I spared you the details of my illness yesterday (sort of) but needless to say I couldn't make it to work. Today, however, I was keen and chirpy.
This weeks work is erecting the concrete pillars. The skilled worker prepares the foundations for the pillars and Guy and I mix the cement and pass it to him. It's repetitive work but it's far less strenuous then shoveling so feels like a breeze by comparison. Often the children will come and help us in their lunch break, forming a sort of production line passing the large bowls full of cement back and forth.
The evening was fairly standard - Guy and I wandered into the village. He had some beers, I had a fanta. The power went out at 6pm (or so) and we all went to bed early. All in all it was a good - albeit a noneventful - sort of day.
A good night sleep and thankfully I was in good form again. With only a few days left at the school in Parsha I'd managed to communicate to the beautiful Ansita that the daal baht was too spicy. Today it was perfect, a flavorsome curry that left my taste buds attached to my tongue!
The work was again mixing and passing cement to complete the pillars and again it was fairly easy. We finished work very early again and I was itching to play some table tennis with the kids (I have some frequent rivals now) but I had to wait for them to finish school.
It turned out to be a fairly quiet afternoon, the highlight being my now ritualistic reading of the Kathmandu Post. There is a daily editorial section that I find a thoroughly good read. The articles often fun against the current of common opinion and are always on interesting and varied topis. It puts the Courier Mail to shame.
In other news the daal baht today was good - Ansita you goddess.
^ The pillars completed.
Day 24
Nothing of interest to report.
I didn't plan to eat hash today. Nor did I plan to find myself pulling embarrassing bloyce dance moves trying to impress Nepalise women. But I did. And on reflection it was probably among the most memorable days of my life.
The morning ritual was the same: hear alarm, hit snooze, fall asleep again, hear alarm, get up, have tea, go to work site. This morning, however, the worksite was uncharacteristically quiet. We were soon informed that the skilled workers (the one's who tell us volunteers what to do) were taking a day off today to celebrate Lord Shiva's birthday. We were given the option of continuing work regardless or taking a day off too. In the end we compromised and worked a half-day.
After work we walked into town in search of a temple. On the way our i-to-i co-ordinator explained that Lord Shiva smoked a lot of hash and had sex with a bull. This holiday is traditionally celebrated by doing as Shiva does, but with less bull fucking. (I hope...)
Anyways, we found a local temple, took our shoes off, and looked around. From the amount of grapes and bananas scattered around the temple I can only presume that Lord Shiva liked these particular fruits. (Perhaps they were an invigorating interlude between sessions of hash and bestiality)
A religious figure (brahman?) approached us and gave us a blessing by rubbing a red paste (tikka?) on our foreheads. He then offered us a small, white, apparently-edible ball - An offering that our guide explained is infused with hash. I was apprehensive yet simultaneously did not want to deny myself an authentic experience so I at half of the mystery white ball.
As it turns out the hash-balls were quite mild so I had a few more and waited in nervous anticipation for my digestive system to process the hash.
Meanwhile, Guy - who doesn't care for putting mystery substances in his mouth (clever chap) - had set out to find a smokable, Lord-Shiva-approved high. We found some friendly locals waving about bags of weed and making 'come hither' gestures at us. Guy asked for, and received, some weed, but on offering to pay the local said "No no, just live a good life and be happy". Pay? Don't be silly. Nepali people are very generous.
We wandered towards home - or rather, by this stage, I floated towards home - and on the way found a house that was surrounded by loud music and jubilant, dancing locals. We stopped and listened for a while before tentatively requesting to head inside. To our surprise they happily invited us in.
The atmosphere was incredible. Men, women, and children were all dancing, talking, and eating. Their attitude towards us was one of curiosity and wonder rather than the suspiciousness and animosity that we would impart of wedding gatecrashers back home.
I tried my best to act as a sort of "ambassador of dance" representing Australia but more realistically I probably just looked like a fool who'd just wandered into a spiderweb. Nevertheless the locals clapped and cheered and were as enthusiastic as we were. I danced with the children, the high-as-kites men, and one particularly beautiful and flirty Nepalese woman. The hour or so that we spent at that party was so surreal, so vibrant, and filled with such a pure joy that surpassed all cultural differences that I'm sure will remember it for the rest of my life.
Almost as enjoyable as the party itself was recounting the afternoon with Guy on the walk home. We were all enjoying the warm afterglow of hash and talking and really didn't feel like anything could have possibly made me happier at that point.
More of a grind today, although I do feel as though I am becoming quite a competent shoveler. I shoveled out an entire bay on my own today (when I first arrived I could only manage half a bay) and my arms are barely sore. Unfortunately though it's been far hotter here than I expected (feels like 25-35 degrees most of the time) so I wouldn't say it's ultra fun or anything working in the sun. Nevertheless I've developed quite a tan.
Despite having missed a day of work for Shiva's birthday we had been progressing very well work-wise. We'd shoveled gravel into 3 classroom bays and filled one of them with rocks. Today the skilled worker would arrive and give us further instruction.
The skilled worker arrived and told us that we had drastically overfilled all 3 bays with gravel. Essentially we now had to undo all of the work we'd done so far. I was angry; at the people who told us to fill the bay to the original height, at myself for not realizing the error, and - unreasonably - at the skilled worker for delivering the news.
I don't like past-orientated anger - it's pointless and childish. Yet somehow I would have liked nothing better at that point than to have had a rage; and tantrum.
Needless to say, work today was uninspired and seemed harder than usual.
Daal Baht was particularly good today, or, rather, being served daal baht was good. I am, you see, becoming increasingly smitted with Ansita, the young cook and all-round domestic goddess here at the school. She can't really speak english and probably has a Nepalese arranged marriage lined up but if you feed me delicious food and look attractive then all of that is soon forgotten.
In the afternoon we wandered into town for supplies - my supplies consisted of a family-sized block of Cadbury chocolate - and in the evening we sat on the roof with candles and looked at the stars.
Today we got up at 5:30am to get to Kathmandu so that we could catch the bus to Chitawan. The bus ride was long (6 hours) but we stopped for lunch (daal baht or course) along the way.
The school in Chitawan (or more preciesly 'parsha') is lovely, as is the rest of the landscape in Chitawan. Unlike Kathmandu there are many trees in Chitawan and it is common to see fields of grain and vegetables.
On arriving at the school Guy and I were bombarded with excited children who fired questions at us in astonishingly well spoken English. Because both Guy and I have long hair they think we are rock-stars and actors; they also call us 'sir'.
We played volleyball with the kids and were amazed at their skill level. They play better than most of us did back at school (in grade 12) and they are, on average, about 8 years old. One boy called 'Ramesh' became particularly attached to me and promptly declared that I was his best friend. He followed me around all afternoon, it was kinda nice.
We wandered into the village and had a beer and then came back to endure a daal baht thats heat rivaled the sun. Lava wishes that it was as hot as this daal baht. . . ok, so it probably wasn't that hot but still, far too 'piro' ('spicy' in Nepalise) for me. Other than that it was definitely the tastiest ('mitho') daal baht I'd had since being in Nepal.
<----- That's daal baht. We ate it twice a day, everyday.
It's quite warm in Chitawan, t-shirt and shorts weather.
