Cheesy Pesto Mushroom Pasta

Philadelphia - VillaNova - the northwestern Phili area home to the Roman Catholic prestigious college of Villagenova. The campus was all males until 1918 when nuns were allowed to attend night classes. Rose who is now a Senior at Villanova studying engineering said the residential halls are very separated still and there are major consequences for promiscuous activity on the campus. Interesttttting! The campus is quaint with beautiful stone buildings and the spires of St. Thomas of Villanova Church visible pretty much from anywhere on the campus.

This evening I found that the following recipe turns out to be a great dish for lots of people.

1. Pinot Noir (Yellowtail only $15!)

2. Salad with lots of balsamic and olive oil

3. Pesto, Asparagus and Mushroom Cheesy pasta

How to make it?

Heat the olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add mushrooms and saute for 5-7 minutes until golden brown. Add asparagus then salt and pepper to taste and continue to saute until asparagus is tender. While mushrooms and asparagus are cooking, cook noodles per instructions. Once the penne is cooked, drain and return to pan. Add pesto sauce, mushrooms and asparagus then mix thoroughly. Add lots of different cheese. Taste and season with salt and pepper and more olive oil. Top with Parmesan cheese and serve. Enjoy.

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Education

Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance. ~Will Durant

Couchsurfing

http://blog.couchsurfing.org/casey/

Singing

We began singing in the streets on the island of Mykenos and have been playing music wherever we go ever since - In Kashmir, Thalassa and I picked out songs to learn on the guitar and mandolin. So far we have played in Greece, Switzerland and now Germany. Follow the link to hear some of the songs we have been playing in the streets!

http://mablague.tumblr.com/

Braunshweig, Germany

Prost! The word you say when you do your cheers with a beer. Our well deserved German beer deserved a prost after our money making venture yesterday. Thalassa and I earned 25 euros on one of the main cobblestone streets in the older part of the Braunshweig’s city center. We sat down on a bench took out our voices and instruments and began playing all the songs in our repertoire. When it came to singing the traditional German children song about fish, two young children approached us and joined in. One of the lovely things about playing in the streets wherever you go is the people that we have met whilst doing this. I remember checking into our flight in Sofia, Bulgaria ready to put up some kind of argument in attempting to get my guitar case on as a carryon. At the counter the big Bulgarian man with his arms crossed and straight face looked at my guitar case up and down and then at me. I was about to act in shock when he would tell me he wouldn’t allow it as a carry-on for exceeding the size limit. Rather, I was told I could carry it on if we played a song for the pilot and his flight attendants. With an agreement on the table, I happily carried my guitar with my onto our flights to Geneva via Warsaw ☺ Its funny, leaving Bulgaria flying over the great mountainous Balkan Range and the grand Danube River out my window, I had little idea we would end hitchhiking along Germany’s black forest where this major international river originates. We were going to attempt to play on the streets of Munich - city very well renowned for music – only to learn buskers in Munich must go through an audition process before given a spot on the street. Braunsweig on the other hand has a lack of competition and its understandable why with more inhabitants going about their daily routines rather than tourists visiting sites in Munich.

Here in Braunsweig, we have been given a little apartment to stay in by an old friend, Susanne whom last I saw before hiking out of Costa Rica’s jungles three and a half years ago. During the six days of non-stop constant downpour in the jungle during Christmas, her guitar playing and voice is what brought myself and the other interns some light during a rather dark depressing time. Her boyfriend is a fantastic classical pianist and gave us a concert before they left a few days ago. Braunshweig is actually home to Steinway which doesn’t at all leave me surprised with how good of a player he is. He gave me a song to practice whilst they are away to practice as a duet when he returns. As a food science expert Susanne travels around the country of Germany and offered to take us with her but the thought of a few days of relaxing in one place was too tempting of an idea of myself and Thalassa.

Our busking ended with Edelweiss, the song sung in The Sound of Music. Nate found one during out trek up to Ladakh last September in Zanskar Valley. The flowers are white and smell delicious. I tried looking for them when we were in Switzerland where they are the country’s national flower but they are only found in the high elevations of the alps. The song was sung to me by my mother a lot growing up because of her love for that film.

Sitting in the streets of Braunshweig, Germany, the city that granted Hitler residency before he rose to power and created the Nazi party, we sang a song that was written originally as farewell that Captain von Trapp, Maria and his family would bid to Austria when escaping from World War II. And so I played and Thalassa sang and the passing people continues to pass.

Wedding in Switzerland

Alphorns - traditional Swiss instruments made from beautiful spruce or pine wood and traditionally used by mountain dwellers

Thalassa, Sarah, Anna and I finally arriving to the castle after a one hour hike down from the mountain where most of the guests stayed.






As Thalassa's invited plus-one date, I had the lovely opportunity to witness a beautiful wedding in Switzerland. Ellen and her husband, Seth met a week before she decided to take a year off from Yale to sail around the world with him on a sailboat. During that time they fell in love and he continued to spend four more years on the boat as she visited him wherever he was after returning back to Yale. He proposed to her on the mountains above Aigle on a winters day skiing in the Alps during an avalanche safety course he bought for her for Christmas. Aigle is the village they skied down to after the proposal and this castle surrounded by vineyards in the photograph stands above Aigle where they now live.

The following is a dropbox of more photographs - a compilation of photographs take by guests of the wedding.

http://www.dropbox.com/gallery/16819208/1/Wedding.of.Ellen.Massey.and.Seth.Leonard-Aigle-Switzerland-Summer.2011?h=b1a613

Ellen is coming out with a book about their adventures sailing around the world which I will add to the blog upon its publication!

Swiss Treats

Our couch surfing host and dear friend Vallery brought us a few minutes from her house nestled in the foothills of the Swiss Alps to the border with France where we went on a hike along a river. Thalassa and I.



Vallery, Thalassa and I on the North East shower of Lake Geneva in Montreaux for sunset. The lake is shared with France and has a retreating glacier to thank for its deep blue waters.


Vallery's delicious fresh cherry pie treats.


Bern - Switzerland's capital. A city built on a peninsula surrounded by the flowing Aar river which provides almost all of the city's freshwater. 20 km north of the Bernese Alps with lots of Bernese mountain dogs walking around the city!

Germany

It is said if your first stork sighting is of a standing stork, you shall be lazy for the rest of the year. If the stork is resting, you will exude energy. It looks like we have been granted a lazier year this year!


The storks have just migrated back from Africa to the same nest they spend every summer at in a village outside of Braunshweig, Germany. Sighting spotted during 60 km tandem bicycle ride with Thalassa and Michael on July 25th.



Thalassa, Michael and I at Walzburg's bridge along the River Main, a tributary of the Rhine which flows up into the North Sea.


Warzburg - 90% of the beautiful city was obliterated during the British bomb blasting in a mere 17 seventeen minutes.

Exhibition Projects

A major feature of The VIS Academic Program for high school juniors and seniors is Exhibition, an independent study capstone class. Long-established VIS connections with people and organizations around Ladakh benefit internships that allow students to delve deeper into local communities, and contribute to the work of organizations and local society. Research is often undertaken jointly with SECMOL students. Final exhibition projects include written as well as audio/visual components, and are presented to students, teachers and mentors at SECMOL, and to various communities back at home. Students currently in Ladakh have chosen their exhibition topics, and April is devoted to research and internships to culminate in presentations at the SECMOL campus at the end of the month. For more information on exhibitions, and the VIS Academic Program, see www.vermontis.org.


Katrina Alden (The Sharon Academy, VT) is studying women’s health, specifically sex education and the myths behind menstruation and Katrina is staying with one of the founders of Women’s for Women’s health in Leh and is conducting interviews with women and health facilities in Leh.

Caroline Atwood (The Sharon Academy, VT) is researching the introduction of Western toys in Ladakh, and their effect on childhood development. She is studying children from two families, one in the city of Leh and the other in a rural village. In addition to comparing and contrasting the behaviors of these children, Caroline is spending time interviewing youth and business owners in and around Leh to further understand changing perspectives in children related to toys and play.

Moya Cavanaugh (Mt. Mansfield Union HS, VT) is exploring the effects of oral tradition on Ladakhi culture as seen through folktales, especially Ladakh’s epic poem, “Gesar of Ling.” Moya is listening to this folktale, which takes approximately 24 hours to tell, to understand the customs and cultural implications surrounding folklore telling. She is staying with a famous Ladakhi folktale orator and his family to learn phases of this folktale, and then with a former SECMOL teacher who works for a cultural preservation NGO in Leh.

Kylie Cook (Thetford Academy, VT) is researching agriculture in Ladakh, and the effect modernization has on youth perspectives of farming. She is taking part in the three-day annual process of building canals for the intricate irrigation system all households must create for their farms. Kylie will be staying with a family in the village of Alchi, and is conducting surveys and interviews with surrounding neighbors.

Cedar Farwell (The Sharon Academy, VT) is studying how science and technology can be balanced with the philosophies applied by Buddhist monks in Ladakh. He is spending time experiencing monastic life in Ladakh’s famous Thikse monastery to research how daily practices have changed in the past fifty years. He will then spend two days conducting interviews with NGOs and Buddhist scholars in Leh.

Jake Huston (Leland and Gray HS, VT) is researching responses to the 2010 disastrous floods in Ladakh. He is living with a family in the Solar Housing Colony affected by the floods. Specifically, Jake is studying pre-fabricated housing models given to displaced families and their ineffectiveness due to a lack of consideration of variables such as Ladakh’s unique climate and culture.

Taylor Knoop (East Greenwich HS, RI) is studying the effect educational methods can have on cultural preservation and pride. She is comparing the differences between education in government schools within Leh and the village of Shey, and at SECMOL (where she has lived for almost three months). She is interviewing teachers and administrative staff, and observe classes, including personal interactions in classrooms such as discipline, curriculum models and daily activities.

Simone Labbance (U32 HS, VT) is looking into cross-cultural dialogue techniques to be used at SECMOL. She is interviewing Ladakhi youth to create and implement activities that foster multiculturalism, and that may be used in future VIS programs. She is using a Danish group as a study sample to understand the effects her dialogue activities have on groups visiting SECMOL.

Alana Ziegler (homeschooled, Nova Scotia) is researching the availability of mental healthcare in Ladakh, and how physiological illnesses are treated. She is staying with the Assistant Director of PAGIR (People’s Action Group for Inclusive Rights), an NGO that works with people with disabilities. Alana is interviewing practitioners of local hospitals to further understand the situation for mental health patients in Ladakh.

Apricot Elation

How can I explain to you the joy of living in this world now that I have discovered apricots? The world was always a wonderful place to begin with but as I sprawl across my bed with some of the most agonizing and crippling cramps I have ever experienced all I can do is lay there and laugh at my predictable situation. The pain hurts so good: like 90 apricots in two and a half days. Paying for my foolish gluttony cracks me up... literally. Apricots are my new passion in this world and the pain that comes along with it is worth it, deffinatly worth it. I beam from ear to ear in sheer bliss every time I pop a dusty, folded ol’ wrinkle of a friend into my impatiently salivating mouth and I want to dance and sing across the barren landscape of Ladakh in honor of the orangey tasties and the golden sun which dries them to perfection. Nothing I have eaten in this world has tasted like such a decadent slice of heaven. These apricot cramps are just apart of my newly adopted routine and if that is the price I have to pay for these sweet morsels than I will take it ten times over and I will laugh along every step of the way. -Kylie

Winter in Ladakh

The weather is warming up - much warmer overall than the winter I experienced here two years ago. That winter ladakh hit an all time low record average of -30 C. The clear blue skies has let some incredible wildlife show their elusive selves to our eyes. The other day when hiking up SECMOL mountain to tie flags for Ryan, the rare golden eagle soared only a few meters above my head. In a few days we shall be heading to Nubra valley to a village only recently opened up to tourists due to its proximity to the Line of Control. All of the SECMOL Himalayan students shall be joining us as we take the journey over Kardung-la, the highest motorable road in the world, to celebrate the spring equinox in a village of mixed Bon/Muslim faith.

Tunisia to California Pushing for Voices

Sitting in a quaint yet very modern Tibetan cafe across the way from my guesthouse, I read for the first time about the protests that have been happening across the Arab world. My friend back in California wrote to me a few weeks ago briefly describing the situation Tunisia was facing but I had not had any chance to learn anything more while in Nepal. The Times of India might even compare to BBC News with the vast global news it covers. A small article with an image of people waving baguettes and holding up French placards follows all the different stories regarding Egypt's internet shut down, Jordan’s King Abdullah II facing new demands and Tunisia’s massive movement to bring about transparency to their country. The Thai protest in Bangkok denouncing their leaders at a red shirt protest shows their support with the new popular revolt in Tunisia.

Yesterday, we crossed the border into India’s state of Bihar two days late. India’s National Holiday for Independence called for major celebrations in addition to major protests throughout the streets of India, especially in regions dominated by Islamic Indians. The state of Bihar adjacent to Nepal’s southern border is also in close proximity to Islamic Bangladesh. The bus ride was filled with over one hundred men with Kunzes and I sitting on the front seats. There was one other woman besides us who joined us for a few hours on the journey. Covered in black, the only part of her I was able to see were her darkened hands. I could tell when she was looking at me at times due to the impression her nose made in her burqa. I was told by a french journalist a few weeks back that foreign women visiting Irhan are given burqas to wear upon arrival at Tehran’s international airport. I wonder what it would be like to spend my life covered entirely, without giving my eyes chances to feel fresh air. Then again, who are we to judge and think we know what other people want.


With protests feeding off other protests, people around the world at this moment are pushing for political freedoms in the way they believe to be free.

The United States has so much say in the way things work around this world. It is nice to know I have a friend from high school back at home who has mastered the French language and in the process mastering fluency in Arabic. Studying at Stanford University she just made a trip down to San Fransisco joining the Arab American communities in demonstrations taking full advantange of the freedoms which we are blessed with in the United States to help support in pushing accountability in these countries where voices go unheard.

A World Fighting for Freedom

Sitting in a quaint yet very modern Tibetan cafe across the way from my guesthouse, I read for the first time about the protests that have been happening across the Arab world. The Times of India might even compare to BBC News with the vast news of global politicals it covers. A small article with an image of people waving baguettes and holding up French placards follows all the different stories regarding Egypt's internet shut down, Jordan’s King Abdullah II facing new demands and Tunisia’s massive movement to bring about transparancy to their country. The Thai protest in Bangkok denouncing their leaders at a red shirt protest shows their support with the new popular revolt in Tunisia.
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Yesterday, we crossed the border into India’s state of Bihar two days late. India’s National Holiday for Independence called for major celebrations in addition to major protests throughout the streets of India, especially in regions dominated by Islamic Indians. The state of Bihar adjacent to Nepal’s southern border is also in close proximity to Islamic Bangladesh. The bus ride was filled with over one hundred men with Kunzes and I sitting on the front seats. There was one other woman besides us who joined us for a few hours on the journey. Covered in black, the only part of her I was able to see were her darkened hands. I could tell when she was looking at me at times due to the impression her nose made in her burqa. I was told by a french journalist a few weeks back that foreign women visiting Irhan are given burqas to wear upon arrival at Tehran’s international airport. I wonder what it would be like to spend my life covered entirely, without giving my eyes chances to feel fresh air. Then again, who are we to judge and think we know what other people want. With protests feeding off other protests, people around the world at this moment are pushing for political freedoms in the way they believe to be free.
The United States has so much say in the way things work around this world. It is nice to know I have a friend from high school back at home who has mastered the French language and in the process mastering fluency in Arabic. Studying at Stanford University she just made a trip down to San Fransisco joining the Arab American communities in demonstrations pushing for accountability.


I am about to meet and greet the new students arriving in Delhi's airport in a mere two hours. I have just created a blog that will be kept and updated by the students with photographs, stories and personal reflections of their four month academic semester experience. I invite anyone to read the blog to learn about India. It can be found here at visspring11.blogspot.com

Metro and Population

Two Indian girls point me in the direction of the North moving train of the Delhi Metro’s yellow line. I call to Kunzes to follow me and we run onto the metro. Women, mostly young women the same age as us fill the seats and stand around in small groups either talking on the phones or with each other. To be sure we are on the correct train, I ask one of the girls if this is the metro towards Vidan Saba and they shake their heads pointing to the South facing train across from us. I hop off but Kunzes is too late. We face each other through the glass and I don’t know what to tell her or how we’ll get in touch without phones on us. She shrugs her shoulders and we just stare through the glass. The train begins to take off and suddenly out of nowhere the door opens for just enough time for Kunzes to hop out. With no words we rush across to the opposite facing train about to leave. We don’t have time to make our way to the front sections.

Our rush onto the metro consequently put us the men’s designated end of the train. I stand crushed up against the metro’s wall on the yellow line towards our stop of Vidan Saba. The metro underneath the city of chaotic Delhi’s streets is a different world of modernity. It far out beats Boston and New York's subways in terms how advanced and contemporary everything looks. At the next stop more men pile in. Kunzes and I are split up by a man breathing heavily from the bodies crushing into his chest. He says something a bit harsh in Hindi to the man closest to him and they begin to break out into an argument. There’s not enough room and hands are everywhere. The amount of people on this metro would be considered a health hazard back home but by now, especially after taking micros and buses in Nepal, it doesn’t phase me except when personal space is violated a little too far. I decide to kneel down on the floor below their legs and look all the way down to the end of this first section in between shiny shoes and pressed pants. I imagine what the city of Delhi looked like before the metro came into being a mere eight years ago. With the existing bus system hardly able to bear the loads of people, more are taking to private motorcycles and cars. The streets of Delhi would be a nightmare. I think back to the accident we saw yesterday on our way to Delhi. Three giant buses obliterated one another. Our bus, along with other traffic stopped just to see it. A man bleeding profusely yelling out to the crowds but no one could do anything. Accident after accident fills the streets of Nepal and I think of the wonders such a metro could do for that city.

Men are staring down at me so I take out the latest National Geographic Article I just awarded myself with to revert my eyes to something. The second page, the Editor’s Note, is a photograph of crowds surfing the annual Rath Yatra Hindu festival in Puri, India. Underneath the crowds it reads,

“The world’s population will reach seven billion this year. But you don’t need to visit Delhi, India (population 22), or China (home to a fifth of the world’s people) to grasp the consequences.”

Men above continue to argue with one another above. A fight couldn't even begin here because there is no room to move a finger.

The metro stops and I slip out between the legs of men. Kunzes looks at me laughs and says, “How did that happen Holly? How did that door open like that for me?”

“Perhaps, making friends with Karma in Nepal really did bring us good karma.” :)

Bridging Korea and Nepal Through Dance

Voices in the Streets

Holy men, beggars, school children, business men and street food sellers fill Kathmandu’s streets every day. Unlike the rest of Nepal, Kathmandu’s street life is speedy with microbuses zipping around and people walking fast paced everywhere. Walking up to an overpass, we hear traditional Nepali songs coming from a group of eight woman sitting in a circle on the sidewalk. Together they play instruments and hold each others hands. One of them reminds me of Thuk Je with the feeling she puts into her singing. I sit down in their circle and in no time at all passerbyers stop and listen to their music. Sitting in the middle of a city, one that illustrates the epitome of political corruption, peace is brought by the ones that cannot see the chaos in the way we see it. More and more Nepalis crowd around. Smiles are everywhere bringing more Nepalis into the presence of singing against the backdrop of heavy traffic turbulence . There is one foreigner standing behind me, an older man. He’s the only foreigner I had seen that day. With leaving I see he drops 500 Nepali rupees into the jar placed in the center of the circle. I think to myself, how happy they will be when they feel their way into the hat and feel that one bill. I wonder what they will think. I wonder if they know what their voices are creating.

Urban Migration

Photographs of bustling life in Kathmandu's corners....


Young calf sleeping


City getting bigger


Son helping his mother sell street snacks








Billboard rising high beyond Kathmandu's building tops.


The swastika is seen throughout Hinduism and Buddhism as a sacred symbol. It takes on a wide range of meanings in these religions, most denoting good fortune.



Nepali men walking together amidst the streets outside of Pashupati wearing traditional dhaka topi (caps) with jackets covering their dowra sulwar (suit).

The Stupa

New Year’s Eve as Kunzes and I made our way around the giant stupa of Boudanath. Monks sit cross-legged reciting ‘Om Mani Padme Om’ while spinning prayer wheels in their hands. Little children chase each other spinning the wheels along the way. Kunzes,” I ask, “What do these people pray for?” I wasn’t expecting her to have an answer. The Tibetans lay out into full prostrations before the Stupa. Buddhists on pilgrimage all the way from Ladakh purchase corn to feed to the pigeons that congregate along the Stupa’s outer rim. Foreign monks spin the wheels as hundreds of people gather to circumambulate the Stupa. Kasmiris huddle together sipping tea waiting for the next photographer to glance at the scarves they sell. Everyday from 4am until sunset, people from all over (mostly Tibetans) walk clockwise around the magnificent Stupa.
“The whole world" Kunzes tells me, "They are praying for all beings from insects to trees to people.”

“And what about themselves? Their family? Their health?”

“No, no, no. They are thinking about everything that exists. It is only sometimes when we pray for one thing. Like yesterday when I did prostrations for your father.”

Above us, the colored prayer flags stream the skyline, wavering in the wind. The overpowering scent of incense catches your ever inhalation. The deep noted mantra prayers drowns out the crazy traffic of Kathmandu’s city streets.

“You should see my mom on days where she must water our fields in the village. In the morning she wakes up before the sunrises and prays for the insects that will be killed that day. She can’t help it because the fields must be watered.”

Alongside, stand blind beggars with their hands cupped. Tibetans who have saved up forever to come here, place coins in their hands as they pass in front of us. For the first time I saw the Stupa as a spiritual, holy site. Not what it did for me but the beauty in what it did for these people and the world.


Monk feeding the pigeons

World Without Warning

Tsering Kunzes and I climb onto the bus heading back to the village from Chautara. It had been four days of sleeping at during the day and staying awake at night to finish the website as internet connection only works at night. I’m a little dazed and sit down next to a young boy. He has beautiful big light brown eyes, I use the little Nepali I know to ask him his name. “Saroj Bogarti.” If the children here don’t go to private schools, they are usually very shy to speak with me especially the girls. This boy smiles but doesn’t say anything more. School children begin filing onto the bus, some climb up the windows from the outside to get onto the roof. And before we know it, it’s crowded as usual. The little girls have pigtails with green or red bows and wear plaid skirts and pressed shirts – definitely coming from the local private school. I drop my book and before I can even turn to see where it went, the boy quickly reaches down to pick up the book using both hands when passing it to me.

A few minutes later, he slips his small hand into his pocket and takes out a cigarette. Lights it up and draws a big inhalation like he’s been doing it forever. I look around at the adults and children with no one takes notice.I ask him in Nepali how old he is and his reply,"Bara Barsako." Twelve Years Old. Across from us, Kunzes takes uses her camera to take a snapshop and then he continues to pose for her.



Here in Kathmandu I take a closer look at the cigarette ads. There are more advertisements for cigarettes than there are for any other single product in this country. Coke might be comparable. Advertisements for adventure travel with paragliders smoking in the air. Walk into any tea stall or general shop, these ads plaster the wall. For the first time in a month I am with someone who is totally literate in both Nepali and English. I finally ask the question that has been on my mind since first taking notice a while ago of the large amount of cigarette advertisements. “Deepish, do you see and do you understand this health warning in English at the bottom of this poster?” He nods and then I ask him, “Can you tell me what this entire Nepali script saying is?”

He moves his finger over the script throughout the poster. “It is saying how tasty and good these cigarettes are.” And then I ask him, “Does it say anything that relates to the health warning in English, how it is injurious to health.”
“No, it says nothing about that.”

I look around at the people smoking in the tea shop, at the owner looking at Kunzes taking a photograph of one of the advertisements. None of these people know. That is why in the villages, mothers and fathers will puff smoke into their babies faces. That is why the children have smokers cough. That is why our grandmother coughs up black tar in her spit throughout the nights. It’s a country where the majority of the population is being fed these cigarettes with no notion of what will happen to them. The warning is in English, a language they can’t understand.

I think to myself, our country went through this mistake forty years ago and these people are beginning to follow. We live in a time where people have already been through this mistake. Why haven't we warned the rest of the world?

Geography - Lesson One

I open the atlas book I purchased in Chautara this afternoon. It is evening time and as usual the children of the village have made their way to our room. They come here to simply sit around and listen to Tsering Kunzes and I speak or learn Ladakhi songs from Kunzes. Last night we taught each other the names of body parts. In Chautara, we were able to get posters and markers in the hopes of having the children draw a map of Nepal and India. Opening the fold-up atlas I ask them, “Nepal, kaha?” (Where is Nepal?) Sabina along with Manuj and two other village children look at the world map and begin to search. Their eyes going back and forth in a state of both curiosity and confusion. Sabina is sixteen years old and would look at the ground or cover her mouth when we first met each other. Now, after spending every evening in our room she looks at me with confidence and points to North America, then to Africa, then to the blue Pacific Ocean. I then try again. “Asia Sabina, kaha?” They all use a click of their tongue to let me know they do not know. I say very slowly the Nepali meanings of English words for ocean and land to them while pointing to the blue ocean and then to the green continents. “Land– Mahadesh” “Ocean-Mahasagar.” I repeat the words again and again while moving my finger from land to ocean all over the map. I then ask Sabina “ocean, kaha?” And she slowly moves her finger across the atlas tracing the outline of the world’s blue ocean and looks up to find me smiling in approval. She knows she got it and continues to move across the Atlantic ocean onto the Indian ocean. Mahasager – Nepali word for ocean. A word she may have been forced to memorize in school. How to understand what an ocean is living in the landlocked country of Nepal in a village with no television, internet, magazines or tourists and in a school that provides no pictures in the books. “Land Sabina?” I bring her hand up to the continent above the Indian ocean and slowly say, “Asia.” And she begins to trace Asia wither finger.

Spreading goodness through Sweets

Down the mountain from our village through a beautiful alpine forest we came upon a factory that makes lapsi and ginger candy. The factory had about twenty women total working together in peeling, boiling and deseeding the fruits and ginger. The factory was set up with the help of the UNDP to empower women by giving an opportunity to earn income. Their children were climbing trees to harvest the lapsi fruits and helping their mothers make candy. The lapsi paste is baked in solar cookers and the whole process from growing to harvesting to bottling is done as environmentally sound as possible. They also pickle the lapsi seed turning it into a deliciously sweet addition to rice!

Tiger

In the middle of every night I awake from my sleep for one of two reasons: mixures of different languages coming from Kunzes' dreams or from the amount of water I must drink to complement the very spicy Nepali dinners we have here. When the latter occurs, I hike out to the field of mustard flowers that villagers use as their bathroom. Last night, I was stopped by the dad who has now given up his room for us and sleeps with the animals. “Tiger” he says. With my minute understand of Nepali I was able to understand there was a tiger roaming in our village earlier. Keep in mind our village is made up of five homes including ours. Our mother gestured for me not go to the field and to go closer to the “ghar” (home). I guess after the snake skin incident I shouldn’t be too shocked that there are tigers here. The mother could see I was having a bit of trouble getting myself out of the door at that point. She got out of bed, took my hand and brought me to the animal hut below. Under the bright moon and stars and I tried not to think about the tiger but of the mother right beside me keeping watch of the animals in her shimmering red sari.

Buffalo Dung

Manuj and his younger brother


Its 4 in the afternoon returning back to the village from the day in Chautara. “Aunice Holly!” Says Mohan’s older brother, Manuj. I follow him to find about five of the village’s children in addition to Manuj’s mother filling up their beautiful handmade baskets with buffalo dung from the grandparent’s animal hut. One by one they kneel down with their heads back to fix the rope around their heads in order to balance the basket on their upper backs. “Basnus!” He says to me so I sit down as they fix it onto my head. Everything I do here turns people around me into laughter. The way I simply eat, drink, sit – everything. And I have come to just accept it and embrace the fact I am the laughing stalk of this region. What to do… So I use Manuj’s hands to pull me up and take a minute to get used to the strange feeling of having to use my neck muscles for the first time in my life. Thinking we would be walking to the adjacent field, I tell myself I can do it. Oh, how little did I know at the time. The walk was twenty minutes down the mountain. Almost falling with every terraced field we would have to walk down, the children couldn’t stop laughing. These kids and mother were doing this barefeet and I was having trouble with sneakers! I always knew that mountain people were physically shorter. I’m 5”2 and considered tall in the region of Ladakh where I tower over most Ladakhi women. These people are also quite short, not as short as Sherpas or Ladakhis but still comparable. Having to hike down this mountain with a huge basket of buffalo dung balancing on my head, I realized how much safe it would be to be lower to the ground!

The night before Kunzes and I had taught Manuj and the other village kids that come to our room every night to learn English, how to say “This is.” While walking behind me he decided to practice. With extremely little English he would say “This is my tree!” “This is my soil!” “This is my water!” as he walked behind me cautioning me with “Bistari, bistari” meaning “slowly, slowly.” Focusing very hard on where my feet were placed and balancing the dung, I couldn’t turn around to correct his pronunciation. “This is my monkey tree!” “This is my snake” My mind was in a zone, letting the kids laugh at me as I struggled to follow their careless steps that seemed to fall in place naturally down the step fields carrying more dung than I myself was carrying. Finally, we came to the step field that felt like 3 kilometers away from where we started. They all threw the baskets down, letting the dung form into a perfect pile. I tried to imitate their throw, but had no luck throwing it all over my head. The kids fell to the ground in laughter and then Manuj jumped up. “My snake.” I thought he was joking when I heard him say it before. I started to feel queasy. In his hand was the skin of a snake bigger than me. Bigger than my body. Then he pointed “my monkey tree” and in the tree was a white monkey with a jet back face – like no monkey I’ve seen before. I pointed to the village, gesturing for the skin to be taken to the village so I could show Kunzes. “Grandfather angry, here it sits. Ghosts don’t come” I gathered that this meant the skin must be kept on the ledge of the field to keep bad spirits from entering the fields, destroying the crops.

“fast walking!” One girl shouted “Going fast!” Manuj yelled to me. As I walked amid the children up the fields preparing for four more trips as I gathered from them, I realized something. These people don’t know anything besides this. There are no TV’s, no computers, no phones and the education system has failed here in bringing knowledge to students. On the way up I admired the pink skies getting ready to for the sun to set. I tried to imagine explaining to these people the fact that the earth spins, hence the reason for night and day. But what is the point of explaining something when it is beyond their ability to understand .

For some time I thought I would leave this village because of the unbelievable lack of understanding. The grandmother would become upset when she heard I was going to Chautara for the day because she thought I didn’t like the village. Even in translation I knew she would never be able to comprehend, to understand the idea of the internet. It literally would be a different world or planet – as this experience has been for me. But I have grown to love these villagers and have created friendships with Nakul and Parkesh – the chief’s sons. Nakul is only 16 years old and is the most polite boy along with his brother I have ever met. They smile so innocently and make sure I am always taken care of. “please let me show you Holly.” None of the villagers can believe it when they see me in the fields. “You must not get dirty.” The children sometime say to me. “This is too heavy for you.” So attempting to show them I’m just a regular person, I join and it ends in laughter and confusion.

It is difficult to be almost revered as some guest god in this Hindu/Animistic village and I feel continuously helpless as I tried to do things that are second nature to them such as tie hay into a bundle, make a fire from blowing into sticks or making bowls out of bamboo leaves. But then I guess I begin to realize all humans have different things we can do depending on our environment. When I type on my laptop Nakul just watches and sometimes asks for me to teach him how to move the curser. I once left my laptop with him for an hour to come back and find all the folders on my desktop deleted. Thank goodness I backed them up the day before. Perhaps that’s why I’m trying to learn how to build a website on my own – to feel like I can help in some small way with the skills and information I know I have access to in my life. To take advantage of my own upbringing, environment and people in my life back home to show the rest of the world that the people where I come from do care about them.

When I arrive to our home Kunzes is playing music with Nakul. She washed all my clothes for me. “Now, Holly. You must stop sitting wherever you please. That is why your pants are always dirty and mine are always clean – you just plop yourself wherever.” Oh, my sweet Ladakhi ache-le.

I turn to Parkesh wanting to know more about the snake skin in the field. I am able to get him to understand “snake.”

“Skin, parkesh. Snake skin.” Pinching my own skin, I try so hard to explain to him but his reply “I don’t understand.”
Five minutes later he comes back. “You mean cover. Snake cover.” He then pinches his clothes, “Like clothes.” I smile and say, “Yes, snake clothes.

“We must leave it there.” Wanting to understand why, his response to me was, “Because it must stay there. That is all.” And with that he passed me a warm cup of buffalo milk.

It is beyond me to understand why they wake up every morning at 4:30 to go to the rocks near the water pump and demand things from the gods. One would have to spend their lives from a child to truly understand as well as learn the skills these people have. To see a mountain and learn that with human power alone, they have created and maintained magnificent fields that have totally sustain them, from the bamboo baskets and mats to the fire they burn using mustard seed oil and sticks to homes they build from clay and mud. To look at a field of pulled up hay and with hands alone press them into perfect tight bundles ready to be brought up to the animals. To see soil and have twenty different names for a concept we only have one word for. He gave his answer through his eyes and it sufficed my need to know. Why? It is beyond my ability to understand and Parkesh knows this.

Lack of Aid....

The students are in exams now for nine days which has given me the time to come here. As I sit here building my website in the city/town of Chautara where I must hike up a mountain and then take a bus or pickup truck to this place, a foreigner pops into the room. Very surprising to my eyes as I haven’t seen one foreigner now in two weeks in the region of the village I am staying nor here in this city. I can’t even find this city online – its like it doesn’t exist. The owner of this café isn’t here to set him up on a computer so we begin speaking. He, like me has not seen a foreigner in this region until me. However, this is his fourth month here. So I ask the question I’ve been wondering. “Why is it that you are the first foreigner I have seen here?” He explains to me the situation that happened in Nepal with the Maoist Insurgency and how this area in particular is full of Maoists. The guerilla war by Maoists rebels was particularly bad in this region. It is still full of Maoists who want to abolish the monarchy and establish a communist system in this poor country. “I’m safe wherever in the world I go because I’m from Holland. It’s the Americans and English they don’t like. But even being from Holland, the staff of the orphanage I am volunteering don’t let me go out alone.” It made so much more sense to me now why the villagers are so protective of me whenever I leave. I have both a British and US passport and I think he could sense the little bit of worry I had as he was telling me this. “Oh, its totally fine now. There has been peace in the region for two years.” I guess what the Maoists used to do with Americans and English was hold them up by forcing them to pay money wherever they were. I learned the reason the orphanage this man works for was set up was because of the amount of parents that were killed in the fighting of the Maoists. After doing a bit of research online I have learned that the reason there are hardly any NGO’s in this region is because they withdrew many years ago when the fighting began which has caused a huge halt in development, aid, infrastructure – everything. Projects and plans for helping these people are still not happening even though its considered a peaceful time. The kind man has invited me to see the orphanage and perhaps do an environment/health workshop with the students once I get this site up and running....