldn’t consider myself a very nature-y person. But I have come to love looking out my classroom window to admire the bright white peaks sawing into the sky.

 

 

The ease of going slow. There is so much pressure in the U.S. to be going, doing, working… and that pressure doesn’t really exist here. It drives me nuts when I see teachers sitting in the sun instead of teaching their classes, but it has also been nice not to spend hours afterschool trying to keep up. I know that my early bedtime, relaxed morning time, and shortened school day will seem very faraway when I return to teaching in the U.S. Why can’t there be a happy middle ground?

Public transportation just outside my door. Because American buses have actual stops and don’t just pull over when anyone wants to get on or off.

In Nepal, I never feel pressured to put fashion before warmth. It is perfectly acceptable to wear two shirts, a sweater, a scarf, leggings, pants, a coat, gloves, socks, and sandals all at once. In the U.S. I have definitely endured goosebumps in the name of looking put together.

In a strange sense, I will actually miss loadshedding. It is kind of nice to have a certain number of hours every day where I am forced to disconnect and only interact with the people in front of me. It has also made me realize just how severe my need to be digitally connected really is; I occasionally find myself checking my email at 3am when I roll over and see that the light has come.

When I lived in Cameroon, I came back very cynical about technology and modern conveniences. Probably because things like washing machines and dishwashers and freezers were extremely rare. In Nepal, there are lots of people who live without these things but there are also lots of people who have them. It’s definitely harder to appreciate a simple life when the person next door has their own generator. I think my time in Nepal has helped me reflect on my life in America in a more balanced way. It would be hard to come home and live like I had never been to Nepal, but I also recognize how silly it would be to ignore the culture around me in the U.S. I will continue to reflect on this for a long, long time.