Nancy’s Big Adventure

 Namaste means Hello/Goodbye in Nepali.

I am leaving for Bangkok this afternoon.  I have just enought time for a pot of milk tea, drop-off at the 1 hr laundry, and a quick post before I leave for the airport.

The reason I came to Nepal was to serve as a volunteer, to teach English and work with the children.  Most of the volunteers work in schools and children’s homes in placements all over Nepal. The children’s homes are set up for orphans and children whose parents cannot care for them. The homes are established in quiet neighborhoods to give the children a safe environment. During my placement in the remote village of Ganganagar, I helped the children with English, Geography, History and Math homework in the mornings and then gathered the street children for hygiene and basic English in the afternoons.

All of the volunteers I worked with had plenty of time for traveling and sightseeing.  Here is a quick summary of the highlights:

Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, is a city of temples and shrines and living Gods, where worship of God and Goddesses is a legend and public part of daily life.  The altitude in Kathmandu is 1370 meters (4500 feet) compared to 250 meters (about 800 feet) in Minnesota.  The initial adjustments weren’t that difficult, but the altitude changes would prove challenging as time progressed.

Thamel – The Thamel area is the most popular tourist area of Kathmandu, with plenty of lodges and hotels, restaurants, bars, and tourist-oriented shops.  I am staying at a guest house in Thamel, just a few blocks from the placement office.

Durbar Square – One of the top attractions of Kathmandu, the square has more than 50 Temples and shrines within a few blocks of one another. Durbar means “King” and it was from the Royal Palace on the square that the kings of Nepal once ruled. The buildings here are representative of the great rivalry between the three palaces of Kathmandu, Patan, and Bhaktapur.

    Boudhnath – One of the world’s largest stupa, Boudha is generally acknowledged to be the most important Tibetan Buddhist monument outside Tibet. Tibetans simply call it CHORTEN CHEMPO “Great Stupa”. It has now become the Mecca of Tibetan exiles in Nepal.

Pashupatinath – The temple of Pashupatinath is dedicated to Lord Shiva and is situated on the banks of sacred Bagmati River. It is a pagoda style temple with a gilt roof and richly carved silver doors. During the festival of Shivratri, held in the month of February or March thousand of pilgrims from all over Nepal and India descend on Pashupatinath.  This is where we saw the burning corpse.

   Dhulikhel is where we stayed during our training camp.  Dhulikhel is situated at an altitude of 5500 Ft , about 20 miles (and a 90 minute drive!) east of Kathmandu.  It is a magnificent place to spend the night and awaken to the sun rising across the wide Himalayan range.

    My village placement was in Ganganagar, not far from Royal Chitwan National Park. The national park is large area of low, heavily forested hills bordering >strong>India in the south, home to the one horned rhino, leopard, varieties of deer, wild boar and around 400 species of birds. The park, formerly a royal hunting reserve, covers nearly 400 square miles of dense forest and also home to nearly 60 Bengal Tigers. The Elephant grass at this time of the year grows up to 20 feet, which is still too short to provide cover to rhinos.  Amazing.

  Pokhara is about 125 miles southwest of Kathmandu and is the starting and/or finishing point for some of the popular treks. The enormous scenic valley of Pokhara is covered by forested hills, three crystal blue lakes, waterfalls, and terraced fields.  Pokhara also offers excellent views of Dhaulagiri, Himalchuli, the five peaks of Annapurna and Machapuchare.  Absolutely mind-bogglingly beautiful …

Thanks for the questions and comments.  Many have mentioned the “culture shock” which I guess I really haven’t addressed much yet … perhaps in the next posting.  Until then –

Namaste!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 26th, 2007 at 11:41 pm and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.