Windows Into Nepal

View of the Himalayas from our Hotel

Windows into Nepal
February 2013

Our amazing trip to Kathmandu gave us a glimpse through the Nepal window of time. It was like traveling back through the centuries to see how people lived their everyday lives.

Rickshaw Drivers Waiting for Customers

Selling Clementines in the Street

Although Kathmandu is  a very dusty polluted city, it is filled with living history, the streets lined with ancient buildings busy with markets, school kids, motorbikes zooming by, laundry hanging out windows, bicycles carrying huge loads of wood, carts laden with bricks, women carrying large baskets of sand, and chickens running about.

The Pots and Pans Traveling Salesmen

Chickens in the Streets

We were in Kathmandu to attend an English Language Fellow summit and present at the Nepal English Language Teachers Association Conference. It was great fun to meet the other Fellows and teachers from Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Nepal.

Jenise and Her Fellow ELFs

While we were there, we got to do a bit of sight seeing and saw several World Heritage Sites. The Hindu Temples and deities were amazing, one of them houses the living Goddess Kumari, who is a 7 year old girl held in the temple until she becomes a woman. The belief is that this Goddess is reincarnated every 13 to 15 years and is taken to live in the palace/temple. Seeing her is very lucky, but alas, she was not a the window when we were there.

Women Glazing Pots in the Square

We also got to see a Maoist parade celebrating the government transition to the Mao Party.

The Palace of 55 Windows

After the conference, we spent two days in Bhaktapur, an ancient city just outside Khatmandu which was the capitol of Nepal in the 12th to 15th centuries.
Amazingly the buildings with hand-carved window grates and doorways have survived.

Carved Door to Place

Religion and everyday life go hand-in-hand with a shrine in every courtyard and on every corner, and a huge Durbar Square filled with multi-roofed temples and giant lions, elephants and bulls guarding the stairs that lead up to the deities at the top.

Five Roofed Temple in Bhaktapur

Riding the Winged Lion that Guards the Temple Door

One of our favorite sites were the wells where the women gather water in big metal pots from alligator spouts at the bottom of the walled structure.

Woman Getting Water in the Well

Girls at the Well

In this city the ancient crafts are kept alive, so you see hundreds of clay pots laid out to dry, women winding long, long warps on the streets, men carving masks and clusters of women knitting on doorsteps.

Winding a very long warp and threading a reed in the street

Pots waiting to be fired

Namaste

Maldives Meanders

Maldives Meanders

Our trip to the Maldives in the end of January was nothing like we had imagined it would be. With 1,200 coral islands surrounded by reefs, we were sure we would make good use of our masks and snorkels. but alas we did not put one toe into the beautiful turquoise water.

Island Harbor

Coral Island

We flew into the airport island and took a ferry (dhoni) to Male the Capitol, which is 1km x2km and totally covered in streets and buildings. 

Rows and Rows of Motor Cycles

Our first impression was the multitude of motorcycles that lined every street and came zooming at you from all directions. There must be at least two for every person, and unlike Sri Lanka, where 3 or 4 ride on a single cycle, only one or two ride, with not a helmet to be seen.

Male is very contemporary with high rise buildings and coffee shops in abundance. We took full advantage of the latte and croissant  offerings every morning we were there.

Male

After many arrangements and rearrangements, we boarded a plane to a southern island where we stayed with a family while we did teacher training. This island unlike Male was very quiet with hardly a soul on the the wide streets.

Preschool

Our four island tour where we did class observations, workshops and consulting was a whirlwind of travel via planes, speed boat, ferries and fishing boats. Fortunately neither of us got sea sick even though several others on the boats did.

Jenise Working with Teachers

The teachers and principals were all so kind and rolled out the red carpet, feeding us five or six times a day. The fish was wonderful! Fishing and resorts are the main industries. We only visited the inhabited islands where the locals live and only saw the uninhabited or resort islands as we passed them in the boats.

Teachers seeing us off at the ferry

Island Street

The islands we visited were teeny tiny, taking about three minutes to walk from one side to the other. But they managed to keep us busy with workshops for teachers from preschool to 12th grade everyday starting with assembly at 7:45 am and ending at 10:30 pm. to accommodate the prayer schedule.

A Walk on the Beach with the Teachers

One of our favorite memories is being taken on a tour of her island by an 11 year old with nearly perfect English and seeing her hold a pet rooster. And the other was going for a round with the teachers at 11 pm after the workshop was done - which meant walking around the island (no alcohol in this Muslim county).

Our 11 Year Old Guide

Our final visit was at the English Access Center in Male, a USA funded program where we had 75 students eager to talk to us. We introduced a video game designed to teach English and the kids loved it. They were great fun and it was a highlight of the trip.

Access Center Kids in Male

 

University of Ruhuna

Jenise and I are having a great time working with the teachers and the students at the University of Ruhuna here in Matara, Sri Lanka.

Ocean view from campus

Monkey on the roof

The University Campus is beautifully designed by a famous Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa. The buildings are tiered up the side of a steep hill with magnificent views of the ocean from almost every building. Monkeys and wild peacocks perch on the red tile roof tops calling to you to watch them.

Another ocean view from campus

Every day we walk the one km. to the campus and up the hill to our units, stopping under the shade of a tree at the top to drink some water and revive before we head inside into the rather hot and sticky rooms. Along the way students say hello and then giggle with their friends when we greet them back, making us feel like we have celebrate status.

Students on their way to class

Jenise works in the English Language Teaching Unit (ELTU) and I work in the Career Guidance Unit (CGU). Jenise has the very difficult job of reforming the ELTU completely and is making great progress working with the teachers and administrators. I am working with the two Career Advisors, one of whom had a baby on December 3 and will be gone until March. Besides doing workshops on job interviewing and resume writing I helped organize a Job Fair for 350 students with only 8 companies attending. Needless to say there was speed interviewing going on.

Margaret with student at Job Fair

Margaret working with a student at the Job Fair

The students love to practice their English and quiz me about American culture, like why do so many people have guns in the US? Not easy to answer. I also get lectures from them on Buddhism and University systems. Not easy to understand.

Jenise and the head of her unit

Job Fair Student Committee Members

Everyone is so kind to us. The woman I work with, Sujeewa bought me a sari and had her mother make me a blouse for it so I could wear it at the Job Fair. Her mother is also found of making me lunch, rice and curry that comes wrapped in a banana leaf and then newspaper which keeps it warm until noon.

Staff and Students Margaret works with

Christmas in Sri Lanka

Christmas in Sri Lanka 2012

Creche made by University students

Christmas this year was definately not like being at home. Christmas is celebrated here even though only about 10% of the people are Christians. But it is a very different experience than we have ever had.


One of the students I work with is a member of the University Christian Group, and they put on a caroling program at the University. They went all out and built a 6'x6' creche with real grass and palm woven thatched roof to promote the event.

Buddhist Monk watching the Christmas program

As usual the dignitaries attended, which included us and the Deputy Vice Chancellor, two monks, two priests, six nuns and a couple of deans. Loved the multicultural aspect. Of the 20 carols they sang, we only recognized two - Silent Night and Feliz Navidad. They must have their own song writers here. The priest, after telling us all about Easter, sang a solo in a beautiful operatic voice that was the highlight of the music.

Dancing Santa

We were all served juice and treats in our seats by tray-toting  students and then the big finale... a very skinny Santa with a rather scary white bearded mask came dancing down the isle to the sound track of Jingle Bells, throwing candy to all. It was quite a delightful evening.

On Christmas Eve we were invited to a dinner at a very up-scale ayurvedic resort. It did not seem like we were in Sri Lanka but were transported to a Monterey, California spa.The grounds were magical with art deco Christmas trees all lit in white, bridges and curving walkways that led up to the restaurant adorned in red and green table linens and fancy hand-made menus. The beautifully-presented buffet was bursting with exotic food of all kinds, from squid to turkey to pomegranate salads to real cheese. It was an amazing feast topped off by another Santa who danced with us all to Gangnam Style and Dancing Queen.

Christmas Eve at an Ayurvedic Restaurant

Another Dancing Santa

Christmas Day on the beach

On Christmas day we had a lovely walk on our beach and a swim with the surfers who flock here from Australia.



We ended the holiday with popcorn and rambutan, a sweet Sri Lankan fruit.

Life is good.

Popcorn and crab apple drinks

Rambutan

Home Sweet Home and Sari Saga

Home Sweet Home

Jenise had found a house on-line and Aruni (our embassy contact) took us to Matara to help us secure a place to live. After looking at 2 other abysmal places we stopped at an ATM and went back to the little house on the hill to put our deposit down. We had a home but not for 4 days while they cleaned and painted, so we moved into Polhena Reef Hotel.

Our new home

We happened to arrive on a Buddhist holiday, Poya or full moon day. Polhena Beach is famous as a family vacation spot and was packed with families enjoying the water. This beach has a coral reef surrounding it, so it is fairly safe for swimmers although most Sri Lankans do not know how to swim and stay very close to shore. I waded into the water up to my waist and started to swim out toward the reef which threw the families into hysterics wanting me to come back even though there was no chance I would be swept out to sea because of the reef. I returned to their great relief and just stood in the water just like them.

Holiday at Polhena Beach:  Note everyone wearing their clothes in the water

We are thrilled to have a place to call home. Our little house on a hill catches the sea breezes and is surrounded by tropical plants including several very tall coconut trees. We have two bedrooms, so we are ready for guests.

Looking out our front door

Our living room

Our little kitchen has a refrigerator and a two burner gas stove fueled by propane tanks. One of our first tasks was to get a back-up tank, so we are ready when the one in use goes dry. This required arranging a tuk-tuk to take the empty tank to the shop and trade it in for a full one.
It is quite amazing what one can get into a tuk-tuk. One of our trips into town to purchase household goods included a rather large drying rack (there are no clothes dryers in Sri Lanka), an iron (looking clean and pressed is important), a mop and bucket for the tile floors, a squeedgie for the bathroom floor (no shower curtains here), a scrub brush on a broom handle (floors get washed often because the salt air makes them sticky), a water filter (just to be safe), and laundry baskets. All this plus our landlady (who loves to take us shopping) in one little tuk-tuk.

Our kitchen

Our back yard with tuk-tuk

Our driveway and front yard

Sari Saga

I now am the proud owner of a sari. The first thing the students said to us at the University was "Why don’t you wear a sari?" All the female teachers wear saris but the men wear just a western shirt and pants. So the hunt was on to find a cotton sari. Our landlady took us shopping and it turns out most of the saris are polyester, but after 4 shops, we found Jenise a red sari and a yellow and blue one for me. Then we had to get the sari slip which has a draw string to tie it tight and a matching blouse that also fits very tight. The 5 yard saris come unhemmed so I hemmed them and washed them and ironed them. That was the easy part.

Hemming the sari

Next I had to learn how to wear the sari. Nelum my landlady was very kind to show me how to wrap the sari and make sure it will not fall off (the secret is lots of safety pins). Then comes the hardest part of all, wearing the sari. It turned out that my sari was not cotton after all the promises the shop keeper gave us. So wearing it feels like I have on my own personal sauna. But the reaction was worth it with the men along the way to work calling “very beautiful, Sri Lanka style” and the old women smiling and saying “sari good”. Even the teachers at the University were impressed that I came in a sari and set about adjusting it and repining it for me. Now if I can just figure out how to walk in it without tripping over it when I go upstairs and keep it from wrapping around my legs so I cannot move, I will be set. So far Jenise still feels the sari sacrifice is not worth the accolades, but she does wear almost to the floor skirts, which one also can trip over.

Nelum helping me wrap my sari

Do I look Sri Lankan?