Funny Face Field Trip: Part 3

Behind those funny faces, there is quite a bit of cuteness. 

But behind the innocent looking cuteness, there are sneaky germs galore. 

And now I am sick. 

As sick as a dog dinosaur. 

Sicker than the dinosaurs on Asmita's sweatshirt. 

Bleeeeeeeh.

But oh how I love these little ones! I am head over heels for them!

Loving them and holding them and walking down the street hand in hand is worth the germy mess... because someday, I will speak Nepali well enough to tell them why I love them so much. 

Funny Face Field Trip: Part 2

 This is the actual field trip part of the story.

After we got bored of taking funny face photos, all of the kids decided to show me around the neighborhood so that I could take photos of cool stuff. They pointed out the football (soccer) field, the big tree far far away, and the little hen out on the horizon. When I explained that the tree and the hen were too far away for me to photograph, they decided to take me to the local temple. 

The big kid with the rubber band around his face was the ring-leader, pointing out each little cage thing and making sure that I took a photo of each one. I'm not sure what the significance of the cage is... maybe to protect the gods or the offerings?

I do know that people put offerings inside the cages, and then ring the bells to let the gods know that an offering has been made. I can hear those bells from my bedroom early each morning. 

Look! Asmita found some tikas. 

Asmita is the little girl who wears boy clothes. Last week she wore this awesome dinosaur sweatshirt all week. This week she is sporting a yellow Snoopy hoodie. 

(Tikas are those red dots that women wear between their eyebrows.)

More nasty idols... in a cage.  

Then, the ring-leader set up all of these kids so that I could take a nice photo of them all together. 

Baaah! I love them so much, gang signs and all. 

Funny face field trip: Part 1

*Viewer Discretion is Advised*

Warning: This post contains excessive amounts of snot, crusty noses, and snaggle teeth. I cannot be held responsible for nausea, feelings of grotesqueness, or other side effects that may result in viewing the following photos. 

Sooooo, yesterday I went out for a walk, with the intention of taking a few photos...  but then I was aggressively acosted by several children.
  

I started out taking photos of the kids, and then all of us together....


...and then the following photo happened. And all craziness broke loose.

Check out the little guy in the middle.  Ha-larious.

Once I showed them that photo, they all started seeing how distorted they could make their faces look. Please enjoy the results.

And the winner...

...for the most silly faces...

...is...

(by a landslide)

 DALMATIAN BOY!

  

The End.

Join us next time for Parts 2 & 3.
Because these kids are much cuter than their distorted faces and snotty noses let on. 

Typical Nepali dinner.

Tonight we went next door to our landlord's house for dinner. It was surprisingly not awkward at all, and was actually kind of fun. 

Yesterday they invited us over, and when I asked what time we should come his wife said, "I will call you."

Cool. So this evening we waited for the call. I was expecting her to send one of her sons over to get us, but at around 7 o'clock my phone rang.

"Hello?"
     "Hello!"
"Krishna!"
     "Dinner is ready!"
"Ok, we are coming now."
     "Ok, Hurry up."

Haha. I love Nepali phone conversations... simple and direct. Just my style.

We walked over and his son was standing outside waiting to walk us up to their flat. As soon as I walked inside, I saw Krishna and I busted out laughing. I have zero self control in the laughter department sometimes and tonight I could not get myself to shut up. Krishna was wearing a huge, fuzzy, cheetah print hat that started from his eyebrows and worked itself straight up for about 9 inches.

photo cred: google.com

That's the exact moment when the line between my imagination and my giggle box could not be stopped. All I could see was this tiny Nepali man sitting beneath a huge-changing-of-the-guard-cheetah hat. After about 3 minutes of me laughing he took his hat off. Hmmm. Smart man, that landlord.

Then we were wisked away into the kitchen... but before we could eat, we had to go outside to wash our hands. Duh, Beth, you live in Nepal. Then we went inside and ate Everest sized mountains of rice, with a side of lentils, veggies, and lots of different kinds of chutney.

And by we ate I mean that Cynthia and I ate while Krishna and his wife watched. It's actually really polite, what they were doing. They were making sure that their guests had enough to eat, double checking with us after each bit of rice. After about thirty meals eaten in this fashion, it has become much less awkward.

Then, we went into the living room while Krishna and his wife ate. Again, not awkward.

After dinner there was the typical conversation about America vs. Nepal, made complete by the 60 second intervals of silence. Seriously, though, its not awkward any more.

And then it was time for Krishna to walk us out... and then the hat came back. Bahahahaha.

around the neighborhood

My very favoritest part of the day happens every time I go outside. 

"Deepa! Deepa!"

 I love hearing the kids on the street calling my name (Deepa is my Nepali name). Tonight when I came home the girls down the street were calling me. I ran inside, grabbed my camera, sprinted up to the roof and snapped this photo before heading back outside. 

The view of the Himalayas from my roof. 

I have been wanting an excuse to take some photos of my street, and tonight the mountains gave me a perfect excuse to go outside with my camera.

Football!

Check out the mountains behind those houses!

Then, Laxmi, who talks SO fast that I never understand a single word that she says, wanted a photo together. She is so cool with her little peace sign.  

Laxmi and myself just outside my house.

And then out of nowhere, her friends showed up. So I took a photo of all three of them. 

Laxmi, Ekta, and Shrezana. 

And then this old man, who's name I do not know, was standing there the whole time and kept wanting to see the photos. Somehow, I communicated that I would take his photo if he would like...

He was thrilled with that idea.

So there you have it. A sneak peek at my favorite part of the day: hanging out with my neighbors.

Oh Christmas Tree!

I am writing tonight with a happy heart. I recently received the package that my home-front team worked so hard at putting together for me.


As I was opening the package, Prativa came into my room. She and I gathered Cynthia and we all moved into the kitchen. We put the tree together and C and I got to explain why we celebrate Christmas. It was such a joy! Thank you all for the love that you put into that box!    

When I looked at all of the photos that you guys sent in, I was overwhelmed by your graciousness, generosity, and faith in the One who has us on this journey. Thank you so much for who you are and what you are doing for the Kingdom.

p.s. These are terrible photos of all three of us... but I wanted you to see our tree! Charlie Brown ain't got nothin' on this little guy!

Language lessons learned.

I have reached that point in language learning where I know just enough to be really confused.

For instance, this morning I was waiting for Cynthia so that we could cross the (really busy) street together, so I started talking to a man who was standing next to me. We were standing along the side of a dusty, dirty, busy, dusty road, and He kept asking me to sit down. "Um, clearly there is no place to sit sir." I was really confused.

Theeeeen, about 45 minutes later, we were sitting in language class, and our teacher used that same "sit" verb in a sentence that was not at all about sitting. Woa, Krishna. What the heck is going on with this word today?

Turns out that verb means "to sit," "to stay," and "to live."

Ahhhh! The man on the road was asking me where I live. Hahahaha! Isn't that funny?!

Ok, I guess it's one of those "you had to be there" things....

In other news, I have been romping around the country in my PAJAMAS(!) for the past three months. 

 Yesterday C and I went for a walk around the neighborhood to practice some of our new phrases. We stopped in a tailor shop to say a few things and ask some questions. We were asking about the different kinds of pants and discovered that there are three kinds. The big poofy ones are called 'punjabi pants.' There is also a skinny jean style that I forgot the name of. These two are the most common types of pants for Nepali women. Then we pointed at our straight leg, loose pants that our old tailor made for us and asked him what they are called. "Those we call pajamas."

Wonderful. No wonder everyone laughs at me. I have been wearing green pajama pants all around Nepal. Lesson learned.

And on a final note, I did attempt to take some photos, but I forgot to put my memory card in my camera, so.... yah. No photos.

Photo bomb.

There are exactly two things that you should know about me.

Number 1. As I am walking down the street each day I think to myself, "Self, that thing that you are looking at is really cool. You should take a picture of it."

Number 2. I hate taking out my camera in public. Nothing shouts "FOREIGNER!" to my neighborhood like whipping out a Cannon and snapping a photo of their funny __________. I might as well dress like Zorro and speak Portuguese.

So, consider this my sincere apology for not posting very many photos. I rarely take any pictures in public. Buuuuuuut.... today we went to the tourist part of town.

We needed to get some shawls, and the best deals are downtown. So off we went. And guess who came with? My Cannon.

The tourist area is full of everyone from left-over hippies, ambitious Everest seekers, and skinny Europeans who come here for vacation. Since I don't live near this area, I knew that I would automatically be labeled "tourist" upon first glance. So my camera got to come out to play.

And I took a picture of... drum roll, please...

a sock.

I know.  I know.

You are spending your precious time reading this blog, and all I show you is a sock!? What the hecky-darn? I'm sorry.

But you have to admit that that is a funny sock.

I promise to take some pictures of real life cool stuff this week.

But I have some good news!

Remember why we went to the tourist area?

Well, let me just tell you something. I totally got the best deal ever on my shawl. There was this old man smoking a cigarette, sitting on the top of a stupa. Cynthia was on the other side looking at some shawls over there. So I walked up, looked delightfully at the rows of shawls hanging down from the stupa, and said (IN NEPALI!) "Honorable shop owner, you have a nice shop." I know, I am a suck up. But let me just tell you that I got a killer price on my shawl. When I showed Pratibha (my Nepali housemate), she was like, "What?! That's a good price! Where did you get it!?"

So yah, all of that to say that I will try to take more pictures this week, if I am not too busy studying language... because I am really really loving being able to communicate a tinsey bit in Nepali!

Pariwar

I almost cried when he said it.

"Pariwar."

Here, we call it "pariwar." In English, we call it "family."


This story started a few weeks ago. Cynthia and I have been having some difficulties with our front gate. Someone is always either locked out or locked in. Literally. It is due to bad engineering and no foresight on the landlord's part. For instance, last week we got locked out like three times. And each time got worse. It wouldn't be so bad if it weren't so bad, but it was getting really bad.

 For instance, it's not like we can just ring the doorbell and have Auntie* let us in. Nope. The 'doorbell' is just a facade. So we tried knocking on the gate. Nope. She can't hear us from the back of the house (which is beyond me because I can hear my neighbors hawking loogies all the time! I am not convinced that loogie hawking is louder than our gate knocking.). Then we yelled "Namaste!" "Hello?" "Helloooooooooooo?" Our neighbors and passersby were even getting involved, shouting out advice in Nepali. We looked like crazy people. And we both had to pee.

Needless to say, we needed to sort out this mess.

So tonight we went downstairs and had a talky talk with our housemates. We discussed what we should do to solve the problem. It was pretty simple. Uncle* had an extra key to the other lock! Done.

We have a great relationship with Pratibha, the daughter downstairs, but Uncle gets home late, and we got to bed early, so until tonight, we hadn't even met him yet. And Auntie does not speak English, so our relationship is based on smiles, greetings, and a few conversations translated through Pratibha.

I guess that's why I was so surprised when Uncle said it. 

"No need to feel hesitation in speaking with us. You are not on the outside. We are pariwar."

Ahh. They were words of golden honey. It's funny how a sticky situation can turn out so sweet. We never would have wanted to get locked out of our own house. We never would have asked to be forced to have a talky talk so soon. We never even would have picked this family to live downstairs. But someone "upstairs" knew exactly what He was doing.

So that's it. That's the story of how we became pariwar with the pariwar downstairs. 




*Uncle and Auntie are the Mom and Dad of the family who live downstairs. Culturally, I call older men and women Uncle and Auntie.

Nuwakot

Last week Cynthia and I traveled with our friend to a district called Nuwakot.

We had heard rumors (and read newspaper articles) that this village is a highly trafficked area, so we went to see what it is like. Our goal was to assess the situation and see if it is worth going back to to pursue long term work.

It was sobering.

As we walked through town, I was kind-of in denial. I thought that maybe it was my imagination playing tricks on me. Like, maybe since I have heard all of the rumors and stuff, I was just imagining it all. Maybe it wasn't really as bad as it looked.

But it was.

There were men for miles.

There were women too, it wasn't a ghost town or anything, but they were few and far between. However, most were either married or still in school.

It was a completely different experience than where we have been before, where the villages are made up of mostly women. In those villages, the men have left the country to find work so that they can send money back to their families.


We spent one day walking out to a village to teach English in the village's school. We learned a lot about who we are in the culture, what we have to offer, and what some people are already doing to help their own communities.

I told you this 'kid' was cute!

We still have a TON to learn- we don't even speak Nepali or understand the culture yet. So for now we are learning everything we can and trying to make good friends... I will keep you guys updated... but until then, I will lighten the mood by sharing a photo of a really, really, really cute kid. Enjoy!

Offerings.

I knew that it would only be a matter of time.

I mean, I did move to a Hindu country and I do live in a house with a Hindu family, so I knew that it wouldn't take long. It didn't. Yesterday it happened.

I was served food offered to idols.

I am preeeety sure it happened last week during Tihar as well. As I was up on the roof washing my laundry, my landlord, Krishna, called to me to go down and open the front door.

Miniature fruits and rice bread.

Krishna and his wife gave me a plate of fruit and rice bread. They have terrible English and I have terrible Nepali, so we weren't able to talk too much about their gift, but I know that the rice bread is a Tihar thing (think Christmas cookies). Maybe it was offered to idols. Maybe not. I still don't know.

But yesterday was different. I was siting downstairs with the mom of our housemates (still working on everyone's names) and Pratibha. We were working on some Nepali vocabulary and in walked Krishna's wife with a plate of goodies. The two older ladies talked for a minute, and then the mom took the goodies into the kitchen.

After a few minutes, she came back into the living room with a plate of yogurty stuff and some round flat bread.

Pratibha then told me that Krishna's wife had just done her puja and that she had just offered this food to the god.


I'm not going to tell you what I did, whether or not I ate it.  That's another story for another day. All I can say is that 1 Corinthians rushed through my brain like a blur and I was forced to make a decision... eat or don't eat.

But I am curious... what would you have done?

Locks of love.

Our landlord made us get a zillion locks for all over our house, so now we have a zillion keys.... and they all look the same.

So we color coded our keys with nail polish. 

And now we have locks of love.

 

Aaaaand I am pretty stoked on life right now because our downstairs housemates just came back from the Terai, and oh. my. gosh... I am giddy.

There were fireworks. 

And I did a happy dance. 

And today we are going to raid the guava tree outside.

And, um, stay tuned for more. 

Tihar Eve

Twas the night before Tihar, and all through the town

not a creature was stirring, not even cow brown. 

The lights were all hung on the buildings with care

In hopes that relatives soon would be there...

Tomorrow is another festival! The festival called Tihar. 

Family members are scrambling to the nearest supermarket to pick up tasty treats and each corner is guarded by a man selling candles, garland, and colossal grapefruits. The air is getting cooler and, other than the grapefruits, it feels strangely similar to the final rush before Christmas. 

Cynthia and I decided to try the giant citrus fruit, 

but before we sliced her open, I had a photo shoot. 

It only seems like Christmas sometimes. Tihar has its own little personality. For instance, fireworks. Constant fireworks.

Today, there were about seven little boys lighting fireworks in the wall outside my house! They would stick the little firecracker in a crack, light it, and throw large rocks at it until it blew up! 

I used my best Nepali to say, "That is not good! Enough! Enough!"

Haha, I think that my feeble attempt at speaking Nepali gave them more entertainment than blowing up our wall, so they relented and laughed for a few minutes at each other repeating my words with such a funny accent. 

In the meantime, C and I are heading out of town for a few days for some more cultural immersion... see you soon!

Confessions of a packaholic.

If there is one thing in life that I am not, it is a hipster. 

I'm going to tell it like it is: my glasses are way out of style, my pants are about as baggy as they come, I have zero tattoos, and I have never ever posted a picture of my coffee on the internet.

I am totally not a hipster. 

But there is one thing that I am.

My name is Bethany and I am a packaholic.

Tomorrow is moving day. My suitcases have been packed for exactly four days now in anticipation for the big move. 

For me, it’s not the act of packing that makes me shriek with joy and whistle to myself as I sort things into different pieces of luggage. Let’s be honest; packing in and of itself is not really that cool. It’s not like I get bored and start packing things just for fun. That would be weird. 

The part of packing that makes it such an exuberant experience is that as soon as I finally pull that zipper down and give my bag a few good pats, an adventure is about to begin!  

Such is the case tonight. 

We have been staying in a guesthouse for fifty days. It has been pretty swag. Yet as nice as it has been, I am ready to make the plunge into bucket showers and candlelit electricity. 

You see, packaholism always affects relationships. The constant motion, the distance between myself and loved ones, and the sheer exhaustion of it all has left me somewhat isolated. Skype and e-mails only do so much. My packing levels are high, but my relation levels are low. 

Yet, ironically, I am excited to be packing once more. I am excited because for the first time in a log time, I get to pack for an adventure that I get to keep living. 

 I am excited to live in the same place for more than a few months at a time. I am excited to hang out with my nepali housemates. I am excited to get to know my landlord. I am excited to stay at the little shop across the street for way too long just because I like the little lady that works there. I am excited to have real-life relationships again.

Because I want more than instagrams of coffee, big glasses, and tattoos with like, three meanings. 

I want to love God and love people.

That's why I packed four days ago. That is I why I am a packaholic. 

Sarupani

Here are a few photos I took while in the village. Enjoy!

Cynthia taking a photo of the mountains.

Beautiful.

Haha. This lady asked me to go get my camera so we could have a photo together. 

Sneaking a photo of this shy girl. 

Pure joy. 

This kid was full of personality.

Frisbee!

The mermaid and the marble.

When we got here, we were a big homeless mess. 

Now, after six weeks, I can gladly say that we are no longer homeless. Holla!

However, we are still a big mess. We are technically not homeless, but can't move in until we have some means of survival put into place.  Pretty much we need some form of something other than cement to to sleep on (and a blanket would be nice) and a way to feed and water ourselves. 

But don't worry. Because now we have a mermaid. 

Yah, we bought a turquoise refrigerator. It was marked down because nobody wanted such an outlandish color, so guess who scored a little-mermaid colored block of wonderfulness to keep her lunch meat cold? This girl. 

(And that's a joke... there is no lunch meat in this country). 

And that, my friends, is how we came to have a mermaid in our kitchen. 

Now about the marble. I didn't really want to tell you guys because I was afraid you might judge me, like, because of my job and everything. But um, well, we have a marble staircase. But wait! Stop! Remember how you are supposed to suspend your judgement?!

Marble is like, totally cheaper and more available than wood here. It is even used on the outside steps of old shops. So no worries, folks. Besides... we don't even have hot water in our showers

 or light sockets 

or closets

or a washing machine 

or an oven 

or flooring (other than the marble on the stairs) 

so give me a little grace. 

10 Tips for Village Visits

I have put together 10 essential tips for you... you know, for the next time you go visit a village.

1. Walk to your destination.

Waiting for our bus to get fixed for the third time. 

I don't care how far away or how many meters above sea level your destination is. Walk there. I guarantee that it will be faster, more enjoyable, and your chances of survival will be exponentially higher than if you were to ride a bus.

On the way to our destination, the bus broke down three times. On the way back to Kathmandu,  it took us ten hours to go 100 miles. That's 10 miles per hour, folks.

Did I mention that we were traveling during the biggest holiday of the year? The holiday where you are practically required to go back to your village and visit your family? Did I mention that there were about 100 people inside our bus and nearly as many riding on the roof? Oh, and did I tell you about the grandma who was sitting in the aisle next to me who was gripping my knee with her toes? Or the guy standing behind me who kept falling asleep on my head? Or the countless elbows who made their home in each of the crevices of my ribcage?

I probably forgot to mention that because I am so thankful to be alive. There were literally times when we could look down out of the window and see a 500 foot drop off below... which is probably why grandma had a death grip on me with her toes.


2. If you refuse to walk, at least have a return bus ticket.

You should probably purchase a return bus ticket before you decide to ride a bus to the end of the road in the middle of nowhere. But you were probably already planning on doing that, right?

We had this crazy idea in our minds that we would leave to go home on Saturday. Nope. No bus tickets till at least Tuesday.... remember that whole holiday thing?

Tuesday we walked the two hours down the mountain to get to the bus stop. Only it didn't take two hours. We were practically sprinting and it took four hours. And we missed the bus. So since the next bus was not leaving until the next day, we spent the night at a tea house and tried to buy a ticket on Wednesday morning.

The view from the tea house window. 

Wednesday morning rolled around and we were up before our alarms... only to find out that there were no seats left on the bus!

But wait. There were still some tickets available for us to stand in the aisle. Score.

Here's the thing though. Nepali people are way too generous and way too kind. We accidentally sat in some peoples' seats before the bus got full, and since they saw that we were foreigners, and that we clearly had no idea what was happening, they made sure that we stayed in those seats for the whole ten hours.

It was pretty stinkin' humbling.

3. When you are asked to dance at a PTA meeting on the side of a mountain, don't hold back. Give it all you've got. 

This one is pretty self explanatory. Just dance like a crazy person. You won't regret it. 

4. Bring earplugs. 

It is very likely that there will be several friendly mice running around inside your bamboo cottage during the night. I have found that earplugs make it much easier to pretend that the mice are not really there. 

5. Do not refuse food. 

Actually, I think that it will be impossible for you to refuse hospitality from anyone. Your host will probably give you sad puppy dog eyes and sweetly convince you that it is the best thing for you to take what she has just offered you.

Even if she offers you ten heaps of rice. Or warm buffalo milk. Or baby bumble bee larvae. 

Buffalo curds. Mmmm, tasty!

I'm not even kidding you. I freaked out so bad when I ate those baby bumble bees. I screamed and spit it out so fast that nobody was even offended because we were all laughing so hard. Except me. I was not laughing so hard. I was making sure there were no baby bumble bees stuck in my teeth. 

6. Suspend your judgement.

If you want to cross the bridge to understanding a foreign culture, realize that you know nothing about why these people do the things that they do. Don't judge. Just watch and learn. You will have plenty of time to form conclusions later, I promise.

A bridge we crossed on our way up the mountain.

I would have saved myself a lot of heartache if I had suspended judgement. For instance, I got really frustrated that our hosts were making a little girl carry a heavy basket up a mountain while they didn't carry anything. Then I learned that the little girl isn't really as young as she looks.  I learned that she works to pay for her own school tuition because her dad is a drunk. I also learned that our hostess only has one foot. And then that same hostess took Cynthia's backpack so that her guest could walk up the mountain more easily. And then I felt really, really, really stupid for judging such amazing people for being so awesome because I was too culture-blind to see what was really going on.

7. Try to speak Nepali.

Practicing your language skills is the quickest way to make friends. You will get laughed at, told that you are saying your words incorrectly, and will accidentally tell the buffalo to get married.

It's ok, just keep at it.

8. Let your heart be broken.

It's gonna hurt. When you see the brokenness around you, and you recognize your inability to do anything to change it, don't fight the feelings. Let your heart break. Because that is what is going to lead you to number 9. And number 9 is what is going to make a difference in people's lives.

9. Pray.

Psalm 19 

Pray a lot.

Listen to God.

Pray with the brothers and sisters for people to get healed and then rejoice with one another when God does it (yes He did... four times).

Praise God for the glory that He displays all around you.

Pray for the ones whom you have come to love so much who still do not know Him.


10. Don't resist the refining process. 

The lack of cleanliness, the missed busses, the constant stares, the mice, and the bumble bees are going to send you into a place that you have never been before. You will drift way beyond the end of your rope.

Don't be afraid to fall.

God will catch you.

And you will love what that feels like when He does.