Nepal 03.09.2015 - 15.09.2015
Day 1 - 03.09.2015
by Nadine
Diversity, opportunities and organised chaos - these are the key words which sum up our first day in Nepal. Actually, it wasn't our real first day here, as everyone arrived one or two days earlier. So we already got our first impressions before the study trip programme had begun. Nevertheless, there were still a lot of new impressions today, such as a first real Nepali breakfast, an insight into the Nepali language and the traffic system. Organised chaos - this is the best word for the system and it was also one of the first sentences from Anil Chitrakar, founder of ECCA & co-founder of Himalayan Climate Initiative, whom we met today. He gave us a brief introduction of Nepali history and culture. His statements were clear and for some of us sometimes a bit confusing. For example, he said that Nepal is not an underdeveloped country. After listening to him for some more minutes it became clear that he in general is critical about using trite phrases like 'developed - underdeveloped'. Mr. Chitrakar's speech offered many new perspectives and food for thought and conveyed a general sense of optimism. The latter could best be summarized using the folllowing statement of his: the past is history, the future is a mistery, but the present is a gift.
You always wanted to learn Nepali language? First, one fact: There are 126 different languages here and so - as Anil Chitrakar said - 126 different identities. We got a brief and a bit confusing language lesson from a Nepali English teacher. For example, he told us that the action word always comes at the end of the sentence, which offers an insight into just how different the languages work than the ones we are accustomed to. After this lesson we had lunch at our current homestay, the Bodhi guest house with the traditional Nepali food Dhal Bhat. After lunch we drove to the Durbar Square. The place is famous for his temples. There we had a guided tour and the guide told us about the different styles of architecture and about the meanings of the various sculptures. As it is tradition in Nepal to come late, we also were late and had to hurry a bit. In the morning, Anil told us a joke that Nepali make when talking about Switzerland: 'You guys have all the watches but we have time.' This joke is not very suprising because in Nepal you really NEED time, especially during rush hour. So, also not surprinsingly, we were stuck in traffic on our way to dinner in Thamel. Finally arriving there, we had dinner in Mahabir while listening to Dr. Mahabir Pun. He told us about different projects he is enganged in. Dr. Pun seems to be a very creative and active man as is his way of thinking. Someone asked him how he generates money for his projects. His answer: with the idea comes the money and with money come more ideas. The dinner at Mahabir was almost the end of a very impressive and interesting day. At the very end we had another two quite interesting expriences: First, something that took us a bit by surprise, we had to learn that it is strictly prohibited playing cards in restaurants. Second, a more pleasant thing: after 9 pm there is no more organised chaos in the streets. With this last impression our first real day in Nepal and with it the first day of the study trip, came to an end.
Day 2 - 04.09.2015
by Rea
The day started with an adventurous journey from Kathmandu to Phoolbari village. Beginning in the crowded roads of Kathmandu, the trip took us through large rice fields, past goats and cows and villages until we finally reached Phoolbari, located in much higher altitudes than the capital. Here the first rural part of our nepal adventure would take place. While some of us where having quite some fun on the shaky road, others seemed to be slightly frightened. But in the end we all arrived safely at the Maturissower English Boarding School MEBS, where a huge welcome celebration was waiting for us. The call for financial support for two local projects prior to the trip raised enough money so that books, schoolbags and a computer for the school could be funded. The school celebrated the opening of the new library and bid us a warm welcome. The kids gave us flowers and sang and danced for us and from the school team we got scarves and so called Topis, a traditional hat for Nepali men. A highlight was that we were given our first "Tikka" which is a blessing and brings luck. During the Tikka you get a point of red rice on your forehead. After playing some games with the kids (they knew "Zeitungslesen" already) we took a short walk to the community where the second Tikka followed. The community hosted us for the next two days. After some tea we formed groups to decide which team of two was going to work with which family. In addition to the equipment for the school some of the funds were used to support a rainwater harvesting project, an essential part of which is to plant trees. The group could help select some of the trees and assist in planting them. We first formed the groups in our Swiss-way which took us around 2 minutes but Bjijai, our Nepali team-leader decided to form groups in a Nepali-way which took us about half an hour but was all the more fun. Still everyone got a family in the end, and the respective teams were invited to drink tea. In Phoolbari the destruction caused by the earthquake is still really visible and the families showed us the damage at their houses and the shelters they built to sleep in. Even if the kitchen of the house is often still used no one we met in Poolbari would sleep in their old houses. They are too scared by the possibility of another quake which could catch them during the night. In the evening we ate the traditional Dhal Bhat, which means lentils and rice, with some other dishes as well. It was our first meal in Nepal which we were eating by hand and even if our hands were a bit yellow afterwards, I think we succeeded pretty well.
Day 3 - 05.09.2015
by Claudia
This day we woke up in Phooolbari with the nice sounds of a rural place: goats bleaking and children playing. After a warm, little breakfast we went off for a demonstration of how to build a pond for saving water: rainwater harvesting. There are more than 60 ponds that store about 60'000 liters of water each. For the community these over 60 ponds mean a lot: in the rainy season, they can save water for the dry period and give the people the possibility to save money by not having to buy water which is needed to cultivate their land. Furthermore, the ponds help the farmers every day. The next natural spring is further downhill, which would mean about 2000 trips by foot a year to collect the necessary amount of water. So the rainwater harvesting can safe a lot of time and dratically reduce the work needed for getting hold of the water. Next point on our schedule was again a tradtitional dish: brunch at 9.30 with Dhal Bhat, some beans and maize. After that, we and some of the family members went down for a introduction and training about planting trees at Everything Organic Nursery. The demonstration showes an organic way to cultivate and harvest fruit and nut trees in this area. Before starting this adventure the next day, everyone of us got an informative, short introduction which alowes us now to talk about bone meal like farmers ;-) . For the farmers who normally cultivate beans, maize, some vegetables and a little amount of fruits, the trees will be very useful in a few years and so the conversations switched a few times between English and Nepali for further explanations.This part of the programme has been followed by actually planting a tree as a symbolic example - but in Nepali style: some helping, some phoning, all talking and we from IFIL standing beside without any clue what and how we could help. In the end, a nice place had been found and in a few years a beautiful almond tree is hopefully going to spend nuts.
Then finally we got a few trees to carry up with us: almonds, apples, avocado and so on. A little bit exhausted but curious how the planting will be within that steep ground we afterwards had the chance to listen to traditional Nepali music and dancing in the evening. A few of us also tried their best at dancing to the Nepali songs and singing some Swiss Evergreens. After we had an insight into how nepali women dance we decided that they performed in such an amazing way that we better gonna stop and just enjoy the rest of the evening not moving around too much.
Day 4 - 06.09.2015
by Muriel
As usual, the day began with a nepali breakfast consisting of channa dhal (cooked chickpeas), beaten rice and milk. Soon after, our hostfamilies picked us up so we could start planting the trees. Many families had already digged the 1 meter deep holes hence the hardest work had already been done. However we could still help refilling the wholes by collecting dried biomass, green biomass and compost. It was remarkable to experience how people with different cultural background and languages could work together without any problems. We hope that the trees will grow quickly and will make a tangible contribution to a higher standard of living in the community.
After saying goodbye to the host families we headed back to Kathmandu. On our way we stopped in Bhaktapur, one of the former kingdoms in the Kathmandu valley. There we saw the largest temple of nepal which was built in the 7th century. It is truly a miracle that this beautiful building survived the recent earthquake. Our guide told us that there are two possible explanations for that. It could either have survived because of its symetric construction or because of the gods that protected the temples. Either way, many other houses in this area did not sustain. We could see collapsed and damaged houses everywhere. The distruction and poverty in this part of kathmandu was very touching, however the people still had a positive attitude. After this long day we went back to our guesthouse in Bodha and enjoyed typical nepali momos and lemon tea.
Day 5 - 07.09.2015
by Pascal
Today we met two activists from NITI foundation, a NGO that facilitates policy making by providing platforms, data and studies and by bringing stakeholders together. In a extraordinarily informative talk they gave us an insight into the functioning of Nepali government, which they called "a fortress", i.e. hard to even get a mere idea of. They identified three core problems of Nepali politics: 1. The representation issue: Nepalis apparently don't vote for political agendas, but for kin or simply for the one who buys them a beer and a warm meal. 2. The implementation issue: even materially good policies are not implemented properly because they are top down orders and therefore lack acceptance. As an example they quoted a law regarding earthquake secure building. From a Swiss perspective I think Nepal clearly should have something like our "Vernehmlassungsverfahren". 3. A lack of accountability whick results in the misuse of power and public financial resources for private or particular interests, or in short: corruption. Furthermore the NITRI experts emphasized the institutional barriers that prevent Napali from using Nepal's prime resource: hydropower. Due to the lack of a functioning procedure to receive building permits, often protests occur when the building machines turn up. Villagers then block roads and demand absurd benefits, like a volleyball field, then volleyball shoes, then a museum...
Later we met Nepali students, activists and two members of parliament to discuss being youth in nepal as compared to being youth in switzerland. Here third and first world perspectives collided. The Nepali youth have few options, usually they can chose either to stay in the village and be subsistence farmers or going to the city or abroad an accepting literally any job offered - in spite of a very hard earned, good education. Swiss youth on the other hand are normally overwhelmed by the many options they have. While they have no choice, we have all the possibilities. Yet everyone agreed that with a modern constitution soon to come and a political stability economic prosperity will come and better Nepali youth's perspective. MP Ranjeet Karn also confirmed what we had heard regarding the representation and the accountability issue. He daily receives plenty of calls, all demanding personal favours from him, e.g. a job in government or in the army, never any suggesting policies. All in all it was a very informative day with lots of thought-provoking inputs which also dominated our discussions among each other during the dinner with which the day finally came to a pleasant end.
Day 6 - 08.09.2015
by Anouk
Today we left Kathmandu very early. At 6 am we hopped on the bus to Pokhara. After we left the dusty and loud city behind us the real fun part of our journey started. If you've never been on nepali roads let me explain it in some words: lot's and i really mean lot's of honking, cows, goats and other animals on the street, people walking on the streets (and no, there are no sidewalks of course), motocyclist driving how they want and where they want. That also explains a bit why there are a lot of dangerous overtaking manoeuvre. Therefore our bus trip was quite exciting. Althought some of us still managed to get some sleep. We stopped in Pokhara for a quick lunch and then continued our bus ride to the village Bhadaure, where we would spent the next two nights. Actually we didn't drive to the village. We got out of the bus some miles away from the village and had to walk the rest of the way. It would have been quite a nice walk and eventhough we had to carry all of our luggage we would have managed it just fine, IF it hadn't started raining the minute we got out of the bus. In the beginning we didn't really mind because we all had our raincoats but then the rain really got started. It literally felt like someone started emptying buckets full of water from the sky. So we all arrived fully soaked in the village. I'm not sure if someone was still wearing one piece of dry clothes, when we arrived. We had a warm welcome from the village's eldest and the host mum. That means we got a thika (some colored rice) pressed to our forehead and recieved some nicely prepeared flower. After putting on dry clothes we gathered together and some snacks and welcome drinks were served. The welcome drink was a speciality of the village, some local brewed liquor, which most of us didn't manage to finish, because it was really special. But our mood got better when we saw the snacks arriving; french fries and something which tasted like popcorn! Before dinner they let us try their local beer. Some of us were looking forward to a good glas of beer instead we got a cup filled with a drink, which only had very little to do with beer, only the taste of alcohol I'd say. So a long day came to an end and everyone was very happy to jump into a dry bed
Day 7 - 09.09.2015
by Bettina
As Bijay told us in the beginning, there is usually a honeymoon phase and a hostility phase during a longer trip. We reached the hostility phase exactly in the middle of our trip. The plan was to hike all up to Panchase hill. It all started well with a delicious naan and dhal. Then we started walking with a short stop in a shop, to fill up on cookies, before the trail really started. Some already started hiking with a guide infront, but after a short while we realised that a big part of the group was missing. So we stopped and waited. After a while Rebekka and a few other reached us and informed us that some of the group started walking in the wrong direction and they were still missing as the connection with the phone was quite bad. Then we had to decide if we wanted to return or if we wanted to hike up. As the weather was not that nice, correctly saying it has been really really foggy and there was not really hope that it will change later in the day. Therefore a bunch decided to go down. For the ones who returned it was quite a lazzy day, lot of tea drinking a short hike on top of the hill behind the house, and watch the geese and pigeons enjoy a happy country live/love. As time went by we started worrying about the others as it started to rain heavy. And we were told the day before that it was dangerous to walk down during the rain as it is really slippery then. At around six some really wet people returned. The highlight of the long hike beside the beautiful almost rainforestly looking nature was the small stupa on top of the hill and they saw leopard shit, the closest we all got to a leopard during this trip.
In the evening we could again enjoy a cultural programm with music and singing and dancing. Our dancing already slightly improved. The most interesting differences was that in the second village the women were the ones having "the power". Another funny thing is that as a boy when you want to have a chance with a girl you should be a good dancer. As thats how dating works for them, Different villages get invited and they sing and play music and of course they dance. By the way did you ever have the chance to try fried alcohol? We did try some alcohol made out of rice and there was also fried rice inside. So it is kind of like beer and chips all in one just like nepali style. After an interesting and for some also an exhausting day we went almost dancing to our rooms and fell asleep happy.
Day 8 - 10.09.2015
by Andrea
At the early morning we left the Gurung village Bhadaure and got a goodbye ceremony with the typical red tika. After an adventurous and bumpy trip by jeep one part of the group visited a Tibetan Buddhist monestery in a village of Tibetan refugees. After the visit this group continued by local bus and by jeep to get to the river Mordi. The other part of the group went to a five hours hike. They enjoyed the landscape and finished their journey with a bath in the river Mordi. Both groups met there again at the river Mordi and so we continued the last 30 minutes to our final destination - called Rivan - together. On our last part of the journey, through the beautiful landscape with endless rice fields, we passed a suspension bridge - which wasn't that easy for some of us because of their fear of height but finally we all reached the other side of the bridge...pretty proud. After that we were waiting under a small kiosk in Rivan for the rain to stop and Tulsi to come. Drinking tea, playing "Werwolves" and buying so much sweets and snacks we were sure, that this must have been a very good day for the kiosk owner. After the rain stopped Tulsi - one of our co-organisators - arrived. He grew up in the village of Rivan and carries since 2010 together with friends an organic farm in Rivan called "Sati Farm" ("sati" means "friends" in Nepali). When we arrived at Sati Farm it has already become dark. We got some good food, listened to western as well to Nepali and typical Swiss music and went full and happy in our tents to get some sleep.
Day 9 - 11.09.2015
by Nadine
Good morning and welcome to the farm! So, how is it to wake up at a Nepalis farm? Got up here was quite easy and chilly. Some of us relaxed, some went down the hill for morning yoga. Especially the laugh training was funny. After doing sports the whole group got a very delicious breakfast - coffee, tea, banana pancake with a wonderful tasty apple jam. Next point on our programm was walking from the farm up to the village. Again a similar question: how is it to walk up from a Nepalis farm up to the village? First of all: Namaste, Namaste, Namaste - greetings from everywhere. Second: be cautious of leeches, branches that hang losely from trees, dog shit and slivery. Approximately at the half of our way we reached a beautiful place where local people usually enjoy the morning sun. This place is called Gham Tapne Deef. Our cautiousness on the way to the village was not at all successful. When we reached the village there was everywhere blood from the leeches. But not everyone got bites, so we developed a theory: the more sweets you eat the less bites you will get. Why this theory? Two of our group usually eat almost no sweets and these two got a lot of bites.
What is the activity Nepalis most do? Exactly, it is drinking tea and eating. Not a while after we came back from the farm we were already eating lunch. The excellent cook prepared once again Dhal Bhat. After lunch, Tulsi gave us the afternoon off to do what we want. Some of us read a book, some went down to the river for a refreshment and some just relaxed.
The last similar question for today is: how is it to make a BBQ at a Nepalis farm? The beginning: ash flew all around the place and as it is swiss style everybody became angry about that. So it didn't took a long time until the Nepalis were all alone around the grill. The middle part: the group recovered from the ash attack and gathered around the grill. A little chaos of distributing the food started but after a while everyone got a very delicious meal. Finally the end: we were all very full and satisfied we went to bed.
Day 10 - 12.09.2015
by Sandra
Raindrops keep fallin' on my head... - some may now remember the Oscar award-winning song of B. J. Thomas whereas this was the first thing we all thaught when we got out of our tents at Tulsis farm this morning of departure, even before the crack of dawn. After a short breakfast, which should give us the energy to survive our journey to Pokhara, we all tried to get more or less waterproof and left behind Tulsi, his friends and his farm. One last time we faced the leeches and the muddy pathways and fighted our way to the coffeehouse where the jeep was already waiting for us. So we started our journey in direction Pokhara, following the credo: the bumpier the street the jumpier the people in the car.
Arriving in Pokhara was like arriving in the slurmonkeyland; beds, toilets, warm water, and some dry patches to put our backpacks on, not to forget all the appetisingly restaurants and cafes of course!
We all enjoyed our day off in Pokhara - some by shopping others by just sitting in a cafe or even by rowing in a boat over the lake. As the day went by, the rain stopped and for some short magic minutes even the mountains were sneeking out of the clouds.
In the evening we got the chance to meet with one of the three sisters from "Lucky Chetri" - the first and only female trekking company for women from women. But this orgnisation goes far more further than just make female trekkers comfortable. It is about emopwering women in Nepal, extend social boundaries and provide employment opportunities for socially and geographically disadvantaged women.
This potburri of a day, with rain, bumpy roads, interesting facts, shopping, eating and a lot more, came to an end with a delicious dinner and some very interesting insights in nepali way of partying ;)
Day 11 - 13.09.2015
by Rebekka
After having breakfast in a tiny French cafe right next to our guesthouse we jumped back on the bus and headed towards a small hill at the other side of the Pewa lake. All of us where pretty happy that the bus trove us up the hill and we only had to hike the last bit of it to reach the Peace Pagoda – one of worldwide 80 monuments designed to provide a focus for people of all races and creeds, and to help unite them in their search for world peace. From up there we had the chance to have a glimpse at the impressive Himalayan range hiding behind the clouds. Even though we didn’t have the full view of the range due to the after monsoon-season-clouds it was quite impressive to see how huge they are. Our next stop where the Devi falls. As most of us expected to see some kind of waterfall we were surprised to see something reminding us of a small Aareschlucht. Nevertheless it was impressive to see the strength of water. But due to the fact that on the way to the Devi falls the news hit us that there was bandha – Nepal strike – on the road from Pokhara to Kathmandu, the mood of the group wasn’t in such a good place. As an end of the strike didn’t seem to be in sight we decided to visit some other lake close by. After trying to fill our time by eating, sleeping and playing card most of us got lazy and annoyed from waiting. And as we did not receive any good news regarding the strike we decided to drive back to Pokhara to pass our time over there. On the way we started to discuss the possibility of taking a flight back to Kathmandu as four of the group really had to be there by the 14th to catch their flights on the 15th. Just at the moment we decided to check our options at the travel agency the good news, that the strike was over and the roads where open again reached us, so we pulled the bus over and where finally heading towards Kathmandu. Due to our delay we reached the guesthouse in Kathmandu pretty late. After a long, bumpy ride with a lot of honking and too much traffic we were happy to see the stuffs smiley faces and some delicious momos waiting for us.
Day 12 - 14.09.2015
by Claudia und Rea
The place around Lalitpur is known for his high internationality. This morning we were there and happy to meet one of these experts: Jürg Merz from Switzerland . He's the international program advisor of Helvetas and since 1998 in Nepal. Whoever's sympathy hadn't already been awake beforehand - at the latest when he arrived at 9.01 by bycicle, he had impressed us all. Jürg spoke on the one hand about his personal life in Nepal and on the other hand about the Helvetas development program. Since Helvetas has started, Nepal has always been the biggest national program. Besides water, nuts, agriculture and coffee projects, trail bridges are their flagship and get built now by Nepali all over the world. Furthermore Helevtas played an important role at the emercency help as well as in rebuilding houses and infrastructure after the earthquake. Jürg also cleared some general questions about NGO work in Nepal: since the number grew steadily the particular interests became more and important and now it's sometimes harder to get the permits for projects. As an important point he mentioned that one of Helvetas' main goals is to involve Nepali people as much as possible.
Afterwards we visited Swayambhunath, the 2nd biggest Stupa which is throning over the rest of Kathmandu and known as the Monkey Temple. We soon realised why it got this name. There were a lot of monkeys playing around even during the holy festival which was taking place during our visit. Once again we experienced why 'organised chaos' is a perfect description for Kathmandu.
Later on, Bijay brought us to a private spice and herbs shop. Stuffed with masala tea, ginger and lentils for the whole neighbourhood we went back to our guesthouse.
In the evening time we had the opportunity to visit one of the holiest and at the same time for us most unusual experiences: Pashupathina. The crementory shows the high importance of Hinduism in the daily life of people. Saying goodby to a relative is more public and linked to many more rituals than we are used to at home.
Day 13 - 15.09.2015
by Andrea
In the morning we met Peter Effenberger. An agronomist and the leader of a Demeter project which sells tea and incenses. Peter told us from his ideology and what difficulties he had to face and still hast o face in Nepali agriculture. After we had a look at the production, we went for lunch somewhere in Boudha. It was our last Daal Bhat.
And it was delicious as hell.
In the afternoon we arrived at our guesthouse and spent our last hours together with packing, playing frisbee, sitting around, doing our last shopping and bargaining in Boudha and turning the prayer wheels for the very last time. Before some of us left, we also had a review all together. We were all very grateful to had Bijay and Rebekka always around us who organized together with Tulsi (who appeared and disappeared like a magician from time to time;)) this trip full of interesting and inputs and beautiful, breathtaking impressions and little adventures. We all received a mini prayer wheel from our organisators for being such good group members while they received our warmth and mercy at the feedback round ;) Actually they did a great job and without them we all hadn’t had the possibility to had those great experiences! So we were really, really happy and greatful that they were realizing this trip in spite of the earthquake!
SO AT THIS POINT: ONE MORE TIME: THANK YOU SOOOOO MUCH FOR YOUR COMMITMENT!!!
At six o’clock four of us had to leave to the airport while the rest of us will still stay for a couple of days or even weeks. Bumping my last time through the loud and chaotic streets of Kathmandu – which was also the first thing, I experienced here -- this last ride made me think of all the things we saw, felt, heard, smelt, tasted, lived, walked, danced and laughed together. There was a trace of sadness and nostalgia in the atmosphere while leaving this city, this country, this people, this culture.
But at the same time a warm and happy feeling overcame me because I thought of all the memories that no one will ever be able to take away from me.
And there was this certainty that this trip was one of the best decisions I have made so far.
Dhanyabad & Namaskar, dear Nepal!