Nepal Volunteer Journals

Hi,
Well Tihar happened over the weekend and for the most of it itwas fun. Sadly I got food poisoning and had to skip some of the festivities. On Saturday night my family lit candles around a chalk drawing on the front step and up to the little shrine on the third floor. Then they did Puja and we had a meal of fried chaapati, chickpea and paneer currey and a sweet rice pudding full of nuts and raisins. For the next few hours kids come round to the houses and sing and dance then they are given money and sweets. [...]

Hi everyone,
Well I am well and truely in my placement now. I live about 8 minutes walk from the home where I am helping out with 30 kids. 23 boys and 7 girls. It is challenging at the moment as they are out of school for the period between two major festivals – Daisan and Tihar.
Tihar is this weekend & goes for 3 days. It is to worship three different Hindu Gods and there is singing, lights everywhere, presents, sweets and Tikka. Different family members Tikka each other on different days. I am very excited to be here to watch [...]

Hi everyone,
Yes I am back in civilisation and to be honest I really was liking the country side….Kathmandu is loud and smelly ALL THE TIME.
So on Wednesday we packed up and high tailed it out of the city out to the village of Bistachhap. That took about 1.5 hours. On the way we stopped at the GVN build site. They are building a new home as some of the kids are currently in a rented place and it is way too small. They are doing such an amazing job.
Then we went on the Bistachhap to meet our host families. My [...]

Hi Everyone,
This is my trial journal. I have about 36 hours to go before I step on that plane and the butterflies are there! So next time you hear from me I will be well and truely there.
love, hugs and boogers
liz

Hi,
My name is Valentini and i’m from Greece.i’ve just finished my studies as a pre -school teacher and this summer i’m spending two months working with children in Nepal ( sounds strange even saying it let along doing it!).    Trough this journal i’ll try to describe as good as i can my experiences in Nepal - i ask for leniency in any spelling mistakes since english is not my first language-.I’m counting 6  days for my departure and only now that i’m trying to fit everything in my suitcase i’m beginning to realize the length of what i’m about to do..anyway hopefully my [...]

Namaste…this will be the last journal entry to come to you from Nepal!

Bandha bandha. Big strike today. I left the guesthouse before Amanda and Laura woke up to try and find some breakfast. Everything was closed today (not just transportation) and I had to walk all the way to North Lakeside just to find a roadside shack that looked like it might serve me some toast and tea. The butter on my toast was really orange and smelled a bit funky, but I ate it anyway (convinced myself it must have been special water buffalo butter). As I was [...]

Namaste from the pouring rain in Pokhara,
Rafting – day 2:
I was the first one up in the morning, so I made a cup of milk tea and sat on a rock by the river…thinking about where I was and how I wouldn’t have imagined myself here in the not so distant past. It started raining so hard that we huddled under the tarp attached to the raft propped on its side to eat breakfast (porridge, toast, eggs, fried veg, hashbrowns…way too much food!). We waited out the rain and then broke down camp, washed all the dishes in water so [...]

Namaste loves!
 
I think I left off the day before my birthday, so I’ll be starting now with my birthday. I slept in late on my birthday (to 7am). I didn’t even hear the other girls as they came back to the room from the Nepali dance bar around 2am. There was a large scale bandha (strike) today by the Newari people; apparently they want their own autonomous state. I’m not sure how realistic that request is…but then I thought of Canada and Quebec and realized that it’s not such an unusual thing to ask for. Nearly everything in Thamel was closed. [...]

Namaste…today is the day I’ll try to catch up with this journal:
 
Starting with May 27th. Amanda, Laura, Matt, Elan, and I left our Children’s Homes on the microbus to get in to Thamel after walking the kids to school in their matching blue rain ponchos. All five of us squished in to a tiny white Suzuki Maruti (the only kind of taxi there is) from Ratna bus park to New bus park where we were going to buy our tickets to get to Karkabhitta at the Nepal-India border on the east side of the country. The taxi driver was quite [...]

Namaste and shuba bihani (good morning),
Saturday is the children’s day off from school, so the kids are at the home all day today. I just can’t seem to get used to not having any breakfast when I wake up, so I end up buying biscuits and lapsi to hold me over until my morning dhal bhaat. We did the morning routine with the children and then Matt, Amanda and I looked over an atlas, proudly chirping out interesting facts about each of our countries (Australia, New Zealand, and Canada). There was no decent map of BC, but I still sat [...]

Namaste my much missed friends and family!
 
So after the Chitwan adventure I arrived back in Thamel and started organizing all my gear from the trek and the garbage bag full of stuff I’d left behind in storage to get ready for volunteering again. I went for breakfast to my favourite place in Thamel and had a bowl full of curd (something like chewy, tangy yogurt…except it tastes much more amazing than that description) and bananas and a piece of thick toast with butter (also doesn’t sound that impressive, but trust me, any breakfast food getting that close to Western toast [...]

Namaste!
Well, today (May 12) was seven weeks in Nepal and my first full day on the relaxed lakeside dwelling of Pokhara, teeming with hippies. I didn’t have a good sleep at the hotel because my whole body ached, but especially my arms for some unknown reason. I wandered outside in my pajamas (all clothes, including underwear and bra still in the hotel laundry service…they say they have a washer and dryer but I’m certain my clothes are up drying on the roof in the sun because no washer and dryer takes nearly 24 hours to do it’s cycle). Had a [...]

Namaste!
This will be my final post as a 2009 GVN/VSN volunteer in Nepal. What to say?? This has been an incredible experience – and leaving is bittersweet. Originally my trip was supposed to be 4 weeks volunteering + 2 weeks travelling. There are several reasons for cutting the trip short, namely my difficulty adjusting and the political situation (which at the moment poses no real threat but has the potential to suddenly deteriorate). I should mention that the decision to leave has nothing to do with GVN/VSN – in fact, the organizations have been extremely flexible, supportive, and caring throughout [...]

Well, I’ve been trying to write this with as much speed as possible, but it seems I still only left off at the end of day 8. I think I need to hurry myself up a bit because tomorrow I was thinking of heading out for a couple days of jungle safari (don’t worry, I bought some anti-malarial pills from a sketchy pharmacy – read: tiny hole in the wall with random drug packages packed to the ceiling in an impossibly random order- at the end of the road today) and I’ll be without internet again. Enough of that…
Trek – [...]

Ok back again. I think I left off at the end of day 4.
Trek -day 5:
The chilly rain last night meant bright blue skies this morning and we even saw our first snow capped peak (thank god!). The day was beautiful, sunny, and clear, with a dry heat and scenery of tall rock-faced cliffs/hills…I could have been convinced I was somewhere in BC, right down to the pine cones scattered on the path. I think the scenery and weather made a positive difference to my mood. Everything was mostly climbing up for the morning, which I find better than the [...]

Well…I have missed you all very much on my trek, and it certainly seems like an entire world of things have happened since I last got to write to you. I’ll try to keep my entry(ies) about the trek as concise as I can…otherwise this might turn in to a novel
 
The night before we left for the trek (April 26), we met with our guide Raj only to be informed that he had a sudden matter to attend to and that a different guide would be taking us on our trek. None of us were very impressed by [...]

Hi everyone,
Well, we have just completed our first 2 days of placement in Manamanju, Kathmandu, Nepal. The village (which reminds me more of a sub-burb) is pleasant. The people are very welcoming and the children are adorable.  Paul and I have been sick, on and off, for the last week – making it difficult to adjust. For this reason, and a few others, we have decided to come home early. Our 1-month volunteer service will now only be 2 weeks in total. Thankfully the children’s home where we are helping is very self-sufficient and well run. The children are generally [...]

Hi Everyone!
I can’t make this post very long as we just never know when they will cut power next. However, I want you to know that Paul and I are doing fine and adjusting as best as we can – it’s a big change! Fun facts about our trip so far…
- Great flights – very pleased!
- Bought a new camera in Doha (I think I may have already told you that).
- Paul’s lauggage was misplaced
- Crazy taxi drive from airport (so many cars/horns and no real organized system to traffic)
- Not a bad hotel – we’ve spiced up our room [...]

Hi!
I’m Katie (as most of you know) and I’m a recent University graduate from Ontario, Canada. I will soon be setting out on my Nepalese adventure with my travel partner, and best friend, Paul. Together, we will be volunteering as part of GVN’s Health Education program for 4 weeks. I was especially interested in this opportunity as a future medical doctor, and Paul has always wanted to see the Himilayas, so this program/trip will be a perfect fit for us! Upon completion of our volunteer time, we intend to spend a couple more weeks touring around, enjoying the beauty and [...]

Namaste my much missed crew,
It feels like a lot has happened since my last entry, so it’s a good thing I’m reading from my paper journal right now. So now here I start at April 22.
I had another crappy sleep in my sauna room full of mosquitos, woke up and had the ridiculously sweet black tea my family serves me in the morning (which I’ve actually gotten used to and now quite enjoy). I went out and got a fried dough ring (still don’t know what they’re called) AND a donut…so healthy. Both were fresh, warm, and delicious. When it [...]

Namaste my beloved friends and family!
On Saturday, I left my host family early in the morning to meet one of the volunteers in Thamel for breakfast at this delicious little Korean run restaurant that serves a toasted peanut butter, banana, and honey sandwich (soooo good after you’ve been eating a heap of rice and curried vegetables for breakfast for the past however many days). I had come in to Thamel to go with the Health Coordinator to the other Children’s Homes and help with the monthly health checks (our home had been done the week before, if you remember). As [...]

Namaste friends,
Dad pointed out a typo in my last journal (internet isn’t cheap in Thamel, so I just type fast and don’t bother proofing). All I eat is CARBS…not CARDS. Thanks Daddy.
Woke up last Wednesday and managed to get a hold of Mom on the phone. Don’t worry Mom, everything is going well here! Just because something’s different (poverty, dirt, culture, or otherwise) doesn’t means it’s bad, remember? I walked in to Thamel for our weekly volunteer meeting at the VSN office. One of the volunteers walked in with me because she was ill, so I dropped her off at [...]

Namaste friends and family who I miss so much!
 
Here’s the rest of what’s been happening up till today (April 15)…provided I can finish it all in the next 20 minutes! On Saturday I was in a hurry to get to the home because the nurse from VSN and a Nepali doctor came to our children’s home to do health checks for the children (this happens once a month). However, my daal bhaat was served late and also included meat for the first time (goat) and a dish of curd. Hard to get through quickly….
 
This also wasn’t helped by the fact that I had [...]

Namaste!
It feels like it’s been quite a while since my last entry and I know I have loads to tell…but unfortunately it’s 9:45pm (a good hour past my bed time) and I’m exhausted! I’ll do my best…
On April 6 we woke up in Thamel and went to the VSN office to be sent to our volunteer placements. We soon found there was a bandha (strike) and that we couldn’t be driven anywhere (or apparentely rocks would be thrown at our car). Bandhas happen here often and for what seems like no reason. Someone explained it to me as follows: someone’s [...]

Namaste saathi! (I salute the god in you, friends!)
I returned last night back to Thamel from the training village of Bistachap. I decided to cut my training short to 5 days (instead of so that I could start my placement sooner in the children’s homes. I’ll be missing some language training, but I seem to have trouble remembering any Nepali unless I have my book in front of me anyway.
We arrived in Bistachap on Friday after a bus ride that felt more like being on a rickety boat on very rough seas. At least we each had a seat [...]

Namaste!
I had a lazy day on the 30th because I woke up not feeling too well (perhaps the momos the night before? ). I took a nap and relaxed in the room for most of the day, which was probably a smart idea in the end. The next morning I headed out to breakfast alone to the highest rooftop cafe in Thamel. Good views of the city, but disappointing views of the mountains (…or should I say no views of the mountains). It’s getting to the end of the dry season here and I’ve been told it hasn’t rained in [...]

Namaste!
Once again I have forgotten to bring along my paper journal so that I can use it to write this journal. I’m sure I’ll forget many things now…but for anyone who is particularly interested, you can read my paper journal when I get home (haha I’m sure there will be no takers for that!)
I met Kailen (the guy from Vermont who I went to the monkey temple with) for breakfast yesterday and we headed out east from Thamel towards Bodhnath (the largest Buddhist temple in Nepal, where many tibetan exiles now live in the monasteries at the site). We decided [...]

I should have brought my (paper) journal with me, so that I could remember what’s happened since my last entry….it hasn’t been long, I know, but my brain feels overfull already. I had my first daal bhat with the ‘old’ volunteers at a Nepali restaurant (rice, lentils, curry, cooked spinach, curd, all mixed together), which will be what I will be eating twice a day, everyday once I start my volunteer placement. After the day with the ‘old’ volunteers (who were only in Kathmandu for their one day off), I was left to be on my own. None of the [...]

Well, after a bit of a whirlwind day in downtown Hong Kong with Andy (getting soaked by the rain and probably drinking too much coffee), I took the train (like a sky-train) back to the HK airport. I had a good flight to into Nepal, where almost half the people on the flight looked like tourists (much different than the HK flight), which was somehow comforting. I think I even snuck in an hour of sleep on this flight.
We arrived at Tribuhvan airport in Kathmandu and after filling out paperwork and getting Visa’s, etc (no computers in this airport!) I [...]

Just dropping a very quick line to let anyone who’s interested know (most likely just Mom and Dad) that I’ve arrived in Hong Kong safe and sound. I’m writing from my friend Andy’s bedroom at his house in HK. I think I’m heading in to about 37 hours without sleep (a plane is no place to sleep as far as I’m concerned…unless you enjoy a kinked-neck-balled-up-fetal position type of sleeping arrangement). The airline did, however, feed me a second dinner at 4am, which I suppose partly makes up for it. I’ll update more later, but for now Andy and I [...]