Sunday, April 5, 2015
Mornings in Tansen were the best, and this Easter morning was no exception! As the sky lightened toward the east the birds would start to sing, then the dogs and the people would start to move about and make noise. Nora’s place was a nice two bedroom and bath house, perfect for her and her roommate, a doctor who she stayed with. She was gone for a few weeks which allowed for me to have the open room while I was in there. The sun would come in through the windows that overlooked the nursing school below it, and the Tansen valley below that.
In the center of the house was a common living/dining room with the tiny kitchen next to the front of the house. Off of the common room in both directions was a alcove that made a perfect office or study, and then a bedroom and bathroom were off of the alcove.
After breakfast Nora left for language class. She studied Nepali all of the time she was in Nepal, and though she felt she didn’t do that well, I was pretty impressed at what she accomplished. Nepali is a hard language, and the script is difficult as well. I was only able to pick up a few words and phrases during the month I was there. One interesting phenomenon that I observed in myself though was that for the first few days I was there, listening to the Nepali language sounded like strange chaos, but after about a week it started to sound like something that made sense, even though I couldn’t understand it. By the time I left I had become so accustomed to it that I knew I would miss hearing it, and I was correct.
While she was gone I attempted to repair her laptop that died while she was there, but unfortunately it was a terminal case. The electrical power in Nepal is not great with frequent outages and rolling blackouts. Any time there is a storm, and they come often, the next few days tend to have unreliable power and internet service. Those voltage spikes had taken their toll.
Students at nursing school had Outdoor Week while I was there. Each day there were various activities for them which they seemed to greatly enjoy, if the noise level was any indication. Later in the week they had a carnival/fundraiser of sorts, which we enjoyed. The school is separate from TMH but being as close as it is works well for both. This day I was treated to some pageantry.
Looking down on the nursing school.
In the afternoon we went to the bazaar (a 4 mile round trip) and bought food and other supplies. We couldn’t get an ATM to work, not matter how we tried. They may have been down because of the storm, though they appeared to work – just hated our cards! This was becoming a concern because we needed to get money together for our upcoming trek in a few days.
After we came home and I made tortillas from what I could improvise for ingredients and we had buffalo meat and yak cheese tacos for dinner. Then I pulled out the treat… blackberry pie from America! Now I get to brag a tiny bit because Nora said both were best she’d had in 8 months! Yes, I brought two pieces of homemade pie, that I froze and vacuum-packed before putting them in a small box in my suitcase. It survived the trip quite well, and this was day 8! So it was worth the effort…
To end the day we watched a Christian movie this time, after last night’s cinematic disaster. LOL All in all it was a cool Nepali Easter!
