The post monsoon cupboard clean out, disposing of all the rancid spices, revealed a bag of what had once been pasta that had become transformed into a thriving ant colony. Tiny ants now superseded by snails multiplying under the kitchen sink and a gecko the size of a Komodo dragon, but even this is no match for the huge spiders that lurk in the bedroom at night. Compensated by the arrival of swarms of fireflies, lighting the bedroom with twinkling stars. Woke up and imagined I was in heaven. A surprise storm on Tuesday morning cooled the air; I feared for David who had left home laden with a full rucksack in his bicycle basket, nine almost-life-size cut out animals on his carrier, 2 large framed charts under his left arm and his brow mopping towel in his right hand. He arrived at school just as the winds and lashing rain began.
On Tuesday evening we were invited to the Eastern Star hotel to have dinner with the VSO delegation from Kathmandu, including a Tory MP – the sole Conservative representative of VSO’s VolPol event to mark its 50th anniversary, and presumably to ensure government funding for a few more years. He fitted the stereotype. 11 MPs are currently visiting VSO projects in different countries, and supposedly having a ‘volunteer’ experience; his has been more of an embassy experience. On Wednesday we helped facilitate a review workshop for NGOs and their communities at the misnamed Sagarmarta (Nepali name for Everest – it is of course completely flat) Party (no sign of one) Palace (certainly not). Very interesting to work with a group other than education; the MP slept through most of it, possibly due to his wine consumption the previous evening and we bundled him into a rickshaw to take him back to the airport in the afternoon. Transport was difficult as it was the day for worshipping machinery. Buses, trucks, lorries, tractors, cars and rickshaws were taken to the temple to be blessed, have huge tikkas applied, and be festooned with garlands.
Most of the local factories have been forced to close because of the power shortages – more than 12 hours without electricity some days, and no schedule so it is impossible to plan. We try to keep our laptops and phones charged and the water tank topped up when we are home, but some days its impossible. When the power is on, it is usually only enough to produce a brown flicker in the light bulbs. We are loving our new supply of DVDs – have just finished Middlemarch and Cranford, often getting up in the middle of the night to finish an episode when the power comes on. We feel immersed in 19th century England – and indeed the conditions of some of our neighbours are not unlike the poor depicted there. Karna, now confident in negotiating his way round the computer, discovered Cranford yesterday, and is now very confused about what England is like.
Suddenly a 4 day workshop organised by a local NGO roused my colleagues from their torpor; after half an hour of planning they disappeared for the rest of the day. I met them at the NGO Federation at 8am on Friday tucking into a hearty breakfast. The workshop is targeting teachers from very poor Dalit communities near the Indian border, and follow up support will be provided. The lack of proper planning was evident, so we had a shamefaced debriefing at the end of the day. By Sunday things were going well, with some of the best training I have ever observed. On Monday, a bright young man from Save the Children, who are funding the initiative arrived for the final day – another useful local contact. We spent most of Tuesday ‘debriefing’ and planning for how we will change our approach for the primary training that starts at the ETC after Tihar.
Durga is being remarkably pro-active and we have been off into the countryside on the back of his motorbike visiting some of the headteachers who were trained before the monsoon. The travelling is wonderful, if precarious. On the highway he is no respecter of speed humps, and once off the road we bump along increasingly narrow tracks through bright green paddy fields and lush banana plantations, negotiating cows, buffalo, chickens, ducks, women carrying huge bundles of fodder and tiny children playing in the dirt. Blue mountains in the distance. Looks idyllic, but the reality of life in the villages is grim. Flimsy houses of bamboo and mud, dilapidated school buildings with dirt floors and no resources, but some bright eyed teachers trying their best. Children, as ever, are curious and delightful.
I read in the Guardian Weekly today that the average British family spend 34 minutes a day shouting at each other. Include the dog and multiply that by 10 and you have an approximation for a Nepali family. Especially when they live downstairs. We have discovered that they are very rich, own three cars, and want to buy the whole house from our landlord. They have just installed a generator, so now the 2 televisions are on from dawn til late. We are in delicate negotiations about who should pay the electricity bill for the month that we were in England.
On Sunday September 28 we go to Kathmandu for a VSO workshop followed by our Dashain holiday, rafting down the Seti river to Pokhara before we take to the hills. There is a general air of festivity already, with more street stalls selling trinkets, children with balloons and firecrackers, and the setting up of huge bamboo swings. The barley seeds will be planted on Tuesday. Our colleagues are starting their annual family gatherings with singing, dancing and much feasting on everything except fatted calves.
Saturday, 27 September 2008
Saturday, 13 September 2008
National Education Day
It is sometimes hard to remain positive about the improvement of state education in Nepal. Schools were closed to celebrate National Education Day, following three days holiday for festivals last week. Purna arrived from Kathmandu for our annual review on Monday and spent a frustrating day chasing staff at the DEO and now has a better understanding of the problems that David has faced. On Tuesday and Wednesday mornings he attended schools with David and was delighted with the progress he saw. David’s teachers had worked really hard and did their best to impress. My turn was on Tuesday afternoon; Tulsi was called to a meeting as Purna arrived which delayed us, but Durga and Govind gave copious feedback. They told amazing stories of what they feel what has been achieved – including a first class pass for Deepti (Govind’s daughter) in her MSc. When Tulsi returned he held forth at length about the factors hindering change. Both David and I have set an agenda for the next six months, with a strong recommendation that we should not be replaced here. Sad, but given the situation and constraints under which we are working, it is not good use of a finite resource. We left late, and our departure was further delayed by a visit to Umapati who had just returned back from hospital after the removal of his gall stones. We were ushered into the bedroom where he was reclining like an emperor on rather grubby pillows, splendid in snowy white kurta pyjamas, watching television. We were obliged to shout our enquiries about his health. Nirmala appeared with lemon juice and the gall stones.
At last Durga has decided we can do some monitoring visits, following up recently trained teachers. He has approached the autocratic R N Bhattarai, headteacher of our adjoining school with a view to developing a model school – great in theory. We developed a monitoring form for training follow up and questions for a focussed discussion with the 7 primary teachers at the end of the morning. There are 7 primary teachers. I was 20 minutes into an observation of period 1 when Durga came in to say he had seen every one else and we could go. I persisted and watched whole lessons with different teachers for the rest of the day. At the end of the second day I had seen everyone at least once, so have some ideas about what would be helpful. I am trying to dissuade him from calling a staff meeting to announce that they must make a model school. Durga’s next plan is to evaluate the headteachers we ‘trained’ before the monsoon. We have been to visit my friend Bina at the girl’s school, who tells him proudly that she now does MBWA (management by walking around). At least she does the walking around. Expect we’ll assess all the headteachers in Morang by the end of next week. Another box ticked. I stayed on for the rest of Friday morning watching BEd students. The Science teacher, in jeans, a T shirt with a penguin on it and a baseball cap, managed a traditional lesson on viruses. I sat at the back of class 10, looking at 68 almost identical shiny black plaits. Outside strong sunlight shone on a beautiful green view, with tall palms, darker spreading mango trees, lush brilliant green rice paddy. Small brick houses with kaleidoscope lines of washing in red, pink, yellow, lime green, purple and turquoise. The English teacher was wonderful, with lively, interactive student-centred teaching. When I talked to him after his lesson I was delighted to learn he is being taught by Bedu, with whom I have done a lot of training. There is some hope!
The introduction of our empty yoghurt pots to David’s nursery class has caused great excitement and a 50% rise in attendance. Hours of fun making towers and bridges. Stacks with tops on and without tops. Stacks of tops without bottoms. Patterns on the ground with lines of pots. Trading pots with one another. Working in twos and threes to make bigger towers and watching them fall over and everyone chasing the rolling pots to add to their store. Friday was further enlivened by one child bringing in a baby goat called Gita. Most of the time they have nothing. They work on an open porch on the concrete floor outside two classrooms sitting on big mats VSO bought.
The weather is heating up again, as apart from the occasional thunderstorm the monsoon seems to be over. Youngsters are catching bullfrogs in the rapidly drying swamps; the night time chorus has subsided and has been replaced by cicadas and mating dogs. My computer has been infested with tiny red ants again. They scurry out from between the keys when it heats up and manage to transfer themselves to my underwear. They bite. Fortunately the laptop has responded well to a liberal spraying of Baygon. The electricity cuts increase every day; sometimes we are off for more than 12 hours. Our local hospital continues to operate by candlelight.
A dramatic end to the week. After a wonderfully peaceful (but electricity free) Saturday – Karna had gone home, the family disappeared about 7am, the dog slept – our bell rang at 8pm. There was a man on the porch, asking for the key to downstairs, saying he had to stay the night. We told him that the family were away and we had no keys. With our limited Nepali we did not know what to do next, but explained that he could not get in. He leaves and returns with a crow bar and attempts to break the padlock. By this time we are safely behind our metal gate, The hammering went on for sometime; the dog fell silent ……. more ringing. Another man with some English appeared and reported that they were supposed to provide security as the family would not be back from India until the next day. Eventually they left, locking the front gate behind them and locking us in - for security.
Tomorrow is National Children’s Day and another school holiday of course. The government has announced that there will be 100% literacy in two years.
At last Durga has decided we can do some monitoring visits, following up recently trained teachers. He has approached the autocratic R N Bhattarai, headteacher of our adjoining school with a view to developing a model school – great in theory. We developed a monitoring form for training follow up and questions for a focussed discussion with the 7 primary teachers at the end of the morning. There are 7 primary teachers. I was 20 minutes into an observation of period 1 when Durga came in to say he had seen every one else and we could go. I persisted and watched whole lessons with different teachers for the rest of the day. At the end of the second day I had seen everyone at least once, so have some ideas about what would be helpful. I am trying to dissuade him from calling a staff meeting to announce that they must make a model school. Durga’s next plan is to evaluate the headteachers we ‘trained’ before the monsoon. We have been to visit my friend Bina at the girl’s school, who tells him proudly that she now does MBWA (management by walking around). At least she does the walking around. Expect we’ll assess all the headteachers in Morang by the end of next week. Another box ticked. I stayed on for the rest of Friday morning watching BEd students. The Science teacher, in jeans, a T shirt with a penguin on it and a baseball cap, managed a traditional lesson on viruses. I sat at the back of class 10, looking at 68 almost identical shiny black plaits. Outside strong sunlight shone on a beautiful green view, with tall palms, darker spreading mango trees, lush brilliant green rice paddy. Small brick houses with kaleidoscope lines of washing in red, pink, yellow, lime green, purple and turquoise. The English teacher was wonderful, with lively, interactive student-centred teaching. When I talked to him after his lesson I was delighted to learn he is being taught by Bedu, with whom I have done a lot of training. There is some hope!
The introduction of our empty yoghurt pots to David’s nursery class has caused great excitement and a 50% rise in attendance. Hours of fun making towers and bridges. Stacks with tops on and without tops. Stacks of tops without bottoms. Patterns on the ground with lines of pots. Trading pots with one another. Working in twos and threes to make bigger towers and watching them fall over and everyone chasing the rolling pots to add to their store. Friday was further enlivened by one child bringing in a baby goat called Gita. Most of the time they have nothing. They work on an open porch on the concrete floor outside two classrooms sitting on big mats VSO bought.
The weather is heating up again, as apart from the occasional thunderstorm the monsoon seems to be over. Youngsters are catching bullfrogs in the rapidly drying swamps; the night time chorus has subsided and has been replaced by cicadas and mating dogs. My computer has been infested with tiny red ants again. They scurry out from between the keys when it heats up and manage to transfer themselves to my underwear. They bite. Fortunately the laptop has responded well to a liberal spraying of Baygon. The electricity cuts increase every day; sometimes we are off for more than 12 hours. Our local hospital continues to operate by candlelight.
A dramatic end to the week. After a wonderfully peaceful (but electricity free) Saturday – Karna had gone home, the family disappeared about 7am, the dog slept – our bell rang at 8pm. There was a man on the porch, asking for the key to downstairs, saying he had to stay the night. We told him that the family were away and we had no keys. With our limited Nepali we did not know what to do next, but explained that he could not get in. He leaves and returns with a crow bar and attempts to break the padlock. By this time we are safely behind our metal gate, The hammering went on for sometime; the dog fell silent ……. more ringing. Another man with some English appeared and reported that they were supposed to provide security as the family would not be back from India until the next day. Eventually they left, locking the front gate behind them and locking us in - for security.
Tomorrow is National Children’s Day and another school holiday of course. The government has announced that there will be 100% literacy in two years.
Saturday, 6 September 2008
Friends and neighbours
A very smooth journey back to Kathmandu via Delhi. The only casualty was one of David’s cans of varnish, bought to protect the already flaking paint on his beautifully crafted blocks for the nursery children. The entire contents of the bag, fortunately the small one, are now varnished. Its only the underpants that are likely to be a problem.
How easy it is to make the transition from the tranquillity of Bradford-on-Avon to the density and diversity of people, chaotic traffic and stench of diesel and rotting garbage in Kathmandu. The weather is depressingly similar; low cloud, grey skies, drizzle and heavy rain, but at least 10oC hotter. The traditional and modern sit easily side by side. As we drink delicious Himalayan coffee in our favourite Lazimpat café with our muesli, fruit, yogurt, toast and mountain wildflower honey, surrounded by young Nepalis with their laptops using the wifi to check e-mail, the egg seller arrives. She’s middle aged woman in red sari with splendid gold ear and nose rings with 24 egg trays each holding 2 dozen eggs strapped to her back. Free range of course. Rafi buys 2 trays.
We are warmly welcomed back at the VSO office; what we intended to be a short visit to announce our return turned into a whole day, as Purna and Rima wanted to talk about plans for the next few months. Rima’s maternity leave is imminent, and Purna starts his new job at VSO London in October. Lots to be completed before he goes; we find ourselves agreeing to do all kinds of things.
On Friday Purna and I went to NCED (National Centre for Educational Development), the lead organisation for teacher training, to meet Bishwanath, the Deputy Director. We want to build the relationship with VSO and try to establish a clearer role for volunteers in the development of teacher training. A wide ranging and at times difficult conversation produced no real outcomes. The future of teacher training and the role of NCED and the ETCs is uncertain. An adventurous return journey to the VSO office as the road was completely blocked. The taxi driver knew a short cut – of course. After 10 minutes struggle uphill on a dirt track, we hit a swamp in which a truck and a car were already stuck. With the help of stones, pieces of wood and lots of shoving we eventually moved them on, getting splattered with mud in the process. Our taxi driver got us through like a rally driver and kindly stopped at the water pump where the village women were washing themselves and their clothes so we could wash off the worst of the mud. Back at the VSO office just in time for the monthly education meeting, which generated lots more work to keep us busy until Purna arrives for a review meeting on September 8.
On Saturday August 30 we arrive at the airport with tickets for the 10:30 flight ‘home’. There is no 10:30 flight, and we are not listed at all. After a lot of patient smiling, the helpful man at the Buddha control centre manages to find two seats at 12:30. The domestic airport is always fascinating, especially out of the tourist season, with a diverse Nepali population returning to their villages with sacks, boxes, bulging plastic bags, huge suitcases and an occasional goat. Men and women in colourful embroidered clothes, with high cheekbones and weathered faces squat chanting with Buddhist prayer beads; Hindus sport elaborate tikkas from the temple for a safe journey.
When we eventually get airborne, the mountains are obscured by heavy cloud, but we are able to see the extent of the terrible flooding caused by the collapse of the levees of the massive Koshi river. 60,000 Nepalis and 4.5 million Indians in Bihar have been displaced and their rice crop lost. The Nepalis have been evacuated to Inaruwa, 20km from Biratnagar, but Inaruwa itself is now under threat of submersion. VSO is co-ordinating relief efforts with other international organisations and NGOs. The government appeal is likely to be less successful, as the newspaper headlines report that the money, food and other supplies ‘disappear’ . The floods have also brought down the towers supplying electricity to large parts of the country, and Biratnagar had none at all for two days. Now it is ‘occasional’. From cuts due to drought to those caused by too much rain in about a month.
As we got off the plane, we felt as if we had been muffled in a large, wet blanket, and we arrived home to find a white dog chained to the gate, a car wearing a plastic mac in the drive and festoons of washing. The children next door were fishing in the swampy water beside the house and shrieked greetings when they saw us. We met Pyel, a girl of about 16 and her mother, Rani. Neither admitted to speaking any English, but we exchanged smiles, greetings and introductions. We were alarmed to see that our water pump had been disconnected in favour of a picture of Shiva with flashing lights. The dog goes yip yip yip yip yip …….
Our flat seems to have survived the monsoon well; the mould, dead cockroaches, termite colonies, spiders’ webs, gecko poo and accumulated grime responded well to the hoover and the mop. The damp patch on the kitchen ceiling may take longer to fix. The plants are well, and there is enough basil to supply Jamie Oliver’s new chain of restaurants. The cows and buffaloes are sleek and fat from feasting on the lush vegetation. We walked to the market as our bike tyres were completely flat and our favourite man with pump takes the day off on Saturdays. Shopping took longer than usual as we had to greet everyone and recount tales of merry England in our rusty Nepali.
Normal life was resumed on Sunday; bikes given a makeover, cooking done, ice-cream made, Karna back from school to tell us all his news. We are dismayed to hear about the ‘teaching’ which consists of a series of different teachers coming to the class, writing on the board for 45 minutes, then going off to another college.
Having counted 19 people aged 75 to a few months old downstairs, the numbers supported by the extent of the washing lines and assorted vehicles (car, motorbike, 5 bicycles) we were delighted to discover that there are only 4 permanent residents – Pyel aged 16, her brother Abhishek, 13 and their parents, with several domestic servants, their children and a car driver. Pyel has got over her shyness and both children chat to us in excellent English, reflecting their privileged education at St Joseph’s. Unfortunately this has exacerbated the water crisis, especially when the car is being washed using a hose attached to our water tank. 24 hour power cut on Thursday / Friday stopped the water completely.
Daily swimming in afternoon sunshine has been a pleasure and a way of keeping clean. Particular excitement when a rat was discovered in the pool on Thursday and Shyam with a net, a mechanic and 2 chefs armed with metal spikes managed to hook it out of the pool. Instead of the expected clubbing to death, they tossed it over the wall. Expect to meet it again soon.
Tracey (Country Director) took us to dinner on Thursday evening; she is in the east visiting disability projects. Our friend Dinesh is back from Kathmandu and stranded as Kathmandu is currently only accessible by plane because of the floods.
Back at work
David has managed 1 ½ days in school this week, planning his schedule for the next few months. The other days schools were closed for the Teej festival. He spent those days using the remains of his varnish.
I arrived at the ETC on Monday, deserted except for Lalmani sitting on the steps in his vest and pants reading the newspaper. Gradually my colleagues arrived; they have had no real work since I left in mid July. Durga’s only excitement was a week’s visit to PLA (Maoist army) cantonments in the eastern Terai to set up an education access programme for young and not-so-young soldiers. Several itinerants seem to arrive for a mid morning sleep on the training room tables under a fan.
Tuesday was brightened by the delivery of small Hindu texts, so Tulsi sang most of the Bhagavad Gita in Sanskrit to us for the rest of the day. I have been taking staff photographs and making news boards – a big success. The logistical exercise of putting up photographs would make a fascinating time and motion study; this has prompted a general tidying up and an agreement that we will prepare the rooms ready for the new round of training (whenever that might be).
New carpets have been put down in all the offices; the carpet has been waiting in the storeroom for 5 years, so is a little mouldy around the edges. Having got new furniture and a new carpet, Durga has decided to do something about his office walls, which are covered in lists of training participants starting over 20 years ago. His name is there in 2047, the year his 18 year old daughter was born. The lists are of course riveted to the walls. Bhakta was brought in to remove the top nails, balancing on the tops of the windows. Durga had the foresight to turn off the fan to prevent a beheading. Concerted attacks with the claw hammer have brought down huge chunks of plaster – all over the new furniture and new carpet. It has made removal of shoes before treading on the carpet an irrelevance. I note that the brick that is used as a door stop has been covered in my ‘Old Macdonald’ song sheet.
How easy it is to make the transition from the tranquillity of Bradford-on-Avon to the density and diversity of people, chaotic traffic and stench of diesel and rotting garbage in Kathmandu. The weather is depressingly similar; low cloud, grey skies, drizzle and heavy rain, but at least 10oC hotter. The traditional and modern sit easily side by side. As we drink delicious Himalayan coffee in our favourite Lazimpat café with our muesli, fruit, yogurt, toast and mountain wildflower honey, surrounded by young Nepalis with their laptops using the wifi to check e-mail, the egg seller arrives. She’s middle aged woman in red sari with splendid gold ear and nose rings with 24 egg trays each holding 2 dozen eggs strapped to her back. Free range of course. Rafi buys 2 trays.
We are warmly welcomed back at the VSO office; what we intended to be a short visit to announce our return turned into a whole day, as Purna and Rima wanted to talk about plans for the next few months. Rima’s maternity leave is imminent, and Purna starts his new job at VSO London in October. Lots to be completed before he goes; we find ourselves agreeing to do all kinds of things.
On Friday Purna and I went to NCED (National Centre for Educational Development), the lead organisation for teacher training, to meet Bishwanath, the Deputy Director. We want to build the relationship with VSO and try to establish a clearer role for volunteers in the development of teacher training. A wide ranging and at times difficult conversation produced no real outcomes. The future of teacher training and the role of NCED and the ETCs is uncertain. An adventurous return journey to the VSO office as the road was completely blocked. The taxi driver knew a short cut – of course. After 10 minutes struggle uphill on a dirt track, we hit a swamp in which a truck and a car were already stuck. With the help of stones, pieces of wood and lots of shoving we eventually moved them on, getting splattered with mud in the process. Our taxi driver got us through like a rally driver and kindly stopped at the water pump where the village women were washing themselves and their clothes so we could wash off the worst of the mud. Back at the VSO office just in time for the monthly education meeting, which generated lots more work to keep us busy until Purna arrives for a review meeting on September 8.
On Saturday August 30 we arrive at the airport with tickets for the 10:30 flight ‘home’. There is no 10:30 flight, and we are not listed at all. After a lot of patient smiling, the helpful man at the Buddha control centre manages to find two seats at 12:30. The domestic airport is always fascinating, especially out of the tourist season, with a diverse Nepali population returning to their villages with sacks, boxes, bulging plastic bags, huge suitcases and an occasional goat. Men and women in colourful embroidered clothes, with high cheekbones and weathered faces squat chanting with Buddhist prayer beads; Hindus sport elaborate tikkas from the temple for a safe journey.
When we eventually get airborne, the mountains are obscured by heavy cloud, but we are able to see the extent of the terrible flooding caused by the collapse of the levees of the massive Koshi river. 60,000 Nepalis and 4.5 million Indians in Bihar have been displaced and their rice crop lost. The Nepalis have been evacuated to Inaruwa, 20km from Biratnagar, but Inaruwa itself is now under threat of submersion. VSO is co-ordinating relief efforts with other international organisations and NGOs. The government appeal is likely to be less successful, as the newspaper headlines report that the money, food and other supplies ‘disappear’ . The floods have also brought down the towers supplying electricity to large parts of the country, and Biratnagar had none at all for two days. Now it is ‘occasional’. From cuts due to drought to those caused by too much rain in about a month.
As we got off the plane, we felt as if we had been muffled in a large, wet blanket, and we arrived home to find a white dog chained to the gate, a car wearing a plastic mac in the drive and festoons of washing. The children next door were fishing in the swampy water beside the house and shrieked greetings when they saw us. We met Pyel, a girl of about 16 and her mother, Rani. Neither admitted to speaking any English, but we exchanged smiles, greetings and introductions. We were alarmed to see that our water pump had been disconnected in favour of a picture of Shiva with flashing lights. The dog goes yip yip yip yip yip …….
Our flat seems to have survived the monsoon well; the mould, dead cockroaches, termite colonies, spiders’ webs, gecko poo and accumulated grime responded well to the hoover and the mop. The damp patch on the kitchen ceiling may take longer to fix. The plants are well, and there is enough basil to supply Jamie Oliver’s new chain of restaurants. The cows and buffaloes are sleek and fat from feasting on the lush vegetation. We walked to the market as our bike tyres were completely flat and our favourite man with pump takes the day off on Saturdays. Shopping took longer than usual as we had to greet everyone and recount tales of merry England in our rusty Nepali.
Normal life was resumed on Sunday; bikes given a makeover, cooking done, ice-cream made, Karna back from school to tell us all his news. We are dismayed to hear about the ‘teaching’ which consists of a series of different teachers coming to the class, writing on the board for 45 minutes, then going off to another college.
Having counted 19 people aged 75 to a few months old downstairs, the numbers supported by the extent of the washing lines and assorted vehicles (car, motorbike, 5 bicycles) we were delighted to discover that there are only 4 permanent residents – Pyel aged 16, her brother Abhishek, 13 and their parents, with several domestic servants, their children and a car driver. Pyel has got over her shyness and both children chat to us in excellent English, reflecting their privileged education at St Joseph’s. Unfortunately this has exacerbated the water crisis, especially when the car is being washed using a hose attached to our water tank. 24 hour power cut on Thursday / Friday stopped the water completely.
Daily swimming in afternoon sunshine has been a pleasure and a way of keeping clean. Particular excitement when a rat was discovered in the pool on Thursday and Shyam with a net, a mechanic and 2 chefs armed with metal spikes managed to hook it out of the pool. Instead of the expected clubbing to death, they tossed it over the wall. Expect to meet it again soon.
Tracey (Country Director) took us to dinner on Thursday evening; she is in the east visiting disability projects. Our friend Dinesh is back from Kathmandu and stranded as Kathmandu is currently only accessible by plane because of the floods.
Back at work
David has managed 1 ½ days in school this week, planning his schedule for the next few months. The other days schools were closed for the Teej festival. He spent those days using the remains of his varnish.
I arrived at the ETC on Monday, deserted except for Lalmani sitting on the steps in his vest and pants reading the newspaper. Gradually my colleagues arrived; they have had no real work since I left in mid July. Durga’s only excitement was a week’s visit to PLA (Maoist army) cantonments in the eastern Terai to set up an education access programme for young and not-so-young soldiers. Several itinerants seem to arrive for a mid morning sleep on the training room tables under a fan.
Tuesday was brightened by the delivery of small Hindu texts, so Tulsi sang most of the Bhagavad Gita in Sanskrit to us for the rest of the day. I have been taking staff photographs and making news boards – a big success. The logistical exercise of putting up photographs would make a fascinating time and motion study; this has prompted a general tidying up and an agreement that we will prepare the rooms ready for the new round of training (whenever that might be).
New carpets have been put down in all the offices; the carpet has been waiting in the storeroom for 5 years, so is a little mouldy around the edges. Having got new furniture and a new carpet, Durga has decided to do something about his office walls, which are covered in lists of training participants starting over 20 years ago. His name is there in 2047, the year his 18 year old daughter was born. The lists are of course riveted to the walls. Bhakta was brought in to remove the top nails, balancing on the tops of the windows. Durga had the foresight to turn off the fan to prevent a beheading. Concerted attacks with the claw hammer have brought down huge chunks of plaster – all over the new furniture and new carpet. It has made removal of shoes before treading on the carpet an irrelevance. I note that the brick that is used as a door stop has been covered in my ‘Old Macdonald’ song sheet.
Saturday, 12 July 2008
Winding down
Variable weather from very hot and sticky to cool and wet. Electricity comes and goes. Water reduced to a trickle some days, but the new pump is wonderfully efficient. Most of the schools have closed for the monsoon break, so David is busy preparing teaching schemes for when he returns in September.
The last week of ‘proper’ work before the summer break was busy and enjoyable for me – I completed the last week of the English training; a delightful group of teachers to work with, and of course very easy to work in English all the time. I also managed to spend some time with the primary teachers as they finished off their portfolios. They are still spending huge amounts of time and effort producing beautiful ‘artistic’ pictures (peacocks made from stuck on sequins, rabbits with cotton wool fur, glittering flowers) and look confused when I ask how they could be used for teaching and learning. The reality is that they will join the piles of decaying and dust covered efforts produced by previous generations of trainees. I attended the ‘closing ceremony’ after 2.5 months of training. 4 ½ hours of speeches, followed by singing and dancing and tearful farewells.
Yet more training started on Sunday – a 5 day workshop for science teachers organised by Nepali Academy of Science and Technology. The purpose is to help them make physics materials that they can take back to their schools for practical demonstrations. On the first day they attempted to make electric bells from a power pack and assorted metal strips. After 6 hours of concentrated work, some managed to produce a scratching vibration. They all have excellent scientific knowledge, but so little ‘hands on’ experience. Advice such as ‘try connecting the red wire to the red terminal’ was gratefully received. Day 2 was more hazardous as they attempted to demonstrate Ohm’s Law. The training room was festooned with pieces of wire at head, neck, knee and ankle height, as 30 participants attempted to use the single power socket in the training room. Amazing that we are all still alive.
Three months after the election has seen no change. PM Koirala continues to make all decisions; he announced his resignation 3 weeks ago, but is still PM because only the head of state can accept his resignation. Following the deposing of the king, there is no head of state until the new government elect or select one ….. they have not yet decided how the process should work. And if Koirala becomes the new president, as Nepali Congress want, will he accept his own resignation? The CA has attempted to meet every day, but have not yet managed to conduct a session as dissenting factions with conflicting and increasingly ridiculous demands disrupt proceedings by shouting and chanting. Daily newspaper reports fluctuate between ‘breakthrough imminent’ to ‘no breakthrough in talks’.
A boring last week of finishing off paper work and reports for NCED and VSO, enlivened by lots of people dropping in for a chat. We ate excellent daal bhat at Durga’s house on Tuesday, followed by surfing Nepali TV channels, featuring political news (no news) and Nepali love songs. At 7:30 he asked if we wanted to stay the night, so we realised we had overstayed our welcome. We have been laden with gifts to take to his daughter in London. As the moon was obscured by thunder clouds and there were no street lights we got lost on the way home and became entangled in a wedding procession and the usual Pamplona-like stampede of cows and bulls to feast on the day’s debris at the market.
Govind’s attempts to find a suitably educated match for his lovely daughter Deepti have at last been successful, although he is financially crippled by the 5 lakh dowry (more than 3 years salary). After a week of wedding events, we attended the party on Friday afternoon, panting after our colleagues on their motor bikes to a ‘party palace’. Deepti had disappeared to wash her hair. We sat in a line on plastic chairs for 10 minutes, waiting for the daal bhat to be ready. Before we had finished shovelling rice into our mouths we were summoned to deliver the ‘ETC present’ – yet another rice cooker. A wet haired and exhausted Deepti reappeared; we did not meet her new husband. Within 5 minutes we were back on the bikes and cycling home.
Karna is researching places for his +2 programme (equivalent of sixth form), with long discussions with us each evening and advice from my colleagues. He is taking entrance tests for several different colleges. Term starts next week and we want to get him ‘settled’ before we leave for Kathmandu.
To Kathmandu on July 14, where we will meet our landlord. We think he is trying to sell the house and will not return to Biratnagar. A few days of VSO work and meeting friends before flying to England. Blog will resume when we return at the end of August.
The last week of ‘proper’ work before the summer break was busy and enjoyable for me – I completed the last week of the English training; a delightful group of teachers to work with, and of course very easy to work in English all the time. I also managed to spend some time with the primary teachers as they finished off their portfolios. They are still spending huge amounts of time and effort producing beautiful ‘artistic’ pictures (peacocks made from stuck on sequins, rabbits with cotton wool fur, glittering flowers) and look confused when I ask how they could be used for teaching and learning. The reality is that they will join the piles of decaying and dust covered efforts produced by previous generations of trainees. I attended the ‘closing ceremony’ after 2.5 months of training. 4 ½ hours of speeches, followed by singing and dancing and tearful farewells.
Yet more training started on Sunday – a 5 day workshop for science teachers organised by Nepali Academy of Science and Technology. The purpose is to help them make physics materials that they can take back to their schools for practical demonstrations. On the first day they attempted to make electric bells from a power pack and assorted metal strips. After 6 hours of concentrated work, some managed to produce a scratching vibration. They all have excellent scientific knowledge, but so little ‘hands on’ experience. Advice such as ‘try connecting the red wire to the red terminal’ was gratefully received. Day 2 was more hazardous as they attempted to demonstrate Ohm’s Law. The training room was festooned with pieces of wire at head, neck, knee and ankle height, as 30 participants attempted to use the single power socket in the training room. Amazing that we are all still alive.
Three months after the election has seen no change. PM Koirala continues to make all decisions; he announced his resignation 3 weeks ago, but is still PM because only the head of state can accept his resignation. Following the deposing of the king, there is no head of state until the new government elect or select one ….. they have not yet decided how the process should work. And if Koirala becomes the new president, as Nepali Congress want, will he accept his own resignation? The CA has attempted to meet every day, but have not yet managed to conduct a session as dissenting factions with conflicting and increasingly ridiculous demands disrupt proceedings by shouting and chanting. Daily newspaper reports fluctuate between ‘breakthrough imminent’ to ‘no breakthrough in talks’.
A boring last week of finishing off paper work and reports for NCED and VSO, enlivened by lots of people dropping in for a chat. We ate excellent daal bhat at Durga’s house on Tuesday, followed by surfing Nepali TV channels, featuring political news (no news) and Nepali love songs. At 7:30 he asked if we wanted to stay the night, so we realised we had overstayed our welcome. We have been laden with gifts to take to his daughter in London. As the moon was obscured by thunder clouds and there were no street lights we got lost on the way home and became entangled in a wedding procession and the usual Pamplona-like stampede of cows and bulls to feast on the day’s debris at the market.
Govind’s attempts to find a suitably educated match for his lovely daughter Deepti have at last been successful, although he is financially crippled by the 5 lakh dowry (more than 3 years salary). After a week of wedding events, we attended the party on Friday afternoon, panting after our colleagues on their motor bikes to a ‘party palace’. Deepti had disappeared to wash her hair. We sat in a line on plastic chairs for 10 minutes, waiting for the daal bhat to be ready. Before we had finished shovelling rice into our mouths we were summoned to deliver the ‘ETC present’ – yet another rice cooker. A wet haired and exhausted Deepti reappeared; we did not meet her new husband. Within 5 minutes we were back on the bikes and cycling home.
Karna is researching places for his +2 programme (equivalent of sixth form), with long discussions with us each evening and advice from my colleagues. He is taking entrance tests for several different colleges. Term starts next week and we want to get him ‘settled’ before we leave for Kathmandu.
To Kathmandu on July 14, where we will meet our landlord. We think he is trying to sell the house and will not return to Biratnagar. A few days of VSO work and meeting friends before flying to England. Blog will resume when we return at the end of August.
Monday, 23 June 2008
Happy ducks and croaking frogs
The monsoon has arrived with vertical sheets of rain, a profusion of new lakes, happy ducks, croaking frogs from dusk to dawn, wallowing buffaloes and mud, mud, mud.
Madan Nath from NCED arrived last weekend to start a 10 day programme for English ‘master trainers’ from central and eastern Terai. When I arrived at work on Monday morning, the group had already started, having decided a 7am start would enable them to finish for the day before it got really hot. He presented me with a schedule, with my name against delivery of sessions for 3 days. Although I explained that I have no experience of teaching EFL, he seems to think that being a native speaker is enough. It is at least giving me a chance to talk to someone who writes policy and training materials, so I am being very cooperative! Delighted to see some familiar faces amongst the participants, including our friend Rajendra from Ilam. On the second morning, my arrival was described in the daily report: “Madam Deborah joined our training. She is very old, but energetic. She is very marvellous”. One of the biggest challenges is nasta break; while my friends consume daal bhat, I am challenged by a whole ripe mango that I have to try and eat while sustaining a conversation. While my fellow trainers deliver sessions where the intricate differences between grammar-translation and communicative methods are discussed in detail, I have developed games, role plays and other interactive activities.
David leaves for school at 5:30am and I follow an hour later. Once the masters’ training is over, I join the headteachers and / or the secondary English training. I am also trying to get to see the primary teachers on teaching practice, but with 57 in 6 different schools, its impossible to follow that up properly.
Meanwhile the king has left the palace, leaving his mother and concubines behind, presumably to become exhibits in the museum that the Maoists intend to make. Political stagnation continues.
A week later: masters training now over, so my time has been divided between schools in the hope that primary trainees will actually be teaching rather than organising musical chairs (no chairs, lots of mud) or making materials for their ‘exhibition’ – artistic rather than having any relevance to teaching and learning. Back to the ETC at tiffin time to see the secondary English group that I now teach every afternoon. David is back on the day shift so life is returning to some normality. Our friend Anil, a volunteer with an NGO in Kathmandu, arrived on Thursday, having survived the 15 hour bus journey with a colleague to visit a water and sanitation project in Jhapa; nights on a double bed in the office with several others and daal bhat 3 times a day. Strange and delightful to have a friend for a meal and a bottle of wine (the first in Biratnagar!); talking and listening is exhausting after our usual isolation.
A treat this week was a visit to the local girls’ school. I know Mina Pokharel, the deputy head quite well, as she comes to the ETC to train Science teachers. She is a very good trainer, wears beautiful clothes, has short hair (very unusual for Nepali women) and rides a motorbike. Her daughters are at school in India. The head of the school, Bina Koirala, has just completed the headteacher training; she is due to retire next year. Like Mina, she is very smart, with a fantastic sari collection – a different one for every day of the 30 day training. I arrived at school at 9:50 on Thursday morning to find most of the staff present, and 600 girls lining up for assembly. Primary students were in ragged blue dresses, while the secondary students wore blue and white kurta surwaal. Grade 10 girls led Saraswati’s (goddess of education) prayer, followed by the national anthem. It was then grade 6’s turn to pick up the litter on the field before going to class. I met all the staff – 9 women and 8 men, before being taken on a tour of the school and being introduced to every class. Taught grade 6 for part of the lesson before grade 10 English. Delightful, well motivated girls. After a science class with Mina, she showed me the cavernous science lab which resembled Miss Haversham’s house, before going to take her optional computer class. To my amazement there are 5 working computers in a newly refurbished room, with a group of students doing fairly advanced computer graphics. A very enjoyable morning and possibly a place of refuge when things are slack at the ETC.
Newspaper headlines are depressing. After one meeting of the new CA when the republic was declared, there has been no further meeting. Koirala continues to make all decisions; strikes are starting again. One Minister locked six of his junior ministers in a toilet for 3 days because they did not agree with him. Maoists have announced they are quitting the non-existent government. MEd students taking their final exams rampaged when invigilators tried to stop them cheating, attacking teachers, ripping up examination papers and preventing others from completing their exams.
Chhatra, our landlord is back in Kathmandu and phones daily with instructions for Karna, who remains cheerful and is a delight to have around. Yesterday he cycled to India to buy shears to attempt to tame the vegetation in the garden. SLC results (GCSE equivalent) were published on Monday; we were overjoyed to discover that Karna has achieved a first division pass, so discussions about his future are underway. His brother, Durna, has also passed, and is likely to go to Malaysia to earn money, as so many young Nepalis do.
Madan Nath from NCED arrived last weekend to start a 10 day programme for English ‘master trainers’ from central and eastern Terai. When I arrived at work on Monday morning, the group had already started, having decided a 7am start would enable them to finish for the day before it got really hot. He presented me with a schedule, with my name against delivery of sessions for 3 days. Although I explained that I have no experience of teaching EFL, he seems to think that being a native speaker is enough. It is at least giving me a chance to talk to someone who writes policy and training materials, so I am being very cooperative! Delighted to see some familiar faces amongst the participants, including our friend Rajendra from Ilam. On the second morning, my arrival was described in the daily report: “Madam Deborah joined our training. She is very old, but energetic. She is very marvellous”. One of the biggest challenges is nasta break; while my friends consume daal bhat, I am challenged by a whole ripe mango that I have to try and eat while sustaining a conversation. While my fellow trainers deliver sessions where the intricate differences between grammar-translation and communicative methods are discussed in detail, I have developed games, role plays and other interactive activities.
David leaves for school at 5:30am and I follow an hour later. Once the masters’ training is over, I join the headteachers and / or the secondary English training. I am also trying to get to see the primary teachers on teaching practice, but with 57 in 6 different schools, its impossible to follow that up properly.
Meanwhile the king has left the palace, leaving his mother and concubines behind, presumably to become exhibits in the museum that the Maoists intend to make. Political stagnation continues.
A week later: masters training now over, so my time has been divided between schools in the hope that primary trainees will actually be teaching rather than organising musical chairs (no chairs, lots of mud) or making materials for their ‘exhibition’ – artistic rather than having any relevance to teaching and learning. Back to the ETC at tiffin time to see the secondary English group that I now teach every afternoon. David is back on the day shift so life is returning to some normality. Our friend Anil, a volunteer with an NGO in Kathmandu, arrived on Thursday, having survived the 15 hour bus journey with a colleague to visit a water and sanitation project in Jhapa; nights on a double bed in the office with several others and daal bhat 3 times a day. Strange and delightful to have a friend for a meal and a bottle of wine (the first in Biratnagar!); talking and listening is exhausting after our usual isolation.
A treat this week was a visit to the local girls’ school. I know Mina Pokharel, the deputy head quite well, as she comes to the ETC to train Science teachers. She is a very good trainer, wears beautiful clothes, has short hair (very unusual for Nepali women) and rides a motorbike. Her daughters are at school in India. The head of the school, Bina Koirala, has just completed the headteacher training; she is due to retire next year. Like Mina, she is very smart, with a fantastic sari collection – a different one for every day of the 30 day training. I arrived at school at 9:50 on Thursday morning to find most of the staff present, and 600 girls lining up for assembly. Primary students were in ragged blue dresses, while the secondary students wore blue and white kurta surwaal. Grade 10 girls led Saraswati’s (goddess of education) prayer, followed by the national anthem. It was then grade 6’s turn to pick up the litter on the field before going to class. I met all the staff – 9 women and 8 men, before being taken on a tour of the school and being introduced to every class. Taught grade 6 for part of the lesson before grade 10 English. Delightful, well motivated girls. After a science class with Mina, she showed me the cavernous science lab which resembled Miss Haversham’s house, before going to take her optional computer class. To my amazement there are 5 working computers in a newly refurbished room, with a group of students doing fairly advanced computer graphics. A very enjoyable morning and possibly a place of refuge when things are slack at the ETC.
Newspaper headlines are depressing. After one meeting of the new CA when the republic was declared, there has been no further meeting. Koirala continues to make all decisions; strikes are starting again. One Minister locked six of his junior ministers in a toilet for 3 days because they did not agree with him. Maoists have announced they are quitting the non-existent government. MEd students taking their final exams rampaged when invigilators tried to stop them cheating, attacking teachers, ripping up examination papers and preventing others from completing their exams.
Chhatra, our landlord is back in Kathmandu and phones daily with instructions for Karna, who remains cheerful and is a delight to have around. Yesterday he cycled to India to buy shears to attempt to tame the vegetation in the garden. SLC results (GCSE equivalent) were published on Monday; we were overjoyed to discover that Karna has achieved a first division pass, so discussions about his future are underway. His brother, Durna, has also passed, and is likely to go to Malaysia to earn money, as so many young Nepalis do.
Saturday, 7 June 2008
More strikes
David started the early shift at Bokhari on Monday, leaving home at 5:30am. The staff and children were delighted to see him and he enjoyed his day helping to plan teaching and learning for the next two weeks. My primary trainees started their teaching practice; I visited two of the three training schools, and found them excited and working hard on timetables and lesson plans.
Tuesday: David home by 7am as a bandha called for 15 days to protest at the lack of textbooks in schools. There were a number of incidents at the end of last week, with students protesting and the DEO office closed. It seems that the Ministry has called the current action, presumably to divert attention from the fact that they are responsible for the production and distribution of textbooks. Ironically, David has seen his best teaching since the teachers were relieved of the constraints of the textbook. I went to school at 10 to see what was happening in the training schools. All the trainees were at Shankapur with about 30 children, and mothers were bringing new little ones. Most of the regular teachers were there, so we sat in the porch on plastic chairs and chatted about what we might be able to do. My friend Rekha arrived and was delighted to see me as she is timetabled for grade 4 and 5 English this year, and needs help. Some girls who I taught in grade 4 came to chat, and I was dismayed to discover that Sony, the brightest girl in the class has got married (age 12) and will not return to school. Tragic. We spent the morning looking at lessons plans and teaching materials and I returned to the ETC to help sort out a contingency plan.
The government then announced a three day public holiday to coincide with the first session of the new parliament. Training continued at the ETC, while David spent the day converting his alphabet charts from Q is for queen to Q is for queue in recognition of the new republic.
Wednesday Jestha 15 (May 28). The new parliament met and the end of the monarchy and beginning of the Democratic Republic of Nepal was passed by 560 votes to 4. The start of the meeting was delayed by many hours, a few bombs and fears of a military coup. It is likely that Koirala, the 83year old PM, will become a constitutional head of state, and that Prachanda, the Maoist leader, will become PM when they meet again next week.
On the home front, the water problem seems to be resolved at last. A reserve tank with a motor has been installed downstairs so we can pump water to the roof. The non-functional taps in the house have been replaced and the kitchen tap now has proper water flow after the drip drip drip of the last year. Several leaks have appeared in the pipework, but are being fixed. Karna and his brother Durna are living happily upstairs and working hard during the day and studying in the evening. They have been a great help in sorting out the plumbing work, and Karna’s English improves every day.
MoE U turn on Monday when they declared all schools must reopen. Half the staff, 3 trainees, one small child and a dog were at Balmandir across the road from the ETC where I checked first before deciding it was not worth ‘doing the rounds’ on my bicycle. At last I got my ‘training of trainers’ underway, only 90 minutes late. 5 each of English, Nepali and Social Studies part timers arrived on Monday afternoon for allocation of the one month training that starts on Wednesday. The ETC staff also took part; we’ll see if there is any difference. Pandit Guru, the Hindu priest who teaches Nepali has had a makeover. Formally only wearing white – white trousers, kurta, shoes, socks, cap, topped off with a bobble cap on cold days, covering his white hair. Today he was in saffron robes and saffron topi covering bright orange hair.
Teaching resumed in schools in a half hearted way on Wednesday, but few lessons were actually completed and teachers and students didn’t manage to last the whole day. I was delighted to find that the nursery at Balmandir now has some toys and I played happily on the floor with tiny grubby children while waiting for the trainees to go and teach. Sadly at Shankapur, the tinies are put into the grade 1 classroom and there is no provision for them. Helped Kalpana organise a game on Friday, before helping Gita with what turned out to be a really good English lesson with grade 3, once she abandoned her lesson plan. Teaching finished after period 2, when the male trainees decided to take all the students outside for musical chairs. I arrived back at the ETC to find that Durga had taken my suggestions about more variety of activities to heart and had prepared a very good role play activity for the English teachers in the afternoon. On Friday evening, a surprise call from Dinesh, back from 2 months in Qatar, where he worked in tourism, taking Americans and Europeans out into the Arabian Sea on a dhow and organising watersports activities. A huge culture shock for a young man who had never seen the sea. He loved it. The biggest challenge was coping with watching people eat beef at the beach barbecues. He will be sent a work visa and will decide if he is prepared to go for 2 years. There are currently 2m Nepalis working in Qatar – making up more than 20% of the population.
New democratic Nepal is still non-functional, as no agreement can be made and all parties are now threatening to pull out of non-existent government. The king has left the palace, and Koirala continues to make all decisions.
Tuesday: David home by 7am as a bandha called for 15 days to protest at the lack of textbooks in schools. There were a number of incidents at the end of last week, with students protesting and the DEO office closed. It seems that the Ministry has called the current action, presumably to divert attention from the fact that they are responsible for the production and distribution of textbooks. Ironically, David has seen his best teaching since the teachers were relieved of the constraints of the textbook. I went to school at 10 to see what was happening in the training schools. All the trainees were at Shankapur with about 30 children, and mothers were bringing new little ones. Most of the regular teachers were there, so we sat in the porch on plastic chairs and chatted about what we might be able to do. My friend Rekha arrived and was delighted to see me as she is timetabled for grade 4 and 5 English this year, and needs help. Some girls who I taught in grade 4 came to chat, and I was dismayed to discover that Sony, the brightest girl in the class has got married (age 12) and will not return to school. Tragic. We spent the morning looking at lessons plans and teaching materials and I returned to the ETC to help sort out a contingency plan.
The government then announced a three day public holiday to coincide with the first session of the new parliament. Training continued at the ETC, while David spent the day converting his alphabet charts from Q is for queen to Q is for queue in recognition of the new republic.
Wednesday Jestha 15 (May 28). The new parliament met and the end of the monarchy and beginning of the Democratic Republic of Nepal was passed by 560 votes to 4. The start of the meeting was delayed by many hours, a few bombs and fears of a military coup. It is likely that Koirala, the 83year old PM, will become a constitutional head of state, and that Prachanda, the Maoist leader, will become PM when they meet again next week.
On the home front, the water problem seems to be resolved at last. A reserve tank with a motor has been installed downstairs so we can pump water to the roof. The non-functional taps in the house have been replaced and the kitchen tap now has proper water flow after the drip drip drip of the last year. Several leaks have appeared in the pipework, but are being fixed. Karna and his brother Durna are living happily upstairs and working hard during the day and studying in the evening. They have been a great help in sorting out the plumbing work, and Karna’s English improves every day.
MoE U turn on Monday when they declared all schools must reopen. Half the staff, 3 trainees, one small child and a dog were at Balmandir across the road from the ETC where I checked first before deciding it was not worth ‘doing the rounds’ on my bicycle. At last I got my ‘training of trainers’ underway, only 90 minutes late. 5 each of English, Nepali and Social Studies part timers arrived on Monday afternoon for allocation of the one month training that starts on Wednesday. The ETC staff also took part; we’ll see if there is any difference. Pandit Guru, the Hindu priest who teaches Nepali has had a makeover. Formally only wearing white – white trousers, kurta, shoes, socks, cap, topped off with a bobble cap on cold days, covering his white hair. Today he was in saffron robes and saffron topi covering bright orange hair.
Teaching resumed in schools in a half hearted way on Wednesday, but few lessons were actually completed and teachers and students didn’t manage to last the whole day. I was delighted to find that the nursery at Balmandir now has some toys and I played happily on the floor with tiny grubby children while waiting for the trainees to go and teach. Sadly at Shankapur, the tinies are put into the grade 1 classroom and there is no provision for them. Helped Kalpana organise a game on Friday, before helping Gita with what turned out to be a really good English lesson with grade 3, once she abandoned her lesson plan. Teaching finished after period 2, when the male trainees decided to take all the students outside for musical chairs. I arrived back at the ETC to find that Durga had taken my suggestions about more variety of activities to heart and had prepared a very good role play activity for the English teachers in the afternoon. On Friday evening, a surprise call from Dinesh, back from 2 months in Qatar, where he worked in tourism, taking Americans and Europeans out into the Arabian Sea on a dhow and organising watersports activities. A huge culture shock for a young man who had never seen the sea. He loved it. The biggest challenge was coping with watching people eat beef at the beach barbecues. He will be sent a work visa and will decide if he is prepared to go for 2 years. There are currently 2m Nepalis working in Qatar – making up more than 20% of the population.
New democratic Nepal is still non-functional, as no agreement can be made and all parties are now threatening to pull out of non-existent government. The king has left the palace, and Koirala continues to make all decisions.
Wednesday, 28 May 2008
To the hills
On Friday evening to Koshi campus with Durga where he is doing his MEd teaching practice in Applied Linguistics. I am his audio-visual aid. After a hazardous journey on the back of his motorbike in a high wind, we arrived at the campus – an assortment of tin and bamboo roofed rooms around a courtyard. The students, second year BEd English were delightful; the session was highly interactive, with lots of examples. When I emerged, the third year students had set up chairs under a shady tree ‘for conversation’. They have never had the opportunity to talk with a native speaker before, so we talked until the sun set. I will go again.
I have also been enjoying reading Deepti’s masters thesis on control of snail pests in eastern Nepal. It reminds me of A level projects by diligent girls. We spent a morning together discussing possible improvements, but it’s difficult without knowing the expected standard; she wants me to go and meet her supervisor.
We have developed a new system of rubbish disposal, after several weeks of being woken at an early hour by the boy with the cart who comes daily and rings the bell just in case we have anything to get rid of. Leaving the bags outside is an option we tried, but found that the goats got to the rubbish first and scattered it all over the road. We now hang the bags on the metal spikes on the top of the gate. It resembles the Tower of London after a beheading.
The water situation continues to be dire. Chhatra’a sister has now had the pump removed and taken the motor away. With Karna’s help, we have contacted the plumber who did the original work on the house; he has phoned Chhatra in America and has agreed to do the work. He arrived on Monday at 7am and Tuesday at 8am with workmen, but Chhatra’s sister will not supply the materials. Meanwhile the rain falls steadily and sometimes torrentially as a result of the cyclones in the Bay of Bengal. The weather is pleasantly cool.
May 20 Buddha’s birthday was a public holiday, and the headteachers demanded a day off after an exhausting day of action research with me, enlivened by teaching them the hokey cokey. The primary training continued. A noisy evening with temple music on one side and a rock concert on the waste ground at the end of the road on the other.
At the weekend we managed our long planned visit to Ilam at last; we were invited by two enthusiastic teachers we trained last October, but transport strikes and ‘trouble in the hills’ had made the journey impossible. We met Surya, the head of the ETC, at Tulsi’s son’s wedding and he was very keen for us to visit his training centre. It seemed a good way to combine business and pleasure. On Wednesday, the peace following the election was shattered by storms, strikes, burning tyres and police curfews, but Thursday dawned peacefully and we had seats on a bus heading for Itahari before 7am. East along the Mahendra Highway for 3 hours to Birtamod where we changed onto a microbus heading up to Ilam, another 3 hours away. When it was stuffed to bursting point we began the ear popping climb through spectacular wooded hills, causing the girls in front of us to throw up. The top of the ridge was shrouded in mist with thick bamboo forest, abundant cardamom plants and tea gardens. A rapid descent to cross the mighty Mai River, before the final ascent to Ilam. Ilam has been described as ‘the Darjeeling of Nepal’, but apart from the presence of tea there are few similarities. We checked into the Green View Guest House that overlooks a tea garden, ascending a flight of stone steps to a room with two wooden beds with thin cotton mattresses, warm quilts, some camouflage material over the window and a small bathroom with running water. We decided to attempt to locate the ETC ready for our official visit on Friday. As we walked out of town following directions given to us at the guest house, a young man came hurtling down a precipitous slope shouting “You are Deborah; I have seen your picture; can you help me with my action research?” He had just finished a training day and wanted to share his ideas, so he led us to the ETC across a ditch, followed by an undignified scramble up a muddy cliff, where Surya was delighted to see us. The primary teachers were just finishing their day of PE training with some military looking exercises on a small patch of flat ground, and we contacted our friend Rajendra and arranged to meet later. The primary teachers led us back into town and we wandered north and suddenly bumped into Pankaj, the bright eyed young English teacher from our training who I had tried to contact by e-mail to let him know of our arrival. He was so excited and took us on a tour of the town, where he knows everyone and everyone knows him. He has done extraordinarily well; his family are from a small village 2 hours away, where he attended the village school, achieving high enough marks to study for his BA in English, followed by a MEd in Kathmandu. He now teaches +2 (sixth form), does some training at the ETC, runs a communications shop (photocopy, fax, phone. computer) and is a ‘radio jockey’ on the local FM station. It is a bit more than a one horse town; the main street was busy with trotting ponies carrying milk churns from villages in the surrounding hills to the cooperative dairy. Ilam is the centre of cheese production, as well as tea. The main street is lined with shop houses, many with wooden balconies on which plant pots with a spectacular array of geraniums, hydrangea, foxgloves, and fuschia were balanced precariously. An extraordinary number of shops sell women’s sandals.
Rajendra and Pankaj met us in the evening over our daal bhat to help us plan our visit. On Friday morning we returned to the ETC for the final session of a workshop, and we toured Adarsha, Pankaj’s school and Makendra Campus where Rajendra teaches degree students. Then to the Education Office to meet the new DEO; Hari is a charming man, who studied at the Institute of Education in London and in Denmark and Japan. Prompted by Surya, he organised a trip by DEO jeep to Mai Pokhari, a sacred lake for Hindus and a conservation area on Saturday.
Saturday dawned bright and clear with glorious views over the hills, dotted with tiny villages. Rajendra and Pankaj joined us for breakfast, and by the time the jeep arrived around 11:30 the sky was overcast and the mist was swirling through the trees. We rattled past ponies taking their empty churns home and soon came to the end of the tarmac. The next 8km, only possible in 4WD took a bone shaking hour, the rain pelted down and visibility was reduced to 3m. The driver and Hari assisted the windscreen wipers to help find the way. It was impossible to see the lake when we arrived, so we dashed into a wooden tea shop and sat on benches in semi darkness while the rain pounded on the tin roof and fog crept in through the broken plank walls. Our stay was enlivened by plentiful tea and conversation with a group of very wet female students who had come to the lake to celebrate the end of their exams. After an hour, the mist gradually lifted and the rain stopped, so we ventured out into a dripping green landscape and were eventually rewarded with stunning views over to Darjeeling and a pale glimpse of sun. The lake is beautiful, with splendid water lilies and surrounded by pine forest. There are 9 small bays around the lake, each with religious and ecological significance. While our friends did puja, we searched for warty newts and admired the rhododendrons. A young boy accompanied us so we did not get lost, while his brother stayed to roast maize over a fire and his cheerful granny ground it into corn. On our last evening we were joined in the restaurant for our daal bhat by a young deer, apparently a resident on the third floor, and then by Rajendra and Pankaj with presents of tea and photographs to take home.
I have also been enjoying reading Deepti’s masters thesis on control of snail pests in eastern Nepal. It reminds me of A level projects by diligent girls. We spent a morning together discussing possible improvements, but it’s difficult without knowing the expected standard; she wants me to go and meet her supervisor.
We have developed a new system of rubbish disposal, after several weeks of being woken at an early hour by the boy with the cart who comes daily and rings the bell just in case we have anything to get rid of. Leaving the bags outside is an option we tried, but found that the goats got to the rubbish first and scattered it all over the road. We now hang the bags on the metal spikes on the top of the gate. It resembles the Tower of London after a beheading.
The water situation continues to be dire. Chhatra’a sister has now had the pump removed and taken the motor away. With Karna’s help, we have contacted the plumber who did the original work on the house; he has phoned Chhatra in America and has agreed to do the work. He arrived on Monday at 7am and Tuesday at 8am with workmen, but Chhatra’s sister will not supply the materials. Meanwhile the rain falls steadily and sometimes torrentially as a result of the cyclones in the Bay of Bengal. The weather is pleasantly cool.
May 20 Buddha’s birthday was a public holiday, and the headteachers demanded a day off after an exhausting day of action research with me, enlivened by teaching them the hokey cokey. The primary training continued. A noisy evening with temple music on one side and a rock concert on the waste ground at the end of the road on the other.
At the weekend we managed our long planned visit to Ilam at last; we were invited by two enthusiastic teachers we trained last October, but transport strikes and ‘trouble in the hills’ had made the journey impossible. We met Surya, the head of the ETC, at Tulsi’s son’s wedding and he was very keen for us to visit his training centre. It seemed a good way to combine business and pleasure. On Wednesday, the peace following the election was shattered by storms, strikes, burning tyres and police curfews, but Thursday dawned peacefully and we had seats on a bus heading for Itahari before 7am. East along the Mahendra Highway for 3 hours to Birtamod where we changed onto a microbus heading up to Ilam, another 3 hours away. When it was stuffed to bursting point we began the ear popping climb through spectacular wooded hills, causing the girls in front of us to throw up. The top of the ridge was shrouded in mist with thick bamboo forest, abundant cardamom plants and tea gardens. A rapid descent to cross the mighty Mai River, before the final ascent to Ilam. Ilam has been described as ‘the Darjeeling of Nepal’, but apart from the presence of tea there are few similarities. We checked into the Green View Guest House that overlooks a tea garden, ascending a flight of stone steps to a room with two wooden beds with thin cotton mattresses, warm quilts, some camouflage material over the window and a small bathroom with running water. We decided to attempt to locate the ETC ready for our official visit on Friday. As we walked out of town following directions given to us at the guest house, a young man came hurtling down a precipitous slope shouting “You are Deborah; I have seen your picture; can you help me with my action research?” He had just finished a training day and wanted to share his ideas, so he led us to the ETC across a ditch, followed by an undignified scramble up a muddy cliff, where Surya was delighted to see us. The primary teachers were just finishing their day of PE training with some military looking exercises on a small patch of flat ground, and we contacted our friend Rajendra and arranged to meet later. The primary teachers led us back into town and we wandered north and suddenly bumped into Pankaj, the bright eyed young English teacher from our training who I had tried to contact by e-mail to let him know of our arrival. He was so excited and took us on a tour of the town, where he knows everyone and everyone knows him. He has done extraordinarily well; his family are from a small village 2 hours away, where he attended the village school, achieving high enough marks to study for his BA in English, followed by a MEd in Kathmandu. He now teaches +2 (sixth form), does some training at the ETC, runs a communications shop (photocopy, fax, phone. computer) and is a ‘radio jockey’ on the local FM station. It is a bit more than a one horse town; the main street was busy with trotting ponies carrying milk churns from villages in the surrounding hills to the cooperative dairy. Ilam is the centre of cheese production, as well as tea. The main street is lined with shop houses, many with wooden balconies on which plant pots with a spectacular array of geraniums, hydrangea, foxgloves, and fuschia were balanced precariously. An extraordinary number of shops sell women’s sandals.
Rajendra and Pankaj met us in the evening over our daal bhat to help us plan our visit. On Friday morning we returned to the ETC for the final session of a workshop, and we toured Adarsha, Pankaj’s school and Makendra Campus where Rajendra teaches degree students. Then to the Education Office to meet the new DEO; Hari is a charming man, who studied at the Institute of Education in London and in Denmark and Japan. Prompted by Surya, he organised a trip by DEO jeep to Mai Pokhari, a sacred lake for Hindus and a conservation area on Saturday.
Saturday dawned bright and clear with glorious views over the hills, dotted with tiny villages. Rajendra and Pankaj joined us for breakfast, and by the time the jeep arrived around 11:30 the sky was overcast and the mist was swirling through the trees. We rattled past ponies taking their empty churns home and soon came to the end of the tarmac. The next 8km, only possible in 4WD took a bone shaking hour, the rain pelted down and visibility was reduced to 3m. The driver and Hari assisted the windscreen wipers to help find the way. It was impossible to see the lake when we arrived, so we dashed into a wooden tea shop and sat on benches in semi darkness while the rain pounded on the tin roof and fog crept in through the broken plank walls. Our stay was enlivened by plentiful tea and conversation with a group of very wet female students who had come to the lake to celebrate the end of their exams. After an hour, the mist gradually lifted and the rain stopped, so we ventured out into a dripping green landscape and were eventually rewarded with stunning views over to Darjeeling and a pale glimpse of sun. The lake is beautiful, with splendid water lilies and surrounded by pine forest. There are 9 small bays around the lake, each with religious and ecological significance. While our friends did puja, we searched for warty newts and admired the rhododendrons. A young boy accompanied us so we did not get lost, while his brother stayed to roast maize over a fire and his cheerful granny ground it into corn. On our last evening we were joined in the restaurant for our daal bhat by a young deer, apparently a resident on the third floor, and then by Rajendra and Pankaj with presents of tea and photographs to take home.
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