How Was Nepal?

From March 10, 2014

How was Nepal?
And how were the last eight months of your life?

I don’t mean to be rude, but if you ask me this question I probably won’t answer. It’s just too hard. It’s too much information, too much complexity, too much everything to consistently and repeatedly verbalize. Plus it’s not all the happy, rosy, wonderfulness that is expected in those two second conversations as you pass someone in the parking lot.

But I understand that the question comes from a genuine place and today, sitting back at home after my last day of school, I’m in the mood to try and speak the past eight months of my life.

How was Nepal? Nepal was this…

Nepal was disorganized and lopsided.

Nepal was vibrant and fragrant and beautiful.

Nepal was handpicked for me by a group of children whose faces in my eyes are chased by tears because today I said goodbye and I don’t know if I’ll see them again.

Nepal was precious and delicate. Probably not how I would have designed it, but infinitely more meaningful because of that.

Nepal was a lot of weeds.

Nepal was overwhelming and too much to take in all at once. But I desperately want my memories to maintain their truth, even as the experience itself wilts and this season closes.

Nepal was Dipika, Sunita, Sajan, Asmita, Karan, Postraj, Bijay, Niran, Sarmila, Parbati, Dipa, Numa, Sunder, Roshni, Sapana, Sabina, Sangita, Rashmee, Sumanta, Namrata, Arjun, Suraj, Dipesh, Saswot, Hira, Shila, Sushma, Laxmi, Bimala, Dipraj, and Pawan.

Nepal was singing with class one, doing puzzles with class two, learning to whisper in class three, practicing the months of the year rapid-fire with class four, and wishing class five would stop yelling.

Nepal was walking to school and covering my face with a scarf

when a truck left me inside a tunnel of thick, cancerous, smoke.
 

Nepal was being caught by surprise when the mountain peaks were suddenly whiter and brighter after new snow.

Nepal was milk tea.
 

Nepal was me giving handshakes and high-fives and hugs at the gate. Nepal was my students going round and round in the line instead of leaving after the first goodbye. Nepal was me not even caring and perhaps even wishing they would never stop.

Nepal was biting my tongue and smiling through a salty, facial monsoon while my students told me not to cry or be so “sadly.” Nepal was me not even being able to correct their English, but only standing there sniffling.
 

Nepal was me walking home with the most beautiful bouquet of flowers

I will ever receive and realizing I have to come back.

Top Ten Treasured Photographs

It’s hard to believe that by the end of this week I will have been in Nepal for over five months. My one semester commitment to Reach the World has ended when I sent it my last article at the beginning of December. I knew it would be impossible to summarize all of my experiences in a coherent way, so I decided to write my farewell to my RTW students with a top ten list of my most treasured photographs so far. I’m not done writing, but I thought the pictures and the comments were worth sharing. (Especially since I haven’t been very consistent in my postings lately.) Some of the pictures have already made an appearance here, but I think some are new.

As written for my Reach the World students…

 
1) Time to Fly: this picture was taken at an old stone temple that sits atop a hill on the edge of the Kathmandu Valley. From the temple you can watch the morning fog roll across the entire city and then dissolve like sugar in a cup of hot Nepali tea. Religion, in many different forms, is an essential part of Nepali culture. The way the birds are frozen in mid-air in the picture reminds me of the way that religion forces people to stop, to reflect on their lives, and to enjoy a moment of peace.

2) Camaraderie: the people whose outlines you see in this photo are my friends. I didn’t know any of them before coming to Nepal, and if I hadn’t accepted the opportunity to teach English here I probably would never have met them. Sharing this wonderful experience with such friendly, funny and generous people has made my time in Nepal even richer.

 

3) Dance Like No One’s Watching: I took this picture during a celebration at a local school. I’m not sure who started it, but soon a circle had formed and students where showing off their coolest moves. Teachers and students alike gathered around to cheer. This particular kid was pretty shy at first. He acted like he didn’t know what to do, until someone started playing music and he went crazy.  No matter where you are it’s important to embrace the current moment, be spontaneous, and have fun.

 

4) Untitled: I love this photo because when I saw it, I felt like I had walked into a postcard. I love travelling because this feeling happens to me all the time. When you are surrounded by things you know it is easy to ignore the beauty that exists all around. Arriving someplace new invites you to open your eyes and marvel at your surroundings. Even if it’s just a flower or a wall or the sky.
 

 

5) Tika: one of the hardest parts of leaving home is spending time away from friends and family that you love. But by investing in the community and building relationships with local people I have often found myself absorbed into a new kind of family. I can’t just say “mom” anymore because I have to specify if I am talking about my Nepali aama or my American mom. This picture was taken during Dashain and it will always remind me how graciously my host family accepted me as part of their family.

 

 

6) Desk at Dusk: when I return to America, I probably won’t miss the loadshedding schedule and the inconvenience of living without electricity for several hours each day. I hope that my experience will remind me not to take things like electricity and clean water, straight from the tap, for granted anymore. However, I also hope that I will never forget how simple it was to adjust to living without. I hope that I won’t become so easily frustrated my life it’s as convenient as I might have wanted. I hope that I will be patient and grateful.

 

7) Mero Bidhyaarthiharu (My Students): since I am teaching English in Nepal, my student are a huge part of my experience. I treasure their shouts of “good morning miss!” on my way to school, and I even smile at their snotty noses or dirt stained uniforms. I love them on the days they listen and I love them on the days when they spend the whole class misbehaving. I am almost positive they are teaching me more than I could ever teach them.

 

 

8) Strength: living in Nepal it is hard to look around without seeing someone carrying something with a strap around their forehead. I have seen women carrying bundles of hay or other crops larger than their bodies. I have watched men stride down the road with full entertainment center cabinets like it was nothing. I struggle to keep my jaw from dropping open when I pass someone with a basket full of bricks or cement, and I constantly wonder how their neck can support such a heavy load. Living in Nepal I am surrounded by examples of intense physical labor every day. I continue to be awed by the strength and perseverance each of these individuals display.

 

 

 

9) In the Kitchen: in all of my travels abroad I have learned how the process of preparing food can bring people together. You don’t have to speak the language, you don’t have to know the recipe. All you need is a willingness to get your hands dirty. The need to prepare, to eat, and to clean creates an international language that can be understood even when so much is lost in translation. And if you can master a dish or two, it will make for a delicious reminder of that particular place no matter where your further travels lead you.

 

10) Himalaya: a photographic summary of Nepal simply wouldn’t be complete without these resplendent mountains. They stand mighty bold like an impassable fortress, but then disappear behind the clouds like magicians. They are beautiful and imposing in a way that is difficult to express in words. I was never someone who was big on “nature,” but if you ever get the chance to visit this mountain range in person I urge you to take advantage of it.  

 

Present Tense Nostalgia

(From Thursday October 3, 2013)

So today I was standing outside the grade nine, section A classroom at the end of the day. I was waiting for my afterschool poetry club students to filter in while most of the kids headed home. In the past week, I have noticed a dynamic change with a lot of my littlest students. They are definitely not nervous around me and wherever I go (in school or out on the street) I can hear little kids shouting “Good Morning Miss!” When I put my hands on my hips and say “morning?” at 3:00pm they don’t turn red anymore; they just smile and shout even louder “Good AFTEEEERNOOON Miss!” Today, I was standing on the second floor balcony, waiting for my own program to start, waiting to move on with my day, my plans, my life, and all the while my students were waving up at me as they ran out the gate.

And it hit me. I’m going to leave. One day, they will wave at me for the last time.

Obviously, I knew this coming in and I know that this happens to teachers every year: they get attached and then they have to say goodbye. But the realization that I too will become a blip on their radars and that I won’t always hear their footsteps running up behind me (but then suddenly slowing down as if that would convince me they’ve been walking down the hall the whole time!)…it drew up a little wave of sorrow. One might say I was “being nostalgic about now.”

I am so lucky. I am so lucky that after six weeks I have grown to love these kiddos. Even the ones who beat each other or pretend to cry to get out of class. Even the girl who I watched take her pencil, throw it out the window into the small field that backs up to the school, and then shrug her shoulders at me to say “sorry, I can’t do any work today. I don’t have a pencil.” I am so lucky that I get to stay her for another five months to savor all the yelling and laughing and bilingual confusion. I am so lucky that at the end of a week of failed behavior management systems and MIA co-teachers, the good still outweighs the frustrating-irritating-overwhelming-shocking-saddening-craziness so dramatically that today I stood watching them leave and was practically crushed by how much I will miss them.

Repost of one my favorite photos.