Tuesday
11/11
All
in all, a good day. We started the day in Child Club playing GaGa
(renamed tarkari
bare,
vegetable garden), which the children enjoyed, and then had the
children read what they had “researched” about their births. Not
all the children had exactly properly done this, but from what I
could understand it was interesting nonetheless. We then had a good
yoga session, ate, and went off to another organic pesticide
demonstration. While again not all the women were completely
prepared, this women's group was great to work with – they all
eagerly helped with the demonstration, those that were well prepared
had brought a lot of the needed plants, and they showered us with
khaja,
snacks. After the first demonstration we were given radishes, a big
plate of popped corn and soybeans, very tasty buffalo milk, and
buffalo whey (sort of liquid yogurt). Two other women later offered
us khaja
but we had no time as we needed to head towards Kshamawati school. At
the school I worked mostly on the wheat experiment plot, coordinating
seeding wheat.
Wednesday
11/12
A
crazy day. We needed to leave today because our mid-program group
trip to Gorkha begins tomorrow. We all packed up and got ready for
the bus which usually comes around 8 AM but didn't come until 9. As
the bus was older and in bad shape, the ride was especially
uncomfortable today. Then, after about four hours, the bus pulled to
a halt by the river at Suketa, where we had been stuck for hours in a
bhanda
(strike) a few weeks before. This time the bhanda
was
being held by the family of someone who had died in a motorcycle
accident the week before and in the process had had a lot of money
stolen. We are beginning to realize that the bhandas
are sort of the Nepali version of lawsuits. In the absence of a legal
or criminal justice system where these kinds of problems could be
properly dealt with, people feel like the only way to cause the
powers that be to act is by halting traffic or commerce.
I
was treated to a glimpse of the Nepali mentality when, asked how long
we might be halted, someone replied, 'Oh, not too long, only about
two hours.' Either way, I was happy for a break from an unpleasant
bus ride and a swim in the river. While swimming in the river, the
nine of us had already attracted quite a crowd of stranded Nepalis
interested in what the foreigners were doing. We then proceeded to
attract even more attention by performing – a number of times,
until we got it right – Elvis Presley's
“Falling
for You,”in front of a camera, to be sent as a present to Galias
new nephew Elvis. Yet after this the bhanda
started to get tedious. Around 4 PM we heard that the road would not
be opening today and the bus was going to drive back to another town
for dinner and to wait the night until the road opened. We decided
instead to take all our bags and walk the 6 km until the end of the
bhanda
(the road was blocked at two points). After about an hour and a half
we were tired out from the walk and not yet near the end, but to our
luck the road did open and we were picked up by a bus. Yet as if this
wasn't enough, five minutes later our bus hit into another bus,
breaking its windshield. Luckily no one was hurt and we continued the
rest of the way with a broken windshield. We were happy when we
finally arrived home in Kathmandu.
Thursday 11/13
Despite
arriving home late the night before, the group left for Gorkha at 6
AM. At 9:30 we arrived at a beautiful river side where we ate
breakfast, hung out, and swam. This was followed by a talk by Leora
about the 20th
century French-Jewish philosopher Levinas and his focus on ethics
being based on the encounter with 'the other.' For a tactile
experience of this idea, we followed the talk by pairing up and
drawing representational portraits of each other. We had a great
lunch at a little roadside vegetarian restaurant, followed by more
relaxing by the river. For the rest of the ride uphill to the town of
Gorkha Bazaar, the entire group packed up on the top of a public bus
and was treated to a beautiful view of hills, valleys, mountains, and
rivers.
Friday 11/14
We had arrived yesterday after
dark, so when we woke up to see the landscape for the first time we
were amazed. Gorkha Bazaar sits above a number of hills and valleys,
and in the morning all the valleys were full of fog. Our wonder was
matched when, walking up a hill, we were treated to a large view of
Mt.Ganesh, which seemed to be floating in the sky, next to a few
other mountains. On the hill we played some interesting theater games
with our counselor Yotam and then continued up to the top fo the
hill, where there is a palace and temple. The palace is of historical
significance because Pirthivi Shah, the king of Gorkha, who lived in
the palace, conquered the rest of Nepal and thus was the first king
of Nepal.
Seeing Gorkha, the home of
Nepal's first ruling dynasty, was very interesting to me because
there is no capital city to speak of. Gorkha Bazaar is a small town
and the rest of the district is made up of villages. I had expected
the home of the first dyansty to be a major city. Instead, it was a
well-established village kingdom. Of course, this befits Nepal, a
country that, while experiencing rapid urbanization, remains
overwhelmingly rural.
Shabbat 11/15 to Saturday 11/16
Shabbat
started with a nice group Kabbalat Shabbat service and a good meal.
During the day most of the group left on a walk towards a river,
while I and two others stayed in the hotel to rest, read, and eat.
Yet in the afternoon we too went for a short walk in the area and,
after following the sound of music, soon found ourselves at a lively
vegetarian picnic, where a number of local women coaxed us to dance
(which greatly entertained them), showered us with tikka
(the red powder placed on the forehead, in this context as a sign of
respect), and fed us dhal
bhaat.
A number of women from this group walked with us back to our hotel.
We were really happy from this experience, a real expression of the
hospitality and friendliness of Nepalis.
After Shabbat the group began a
number of activities meant to inspire some soul-searching now that we
have passed the midpoint of the program. In the first activity we all
had a chance to write anonymously to each of the group members
behaviors that we would encourage her to start and those that we
would like her to continue.
Sunday 11/17
The soul-searching activities
continued – first we all had a chance to write and share a personal
and a project-oriented goal for the rest of the time, and then each
project group sat with another group to discuss our projects and
share ideas. All of these activities felt very helpful though it made
me sad to realize how little time is left in the program.
Monday 11/18
A somewhat crazy beginning of
the day. All the village volunteers left in the morning for the
department of immigration to renew our visas. On the way, the group's
two dogs started walking with us, and instead of bringing them back
in the yard as we normally do, we let them keep walking, as they had
been outside before and returned home alone. Yet on the way a
micro-bus ran over our dog Kalu and after a frantic minute he was
dead. Mysteriously, a man with a sack quickly came and took the dead
dog away and we were left with only our shock.
When we arrived at the
department of immigration, we were greeted by a man who first told us
that we would need 12,000 Rs (about $150) to renew our visas, and
then, after telling us he would show us where we could find an ATM to
take out all that money, escorted us to a number of waiting taxi
drivers who wanted to drive us (for a high price) the “half hour
walk” to the nearest ATM. We refused this “offer” and proceeded
to find an ATM within a five minute walk. However, this ATM was
broken, and the next ATM, five minutes away, was also broken. We
waited for it to be fixed and took out money, only to return to the
office and find out that we didn't really need it, since the actual
clerks (and not the con artist at the door) asked us for much less
money. Yet even the official bureacracy involved waiting on line and
then being told to return to pick up the visa two hours later.
Tuesday 11/19
We
had a mostly pleasant ride on the 6AM bus, arriving around 1 PM
despite 45 minutes stopped for repairs. Especially as a few of us
were a bit sick, when we arrived we all noticed how much colder it
had gotten over the weekend (it's still warm when the sun is out, but
never hot). The afternoon was spent resting, talking, and watching
the movie Hancock
on my computer. Watching the movie reminded me of how different
Western cities like Los Angeles are from what I have gotten used to
in Suspa and Kathmandu. I am due for culture shock when I return to
the US.
Today was the first day of a
nightly literacy and accounting training for all members of the local
ETC-organized womens' groups, including our host mother Subarna
Laxmi, which will run for the next few months. In an efficient use of
manpower, ETC asked each of the womens groups in the area to nominate
one more literate group member or friend to attend its teacher
training course and then lead this training. As almost all of the
village women (and many of the men) are illiterate, they are very
excited for this training. While it may greatly empower them, it is
unclear how much it will lead them to start reading for pleasure. The
Thami ethnic group of which most villagers are members has a strictly
oral culture and religion in which literacy was never a part and is
not at all necessary. It is the women, who attended school less and
thus spent more time with their parents instead of being integrated
into the literate Nepali culture, who have more maintained Thami
culture and language. The switch to a literacy-based culture will not
come easy. However, their daughters, who almost all attend school
with the boys, may end up as poorer bearers of Thami culture.
Wednesday 11/20
We had a fun child club
meeting, including some interesting responses to the weekend's
research assignment of how things had changed in the village over
recent decades. We learned that: the road (and with it access to
buses and ambulances; before people would walk at least an hour to
town) came only twelve years ago; electricity came sometime in the
last decade (before only those with enough money for kerosene lamps
had light after dark); widespread literacy and school attendance are
very new (the children of the village are the first generation widely
attending school and learning to read); growing a lot of vegetables
is recent (before this people grew almost only starches – rice,
millet, wheat, and potatoes). After this reading the children drew
portraits of each other which were very good.
Because I was feeling a bit
sick, I stopped on the way uphill to work and rested for a while at a
beautiful spot in the sunlight before returning home to rest the rest
of the day. By the evening I was feeling better.
Thursday 11/21
Another fun child club.
Children read their assignent of what they liked in the village, a
number mentioning the natural beauty and the earth; later they worked
on a map of the village. After breakfast we started walking high up
to the Lamanagi village. Our organic pesticide preparation was cut
short and the remainder rescheduled as no member of the local womens'
group had the necessary plastic sheeting. This was just our luck, as
we were able to observe the day-long festivities at the Lamanagi
school called in honor a recently-deceased Japanese donor. We watched
some very well-done dances prepared by children from all over the
area and a few of us added our own dance performance. The day
concluded with more work with the agriculture class in the Kshamawati
school garden, where we preapred a bed and seeded vegetables.
Friday 11/22
We spent most of the day
preparing a great Shabbat meal including a special dessert for
Itamar's birthday, village-style Tiramisu.
Shabbat Friday night and
Saturday 11/23
A
great meal. Last Sunday we built a mud oven and, with the help of
yeast purchased in Kathmandu, tonight we tasted its first success
(after a previous failed attempt), tasty challah
bread.
With the change of the weather
most of the group was sick for some part of this week, as well as the
youngest and eldest daughters of our host family. During the week we
observed the family's approach to illness. First, they consult with
the village guru, a combination spiritual and natural healer, and if
that doesn't help, they seek the help of Western medicine. It seems
that the main work of the guru is to help people possessed of spirits
of the dead. After he found no dead spirit in the youngest daughter,
the family brought her to the local health post for care. When the
eldest daughter had been ill for three days, the guru came Thursday
night, checked her pulse and blood pressure, announced that she was
possessed by a dead person (who was eating out of her body), and
performed a ritual with incense and water to rid her of the dead
person. The family told us that if she was still feeling sick the
next day, they would take her to the hospital. But by the next day
she was better, so they assumed the guru's treatment worked and the
hospital was unnecessary.
-----------------------
Sunday 11/24 to Wednesday 11/26
This week we had more
successful work with the child club, building organic pesticide, and
in the Kshamawati school in the afternoon. I remember a conversation
I had with the school principal about how the school disposes of
plastic wrappers, a major issue in the village. Since the local road
was built about eight years ago, local stores sell many goods wrapped
in plastic – mostly junk food such as noodle soup mixes, snacks,
and candy bars, but also oil and salt – but there is no systematic
collection of these wrappers, nor do people show much awareness of
the need to collect them. Plastic wrappers litter the fields and
paths of the village, and as they do not decompose, they end up in
the ground harming the soil. Stores and families dispose of the
plastic wrappers lying around their areas by burning them, which
pollutes the air with harmful chemicals. I asked Makunda Sir, the
Kshamawati school principal, how the school disposes of the plastic
wrappers on its grounds, and he explained to me that it burns the
wrappers, as they pose a major threat to the soil, and while burning
them harms the air, the air is so clear here that it is not currently
a big problem. Burying the wrappers, he explained, would be too
difficult. Yet he also suggested that in the future as the air got
worse burning the wrappers would become more problematic and they
would need to come up with another solution. Similar problems occur
in Kathmandu – while some garbage is placed in landfill, much is
dumped in the polluted Bagmati river or burned. Yet given how
polluting landfills are, I don't see collection and landfilling as
the solution to the problem of what to do with plastic waste. In my
opinion, it is a problem with no solution; plastic wrappers do not
decompose and cannot be recycled. Seeing them lying around in Suspa,
where I cannot put them out of my sight, has instilled in me the view
that we need to stop producing them.
It is interesting the note how
much this is a problem borne of the integration with the national
economy brought by the creation of the road eight years ago –
before the road, plastic wrapped items were inaccessible. It is a
good example of how integration with a wider economy involves losing
some control such that the economy may become less sensitive to local
needs and concerns; our host mother Subarna Laxmi has said that she
is frustrated about the plastic wrappers which pollute her fields and
would like products to no longer be sold in plastic wrappers but
because she doesn't know the heads of the companies she can't tell
them. This problem is also linked with examples of other problems
coming from economic integration – most of the food sold in plastic
wrappers is unhealthy junk food and its purchase provides little to
no benefit to the local economy (even the shopkeepers, who are
already from high castes and relatively well off, are prevented from
taking a profit by a government-set maximum retail price).
A recent newspaper article
stated that the local district of Dolakha plans, among other
'eco-friendly steps,' to discourage the purchase of items wrapped in
plastic, but I am pessimistic about the success of such a limited
step. Instead, I am encouraged by hearing about the initiative of the
Indian region of Ladakh to outlaw plastic wrappers. According to our
group member Barak, who visited Ladakh, items are instead wrapped in
paper or locally made materials. In addition to mitigating the
pollution of plastic wrappers, this law may also be encouraging the
local economy in that it supports the manufacture of locally made
materials and outlaws goods from outside which have not been made
with sensitivity to local concerns. Another option could be a
national law requiring manufacturers to take responsibility for any
non-compostable waste coming from their products. This kind of system
works with soda bottles in Nepal and India – after the soda is
consumed, the bottle is returned and refilled to be sold again. This
option may be less helpful in addressing the social issues involved.
Thursday 11/27 to Sunday 11/30
After
a pleasant bus ride we returned to Kathmandu for a group-led seminar
without the staff. The seminar included a creative/introspective
writing workshop, challah
bread making, a voice workshop, and two social activities, as well as
a discussion led by the volunteers in Suspa about the idea and
practice of “development” in the context of articles we read and
our experience here. The discussion touched on many of the
problematic aspects of development, especially our discomfort with
bringing the less-industrialized world into a Western lifestyle which
is deeply problematic and impossible, not to mention unsustainable,
in terms of resource use. We argued for some time over whether our
work in Suspa is in fact leading to a different, better end or
whether despite all our concerns and efforts it is leading to the
same problematic and impossible point. We were provided further food
for thought on this issue Sunday night when the group watched the
film Ancient
Futures: Learning from Ladakh
about the remote Indian region of Ladakh (presented by Barak, who
bought the film while visiting Ladakh). The film shows how for
hundreds of years Ladakhis have thrived healthfully in harsh
ecological conditions and maintained a rich culture and strong
community and family ties, yet in recent years integration with the
Indian and global economies has in many ways threatened and harmed
all of this, especially in the capital of Leh. For example, the entry
of cheap imported grain has put local farmers out of business and
made people vulnerable to faraway price fluctuations; people studying
in school or working as migrant laborers has left women alone to work
in the home and fields and disentangled people's willingness to help
each other. The film provided a firmer expression to many things I
see in Suspa but also instilled in me the importance of making sure
Suspa changes in the right ways and not the wrong ways. As opposed to
Ladakh, which seemingly lived in harmony until very recently, Suspa's
problems began about two hundred years ago with the arrival of
Brahmins who attained control over the majority of the land. Since
then Suspa's previous residents – mostly the Thami ethnic group –
have not been self-sufficient on their land and have needed to
purchase food from outside. Our work is thus not breaking harmony but
trying to fix a situation that has been broken for a long time.
Another interesting point in
this weekend was the visit of an Israeli trekking group to our house.
When I heard that their visit with us was the only part of their trip
not dedicated to trekking, I was shocked. I think my time here as a
foreigner actually living among Nepalis has changed my view of
tourism; I don't think I could ever travel again without spending a
lot of the trip learning how local people live.
Monday December 1 to Thursday
December 4
The week began in a rather
unusual way. On Saturday, two buses driving through the area were
racing each other when one sped off the road in the village of
Damarang in Suspa (a fifteen minute walk from where we live) and fell
downhill about fifty meters. Of the three people killed and many
injured, a large number were from the area, and in response the local
residents closed the road by placing trees across it at a number of
places, with the demand that the bus companies stop scheduling buses
at the same time. Because of the strike, our bus from Kathmandu
stopped at the town of Dolakha and we had to walk with our bags an
hour to our house. In the course of the week, a car attempting to
cross the roadblock was vandalized by Suspa residents, leading to the
arrest of four locals. When a number of people went to speak to the
police, another four were arrested. Yet by Thursday afternoon the
strike ended after all eight were freed and the bus companies agreed
to modify the bus schedules.
For every Shabbat (Friday night
and Saturday) we prepare food for ourselves. Up to now we had sent
someone to purchase vegetables in the town of Chericot, but because
of the strike this was impossible. Instead we tried to buy vegetables
from local women and it proved a big success – fresher and cheaper,
not to mention easier, than going to Chericot.
On Thursday many of the other
Tevel b'Tzedek participants came up for the weekend. We were very
happy to have them visit us and had a fun time. On Shabbat afternoon
we walked up to the Kshamawati school and continued past the school a
bit to a beautiful meadowy area. It was a very different experience
for everyone than when the group had been here in the beginnning of
the program, as now everyone has strong Nepali and can actually
converse with the locals. We were also able to continue the
discussion raised by our class on development and the movie about
Ladakh with our friends who were able to draw from their observations
here and in their own volunteering projects.
The
following Monday night was very special. Our group was invited to
dinner by the local shopkeeper. We ate a local delicacy, corn dirro
(polenta-esque mush) with sisnu (a prickly bush that we use in the
organic pesticide and which is very tasty when cooked with water and
a little seasoning). We enjoyed dinner and got to learn a bit about
the store. The shopkeeper is a Brahmin with a house and agricultural
land in a nearby village. He rents the shop's building from an older
woman of the dominant Thami ethnic group. So despite being a Brahmin
he is on reverse terms from the Thamis who work in Brahmin fields; in
addition, Thamis such as our host family seem to like him, referring
to him as a “good Brahmin who doesn't only look out for himself.”
We also discovered that the shop houses some local government office
and the central television cable room for a few villages.
The
rest of the week continued as usual, with the organic pesticide team
really hitting our stride. In addition to preparing the pesticide
with a women's group, we were looking into women's gardens and giving
advice on dealing with bugs and fungus, impressing the women with the
few words we had learned of their own Thami language, and being
treated after our work to khaja
(snack) and tea, fresh buffalo milk, or locally brewed alcoholic
drinks.
