Good-byes and my Nepali adoption

As of today I have ten days left at the monastery. Ten days. Ten. Days. It’s ridiculous how fast time is flying by.

The next few days will consist of little teaching and lots of holidays. Tomorrow I have a class but after that I have four days off. Thursday is another big Pooja, and then Friday, Saturday and Sunday are a long holiday for the monks. Why? Because all of them are taking a retreat for the next six weeks. That means six weeks where they will not leave the monastery. Or as my students say “six weeks no football!” After the holiday there will be four days of classes and then the 26^th will arrive… the day I leave the monastery. The monks are planning a goodbye party, and I’m making sure to write a letter for each class and for some of the monks and yogis, as well as buying lots of candies and a new, expensive football (which is my top top secret gift). I’m sure it’ll be a day filled with tears, of course.

So yes, that’s what’s going to happen the next few days, but here’s what happened the past few days… The week had been full of teaching again, the biographies are going great; I bought lots of paper and had been slaving away cutting them all into pieces and stapling them into little books so that the monks would feel as if they wrote an actual book, an actual biography. They have tomorrow to finish the biographies so I’m sure there’ll be pictures of that in the next blog post! For the other two classes I started a new project; “my roommate” where they write a little 4 page book about their roommate. It is pretty similar to the biography project but just a lotttt simpler. As an example I made one of the person who was my roommate the first few days in Nepal; the other Charlotte. And guess who visited my monastery a few days later? Charlotte. The monks were super excited to see Zizi’s famous roommate in real life…

I really have to think back far here to remember how the past 5 days went. It all started Friday afternoon, I was going to go to Thamel because half of people from my induction group were leaving (Taylor, Pat, Rachel and Spyro) and I thought it’d be the last time that I would get to hang out with them. So after I’d finished class I left on the bus to Thamel. Charlotte and I had been planning for her to come to the monastery the next day to do interviews for her university project so we planned to share a hotel room. I arrived at the hotel, had a fiddle with getting a good priced room and then had a little nap (I live on naps… Naps and pokoda.) Then Taylor arrived and we hung out in the hotel room for a bit. Slowly the rest of the people started arriving and in the end it was Spyro, Taylor, Charlotte and I at the hotel room, we then went to go meet up with the others. We found Stephanie and Liesbeth (two of the newer volunteers) and went to have dinner; I HAD FALAFEL and was on cloud 9 (I had a brief falafel addiction in Abu Dhabi… ask anyone in my old chemistry class). We spent the evening at Woodstock Bar where George (!), Bhupi (!!) and Akkal (!!!!!) joined us!!! Then Pat, Rach and Laura, who had been at Boudha all day, arrived.

Spyro and Taylor ended up in our hotel room too, on the floor and on the chair. We went to sleep super late, which was a problem because the next day would be a 5:00 am wake up. I don’t know how we did it but Charlotte and I managed to get up and get on the bus and arrive at the monastery before 8:00 am, so I still got to go to my class with Tulku Jigme! This time there was no surprise Pooja so I taught all the classes whilst Charlotte was taking a looong nap. At 12:00 pm we had lunch, then we went for tea and then it was time for her to do her interviews. While she was doing that it was my turn to take a nap. At 3:00 pm she was done interviewing the two yogis and one monk and off we were back to Kathmandu because, you guessed it, we found out that everyone would be there again that night…

The night was just as fun as the one before and we ended up in the same room again. Literally right before I was trying to close the hotel room door Rachel stopped it and came in… I have no clue how she found us, she wasn’t even hanging out with us that night! Turns out her room was across the hall! So Charlotte, Rachel and I spent the rest of the early morning talking, knowing that the next morning we could have a proper, full on lie in. We woke up late (for my Nepal standards) at 9:30 am and went to have breakfast at Roadhouse Restaurant and I swear to lil baby Jesus I have never had such a good breakfast… I had a vegan breakfast burrito and almost shed a single tear because of how good it was; I could’ve had five more if I had the money. After breakfast we met up with Laura and Pat and went off to Boudha. There we stayed at a super nice Spanish restaurant called La Casita (with a view of the Boudha stupa in the background) for the next few hours, having lots of tapas, homemade mocktails and cocktails and sangria! When evening started coming we went back to Thamel, I had decided to stay yet another night, one more early 5:00 am wake up wouldn’t make a difference at this point, plus it was the last time I’d see Pat and Laura, for real this time.

Once in Thamel we went to the rooftop of the hotel and one of Laura’s university friends, who was also visiting Nepal (a very Paulin-esque situation), arrived and joined us. Charlotte and I were super hungry still so we went off to the Organic Café and oh my God the food was amazing. We had such good conversations even after 3 days of continuously seeing each other’s faces, I am so proud that we didn’t get sick of each other after all that time! The next morning because she was coming to the monastery to do interviews again! Later that night all six of us went to a café called Electric Bogoda where I found kittens… I may or may not have ended up spending half the night with the kittens instead of the people. And I may have almost taken one back to the monastery with me. Then we all walked back to our hotels, we had a semi-dramatic goodbye with Laura and Pat, then Rachel, Charlotte and I were off to our hotel room.

5:00 am the next morning the alarm went off again… Rachel woke up too since she was leaving to go to Pokora (not PokoDa the food, PokoRa the place) where she’d meet up again with Colten. Charlotte and I went on a hunt to find a bus. This time we weren’t as lucky; 3 and a half hours later we arrived at the monastery, I’d missed the class with Tulku Jigme (don’t worry, I’d called Ngodup ahead of time to let him know). Charlotte slept again as I taught and then at lunch time we went to find her interviewees… we discovered something terrible; both of them were busy that afternoon and couldn’t do it. Damn. So we went and had lunch at Ramsaran-ji’s place. He is officially the sweetest person, whilst we were having food he would constantly come over with more free food for us, apples, more apples, homegrown cucumbers, extra tea ect…

Then, horror struck. The heel of my left foot started having this really strong throbbing pain. This had happened before; a week earlier at the hotel room with Lex and Paulin the same exact thing happened. I thought maybe I’d just walked too much that day but now it was back in the same exact spot, the same exact pain, I was worried. Charlotte was about to leave on the bus to Boudha and I decided to go with so that I could go visit the Tibetan doctor again. We got there and she came with to the doctor. I got herbal tea and the bitter herbal medicine again; tons of it to last a whole month… and it only cost 40 dirhams! I spontaneously told Charlotte to get a checkup too; she’s been having terrible nightmares for the past few years, the doctor gave her some tips and some tea, I really, really hope it’ll help her.

We then went to Chechen monastery (the one from the “Pooja on steroids” post) and had some food at the vegetarian restaurant… I HAD A VEGAN PIZZA. IT WAS AMAZING. I found out that they have a guest house at the monastery so I might go and stay there sometime after the 26^th. After the food it was time to say bye because Charlotte had to go make the three and a half hour trip back to her monastery. After a 30 minute wait a Sundarijal bus finally showed up; it was packed full! I literally was half hanging out the door until a really nice man offered me a seat, he was about to get off the bus anyway he said. So I sat down and a couple of minutes later the smell of alcohol hit me. Someone who had a few too many had entered the bus. And, just my luck, he decided to choose me to hover right over. He started a conversation, his alcohol breath invading my personal bubble. I know how to handle myself in these situations; don’t make eye contact while replying, answer with short sentences, and do not, do NOT giggle or show any signs which might be taken as flirtation. When he started asking me whether I was alone I really started to feel uncomfortable. Thankfully a whole bunch of new people entered the bus separating the man away from me.

I was sitting alone again feeling highly uncomfortable about the whole situation that had just occured and then a super sweet old lady and her grandson came to sit next to me and asked me whether I was alright. This simple question was the beginning to a crazy new adventure. We ended up having a conversation the entire bus ride, the grandson being the translator between the grandmother and I. Then it was almost my time to get off the bus, I stood up and was ready to say my goodbyes, then when I turned around they were standing up too! They were from Sundarijal! We paid the bus fair and got off the bus, I pointed out my monastery to them and it turns out their house is actually really close to the monastery! They invited me over for tea, promising it was only a 5 minute walk. My foot was still in eternal pain but I knew that this was a once in a lifetime thing so I said yes and decided that I could limp my way there, I mean, it was only a 5 minute walk right? IT WASN’T. It took over 30 minutes. Whenever the grandson saw me struggling he said “don’t worry, only 5 more minutes”, he said this so many times that I lost count, and it has now become an inside joke between us… Of course, in typical Charlotte fashion, the grandmother was miles ahead of me walking like she was a 20 year old woman… whilst I was huffing and puffing in the background...

We went deep into the country side and in the end arrived at one of the most expensive looking houses in the village; it was beautiful! Their cows were in the garden and their own paddy fields surrounded the house as well as corn plants, cucumber plants and fruit trees… Was this real life? This was surely a dream. I was greeted by excited screams of children on one of the balconies of the house. It turns out that the grandmother, her husband and two of her children and their families live in the house. They then informed me the house next to the house they pointed out was also their family’s house and that collectively they lived together in both houses. I entered the house greeted by Namaste’s and was guided towards the rooftop. There I found a bunch of kids, 7 or 8 of them, all doing their homework together. I went and sat with them and was questioned thoroughly; they go to a school where some of the lessons are taught in English so we could actually have conversations! 

I was brought tea, donuts and Jolapi (the super sweet thing I described last blog post) and a continuous conversation ensued, with a proud grandmother looking over us. Soon a friendship was formed between me and the baby of the family, a 5 year old girl who is super cute and super sassy. Every time I spoke she would say in Nepali “what does that mean?!” and for the rest of the evening she hung around me picking up English. “yes yes” “no no” “fatherrrrr” with a rolling ‘R’… too cute! The family invited me for dinner and I told them that if I stayed it would be too late for me to go back to the monastery that night, I didn’t want to go back in the dark, so I declined. After a quick Nepali discussion they told me that I should spend the night in the house. I am a very cautious person but it all just felt so comfortable and safe, and the grandmother was just the sweetest lady ever, so I said yes. I called the monastery and let them know that I would be back the next morning at 7:00 am; the oldest grandson had offered to drop me off by bike in the morning. So there I was, practically adopted by a Nepali farming family.

The oldest daughter brought me to her room which was where I would stay the night and gave me pajamas to wear. I put all my things down, changed into the pajamas and went back outside, I was greeted by cheers… and comments that the girl and I were now officially twins (we even had similar glasses). With the pajamas it felt like I was really part of the family and soon we left to the kitchen in the house next door for dinner. I was served first, rice, curry, really delicious fried potato and to my horror; milk. The family explained that they have 3 cows and they were super proud of the milk that they produced, proudly exclaiming in a Ramsaran-ji fashion “no chemical, pure, no water”. They boil the milk. All their eyes were on me, they were so excited to see my reaction to their milk so out of courtesy I tried some of it and it was the creamiest damn milk I’ve ever tasted… I haven’t drank milk in so long that I was afraid that I would get sick if I had it all. So with a massive smile I told them is was “mitho cha!!!!” which means delicious in Nepali and then explained to the grandson that I was afraid that I would get sick if I had all of it since I hadn’t had milk in so long, he explained it to his family and they were all okay with it.

We spent the night chatting away, the 5 year old girl, my new best friend, sitting on my lap imitating the English words and playing with my hair. I was really tired from the 5:00 am wakeup and my lack of a nap so I told them I’d go to bed soon. A whole bunch of them followed me to the bedroom; the aunt and three of the girls and there we talked some more. They got out typical Nepali clothes hoping for me to try some on, but my shoulders were too broad to fit through the 16 year old’s dress… so tragic! So we just ended up doing each other’s hair and eating mangos instead. At around 9:30 pm mom called and as I was speaking to her the women left and said goodnight. I was left alone with the eldest daughter and the youngest son. They usually sleep in the bedroom on the double bed but they insisted that I’d take the bed, and at this point I was so tired that I didn’t even have the energy to protest. Like a princess they fixed the pink mosquito net for me and brought extra mattresses to the room for them to sleep on. Although the bed and pillow were hard as brick and the room super hot, I slept like a baby all through the night until I was woken up by my alarm at 5:30 am.

I spent a few minutes outside in the garden with the sound of the birds and the cows in the background, the view was incredible and the air was so fresh, I could’ve stayed there for the rest of my life. I had breakfast with the family members that were already awake and was starting to say goodbyes, ready to leave the beautiful, kind family behind. I was interrupted by the grandmother who was ranting in Nepali, her rant was translated to me; she wanted me to stay another day and night! I told her that I really couldn’t because I had to teach the monks in a few hours. This was followed by the family telling me that I am welcome to their house any time and that I have to have to have to come back to visit. So during the motor bike ride back to the monastery I was working super hard trying to memorize the way, I think I will go during one of my free days, definitely. The family was just so kind and welcoming, and the kids had such a good sense of humor… I can’t wait to go back again.

So those were the happenings of the past few days. Now I have a bunch of free time again and then the last classes! It’s crazy how fast time is going, but at the same time I am super excited to go back home to see my own family again!

Charlotte x