Wednesday, October 22, 2014
During the month of October the Hindus are
celebrating. Each day they celebrate one of their ‘Gods’. Today
just happens to be the day of the dog and as GC (nickname because his name is
too long and hard to pronounce, who is a site monitor for Rakesh’s projects)
said, “Today they put leis around their dogs’ necks and tomorrow they kick
them”…it was pretty funny, but truly I haven’t any poor treatment of dogs
here—no one dares run over them and they seem to know that because they nap in
the middle of the road and are hard-pressed to move when people honk to get
them to move. Tomorrow they honor some other animal—I think he said crows
were honored yesterday, and then there will be cows, etc. They also
decorate with colorful lights in every color of the rainbow, dripping from
their houses and businesses in 10-foot-long strings.
We got up at 5:30 AM after, finally, a good night’s rest, to
meet our driver out front at 7AM. Last night while shopping for jackets
(with incredibly low prices—knock offs or blems?) we noticed that it was even
more crowded than in the past. Wasuita’s said that October and November
are trekking months and a lot of people come here. The other day up on
one of the mountains we noticed a group of Europeans, lots of them, and couldn’t
figure out what they were doing there in that place as we looked at one of our
water projects. They said that they were on a ‘walking tour’ and had
taken a bus up there. There are site seeing tours and trekkers and
kayakers and all types of groups in our hotel and everywhere we look.
We are going on another long drive of about 6 hours out of
town to yet another area. We have traveled this way on our two other
trips. We will be staying for 2 nights in 2 different hotels before
returning to the city and back ‘home.’ We strangely feel like it is home
whenever we get back to our base. I should mention that we asked help
with our bed and noticed the next day that they had put a fluffy something
under the sheets, softening the blow. Also, our shower is quite
incredible—it has so much water pressure and that is quite divine after a long
day—I think it is better than the one we have at home.
Wednesday night: It has been another very long day,
getting home after dark. Jim and I thought it was going to be cool again
but here it is hot. We didn’t dress right so we will be uncomfortable a
little bit. I decided that even though the road down the mountain pass is
not as scary as some of the places we drive, what does make
it dicey is the way that people drive. They pass on curves and drive too
fast, making it a dangerous road. At the top of the hill just as we were
about to make our descent, there was a traffic jam. A small truck stalled
at the top of the hill on the other side of the road, which caused a massive
jam below him, so in order to get by him, we all had to take turns getting
around him, those coming up and those coming down like we were. Since
this guy had a small truck with a load, and did not have a large lorry or
wasn’t a big bus, it was odd that no one thought to help him push his truck off
to the side to get rid of the jam—instead he just sat there and we all had to
drive around him. As we left we realized we were in front of the line
except for one very large truck in front of us. He was so wide that he
could barely pass anyone in the opposite lane. As he began his descent
his back wheels left the road and if he had had to stop he would have slipped
over the edge and from that spot it was a very long way down. He made
it—we did not want to see anyone go over the edge!
This guy’s rig was so wide he had a hard time getting
by traffic on the other side of the road. He nearly went over the edge
when his back tires left the road. At home we’d see someone driving
behind him with a sign: “Wide Load”. It took a long time to pass
him, after which the traffic got better. On the other side of the road
the jam continued down the mountain a long, long way.
We eventually turned off of the main road following another
large river (or the same one) and headed towards a hotel we were to stay in for
the night. It is quite nice and looks pretty new. As we walked to
our room we saw this beautiful swimming pool and realized we didn’t have our
suits with us…oh, right, I forgot, we won’t have time to use it anyway unless
we wanted to swim at midnight—what were we thinking? The shower in the bathroom
is just on the side of the bathroom with no barrier so the floor got all wet
and after using my towel to dry off, I had to use it as a rug to sop up the overspray.
We only had enough time to unpack a little bit and then return to the car to go
and look at two proposed projects Rakesh had in mind and one in progress that
Rakesh was doing. Even though we had some rough and sometimes muddy
roads, nothing was the least bit scary. But by the time we got back we
had been in the car for 12 hours. Once again, we appreciated the shower
more than ever. Two more grueling days to go before we get back to
Kathmandu. I need a bit more rest…
We received our appropriate greetings, got our tikka
blessing (red stuff on forehead) and our flowers and led into the school
library for our meeting. We had to sit on the floor on a soft mat while
visiting with this group of men about a proposed water project in their village
(and without our shoes). At one point Jim asked them where all the women
were (there were only two in the room sitting behind us). They said that
they were fixing dinner, etc. Jim asked them what they were doing sitting
around the town and why weren’t they working in the fields. Then he
grinned, and the men laughed, feeling appropriately guilty.
This little boy was terrified of us, but he finally
let me take a picture of him and then I showed it to him. He was really
afraid of the strange men.
Another day, another dollar…
Love, Mom & Dad, Jim & Karen, Elder & Sister
Greding
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