So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish (or, a long and cheesy final entry)

Blogger is still rejecting my pictures for some reason, so text-only will have to suffice for now...

Namasté,

After four amazing months in Nepal, my departure time is fast approaching - like, less than 2 days from now approaching. I can’t possibly get all my thoughts down into one organized entry, but I thought a few lists would help capture how I’m feeling right now:

PEOPLE AND THINGS I’LL MISS:
-The Nepali students: Papiya and Rekha’s banter, Bimala and Kussum (the botany students) lagging behind on every hike to collect bagfuls of plants, sweet smiling Shila, Bishnu’s excitement and adventurousness about trying American food and culture, Bikram and his Bikram-isms (“So why not?” “Our population is large today.”)
-Banu, our “mom away from mom”, and Beth, who is like a big sister without any of the fighting or clothes-stealing.
-The incredible CNSP staff. They are wonderful, fun people who constantly go above and beyond. Tildai, our chef, is a talented dancer and never failed to come by with a little snack when I was working frantically at the dining table. He taught me how to fold momos up nicely (more difficult than I thought it would be), and he’s also the sweetest and most cheerful man I’ve ever met – I don’t think I ever saw him looking sad. Shesh daddy, CNSP’s other chef, is constantly smiling and laughing, makes the best pizza I’ve had in Nepal, and loves cricket. Soon is the baby – he’s the age of most of the students in the program, so he’s fun to hang out with. I got a lot of Nepali practice with him, and really enjoying teaching him how to bake carrot cake – he spent 20 minutes whipping cream cheese and icing sugar together by hand for frosting. Tulsi-dai, who is the next tulo hakim (big boss) after Banu, does everything under the sun to keep CNSP running smoothly. He tracked down cream cheese for said cake (quite a task in Nepal), kept all our papers and documents and passport junk organized, and even took my stool sample to the doctor for me when I was too sick to go. That’s serious love, people.
Sarjani and Phulmaya are always in the girls’ hostel making us breakfast, doing our laundry, and hanging out with us. They seem a little serious and stern at first, but both of them have wicked senses of humor which were a delight to discover, and they were sage teachers in the kitchen yesterday along with Soon and Ramita as we prepared a 13-dish Newari feast. Purna, Soon’s older sister, freely dispensed her famous head and body massages after dance and yoga classes made us sore, and shared pictures of her adorable 9-month-old daughter, whom she doesn’t get to see very often because she lives about an hour across town. Ramita, our librarian, opened the library for us at all sorts of odd hours, and it was wonderful to get past her initially shy exterior and get to know her more over the course of the semester.
-Our translators and the other friends we made outside of the program, especially Sky’s translator Y.P. and Emily’s translator Shreeti, who I wish we’d met much earlier in the semester!
-Professor Dambar, who I’m excited to have over for daal-bhaat in Ithaca because he’s heading to Cornell for a PhD. in the fall!
-Getting woken up every morning with breakfast in bed (although I won’t miss the early hour at which it came)
-Doing laundry out on the sunny roof with views of Kathmandu and mountains in the background
-Being a celebrity everywhere I went (“CHALLO! NAMASTE! HOWAREYOU?!”)…although it’s gotten old by now, it was fun in the beginning.
-Wearing my favorite purple and green flowery kurta
-The friendliness and sociability of people here
-People’s talent for the arts, especially informal things: everyone shares songs, dances, poetry, etc. without embarassment
-The amazing cultural and religious variety here, and people’s general tolerance of each other and willingness to share traditions
-Cooking with the staff (momos, Newari food, racing to cook American desserts in our little electric Japanese oven before load-shedding time when the power went out)
-Curling up in the girls’ hostel TV room with Beth, Banu, the American girls, the Nepali girls, the didis, and a movie. Best of all was when Sarjani would magically appear with cocoa and about eight giant plates of popcorn because she is awesome.
-Sarjani and Phulmaya’s amusing comments during romantic scenes of said movies
-Cheap shopping in the ‘du, and bargaining for everything
-Calling Kathmandu “the ‘du”
-Whipping out my Nepali, surprising the hell out of people, and seeing how pleased they were that I was learning their language
-The old buildings and temples in Kirtipur, kayaking in Pokhara, the views in Mustang
-Reading amazing engrish in the newspaper and on people’s shirts (I saw a fantastic shirt yesterday that said something like “aqua DILICIUS”)
-Seeing people’s healthy habits here: they eat daal-bhaat and fruit most of the time, get a lot of exercise walking and working outside, and sleep a lot
-The relaxed atmosphere
-Getting invited over for tea, cold drinks, or a meal by someone I’ve just met
-Comparing American and Nepali culture with curious people who strike up a conversation
-Conversations about everything under the sun – comparing cultures, discussing the caste system and arranged marriage, etc. – with our Nepali roommates and friends
-Beauty days with the girls – doing Ayurvedic facials, putting mehndi in our hair and decorating our hands with it
-CNSP veggie momos, kheer (rice pudding), “Shesh daddy pizza”, baking with Soon and friends, cooking lessons from the staff
-American and Nepali student cook nights
-Aarju and Sangita, my homestay family in Sitapaila
-Our apartment in Patan, and the cute puppy named Loli who lived downstairs
-Having so many significant, set ceremonies and rituals as part of the culture for various momentous occasions in life (for example, giving flower garlands and tikka in an arrival or leaving ceremony)
-Seeing my female roommates stand up for themselves and say things in class, which is a far bigger deal for them than it sounds like
-Living simply and lightly – having one large and one small suitcase’s worth of possessions for four months has really gotten me thinking about our excesses at home. Also, seeing how people repair things and use them till they’re genuinely worn out, eat only what they need of food that is healthy and doesn’t take much energy to produce, etc. makes me wonder what I can cut out of my own life when I get home.

STUFF I WON’T MISS:
-Thamel, the touristy part of Kathmandu
-Having to avoid salad/ice/unpeelable fruit/cold food/etc. etc. etc. in restauarants for fear of massive gastric upset…
-Children greeting us with “Helloonerupee,” “Helloonechocolate,” “Helloonephoto,” as if we are magic stuff-dispensing machines instead of people
-The lack of privacy here and never being able to feel anonymous in a public place
-Seeing and experiencing the blatant chauvinism and gender inequality here
-Getting stared at/talked to/harassed by smirking men
-Watching this happen to Nepali women and wishing they would react
-Serious harassment by street people, and seeing how many of them there are – it’s really sad.
-Getting stared at in general, because everyone stares at you all the time
-Dirt, dust, pollution, poor sanitation
-Sketchy internet and phone
-“Nepali time”, things never being open, disorganization
-Annoying tourists who made me embarassed to be an American here
-Shopkeepers who view me as a giant dollar sign because I’m white and treat me accordingly
-B.O., or in Kat’s code, “it smells like P.O. Box in here.” Most people don’t wash as often here, and deodorant isn’t really available. It’s really, really difficult to try to have a normal conversation with someone when sitting next to them causes you to breathe through your mouth as your eyes water, and you feel guilty for moving away/cutting the conversation short/etc. Luckily this wasn’t usually a problem at CNSP, but as the weather got hotter, bus rides became increasingly torturous.
-The bus, and driving here in general – about twice as many people are loaded on as there should be, it’s hot and smelly, and you feel like you’ll tip over any second because the drivers are fond of weaving in and out of traffic while honking their horns furiously

THE GOOD IN THE BAD STUFF THAT I WON’T MISS:
-Seeing “bad” tourists as a Nepali might – noticing the unbelievably skimpy clothing worn by tourists in Thamel, for example, in a country where exposing your shoulders and calves is a huge deal – makes me want to be a better and more sensitive foreign visitor. It’s amazing how far dressing like the local people dress (or at least respecting their cultural mores about modesty), speaking their language with them, and taking the time to talk with them and treat them with respect can get you, versus snapping their picture without talking to them, as if they’re a zoo animal.
-Having to be so careful about food made me grateful for the clean water and food we take for granted at home, and made me realize how spoiled I am to expect everything to be safe. People in many parts of the world live their whole lives not knowing when they’ll get extremely sick from a seemingly benign piece of fruit or glass of water.
-Seeing how a lot of men (and I should note here that I have met many wonderful, progressive, sensitive Nepali men who are NOT like this) seem to feel entitled to treat women like second-class citizens whose duties don’t extend beyond childbearing and care/washing/cooking, stare at them, sit around while their wives do all the work, and so on made me have a hell of a lot of respect for early feminists back home, who were able to channel their anger into constructive and proactive work. I learned that sometimes the best reaction is to let things roll off your back, that you cannot possibly surivive an extended period of time here if every encounter makes you seethe with anger for the next few hours (I was certainly guilty of this at first), and that I’m really grateful that women are generally better treated at home, at least publicly. Of course, we still have a long way to go before true gender equality is reached, I think, but I’d choose the situation at home over the one here any day.
-Because of harassment from street people, pushy shopkeepers, etc., which initially made me really uncomfortable, I am now MUCH more street savvy and confident. After all, if I can navigate these situations in a foreign country and a language that isn’t my native one, how hard can it be to deal with things that arise at home?
-As with the food, the dirt/dust/pollution, crummy Internet and phone, disorganization and corruption, awful bus/bad smells, etc., made me grateful for my relatively clean, pollution-free, good-smelling home where there is enough water to shower more, reliable internet and phone, organization, and relatively less corruption.

THE FIRST THINGS I WANT TO DO WHEN I GET HOME:
-See and hug my family!!!
-Go to Panera, Shorty’s, or D’Angelos and eat a delicious sandwich with good bread, and a large salad and a drink full of ice just to celebrate the fact that I can and it won’t make me sick…
-See my friends, catch up with them, show them pictures, and give them their presents
-See as much family as possible (my Mamie, my aunt, etc.) and cook them a huge and delicious Newari kajaa complete with beaten rice, of which for some insane reason I have purchased an enormous bag

GOODBYE FOR NOW:
During my homestay in Sitapaila in April, I wrote the following in my travel journal:

“I’ve been thinking a lot about what it’s going to be like to go home, and the mixed emotions I have just thinking about it. I want to write an essay that explains everything I love about this place to people back home – of course, nothing is as good as experiencing something oneself, but I can try my best. Some fragments of ideas:

Dear Mom and Dad,
Having an amazing time in Nepal, so much so that I don’t want to come home. Well, maybe I will return, but only if I can bring back the lessons I learned here and implement them into American society.

At first glance most Americans would probably pity people here in this “third world” country, but I feel so rich here. People care – they have so little but it’s clean, neatly put away, carefully mended. Babies are always in someone’s arms; children are always playing outside with whatever they can find (think of our abandoned American streets, our empty yards full of expensive toys).

People here know how to let go. Everywhere you go, you hear and say ke garne?, “what to do?” in response to a variety of occurrences. Nepali people seem much more aware that things can’t be forced, and that it’s a waste of time to worry or feel angry about something that’s out of your control.

People here are grateful for what they have, and they work hard for it. I’ve met taxi and rickshaw drivers who work 12-hour days or more – the taxi isn’t theirs, so they have to pay off its rent for the day, and getting petrol here can mean several hours in line at the pump. There aren’t enough jobs to go around, especially for educated people, so often parents must go to work in foreign countries and can’t afford to come home very often. Children sometimes have to work here to support their families instead of going to school; we’ve met kids whose most fervent wish is to study, who know the power of an education. Think of kids back home skipping class or praying for a snow day.

How do I reintigrate myself into a culture which, from three months and thousands of miles away, now seems so ominously foreign to me? I, who automatically take my shoes off at the door and sit cross-legged on the floor for hours, squat over the Indian-style toilet without a second thought (and without peeing on my leg), drink three cups of hot tea a day no matter the weather. The shower, naturally, wets the entire bathroom, a meal just isn’t a meal without a Himalayan-sized serving of rice (and it’s Sagarmatha, by the way, not Everest), seven shirts and three pairs of pants are more than enough. A 300-rupee ($4) cab ride is a ripoff, I can eat a whole raw chili pepper in one sitting; I stop to say “hello” and actually listen when someone responds to my “how are you”? A cold shower is good enough, a 2000-meter mountain is in fact a mere hill, a parade of children behind me on the street is a completely benign occurrence. I fall asleep to the barking of street dogs, breathe some of the most polluted air in the world, escape it on the most breathtakingly beautiful mountains I will ever see. I understand why people say the gods dwell on them.

I desperately want to capture the beauty, the work ethic, the unfailing faith and resiliency, the simple pleasures, the properly ordered priorities, and pack it in my suitcase with the sweaters and prayer flags. If I released it at home, would it take root? If women who spend two hours making each meal, picking stones out of the lentils, women without washers or dryers, women without running water country clubs hair appointments, women sometimes even without TV or electricity, can make time for friends and family, for raising secure, well-loved children – surely we who have so much should be able to accomplish this more often than we do? I’ve heard time and time again from visitors to poor countries that they were struck by how happy the people were – what do we, who can generally meet all our basic needs and wants, need to do in order to be truly happy? I’m not sure enough of us genuinely are.”

I’ve always found the following quote interesting: “I cried because I had no shoes, until I saw a man who had no feet.” People often seem to seek comfort in comparing their lives with those of others who are worse off – “Well, maybe I’m having trouble in my marriage, but at least I’m not Mr. X! His wife left him and took all the money!” – and I’m not sure it’s constructive. I do, however, think that I’ve learned some important lessons about need, want, and gratitude in my time here. The next time I’m unexcited at the prospect of eating something, I will think of the people I met who eat the same simple meal of rice, lentils and vegetables twice a day and love it. Perhaps we don’t need as much variety as we think we do, and our pickiness is learned. Relationships may be difficult and disheartening at times, but the fact that I am able to have them freely and openly with whomever I choose is something I always viewed as an innate right, not a privilege many women in the world don’t have. And waking up in order to walk uphill to a boring class on a cold day is never an exciting prospect, but I would do well to adopt the attitudes about school I saw in many children here.

I have a lot to take in and think about from this trip, and the transition back to my super-size-me international superpower country full of massive SUVs, conspicuous consumption, and 24-oz steaks (steaks! I forgot people ate cows, and in such ridiculous quantities for that matter!) is certainly going to take some time. I’m so excited to share my photos and stories with people, and talk about what an amazing place the world could be if we all shared the best parts of our cultures. Of course, the world already is an amazing place – I don’t think I thought about that enough, either, until I came here – but things can always use some improvement, no?

I’m not gonna lie, though: I also really am excited to see my family, eat some Panera, and spend a quintessentially American summer teaching horseback riding at Camp Green Cove in the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina.

I look forward to seeing many of you very soon! Thank you all for reading and commenting so faithfully – it’s heartening to know people care about where you are and what you’re doing in this big, busy world of ours. If there are other people out there who have been following this blog but haven’t commented yet, please take the time to do so on this last entry. I’d really like to know about everyone who’s been following my adventures, and it would be cool to have a record of all my readers in one place on this blog!

Love to all, and a final pheri bhetaulaa,
Rani/Renée

And the crucial question here, as I see it, is simply: With what society, what social group, do you identify yourself? Is it going to be with all the people of the planet, or is it going to be with your own particular in-group? This is the question, essentially, that was in the minds of the founders of our nation when the people of the thirteen states began thinking of themselves as one nation, yet without losing consideration for the special interests of each of the several states. Why can't something of that kind take place in the world right now?
-Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth