Wonder Dog

Yesterday, a strange package was found with wires sticking out of it in front of the Nepali Army offices. Could it be a bomb? Hadn't the country gotten past this with last weeks' agreements?

The air was thick with tension. The area was sealed off. They called in the bomb squad and their robot (who knew they had such a thing!). A street dog was observing the goings on. Finally, he (the dog not the robot) did what dogs do...went to check out the bomb/bag. He decided it was worth investigating in private (you never know who may want to steal your stuff!). Can you imagine the panic in the crowd (which you can see was quite large) as the dog started to walk away with the potential bomb.

Turns out the dog was right...harmless bag.

Smart Goat

We were waiting for a bus yesterday when we looked over at a humorous sight: three guys trying to hold onto their goat who was doing its best to kick each of them. One guy finally got hold of its legs, another its horns. The third guys was standing kind of strangely astride of the goat. Next thing you know, he has the machete over his head. I turned my head just as the machete struck the goats neck. Got to give the goat credit for figuring out what was going to happen I guess.

Just helpin'

The students in my school took their exams this week and I had to give the oral part of my test. I was shocked by the overt cheating. When marking tests, I could see 11 students who had obviously copied each other.

I decided to do a survey to see how much cheating was hapening. I asked 110 students in classes 7, 8, and 9 a series of questions. The most shocking response was that 105 students said that they cheated on tests. I do not know what to do since now I am making the 11 students retake their exams for being less skilled cheaters then the rest of the students.

Never mind

Pakistan being a neighbor of Nepal, Benazir Bhutto's death was huge news here. Roads were closed by protesters between major cities of course. This hapens all the time including once to protest a chicken being run over. This, of course, is much bigger and sadder news. My note of hope yesterday seems to be a little too optimistic.

Season of Hope

If someone would have told me in January that in December we would be talking about

• the speed of US pullout in Iraq because of the progress
• the speed of normalization of relations with North Korea because of their agreeing to the commitments they have made
• that bird flu would still be a fear, but not a major one
• the US and China (the biggest contributors towards global warming) seem to be willing to talk about the issue in a serious manner
• that Iran may not be developing a nuclear bomb after all

I would ask them what they were smoking.

There is a long way to go on all of these matters, but with so much good news it maybe this is a good time of year to look at what has happened and feel some hope.

Christmas

There was no sign of Christmas here, so we just marked some papers for my students. Not too exciting but it was fine for us.

A huge day...or not.

Today's paper trumpeted an agreement to declare Nepal a republic and end the monarchy. The Maoaist have agreed to rejoin the government. All the parties agreed to have elections in April to have the public confirm the decisions.

It is huge news and from what I see and hear it is not being seen as a monumental event. I guess people have heard so many promises from politicians that they really do not believe that the current batch will do anything. I can't say that I blame them, but yesterday could go down in history as one of the biggest for Nepal...or not.

Rat Update

Rat number 2 caught and released much to the amusement of our landlord.

A sports update

Singapore and Kuwait got into the finals of the Asian Cricket Council under 15 tournament which is being held here. For fun, I just read the Arab Times story titled "Kuwait cricket squad make history to reach Elite Cup final". The story extolled the virtues of their team. No mention of the fact that 8 of the teams (including Nepal) were disqualified after they were found to have over age players.

Goats and Comforters

Yesterday we were walking around an ancient temple complex which was destroyed in the 1934 earthquake when we saw a man doing something with a big comforter. I found this humorous because they usually have goats doing what they do (mostly pooping and eating) wandering in this area... not exactly hygienic; they did have the goats tied up at that point at least.

Then, Sandy had a realization...”I bet he is making the comforter we ordered yesterday.” We took a quick pic and laughed. When we went to the shop to pick up our comforter we looked at the comforter...same size (which is very unusual) and material. It was our comforter! We tried to tell the man in the shop that we saw the dude making our comforter in the ancient temple ruins/goat pen but he did not understand. It did not smell so we figured “When in Rome.... sleep under a formerly goat poo encrusted comforter” or something like that.

Scumbags

Todays paper has a story on a government report on children's homes in Pokahara, an area full of tourists and children's homes. The story reports that 80% of the 31 homes are not registered and likely run for profit. Of the six that are registered 3 are kept in deplorable conditions and are being run for profit.

The report had recommended that the children be taken out of some of the homes because it was unsafe for them. In one instance, the government finally got around to acting, but the children were moved to an undisclosed location by the people running the home so they could continue to profit from the children. The homes profit by finding donors, usually foreign tourists, to give money. The money is then pocketed by the scumbags who run the homes.

Sometimes I feel worn down by these sorts of things because so many people are trying to manipulate and use me. I want to help people, but most of those purporting to be helping are simply con artists. Some are convincing so you have to be very careful. You end up treating everyone like potential thieves so you do not help the truly rotten people. Of course, the few that are truly honest are put off by your caution. Not good

A bad way to end a good crap

In the 1970's the German government funded and oversaw the construction of a sewer system in Bhaktapur.

Yesterday, we were talking with a monk at a monastery and he was describing life before they had a sewer system. “There were only maybe one or two houses with toilets in all of Bhaktapur. We used to go into the streets to defecate. There used to be pigs in the streets and soon as they saw us getting ready to defecate, they would come running. They would eat it as soon as we had defecated The pigs were very useful. The only problem was when we were small, the pigs would become too excited sometimes and would knock us over while we were defecating” The story was punctuated by the Dali Lama like giggles of a middle aged monk.

Rats!

Our house has stairs to the roof which allow access for humans to the roof and rats into the house. We assumed they would come in periodically, but when we put plastic up around the openings to help keep the warmth in, we heard the “crinkle, crinkle, crinkle” of our housemates from 9 PM every night.

The other night we noticed the teeth marks on the bar of soap next to the sink in the kitchen. Having gotten Sandy’s assurance that she did not make the marks, I decided it must be the rats. I spent a couple of days trying to seal up all the openings to the roof and, not surprisingly, the rats still found their way in. Last night we tried a Nepali rat trap. It is really humane way to catch the rats…just put a little bait in a cage and when the rat grabs it the door closes. The fact that they drown the rat after the caught it struck me as less humane.
This morning, I was like a child at Christmas… I could not wait to see if I had a present in my trap. Low and behold, our housemate was waiting for me. He seemed less excited to see me than I him. I decided catch and release was better than drown and bury, so I took the guest in his trap to a field. I had seen the TV shows where they do the catch and release thing and the animal always runs right away. Apparently the rat had missed those episodes and as soon as he got out of the open cage he jumped 10 feet high (maybe less …I was a little surprised) at me. I jumped, he ran and now he has a new home in an open field.

Human Trafficking Update

A report in the newspaper the other day said that 7000 women from Nepal are trafficked every year, mostly to India to be forced into prostitution.

Bhaktapur is a remarkably beautiful city, but I found these images of this temple, which was built in 1708, lit up last night to be particularly beautiful.

Huffin'

This picture is shot from our family room and shows both the best and worst of Nepal. The temple is a UNESCO World Heritage Site (with a temporary shed for renovating another temple in front of it). The boys, who have been living there for the last two weeks, have glue in their bags which the boy with the white hat just huffed (breathed deeply from the bag) to get high on.

The boys, who do not appear to be teenagers yet, have not bothered us at all but, of course,poor kids on drugs are not a good thing and can be dangerous. I could have them ousted by saying something to the police, but I am trying to find an organization in town that actually helps them.

Sidewalk Surfin

We were just heading to Kathmandu for our visa and the bus was ready to flip. I guess driving the bus with two wheels on the sidewalk and two wheels on the grass was not the best idea, but it did get it around a traffic accident

Seeing the Light

Girls get married three times in their life here. The first time with a bell (which I do not understand) the second time to the sun, and the third time to their husband. Today we went to a ceremony for a girl who was just getting ready to menstrate, so it was time for nuptuals number 2.

The lead up to the ceremony is interesting because for 12 days the young girl (she is 11) is kept in a room with no sun light. The girl can not see or hear any males. On the appointed day, the Hindu priest comes. The girl is lead outside with a towel over her head.

The towel was removed and she was blinded by the sun. Finally, the priest performed a ceremony. Friends and family members then gave her gifts. We are going to the party they are throwing for her tonight...a mere dinner party for 350 people. Every Newari girl (Newari is the most common caste here) has the ceremony but I think the dinner party might be a tad larger than usual.

In the Land of Giants

Yesterday grade 9 at my school had a class trip. We went hiking in the mountains around our town. The hike, which was supposed to take 6 hours, turned out to be 8 hours of going up and down the mountains. The hills running up the mountains are terraced...covered with rice for most of the year, covered in the bright yellow blossoms of mustard during this part of the year. With the snow covered peaks surrounding the area, there were some truly breathtaking views.

Some of the conversations were interesting. As we walked on a path that was two feet wide that had a sheer drop of about 100 feet one of the teachers said, “Villagers in your country walk on such paths, too right?” She was the first person to give a reasonable explanation of the taboo of inter-caste marriage. She explained the customs and even language is different between castes. Living with the family of the husband would be more difficult. I might not agree with it, but now I understand the taboo.

Of course, all the kids wanted their picture taken, many with me. When I got home and looked at the pictures on the computer, I noticed that I am a frikin' giant compared to the other teachers at the school.

What to do when your house is ready to fall down?

ay There are quite a few homes here that are ready to buckle due to earthquakes. Most are being supported by a couple of boards nailed to the front and then attached to the ground so they will not fall over. This homeowner decided to do something about it and is having the house rebuilt in halves while still living in it (you can see her in the window)!

A New Champion of the Absurd Tags

We have a new champion in the absurd English name tag that came with my new briefcase. I am not certain about my favorite part, but the fact that it was made for "bussinessman outside the world" may explain why I can not understand it.

The

Jimmy To The Rescue!

The political situation has been really bad here and there has not been much hope. Jimmy Carter made a visit to Nepal last week. This was the second visit in the last six months that he has made as a representative of the Carter Center. I am not sure what the final outcome will be, but it seems that the parties are using his suggestions as a steping stone to getting back to serious negotiations on some problems regarding an upcoming (hopefully) Constitutional Assembly.