Action and inaction

Cold and busy week in Kathmandu, preparing, delivering and evaluating VSO’s first action research workshop, with ‘selected’ volunteers and partners from all programme areas. Eastern Terai leads the way, with Joseph, Etienne and me all committed to projects. Pleasant evenings with friends and good food.

A new Nepali magazine, Shikshak (Teacher) appeared on the news stands this week. Imagine our shock at seeing our photograph on the front cover, and a double page spread inside with photographs of us at home and on our bicycles plus a feature article (in Nepali). VSO tells us its very flattering and almost accurate. Worse was to come when we discovered another photograph and an article with several misquotes in the Nepali Times, a quality English language weekly. Its also on the internet!

Inevitable foggy morning delay at the airport on Friday, but arrived home in time to do shopping in the heavily policed streets. Mass rallies organised by all political parties scheduled for Saturday, following announcement of April 10 as election date – the third since we have been here. Our neighbours are pleased to see us home, as they can now get into the garden to cut grass for their animals. Unfortunately the tiny children like using our path as a toilet.

Gloom settled over the Terai on Monday, with thick fog, drizzle, cold wind and escalation of Madhesi ‘agitation’; schools closed on Tuesday and Wednesday – and Thursday and Friday too at Bokhari; road blocks of burning tyres, air full of acrid smoke. The only bright spot on my ride to work was the goat on the corner wearing a pink cardigan.

Drama on Tuesday; after a wasted journey through the burning tyres to Shankapur, I returned to the ETC, where Pandit, a Hindu priest, had arrived to teach Nepali. White priest’s robes, white ‘shell’ jacket, white socks and trainers, 3 white hats – baseball cap, bobble hat and motorcycle helmet, worn simultaneously. David phoned at 11:45 from Bokhari as the man from the tea stall had just burst into school to announce that GP Koirala, the prime minister, had died. We turned on the radio to hear his doctor reporting an improvement in his condition. Spent most of the rest of the day listening to the radio with more news of improving PM and deteriorating security in the Terai, drinking tea and tin beakers of warm water, speculating about what might happen. Durga says as Koirala is 84, it is time ‘he went up’. There is no natural successor, but his daughter, an ardent royalist, is poised to take over.

Wednesday was really cold, with day time temperatures plummeting to 16^oC! Female footwear sets new trends. Most are content with flesh coloured socks and sandals, but Ramita is proud of her sky blue high heeled mules with diamante trim worn with black ankle socks.

On Thursday Bokhari was still closed, but Shankapur had opened with about 30% attendance. Trainee teachers from Koshi Campus (school leavers from a private college, looking younger than many of the grade 5 students) had also arrived, but inspite of 18 trainees, most of the regular staff and minimal number of children, some classes remained untaught. Most of the ETC trainees were busy preparing materials that have little relevance to teaching and learning for an exhibition. I saw Indra teach Nepali to grade 3 with some hyperactive boys and great excitement when a black lamb joined the class. At last she started to involve the girls, and Sanjit held up little Nirmaula so she could write on the blackboard. School uniform has disappeared under layers of jumpers for the children who have them. Puja, my special tiny friend from grade 4, has socks but no shoes and a piece of wire through her nose to keep her piercing from closing. Later I went to see the trainees at Hat Khola, but attendance was even poorer so they closed the school and I resisted Nila’s invitation home to sample her radish pickle.

Friday was a ‘special event’ at Shankapur to mark the end of school-based training. Panya introduced it as an international sports day when I arrived. Lots of fun, with novelty races for excited children. Umapati, Durga and Kamchha, chair of the School Management Committee and local president of the Congress party arrived for speeches and prize giving. Kamchha looks remarkably like Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen. Raj Narayan pedalled off to the nearest tea stall and came back with tea for all the teachers swinging precariously from his handlebars. Then teachers played ‘break the pot’. A young man from Koshi Campus did break the pot and I won third prize.

Power cuts

The electricity is now off for 15 hours a day. At least at the moment it is predictable, so we can plan around it, and are able to cook and keep warm with our gas cylinders and read by candlelight. The walls of the back room are now covered in soot. The newspapers report that further increases are likely; there are also gas and petrol shortages, with huge queues at as soon as there is a delivery from India. We are watched over by a large gilt framed picture of a benevolent Jesus with a bleeding heart – a Christmas present from Narayan at the travel agency, partly to assuage his guilt at not getting our tickets to India after we had handed over several hundred dollars before Christmas. As he is a frequent visitor, the picture is prominently displayed.
Action packed day on Monday. I went to visit the trainees at Shankapur on Monday morning. When I arrived at 10am I was surprised and delighted to see Ram Narayan organising ‘physical activities’ for the children while he waited for other teachers to arrive. By 10:30, almost 50% of the children had arrived (very good for Shankapur), 8 of the 9 trainees, the head and 4 of the regular teachers were present and the children were marched into class. I was confused by grade 4 students joining grade 5 for period 1 with Panya, and alarmed when Shyam attempted to teach grade 2 Nepali and grade 3 maths in different rooms simultaneously. Meanwhile there were 14 teachers sitting out on the field in the sunshine. Govind convinced me that ‘multi-grade teaching’ was part of the assessment. I arrived at the ETC just in time for session 2 of primary English, and obliged with teaching them ‘head and shoulders, knees and toes’, and my Nepali version of ‘Old Macdonald’. We were interrupted by the arrival of an itinerant mushroom seller with large bags of oyster mushrooms. I was summoned home at 3pm by the arrival of Purna, our VSO programme manager, here for 3 days to do the annual partnership review. At 6pm Joseph arrived back after 3 months at home in Uganda to collect his keys. Unfortunately I had just emerged from the shower and was dressed in my usual evening ‘keep warm’ outfit of long nightdress, old sweatshirt and felt boots. David says I look like a bag lady (minus bag). At least there was no electricity. Garlic mushrooms and homemade bread for another candlelit supper.
Purna came to the ETC by rickshaw on Tuesday, met my colleagues, borrowed a bike and we went to Shankapur together so he could see what the school situation is like in the Terai. We arrived just as a bandh had been called, so the shutters were being closed and the children were streaming out onto the field. He had some good discussions with teachers and trainees – partly to help with his PhD research – before they all decided to go home. A dramatic Isadora moment on our return to the ETC; my scarf (Nepali long flowing type worn backwards) caught in the back wheel of my bicycle, pulling me by the throat over the back wheel and onto the road. Fortunately my head did not fall off. I was rescued by 2 young men who up righted me and upended my bicycle to extricate the scarf. The review meeting went well, and we have set some reasonably clear objectives for the coming year. David’s day was more challenging as he never works at the DEO and they have little interest in what he is doing. Purna enjoyed his rickshaw ride into the countryside to meet the teachers that David has been working with and has agreed to buy a white board and mats for the grade 1 classrooms.
On Wednesday evening my colleagues joined us at the Namaskar hotel for a celebration meal with the signing of formal partnership agreements. The DEO appeared briefly. We ate from metal trays of daal bhat in a gloomy dining room under flickering lights powered by a generator. Umapati tells us that our electricity comes from India and the Nepali government are trying to negotiate extension of credit. Our regular on / off cycle has broken down, and I had to get up in the middle of the night to do some urgent printing.
On Thursday Govind took me on the back of his motorbike to Panchakriya, a rural school 8km north of Biratnagar where 10 of our trainees are based. A delightful journey along dirt roads through the countryside at a steady pace, breaking down 4 times on the way. The 300 children had never seen a bideshi before and mass hysteria greeted my arrival. Tiny children crammed onto benches in grades 1 & 2, ranging from those in uniform to those in rags with tangled hair and no shoes. Trainees were working very hard engaging children in activities and shouting responses, but have not yet grappled with what children are actually learning. Grade 5 was smaller, with well motivated and well dressed children. So many of them drop out before they reach grade 5. On the way back we stopped at Govind’s house that he started building 7 years ago and still has some way to go to be completed. The original wooden house now shelters his cow. His wife, 2 daughters and grandson were sitting on the porch chatting and sorting lentils. I had met his youngest daughter, Deepti, before as I was able to give her some help with her masters dissertation in zoology. She tells me that her work ‘is going on’. He has a patch of vegetables and 3 mango trees and is looking forward to his retirement in 5 years, so he can sit on the porch, look after the cow and grow vegetables. Meanwhile my lettuces (Webb’s wonderful and Sangria), rocket and basil are thriving and a healthy crop of cannabis plants has sprung up amongst them.
Back to Kathmandu on Sunday for an action research workshop.

A new year

Sunday December 30. Back to work as the orientation day for primary school-based training that I had suggested had been moved forward by 3 days. The primary teachers were pleased to see me back, and were particularly proud to show me the giant rabbit they have made out of cotton wool; I’m not sure how it relates to the curriculum. We had invited the primary heads, but unfortunately only one of them turned up. Everyone is wearing increasingly bizarre woolly hats, and even Lalmani, who spends most of the year in vest and pants, is wearing a shell suit (remember shell suits?).
I was able to attend the last session of the day with the English group, just in time to be invited to their end of course picnic that they had organised for the next day. I also learnt that Durga has to go to Sunsari for 3 days on Tuesday, so there is ‘no-one’ to complete the last 3 days of training. I suppose I am pleased to be trusted with it; they are a lovely group of teachers, but find working in English very difficult.
On Monday I arrived at Aqua Park at 10:30 as requested. The aqua was a green slime pond, the banks littered with the debris of previous picnics. The park was a patch of grass with a couple of metal swings, but as Lilanath said, it was the cheapest place to go. All the participants were busy cleaning pots, lighting fires and preparing the several tons of vegetables that they had brought from the market. No knives, but a dangerous sword like implements you hold between your feet and slice things against. Far too dangerous for me, so I peeled onions with my fingers while Bishnu scraped carrots and potatoes with a spoon. Nasta (breakfast) started at 11:15. A sack of beaten rice was divided onto 25 leaf plates, piles of spicy chicken, daal and vegetables added, then raw onions and chillies. As they knew I would not eat the chicken, I was also given a box of sweets, 3 oranges, apples and bananas. About 12:30, the other trainers arrived (10:30 Nepali time), ready for lunch. This consisted of goat (all body parts, fried in masala) prepared by Binod, aloo gobi prepared by Maliti, the only female teacher (2 buckets or cauliflower, 2 buckets of potatoes, 2 buckets of onions, I bucket of tomatoes, several packets of spices) and yogurt (10 litres). We sat crossed legged in a circle eating with our fingers, as the hooded crows gathered and became increasingly bold scavenging the left overs. Afterwards there were stories and songs, and Tulsi made a speech and told jokes in Sanskrit.
The first 3 days of the new year were really enjoyable, as I was able to plan and deliver the last topics of the English module. David’s attempts to start working at Janapath school were thwarted by the arrival of 20 student teachers to supplement the nine he was intending to observe, and when he decided to return to Bokari to check on progress, he found that the teachers had given themselves a week off to mark test papers. We delivered a day’s training on communication skills together, and had lots of fun – as did the teachers. Like the Ethiopians, once introduced to role play, their enthusiasm was hard to control, especially in conflict situations! Friday was the day of the examination, which Durga was scheduled to organise, and I had planned to observe primary teachers at Shankapur. As Jeevan remarked “dear respectable Deborah madam, we do not want you to come to the examination, as we are afraid you will not let us cheat”. As Durga did not arrive, there was no choice. I discovered that they could not read English silently; most of them had their manuals and notebooks on their chairs, and Surendra and Ganga (obviously influenced by Crorepati – the Indian version of ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?’, now on Nepali television) attempted to ‘phone a friend’. Fortunately Durga arrived after half an hour, so I was able to hand over my responsibility and not feel guilty. He had been to one of the teaching practice schools, to find no teachers or trainees present. The peon had rounded up the children with a stick and had them singing the national anthem while teachers drifted in up to an hour late. He waited for the head to talk to him about his responsibilities before coming to the ETC. After the exam, we had presentation of their projects – some heart rending stories of trying to improve attendance by visiting families to persuade them of the importance of education, while children were taken out of school to mind goats, work in the fields and the house. In one village, three 12 year old girls had been sold to brothels in India. Some teachers are developing extra curricular programmes to stop boys dropping out to play football, and ‘go roaming’. In some of the more affluent areas there is an increasing drug problem. The day ended with the usual ‘closing ceremony’ for both groups (Maths and English) with all the trainers at the front making long speeches (except me). It was dark by the time we had finished and the mosquitoes were rampant.
It’s the season of grapes and power cuts. The grapes – small green ones from Nepal and larger black ones from India – are delicious. The power cuts are increasingly frequent: 5:30 – 8:30 am and 5:30 – 8:30 pm most days, and for unpredictable periods during the day and night. David has bought us a gas heater, and we have moved into the small back room where we can keep warm in the evenings. Thwarted by exhaustion of battery power for computers, inability to access internet or bake bread on Saturday, we decided to cycle to India. The border was marked by a bamboo pole, a piece of string and two boys in bobble hats in a shed. We resisted the temptation to just carry on cycling in case we could not get back. On the way home we found a wonderful ‘garden centre’ with sweet williams, snapdragons, pansies, dahlias, and verbena. We rode home with flowering baskets.