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July - August 2017
A 45-day adventure by Lisa and Hope in ASIA Read more
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  • TravelerASIA
    Day 1

    TODAY'S THE DAY!

    July 13, 2017 in England ⋅ ⛅ 16 °C

    TODAY'S THE DAY!!! Hope and I are en route to our first stop: Kathmandu, Nepal of our 6 week adventure around Asia!!!

    The aim is to write a blog entry every day of our trip to keep up to date with everything that we get up to. Though I'm sure today's is going to start off pretty boring as we are just traveling (apologies!). Please excuse the bad punctuation, grammar, spelling mistakes etc etc as most of these will be written on planes, trains, when I'm half asleep, drunk, or very hungover haha. So, apologies!

    It's currently 22.05 pm and Hope and I are en route to Muscat, Oman, flying with Oman Airways for our change over flight before heading to Kathmandu, Nepal. We are volunteering in Nepal until the 28th July, for the charity: VIN (Volunteering Initiative Nepal) and will be working for Women's Trafficking prevention. We will be staying with a host family for our time in Nepal, learning all about the Nepalese culture and eating Nepalese food every day. Luckily, Hope and I are with the same host family (we feared we wouldn't be). After Nepal, we are heading to Kuala Lumpar, Malaysia for 3 nights, followed by Bali, Indonesia for 10 nights, Borneo, Malaysia for 7, and finishing with the Philippines for 10 nights before heading home on the 30th August. We are so excited!!!!

    We've been flying for approximately one hour (after a fifteen minute delay) and luckily, so far so good. We've both got La La land playing (But Hope is about ready to drop off as she is very hungover and tired) and we have 2 glasses of wine at the ready (probably 2 of the only people drinking on an Oman Airways plane haha). The flight is 6 hours 15 minutes so we're due to land in Muscat at 7.15 am their time (3.15 am UK time) and have a 1 hour 20 minute wait before our 8.35 am flight to Nepal, also with Oman Airways. It's the first time that either of us have used Oman Airways, but they seem okay!

    We are only starting our journey, yet the day has already seemed pretty long. Hope arrived at my house at 12 ish, and mum took us to the train station at half 1, ready for our 2.30 pm train (to arrive with plenty of time to avoid my usual lateness!). We got a one hour train to Sheffield, and changed over to get the train to Manchester airport. The first train was fine, Hope had a nap and I familiarised myself with how to use a GoPro (I haven't used one since Jonny and I used mine travelling). We arrived at Terminal 2, Manchester airport at 17.30 so were extremely early for our 20.45 flight. We checked in, went through security, and grabbed some food at Frankie and Bennys. I'd love to say the food was great, but both Hope's fish and chips, and my goats cheese wrap were pretty average (especially considering it cost £40!!) however, the sex on the beach pitcher made up for it slightly. After food, we got a pimms at a bar further down, and headed to gate 208 at 20.15. Which almost brings us to present. The take off and first 20 minutes were a little bumpy, but the pilot did warn of turbulence. However, luckily now it's okay (I hope I'm not talking too soon!)

    Anyway, it's getting late and food has just arrived, and then we will probably try and get some sleep.

    Goodbyeeeeee    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 2

    STILL en route

    July 14, 2017 in Oman ⋅ ☀️ 33 °C

    I don't even know which time zone to use... But we are currently 35,000 feet above sea level and are finally (almost) arriving in Kathmandu, Nepal.

    It is 08.58 UK time which means it's 11.58 Oman time (where we landed for our transfer) which means it's approx 14.00 pm Nepal time. All I know is our body clocks are so confused. We are just hoping that when we arrive, we don't have too much on today so can chill,and get used to the time difference.

    The food on the first plane was quite nice. Luckily they had vegetarian left so Hope and I had the pasta. However, the desert was pretty grim.
    The flight was 6 hours 15, then we stopped in Muscat, Oman for approx 80 minutes before flying again. At 7 am, the weather was 32 degrees - unbelievable! We were sweating just on the bus, but we didn't want to take any layers off because of how covered up everyone was. Luckily it wasn't long before we were boarding again. We are flying with Oman airways again, but a much smaller plane and the journey is only 4 hours. We have just begun the descent so we will be landing in no time. Hope and I have been asleep the whole journey - we barely slept on the first plane (it didn't help at I had a kid next to kicking me), so we really were shattered (Hope is still asleep now!).

    When we land, we need to get a visa for our stay in Nepal. Hopefully we can get just the 15 days one for $25. Then we need to look out for 'Akkal' who is coming to pick us up. Tonight, tomorrow and Sunday we are staying in a hotel and carrying out the induction, before moving in with our host family on Monday for 2 weeks. We're going to be finding out exactly what we will be doing for the next fortnight, learning basic Nepalese, paying the program fees of 380 Euros (approx £335), learning basic culture lessons, and doing some sightseeing. For our time in Nepal, we have to ensure that we are covered up at all times, so we have both packed clothes that cover our shoulders and legs.

    The captain has just announced that it is 28 degrees in Nepal, which sounds perfect (especially considering the weather app shows heavy rain for the next two weeks as it is of course monsoon season now!)

    ******
    It is now actually 18.17 on Sunday 16th and Hope and I are about to get showered to go out. However I will catch up with Friday night, and Saturday first!

    Okay so, the first few days have been a bit of a roller coaster ....amazing ... But also we have already had a couple of nightmares and its only day 3. So we landed in Kathmandu at approximately 15.00 (later than expected ), and sorted out our visa (£25 for 15 days), before heading through security. Whilst patiently waiting for our luggage on the conveyer belt.... We waited .... And waited .... And our luggage didn't arrive (everyone's worst nightmare!). Then we heard on the tanoy "Miss Wilkinson and Miss Fenton come to baggage reclaim" (never good news!) to then find out that our luggage was still in Muscat as it hadn't made the transfer!!! Feeling very (VERY) frustrated we gave them all our details, and they told us it would arrive on the next morning's flight along with 15 other pieces of baggage that had also missed it. (Of course we later realised this was a lie!)

    We then left the airport and a man ran up to us to ask if we were Lisa and Emma, and led us over to Akkal who is the driver. We didn't even have any luggage so the man didn't even carry anything for us ... Yet demanded money of us .... Apparently calling our names requires money? We felt pressured though, and seeing as we had no Nepalese money, we had to give English money so Hope gave a tenner (she panicked!). We were in a car with three other VIN volunteers, two Italian girls and one French boy, and we waited an hour for another girl to arrive (who is also Italian). There were 7 of us in a 5 seater car!!!! It was mad!!! The roads are so crazy in Nepal - it felt like there was absolutely no organisation so everyone was just driving wherever (it reminded us of the roundabout near the Arc de Triomph in Paris - but twenty times worse!) but it was a cool drive (though very unsafe - sorry if our parents are reading this ... We are safe we promise!). We checked in at the hotel, Hotel Premium, and went to exchange some money, and went for a drink at a small cafe/bar which was cute. Hope and I shared a pizza, and we just had soft drinks as we were so dead out. We bought some trousers and tops (turning hippy on day one) as we only had the clothes we came in, then went back to the room for an early night as we were absolutely shattered.

    Not an ideal beginning, but we are trying to be as positive as possible!!!    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 3

    Nightmare

    July 15, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

    At 7.30 am, we were about to get a taxi to the airport from our hotel in the hope to receive our luggage from the next flight in to Kathmandu from Muscat, Oman.
    So we set our alarms early, and woke up ready to collect our bags. We grabbed breakfast at the same place we ate the night before (I had mango smoothie and pancakes, and Hope had lemon ice tea and cheese coissant) then we got a taxi to the airport which cost 1200 rupees return (about £10 which included a one hour wait for him at the airport) so it wasn't too bad. We had to check out of this hotel and move to one round the corner as this one was full for the night (just our luck!). So anyway, we get to the airport, but the security only let me through and not Hope (no idea why). The flight had just landed so I was first at the conveyer belt...and sadly....last at the conveyer belt. Of course, I was so angry at this point. I spoke to baggage reclaim and they just apologised and told me that it would come on the next flight in, and that we should speak to Oman Air. So we both went to the office (both fuming) and there's no one to be seen there...raging. There was nothing we could do....I even tried explaining to the baggage reclaim that the bags had emergency items in it...but they were all useless.

    We rang up at 14.30 after the next flight landed ..... No bags ..... And at 20.30 after the final flight landed .....still no bags. One of the Nepalese lady's at VIN asked as well when they picked up Pierre (a new volunteer) from the airport, but baggage reclaim said the same to her as they did to me. We were of course very frustrated, but I will finish off explaining the bag situation in the next entry.

    Excluding the bag malarkey - yesterday was an amazing day! We got the taxi straight to the VIN office (located in Balaju) from the airport as it was the first day of the induction. We did the generic meet and greet games with all the volunteers (there is about 20 of us altogether), learnt about the culture in Nepal, and a bit about the programme.

    I'll teach a bit of Nepalese seeing as we are now fluent (lol):
    Nameste = Hello
    Dhanyabad = Thank you
    Bhaat = rice
    Daal = lentils
    Tarkaari = curry
    Achaar = pickle

    And a few random facts:

    1. They eat their food on the floor with crossed legs and they use their right hand to eat, with no cutlery (left is sanitation) ... Hope is so excited for that when we live with our host family, hahaha!

    2. They do not use toilet roll - just water. Most of their toilets are just holes one ground with just a bucket of water at the side.

    3. The cow is the national animal and therefore it is illegal to slaughter them. This means that there are many cows just wondering the streets (we have already seen a few in the middle of the roads!)

    4. They often shake their head when they mean to say yes (very confusing!!)

    5. Nepal has the highest proportion of Hindus in the world. 81.3% of Nepal's population are hindus

    6. Handshake is not very common in Nepal. People of Nepal put their palms together and bow their forehead and say Namaste or Tashidele (in the Sherpa Communities). Namaste is directly translated as ‘I salute the God in you’.

    7. Of course, the major part of the Himalayas is in Nepal. The Himalayas mountains is shared between five countries in descending order: Nepal, Bhutan, India, China and Pakistan. The mountainous north of Nepal has eight of the world’s ten tallest mountains, including the highest point on Earth, Mount Everest.

    8. There are also many Buddhists in Nepal. Nepal is the birthplace of Lord Gautam Buddha. Siddhartha Gautam (Buddha) was born in Kapilvastu, Lumbini which lies in Nepal. Lumbini is a sacred place for Buddhists

    9. Nepali cuisine consists of Dal-bhat-tarkari (Nepali: दाल भात तरका. Dal is a soup made of lentils and spices. They eat this cuisine throughout the whole of Nepal, and usually for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

    10. The most shocking fact to us about Nepal, is that, within their culture, when a woman is on her period she becomes 'untouchable'. In some places, women cannot be in their own homes during their period; in others women can be in the house, but not in the kitchen and worship room. They are also forbidden from touching other people (especially male members of the family or neighbours) or cattle and from growing fruit and vegetables. Women become untouchable. We think it's shocking that this human right is basically viewed as something that these women should be ashamed of!

    After our lessons, We had the nicest lunch of curry, and sat and ate outside with everyone (we had spoons thank goodness). Everyone is so nice! There's only one other English person, then most people are Italian, or French with a few who are Dutch and Danish.

    After lunch, we had a fab afternoon of sightseeing. We went to Swayambhunath (pronounced Swahi - an - boon - eth "
    ) which is on top of the hill in the Kathmandu Valley. It is also known as the 'monkey temple' because of all the rhesus primates there. The main entrance had a huge number of steps (365 stone steps to be precise) which we climbed to view the main Stupa complex. It was beautiful!
    The Anantapur shrine (one of the large white chedis near the stupa) was destroyed during the April 25th earthquake in Nepal. The monastery at the back of the stupa was also badly damaged. However the vast majority of Swayambhunath survived.

    This was our first experience of the hole in the ground toilets ... it was not pleasant! But we had no other choice, and we knew we would have to get used to it at some point.
    We saw the cutest dog litter on our way down!! And many monkeys of course (hence the name).

    After that, we went to PASHUPATINATH temple. It is one of the biggest Hindu Temple of Lord Shiva in the world. The temple served as the seat of the national deity Lord Pashupatinath until Nepal became a secular country. Only Hindus, Nepalese and Indian citizens are allowed to enter the temple premises. So we were only able to look at the temple from the other side of the Bagmati River. People come to cremate their loved ones here, the river is holy. Whilst we were there, we could see a family hysterically crying next to a body. It was heartbreaking to watch, we felt like we shouldn't have been there.

    We walked to the top and saw some lovely views, and many more monkeys!

    We got back to the new hotel, Friendly Rooms (it is actually nicer so we're not complaining!), then we got a taxi to 'Zara' in a mall near y. It POURED it down with rain (just our luck) and we were in short sleeve tops with no jackets, and in sandals and flip flops. It was so funny though. The mall was definitely not what we expected .... The clothes were not like Zara in England, and a lot of shops were selling primark clothes but triple the price (not what we expected in Nepal) but we eventually found a shop that sold pants and a bra so we were able to buy some clean underwear (the worst underwear you've ever seen but made the situation funnier!). We also bought some shampoo, conditioner, shower gel, some snacks ... And of course a bottle of vodka and some lemonade as we felt it was 100% needed haha! We got a taxi home, got showered and ready (it was so nice to feel clean!!), and of course had a vodka, then went for dinner with some of the people we've met. We had the best night! We went to the nicest vegetarian restaurant which was the coolest and edgiest restaurant everrrrr and obvs we fit right in now that we are wearing edgy 'gap year' clothes (lol). I had chilli mushroom and paneer which was SO good, Hope wasn't so keen as it about blew her head off from the spice haha, but she enjoyed her pad Thai.
    After food, we went for drinks at an Irish bar (after having to withdraw more money due to spending a fortune on clothes etc and replacing toiletries) and ended up getting smashed. There were six of us, and we started off with one green island each (vodka gin and rum), which of course ended up being four or five for me , Hope and Cormac (the three English of course), then we got everyone doing shots (we did flaming sambuca...Hope almost set the whole table on fire hahaha!). No surprise we were all smashed, and were up dancing. So we obviously thought it was a good idea to go back to the hotel and drink the rest of our vodka. We all sat on the roof and carried on drinking, until Hope and I went to bed at 2 ish (I think). We woke up covered in crisps hahaha and to a man telling us we had to get up to move back hotel (at 8am!!!) so no doubt we've been knackered today.

    Overall it was a fantastic day (bar no bags :( !!)    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 4

    Hangover from hell

    July 16, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 28 °C

    It's 22.13, and I've not long got in from dinner with everyone. Unfortunately Hope has been a bit poorly today so she stayed in today, and didn't fancy dinner tonight. We think she will be fine tomorrow. It's probably a combination of cheap alcohol causing a bad hangover, the heat, tiredness, and different food.

    Slight improvement on the baggage situation - a lady called twinkle (lol) has what's app'd me to say that our bags are on tomorrow's flights. We aren't going to be too optimistic about it, as earlier in the day she told me that they couldnt track the bags and that she received an email from Muscat airport Saturday morning to say that the bags are on the 8 am flight (which they were not); so both Muscat and Nepal airport are saying different things (not reassuring!) However, it's an improvement! We will just have to wait and see tomorrow. She said we get $40 compensation each which isn't great - but at least it's something.

    So we moved back hotels at 9 am this morning (we fell back asleep but he came back in rushing us out haha), then Hope conked out as she felt so poorly. I spent the day at the office. Before lunch, we had an in depth presentation with the man who is the founder of VIN. We found out the history of the charity, the purpose, and then specific detail about our individual programmes. I was struggling to stay awake as I was so tired and hungover, but I got through it.

    At lunch we had spaghetti in a curry sauce which was yummy! Then I got the taxi to the airport to speak to Oman air. This time it only cost 1000 which included the wait, then he dropped me back at VIN office. There was so much traffic so it took around 40 minutes each way!
    In the afternoon we spoke to our programme manager/coordinator and found out details of what we will be doing. Hope and I are going to be educating women's groups on women trafficking, and teaching them a number of life skills. I think we have to conduct some research as well, and need to do a report at the end of the fortnight.

    We left the office at 5, and I came back to the room to see Hope at 5.45 ish (it's only a fifteen minute drive but I got us both another top and some more trousers). We chilled for a bit, Hope felt a bit better, but then when we got to dinner with everyone she felt sick again so came back. I had dinner with the others then came back to see her. We are going to have an early night as we are shattered from last night - and hopefully Hope will feel much better in the morning.

    Tomorrow we are meeting our host family! We are excited for it. Today has been good, but tomorrow will be better when Hope is feeling better :) (and hopefully we get our luggage ... Hmmmmmm!)    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 5

    CRAZIEST DAY OF OUR LIFE

    July 17, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    I think today has hands down been the craziest day of our life! This is going to be a long entry, so be prepared. We have had a mental day full of many ups and many downs.

    So it's 23.03 right now and we are in bed (well....if you can call wood a bed) at the host family's house .... All I can hear right now is Hope saying "OMG this is awful!" I will explain the house in more detail later.

    First, I will start with the morning. So we got up at 8, got showered and ready, and went for breakfast. Hope was so hungry as she didn't eat all day (due to feeling ill) that she couldn't get to sleep until 4.30 am so she was shattered. But after some food, she was fine. We went to the same place as day one.... It's nice but takes ages!! But all the volunteers go there so it's nice to see everyone. Hope had croissant with cheese (again haha) and a big hash brown and Fanta, and I had pancakes (again) and a big hash brown with papaya juice (that I did not like, so I ordered a coke instead ....and yes at 8 am haha!). After breakfast, we got a lift to the office. We started off the day with some more language lessons, culture classes and we found out more information about our host families. We had lunch at 1, which was Dal and a juice, then we pretty much chilled out until we got given our lunch boxes (the cutest) and t-shirts, and had group photos and individual photos (which wasn't great for me and Hope right now) but the group photo was cute. Me being clumsy as ever spilt coke all over Pierre's bag and someone's shoes (which I think was one of the workers ... Oops!).
    We have had some of the most hilarious moments today. So the first thing was during the group photo (sorry this is gross) but after all the food they gave us, I really needed to burp but we were so close to everyone, and everyone had their arms around each other so I panicked and burped in Hope's face by accident. It sounds gross but it was one of those hilarious moments that you had to be there for. They give us that much curry that Hope said it was the worst smelling burp she has ever experienced!!!

    The taxis to take us to our host families came at around 14.30 (inconveniently the flight was delayed so we weren't able to find out at this point whether our bags had arrived). It's only around an 8km journey to get to Kavresthali (Where our host family lives), but due to the bumpy road conditions and the hills, it took around 45 minutes. Second funny thing that happened today, was that on our way up a hill, the car just completely stops and so we have to get out the car and help to push it up the hill. It was crazy!

    We arrived at the host family and introduced ourselves to everyone. Luckily we had a member of staff with us who was able to help with the introductions and translate for the first fifteen minutes (we were told that our host families spoke 'OK' English ... Of course we got the host family who were hosting for their first time and speak practically NO English!). We went up to the kitchen on the third floor. Their house is beautiful. Of course it isn't very modern, but it is massive and full of lots of bright colours. We sat down at the table, then the family gave us some food .... And some more food ... And some more food .... Basically they love to feed us hahah (we were warned of this earlier). Hope and I thought we were going to lose weight here ... Not gain it haha! Luckily most of it was fruit; mango, banana and apple. We had some chapatti. The first fifteen minutes was pretty awkward, but then we moved in to our room after half hour and I sorted out my Nepalese sim that I bought after breakfast. Anita sorted it for me as the sim instructions are in Nepalese.
    Luckily we are staying in our host family with Sherilyn and Melanie, two lovely Dutch girls from VIN (on the health programme as they are both medic students), so it has made the experience ten times easier.

    The third hilarious thing that happened was straight after we sorted my sim. So Anita kindly brought in some bangles for us to wear. She managed to fit them straight on to Hope as Hope has such tiny wrists, and straight on to Sheri. However, with me and Melanie, they ended up cutting us with how forceful they were being. So my hand was bleeding in two places from how hard they were trying to squeeze them on to my wrist, and Hope was dying in the corner but trying her hardest not to laugh too loudly. Eventually, Anita gave me one of hers which were slightly bigger (though still absolutely tiny, as all the women have such tiny wrists here).

    Once my Nepalese SIM card worked, I rang Twinkle to find out update on our bags (at this point we thought it was negative as it was already 17.00 and so two hours since the flight landed. She asked me to give her thirty minutes and she would let us know after speaking to arrival. We were still unsure at this point....but.... Half hour later she messaged me on what's app to tell me that THEY HAD ARRIVED!!!!! We literally couldn't believe it. We were so happy!!!!!

    Then she messaged me again to say 'we will send your baggage to pakhara' .... So of course we were then panicking as Pakhara is a 7 hour coach journey away (she must have misinterpreted something I had said!). But luckily, I rang her and she understood that we were going to pick them up today, along its out compensation. And this is where the real difficulty began...

    So, as said previously, our host family do not speak much English.... So we somehow had to tell them that we were going to pick up our bags from the airport....which of course did not go down successfully. So Anita rang the man who translated earlier and the man told me over the phone 'we will send bags to you' ... Which was not what we wanted. We have waited for these bags long enough, and the last thing we wanted was someone to 'deliver' them which probably would have never happened, or came in Nepalese time (which is late!), or the wrong baggage delivered, and we did not want our baggage transferred to Pakhara - we wanted to go there and then. So we rang Dinesh from VIN and asked him to order us a taxi, and also translate what was happen ing to our family. Luckily the taxi was booked, and was due to arrive in one hours time from then, so around 19.00.

    This meant an hour to play with the kids (Hope's favourite!). I forgot to mention that throughout the whole stress of ringing Dinesh and sorting our bags out, the kids were trying to grab my phone and take selfies in between, which was of course not ideal. But once we had sorted the taxi out, we didn't mind playing with the kids. So we played hide and seek, there was about 8 kids and then us 4 girls. Hope was on and was told to count to 100. Three of the kids grabbed my arm and made me follow them through a rice field (through all the mud) and to a pond where the neighbour was feeding fish. They were so excited to show me (bless them) so I had to pretend I was so surprised to see the fish coming to the surface to get the food. The next funny and strange thing that happened was when the little boy picked up one of the dead fishes floating on top, and put it into my hands. When I told Hope later on, she was dying with laughter. It was the strangest 30 seconds. Meanwhile, she was 'on' so wondering around looking for people, whilst linked arms with one of the women. In Hope's words me and the kids looked like we were running through rice fields like a Bollywood film hahahaha!

    After Hide and Seek, we had another stress with getting to the airport as Akkal kept ringing me to say that the taxi driver was confused, so I sent him our location, and e v e n t u a l l y he found us. Akkal rang me to tell me that the taxi was 2500 instead of 1500 (so about £19 pounds which is expensive for Nepal, but we didn't care as we just wanted our bags!). But the next hilarious part was that, because Akkal told us the taxi was lost, Hope started walking down to find him (I wasn't able to as Anita was making me wait until the taxi drove up and she could no understand what I was saying). Then all of a sudden, she's picked up by the dad and thrown on the back of his motorbike and zooming down the bumpy hill at full speed bouncing away full speed hahahahaha. When she described it to me I was dying!

    Finally, we are off on our way to the airport. It was the bumpiest ride ever, and took almost an hour due to traffic. We even collided with a motorbike on the way, but the taxi driver just drove on as though nothing happened, strange!

    When we got our bags (the man only let me through for some reason again), we literally felt like crying with happiness! We sorted our compensation out with Oman Air, which turned out to be 16,000 rupees (a lot more than they originally told us) which is around £123. We are happy with the compensation, but not how they have handled the situation so we will probably still send a complain, though Twinkle and her colleague we will leave compliments about.

    When we got home, we all had dinner. We felt bad as the whole family waited for us, and it was now 21.00 (even the children were up and they usually are in bed by this time). We had dal... We started eating the dal as soup then realised we were supposed to pour it on. Luckily we didn't have to eat with our hands and were given a spoon, but the rest of the family sat on the floor with their legs crossed and ate with their right hand. Hope was really enjoying listening to the slurp as they ate their food! Sheri and Melanie said that they were called up at 19.00 for dinner, but had to just sit and wait until we were home (oops) we felt so bad! One other funny thing (but also very sad thing) that happened during dinner, was that although Anita speaks practically no English, when we said the word 'marriage,' she immediately shouted 'ARRANGED marriage NO LOVE'... We were shocked that she knew no English, yet knew that...and Wass so brutally honest at he dinner table. We felt so awkward. It also made us question whether they actually love each other - it's mad! She got married agreed twelve. It's crazy to imagine that.

    After dinner, we had to wash up (outside whilst squatting). I did it today with Anita as she told us to take turns, but I kept getting told off for not doing it good enough (Hope was laughing).
    Then we had to sit at the table for a bit longer, until 22.30 when we were eventually able to go to bed (but every time we locked the door, ALL of the family kept coming back and banging on the door (first with blankets, then duvets, then lights, then mozzy plug which were supposedly meant to unplug at 4am...????!)
    We had a shower (cold shower) as we were boiling and so sweaty (however there is an open window that we aren't too comfortable with in the bathroom). The toilets are purely a hole in the ground, and they use water to flush them without a chain. We were also delighted to hear that they do not use toilet roll here, so we aren't exactly sure what they do but we are hoping they don't use their hand (though in one of the cultural classes he said that the right hand is for eating and the left sanitation ... Which isn't ideal when they make our food .... Hmmmm hahaha! We then got into our wooden beds.

    It's been one mental day!!    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 6

    HANGING ON For dear life

    July 18, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 30 °C

    It's never a boring day here in Nepal! Today has been yet another interesting day!

    We were up at 7 am for tea and biscuits (though we were actually awoken much earlier from the loud banging noises.. Nepalese people get up so early, like 5.30 am!). The girls had no biscuits, so I 'took one for the team' and had a few (really I just wanted them) ... But I later regret it when we had an absolute mountain of rice, dhal and beat for breakfast at 9 am. We had to wash up after, so we didn't leave until 9.45 (we were meant to be at work for 10 am but our family couldn't understand ... So VIN said they would ring them and ask to do breakfast earlier!).

    The bus stop is a fifteen minute walk from the house. The bus was 60 rupees for all of us (so cheap!) and was about 30 minutes. We were first on so got a seat....but WOW it got SO rammed. The people standing had NO room - it was so cramped... There must have been DOUBLE the capacity on it, with people hanging out the doors.

    The office was a fifteen minute walk from the bus stop...through a LOT of mud (a bad day to wear sandals!). We were at the office from 11- 2 planning our lessons. We met Shweta (the local volunteer) and Om (our project leader) went over the PowerPoint with Hope as she was ill on the day we did it. Hope looked like she was about falling asleep hahaha as Om was literally repeating the same stuff over and over, and her English wasn't great!
    We made lesson plans for the life skill: 'self esteem' which we decided to do as our first lesson, 'communication and public speaking' as our second lesson, and 'stress management' as our third. The annoying part is that the project we chose was 'women's trafficking' yet apparently the first area that we are teaching our women's group in (all three lessons on Wednesday, Thursday, friday) does not have an issue with women's trafficking ... so it is quite annoying and makes our project seem pretty pointless. We wished we chose one that teaches english, but hopefully the life skills lessons will still be interesting, and we can still write on our CV that we taught about women's trafficking.

    We finished about 2 pm after both being asked by a Nepalese man if we are models (lol)! Then decided that we didn't want to go straight back to the host family, so got a 350 rupees taxi to Thamel and had some chips and nachos, and 2 sex on the beach cocktails from a terrace bar (which turned out to be so expensive!!! Like 2200 - ridiculous!) We looked at some shops, then got a taxi back to the bypass bus stop to get the bus back to Kravesthali.

    And wow what an experience this was! So a bus turned up, and we definitely thought it was full... but oh no ... we are asked to get on. We were literally HANGING ON FOR DEAR LIFE! It was so funny ... we were laughing so hard but it was making it so much more difficult to hold on. The journey is uphill and so bumpy, yet we felt like we were almost hanging out the door!! In the end a lady offered to hold my bag. It is mental on there! No wonder it's so cheap. There was one point we felt so uncomfortable from how close people were to us, and it stunk of BO which wasn't ideal! We were glad to get off.

    We met a few of the volunteers at a cafe, then walked back to the house with Sheri and Melanie.

    As we had eaten at the restaurant, and there are no bins anywhere in Nepal (no wonder pollution is so bad here!), we still had our full lunch boxes. So in a panic, just before we get back to the house, we poured the food in to a carrier bag ... then the dad comes zooming past on his motorbike... so in a panic we put a bag full of food (which has a very strong smell of CURRY) IN MY BAG!!! And we had to keep it in our room overnight because we couldn't let Anita see as she would be so offended ... it was not cool! (I am now writing on the 19/07/17 as we got distracted yesterday)

    When we got in, we had tea around the table and waited for dinner at 8 pm. Anita showed us milking her cow in the garden (we felt so sorry for the cow in a small barn) and the kids were non stop shouting 'SISTER TAKE PHOTO TAKE PHOTO' at us haha! Then we went to bed after dinner!    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 7

    First Cultural Lesson

    July 19, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    It's 22.20 and we are just about to go to sleep. Today hasn't been QUITE as eventful as the last few days haha, but still interesting as always.

    We were joyfully awoken (sarcasm of course) by Anita shouting 'HALLO HALLO HALLO' at 6.15 (yes SIX FIFTEEN AM!!!!!!) on our door ... as well as banging on ALL of the windows (and we later found out it was for sugar ... she definitely could have waited!!!).
    We had our tea at 7 am, and this time no biscuits (she is starting to pick up things about what we like and dislike which is good), breakfast at 8.30 today (with 'little' portion of food as she has understood now that we can't eat that much), then we left at 9.15. Hope and I weren't meeting Om and Shweta until 10.30 (Nepali time ... so 10.45/10.50) but we left with the girls and sat in a cafe. We
    Today we had our first cultural lesson with a women's group in a community in Kavesthrali.

    We had the same old usual wake up at 7, then getting ready, then breakfast at 8.30 (Dhal and Bhat). We left the same time as Sheri and Melanie at 9.15 ish, but we weren't actually meeting Shweta (local volunteer) and Om (project manager) until 10.30. We sat in a cafe for an hour, and just organised ourselves. Then we met them at 10.45 (as it's Nepali time of course!).

    We taught the lesson in the garden of someones home. The first lesson was on 'self esteem'. About 9 women turned up, all from the same community, but different ages. One lady had the cutest little baby with her, though she looked so young! And another lady brought her baby too.
    The women didn't speak any English, so Shweta translated everything we said in to Nepali.
    We started off with introductions, our name, where we are from, and why we are in Nepal. Then the women did the same. Fedi and Martino's project is 'photo journalism' so they were taking photos and videos.

    The first lesson was on 'self esteem' and we included 'Women's rights' into this. Not gonna lie, it felt more like we were doing an inspirational speech! The women were clapping when we said we wanted to educate them on their rights as the Nepal constitution is formalised to enshrine equality between men and women. The lives that these women live is just crazy! They have no choice in their clothes (and even the colour! For example, they wear red if they are married), and have barely any free time. Whilst the men go to work, most of these women are washing, cooking, cleaning, running a farm, looked after their children, shopping, etc etc.
    They were interested in the lesson at the beginning, but as the lesson continued, they started to go off topic and talk between themselves about their home lives. These women have no free time, so only see each other during community meetings as they cannot all get time off at the same time from the farm, and their busy life styles. The women were telling Shweta that they wanted to know more about entrepreneurship, and how to increase their income (which isn't actually our programme!).
    We do feel rather pointless in a way because we are given lesson plans, and then a translator translates, but the translator has the lesson plan too so technically they could read off the sheet ... ??? Hmmmmm. But luckily Shweta left it to us to decide what we wanted to do! We are also not a fan of the lesson plans, as some of the ways described for these women to increase self-esteem are just far too western and are just not possible for these women. For example, one method was 'express yourself, wear what you want to wear' ... but when we said this, the women said they would love to do that, but they just arent able to do that in their culture. And one method was 'spend some time on yourself.' And 'spend time with your family'. As sad as it sounds... it's just not realistic in their culture! If they have a day off, the farm won't just run itself, or the food won't get cooked itself. And they would love to spend time with each other, but there's no time that they all have off together.
    We are quite disappointed that we can't teach classes on human trafficking, since that is what we signed up for, but apparently they did interviews on people in these communities, and trafficking isn't a problem here. It feels like we are needed that much, however it's still a great experience and we are going to adapt the lessons and do our own thing a bit, which Shweta is fine with. And at the end of the week, we are going to edit the lesson plans as we don't think they are suited to women's groups here, and aren't the lessons these women want in particular.

    After the lesson, Fedi recorded us saying a bit about the lesson; what we taught, the women's response, our plan etc. And omg I was so cringe ... I just hope that Hope never gets access to that video as I just know it will end up on Facebook!!! Haha

    We went to a cafe after the class (at around 1) and chilled there until 4 with Martino, Nana, Fedi and Asunta. We shared some paneer and chips, which were sooooo good! But we ate a lot of Anita's food also as she makes us less food now.

    We got a mendi pattern on the way back up (the first beauty parlour refused to do ours which was very ...strange). The detail is amazing! It was pouring it down with rain though so this little lady let us sit in her shop for an hour to let it dry, until we eventually decided to just put a plastic bag over it and walk back.

    We had our tea, chilled out, then taught Anita some English. It was so funny! We think that she is already improving though in comparison to day one so hopefully we can teach as much as possible!

    We had dinner at 8 - rice (shock) with potatoes (soooo good!) then we cleaned up (but only our plates again!)

    We were able to go to bed straight after. We think that they understand now that we need our own space, so things are much better. We've been chilling in our rooms for a couple of hours, and now we are about to sleep!

    Goodbyeeeeee x    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 8

    SPONTANEOUS Decisions

    July 20, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    It's actually the 21st July right now, and we are actually en route to Pokhara (damn, I've already ruined the surprise of our spontaneous decision!!!!).

    So yesterday we had our normal morning routine (but with an added bonus of unblocking a hole in the ground toilet as someone had put toilet roll in it .... never a dull day here guys!). But our class wasn't until 1, so we had a nap after the kids went to school, then were woken up by Anita at 11 as she thought we had overslept for work (bless her!). Then we walked to the same cafe as yesterday, and ordered veg phakauda (which was SO GOOD I CAN'T EXPLAIN!!!! Like spicier and nicer onion bhajis. However Hope loved the first one but then realised it was too spicy for her). Then we ordered a random dish off the menu, which turned out to be like hard corn- not ideal! But Martino tried it when he got there and liked it (though found it too spicy!)
    We had a couple of drinks (as in Coke and Fanta, sadly not alcoholic!), and went over todays lesson which was on 'Public speaking and assertive communication' ... but because the women wanted to know about entrepeneurship, we wanted to try and link it more to business.

    We met Om at 12.45, walked to the house, and then Shweta met us there. At 1.15, there were no women there, so we were slightly worried but it turned out they had a community meeting before. At about 1.30, there was about 6 women, and we started the class. However today we had a different girl translating, and she was literally doing the lesson plan word for word so we really did feel pointless. However, we were still doing the class and it was fun, and the women were telling stories about themselves which they wanted us to hear. One of the activities they had to stand up and practice 'public speaking' by giving some information about themselves. One of the women was married at 9 years old (we thought Anita marrying at 12 was bad!) and another woman told us about Kabesthrali 10 years ago when there was no transport. She said that they would have to walk all the way to Thamel to sell the cow milk to make money (which is a long and very bumpy journey that takes 45 minutes in a bus, and would therefore take HOURS to walk it!!) ... its crazy! Most of the women were uneducated, bar one who was grade 7 which is good here. But this lady was only 23 years old so it's no surprise that she had some education. She looked so young though, and already had 2 children.

    The women are all so smiley and lovely, and we can tell that they are proud of their culture and telling stories. And they do recognise that it is changing example through increased women's rights, which they are happy about.

    After the class, we had almost a wedding ceremony between Nana and Tobias (the danish couple). They saw Nana's wedding ring, so then when Tobias came over, the women did a ceremony type thing for them (it was so cute but so funny as Nana and Tobias were just standing there unsure what to do!). One of the women put a necklace round Nana and they were all clapping and chanting. It was so cute though.

    We had a very spontaneous decision to make there and then. We asked Om for next Monday off so that we could spend Friday night in Thamel with everyone to celebrate Sheri's birthday and go for food and drinks, but this is our only free weekend to go to Pokhara so we wanted to get the 7.15 am bus Saturday from Thamel, and come back on Monday. However she said that we weren't able to get the Monday off as she had already arranged classes with a new community and she wouldn't be able to let them know. However, she said that we could have Friday off (tomorrow) if we were to re arrange the class with this community to next Thursday.

    We had to decide on the spot what to do. We really wanted to see everyone and celebrate Sheri's birthday, but this is our only weekend in Nepal and may be the only chance in our whole life to go to Pokhara (and Immy has told Hope how we cannot miss out!). So we felt sad and guilty, but decided that we couldn't miss the opportunity to go. So we rearranged the class until the following Thursday, and had to quickly walk back to the house to pick up our stuff. It was 3 pm and Sumira said that we had to get to the office for 5 pm to book the bus (and although it was more expensive booking with VIN, we wanted to book the bus with them in person to make sure Sumira rang Anita and explained where we were going!).

    We got back, packed our bags in literally 10 minutes flat (so obviously we forgot a few things!), and waited for Sheri and Melanie so we could explain. I think they were sad, but they completely understood.

    We walked as quickly as possible to the bus station (Anita wasn't home but it was a good thing as it would have been so difficult to explain so would have been easier for her to hear from Sumira), and we got the bus to bus park, near the office. It was crammed as per!!

    When we got off the bus, we had our massive bags and it was raining, so we decided to get a taxi. Just our luck ... we are talking to the taxi driver negotiating a price ... and bam ... the Granddad taps us on the shoulder. It was so awkward as we had our big bags on us, but he wasn't able to understand what we were saying. And then he said 'Anita anita' and started pulling us over to a tea shop ... and there was Anita! It was a very difficult 5 minutes trying to explain to Anita, so in the end we rang Sumira and passed the phone over. At first she looked confused but then she understood so when she hung up she was aware of where we were going. At first she looked sad but then her face lit up when we said 'present' and she had a big smile on her face and kept shouting 'GIFTS gifts' haha!!

    When we got to the office, we booked our bus ticket (1300 rupees each), and we gave in some charity money from home. The taxi driver that took us from the bus stop waited outside for us, then took us to Hotel Pomelo, Thamel.

    We chilled for a couple of hours, then went for dinner. The hotel was amazing - and only five pounds each! We had great wifi, a big room with big beds (we were so excited to go to sleep in it!), and a proper toilet!!! Bliss.

    We went to an Italian restaurant, Fire and Ice. We had garlic cheesy bread for starter to share, both had pizza for main, and Hope had brownie for dessert. However when the bill came - we were shocked! There was an extra 23% added on top of everything (VAT and service charge) and the bill was over 4000 rupees!! We were both guessing 2500 maximum just 2 minutes before. It was mad! It's only approx £30 BUT we are in Nepal and meals are supposed to be like a fiver each !!! We then realised we would have to withdraw more money :(.

    We walked back to the hotel (in the pouring rain), and chilled out at the hotel. We didn't end up sleeping until 2 ish as there was a group of dogs outside barking at full volume!!! But luckily the beds felt so comfy in comparison to the wooden beds.

    Overall, it was a great day (but very stressful when we had the 2 hour rush!!!)    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 9

    DEATH road to Pokhara

    July 21, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    We are not on the bus anymore as my phone sadly died. So it's now 20.18 on Saturday 22nd, and we are just at a reggae bar about to eat dinner.

    We wished Sheri a big
    janmadinakō śubhakāmanā 🎉 🎉 🎉!! The family got her a cake, and banners, and bought her some presents. It sounded like she had a fab day!!

    So the bus was a very long 9 hour journey yesterday. It started okay, but ended up being very bumpy, and pretty scary (Hope saw a bus on its side that had gone off the track over the cliff!! - mental). Many people had told us that the journey to Phokara is pretty scary, and that has people had died, but we didn't realise the extent of it until speaking to a local man on the bus. He said that it wasn't rare for buses to go over, and that it was usually people not following the rules, or driving carelessly. Luckily, he said that he didn't know of a tourist bus that had gone over. We were originally looking at a micro bus (which is more expensive, but does the journey in just 5 hours which we thought was great at first ... but we are so glad we didn't now! Many people told us not to, and now we understand why!).

    We got in to Pokhara at around 4.30 pm, and got a 200 rupee taxi to the hostel; Kiwi Backpackers. When we arrived, he told us that there were no more dorms available (which were 600 rupees each) but because we had booked online, he had no choice but to upgrade us to a private room. Which was fab ! We were starving so dumped our bags and went for some food. Due to being so hungry, we literally went to the first restaurant we saw ... which wasn't the best of ideas as Hope's veggie burger and chips was not very nice (how can you get chips wrong???!). My pad Thai was nice, but not amazing. HOpe was still hungry so for some pringles on the way home haha! We weren't wowed at what we saw of Pokhara at this point. But we hadn't had a chance to have a look around yet, so didn't judge too quickly!

    We chilled in the room for a couple of hours, then went out for drinks ... and obviously ended up getting drunk. We went to a cute bar called Moondance and had a couple of cocktails, then a reggae bar (the one we are in now) and had the nicest cool cucumber cocktails (2 for 1) then went to a number of different bars, until we were pretty drunk, and had a fab night! There is a curfew here at 11 though which is very strange, so the police came to shut everything down at 11. So we went and got some chips from a restaurant (strange that bars all shut, yet some restaurants are open which sell alcohol?!). To be fair, we had to be up and ready for a day of walking today at 10, so it was probably a good thing that we had to go back at 11.

    Overall, it was a fab evening!    Read more

  • TravelerASIA
    Day 10

    Pokhara

    July 22, 2017 in Nepal ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

    It's 11.25 pm. Today has been amazing!!

    We set our alarm for 8.30 am (slept in for an extra fifteen minutes), got ready, then went and had breakfast in the social area (it was included). I'd love to explain what it was I had (Hope didn't fancy any)... I think it was somewhere in the middle of like bread/waffle/pancake with chocolate chips, and banana, and a kind of eggy taste (bit strange!).

    Anyway, we went and got cash out after, and were in the lobby at 10 am ready for the day tour. It cost 2000 rupees each (although it's not expensive, we could have done it much cheaper ourselves, but with such limited time here, this was definitely the best option!).

    We had the guide, Manooj, and two other people; Kitty (a lady from Thailand), and Kaas (a lad from the Netherlands). We started off our walk, en route to the Pokhara Ashanti Stupa which is a Buddhist pagoda-style monument on a hilltop in Amanda hill.
    First we walked to the boats, and got a boat across Lake Fewa. Then we started our trek up. I forgot my trainers so has to wear sandals... lol! The men made out that it was a casual 'stroll' up to the top ... but it was not at all! It took over an hour, and we were absolutely DRIPPING in sweat (I can't even put into words how sweaty we were!!!).

    Luckily it was all worth it when we got to the top. The views of the city were breathtaking, and the Stupa was even more so. It was beautiful!! Random fact: you can only walk round clockwise or it's bad luck!!
    Even the gardens surrounding the Stupa were stunning - filled with gorgeous flowers!

    After spending time at the top, we made our way down the other side and went for lunch. Me and Hope shared veg momo (Tibetan culture - it's a dumpling filled with vegetables) and vegetable Thukpa (also Tibetan - noodles, soup and momo all mixed together). It was all beautiful!

    After lunch we headed over to see the waterfall known as Devi's Falls. It is in the gorge of the Seti River and is a magnificent water fall next to Gupteswar Gupha.

    Then we headed to the gupteshwor mahadev cave, just across the road. By this point of the day (14.30), we were absolutely sweating! It was SO hot - so the stairs down (and especially back up) were a bit of a struggle. The venerated cave contained a huge stalagmite worshipped as a Shiva lingham. The ticket allowed us to clamber through a tunnel behind the shrine, and emerged in a deep cavern adjacent to the thundering waters of Devi's Falls (Unfortunately due to the heavy rainfall, we were not able to visit the bottom of the cave as it was dangerous at this time).

    Next, we made our way to another big and beautiful waterfall off SETI River. We had a long walk there after a ten minute bus journey, and sadly enough time to get burnt. We crossed two bridges (one was massive and pretty scary... Hope was petrified bless her, giving herself reassurance as she walked). Luckily, one was a lot smaller (only 270m long and no way near as high!). Then we had a long walk down as well, Hope took a few selfies with some locals who asked her haha, and we all scrambled our way down to the bottom. Hope and I had to get changed under an umbrella (not ideal), but luckily, the waterfall was so worth it! It was so nice to cool off and chill out. The current of the river was actually pretty strong, so we moved quite quickly. We chilled there for about an hour.

    After that, we made our way back up to the top to get the bus back to the hostel. We had to take the stairs up - and wow - the biggest stairs we have ever seen. We were absolutely shattered as we were, then had a gigantic climb up. Our legs were like jelly when we got to the top - and we were no longer cool and refreshed, we were hot and sweaty again.

    (It's now 22/07 and we are on the bus back to Kathmandu so I'm finishing off yesterday's blog!)

    When we got back to the hostel, we checked into the dorm room 106 (600 rupees each). Hope had a nap, and I caught up on some of the blog. Then we went for dinner at half 7 pm. We came to the reggae bar because we had enjoyed our drinks so much yesterday, and liked the atmosphere , and thought the menu looked amazing (Mexican food). But wow, what a mistake! The local food here is fab, but we have realised that any other food is just not nice (which is a shame as we really fancied chips). We had a veggie burger (grim),nachos (they were not proper nachos), and quesadillas (the beans were awful!). The bill was 1500 rupees (if it was local food it would have been maybe 600 rupees). We are going to stick to local food in the future (no matter how much we fancy western food!)

    After dinner, we looked at a few shops, but we were shattered from the day so went back to the hostel at 10 pm ish. We didn't fancy drinking as we knew we had to be up early today.

    Overall - a great day! Hope summed it up by saying it was one of the best but also hardest days ever!    Read more

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