Monday, January 31, 2011

Laundry in the Morning


Early morning. Wake up, start the day hand-washing the laundry. Boiler left on since the night before to catch those three hours of electricity which came on during the wee hours of the morning. Clothes have been soaking for a couple days now, it’s time to give them a good shake. Open the tap, trickle trickle, gush gush. Light a candle rendered useless by the cold morning light trickling in through the grimy side window. Close the door to the tiny, dark, dingy bathroom. Contain as much of the steamy heat as possible. Squelch squelch, scrub scrub. I take advantage of the suds and warm water and give myself a wash as well. Put on the essentials to avoid getting cold.

This hand washing clothes business is new to me. Sure I’ve scrubbed the odd stain or two once a month, but it’s nothing compared to the mountain of clothes I’ve ambitiously thrown into a 30 litre bucket. Do I scrub each item of clothing individually? Should I beat them with a stick? I settle for the provincial wine making procedure, using arms instead of feet. I feel like a strange sort of gorilla.

Pressing down through the water on the soaked folds of cloth, suds spill over the sides unto my shoes. Circular movements, vertical movements, awkward movement become smoother, soothing movements. The quick take in of air as clothes are brought up from below, the slap as they are quickly submerged again and tiny bubbling air bubbles rising to the surface. I’m suddenly five, sitting on the side of the well watching Tita do the laundry in my grandmother’s house.

For some reason doing the batch of colours is more difficult than the whites. Probably because there’s more of them and it’s already half past eight. Quick! Time to rinse each item separately because mass rinsing will never get the job done in time. Take the procedure to the sink, the shock of cold gushing water adds to the urgency and the briskness of my movements. More scrubbing, squelching, wringing. Set aside. Work my way through half the bucket and do the quick math. There’s not enough time. Hang up what is ready, get dressed and go to work. Fifteen minutes. Grab the clothes and head outside, dripping trail following my lead. Wriggle the rusty gates open with my foot, balance the mound of clothes on the dusty balcony rails, try not to loose any privates over the side. Has it been raining? Leaves are damp and mysterious puddles of water are present but the sky is an early morning gray and shows no signs of rain. Ten minutes, shit.

Wring the clothes three at a time, lose two socks and one underwear over the railing in the process.  Ungrateful ****s, get back here! Rush back inside to dress for a rescue mission. Can’t have the whole neighborhood watching as I climb down the gutter to the steep jungle that is my landlady’s garden in fresh smelling under whites, calf-socks and loafers. Five minutes, get dressed! Work dressed. Put on shoes, trousers and a sweater, do your makeup and grab a hair tie. Get your jacket, scarf and backpack. Where’s my hat? Turn off the heater, lock the gate, climb down the gutter, grab your underwear, throw it onto the branch overhanging the balcony, climb back up and bike to work. Hatless.

And here I am, sitting at a computer for the next 7 hours, watching the sun rise over the rooftops greeting the world with its warm embrace. Life is so much more exciting on the outside.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

A Taste of Viet Nam


One of the things I go on and on about over here is Viet Nam. And how much I miss it. And while the best way of getting over someone, something or in this case somewhere, is to focus on other people, places or objects, I can't help but look back. A trigger happy finger resulting in a hard disk full of pictures and nothing to do during a blackout doesn't help the case much either. So I've decided to blog about Viet Nam. I may as well since Nepal is taking its time revealing its many secrets and wonders to me.

So I'm clicking through pictures and a photo of quay comes up. The asian salty version of a churro, deliciously crunchy on the outside, if ever so slightly greasy, and hollow on the inside. You leave it to soak in a bowl full pho' – a chicken or beef water based soup, with a delicate aroma of ginger, basil and spring onions – until it soaks up this savoury liquid. If you time it right, with that first bite you can experience the crispiness of the outside and the juicy chewiness of the inside all in one go. You can then counterbalance this with a slurp of the slippery rice noodles waiting patiently in your bowl, letting the rest of the quay soak up some more pho'.

Another wonderful dish is cha ka, fish cooked with lots of dill, spring onions, peanuts and a yellow slightly spicy sauce of some sort. This is sautéed on the spot, then combined with small portions at a time of cold rice noodles, fish sauce, chili, more peanuts and smelly feet sauce to taste. Smelly feet sauce is optional – it is a purple/gray fermented version of fish sauce which customarily has lime-orange juice and freshly chopped chili added to it when served. It is then stirred vigorously with chopsticks until it begins frothing and can then be used as a condiment for fried tofu, cold rice noodles or cha ka. At its most concentrated form it smells like feet to foreigners, hence why many Vietnamese now jokingly refer to it as smelly feet sauce.

One last dish to be described, and there are so many more of them which will have to wait until the next bout of nostalgia for Vietnamese food, is bun cha. Char-grilled flattened meatballs and slices of fatty beef, each street kitchen has it's own particular blend of flavours its customers diligently come back for. During lunch time those bbq smells can be traced back to a man wearing a face mask which does nothing against the clouds of black smoke engulfing him, crouched over a block of coals holding what appear to be two square sections of chicken wire clamped together with a makeshift handle. A closer look shows you the beef expertly threaded between the two wires, 5 dishes at a time being quickly and efficiently prepared over a cylindrical block of coal. When the meat is ready it is added to a bowl of diluted fish sauce, pickled carrots and green papaya and served hot with a basket full of soya sprouts and leaves (and I do mean leaves not herbs or salad – possibly of the hibiscus variety), and sticky cold rice noodles. Extra chili and garlic can be added to taste. Delicious.  

Tuesday, January 25, 2011


Haggis, whiskey, bagpipes and lots of people bumping in to each other to the beat of a band, can only mean one thing – a Scottish ceilidh. Accompanied by the narration of “Ode to a Haggis” and ceremonious piercing of said haggis leading to the release it's steaming entrails, it can only be Burns' Night.

So were the celebrations of Saturday night at the British Embassy in Kathmandu. Brits, Germans, Scandinavians, Nepalis and who knows how many other nationalities alike gathered on British soil complete with European toilets and British plugs, to feast on bangers, mash and gravy – with a vegetarian option of mushroom pie – and dance young and old in a swirl of tartans and kilts. It's safe to say that even the most skeptics of dancers had a go at stripping the willow and had a great time about it. Only joyous laughter echoed in the halls after the traditional dancing had ended and the electronic beat of reggaetton began blaring through the speakers. Reggaetton of all music, followed by Katy Perry and bollywood music. A tip for those aspiring bollywood dancers: pretend you're screwing in a lightbulb with your right hand and putting out a cigarette with the left foot, et voila you're a professional bollywood dancer!

I leave you with the “Ode to a Haggis”:

Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great Chieftan o’ the Puddin-race!
Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang’s my arm
The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hurdies like a distant hill,
You pin wad help to mend a mill
In time o’need
While thro’ your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead
His knife see Rustic-labour dight,
An’ cut you up wi’ ready slight,
Trenching your gushing entrails bright
Like onie ditch;
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reeking, rich!
Then, horn for horn they stretch an’ strive,
Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive,
Till a’ their weel-swall’d kytes belyve
Are bent like drums;
Then auld Guidman, maist like to rive
Bethankit hums
Is there that owre his French ragout,
Or olio that wad staw a sow,
Or fricassee wad mak her spew
Wi’ perfect sconner,
Looks down wi’ sneering, scornfu’ view
On sic a dinner?
Poor devil! see him owre his trash,
As feckless as a wither’d rash
His spindle-shank a guid whip-lash,
His nieve a nit;
Thro’ bluidy flood or field to dash,
O how unfit!
But mark the Rustic, haggis-fed,
The trembling earth resounds his tread,
Clap in his walie nieve a blade,
He’ll mak it whissle;
An’ legs, an’ arms an’ heads will sned,
Like taps o’ thrissle
Ye pow’rs wha mak mankind your care,
An’ dish them out their bill o’fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware
That jaups in luggies;
But, if ye wish her gratefu’ pray’r,
Gie her a Haggis!



Sunday, January 23, 2011

The stomach has landed


After 2 and a half weeks of peaceful coexistence my international intestinal flora and their Nepalese counterparts have declared war on each other deep in the cavernous trenches of my stomach. That's what I get for eating yogurt with the consistency of cheese, yet here I am again in that same establishment from where this yogurt cheese came, ordering that same dish. I'll learn one day. Then again, these little buggers should really learn to live with each other at one point or other, might as well get it out of the way now.

This week hasn't been too exciting so I don't have much to report. The skies have been gray, the morning's seem colder, and the new load-shedding schedule isn't as reliable as the last. Sunday brunch at Café Soma as usual after a relaxing yoga session at the Summit.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Basantapur

It took me 9,339km, 15 hours flight time and a good dose of Vietnamese culture and noodles to make some German friends. Now 2,961 km due West, and a good 15,281.2 km from the source, I can expand my Salvadoran posse. Seriously, the world is bizarrely small at times, yet at the same time this experience is about how massive the world really is despite the current facilitation of travel and communication and resulting globalisation. The world is huge, but the community of globetrotters is tiny in comparison.

Today I happily revived my Latin roots and two Salvadorans set out to explore the secrets of Kathmandu. Armed with two massive cameras, a map which came out every 200 metres, sweaters, scarves, converse, no money but lots of gusto, we set off from the suburb of Patan in true Salvadoran fashion and walked north. Walked and walked and walked, until the map was rendered useless and the meandering streets gave way to conning shamans and multilingual drunken hindus.

“You have camera, take picture?¨
“Is that ok?”
“Yes, yes, make a donation”
“But we don't have any money”
“Ok ok, no money is also ok”
“Que pensas, le tomamos foto?”

“Va, andate pues, te tomo la foto”
“Ok, you take picture? Sit down”
“Sit down? Really? But it's so...dirty”
“Sit, sit, have friends”

All of a sudden, shamans flock from all over the square to have this one picture taken, and there I am, sitting on the dusty sidewalk surrounded by swirling yellows, reds and oranges, painted faces, dreadlocked beards and clinking silver money-buckets. Beyond them, a group of curious Japanese tourists have gathered around Marco Antonio to observe this curious spectacle. Why is that girl sitting at the shaman's feet?

Click.

“Ok ok, now you make donation”
“But...we don't have...tienes dinero?”
“Si, si...ok here, thank you very much”
“Bah! 15 rupee?!”
“We don't have any money...”
“5 dollar...ok ok...1 dollar...”
“...and there are six of us...”

And on it went. Finally after rummaging around deep in our pockets, a dollar was produced and the shamans were satisfied leaving our backs curse free. Still, the target had been set and a few minutes later as we rested on the steps of an old stuppa, a whiff of alcohol and scarred nose approached us.

“Where you fraaam?” Now this question always poses some difficulties because a) nobody knows where El Salvador is, and b) I'm German. The quickest exit is a lie, but this time...
“El Salvador”
“Elsalbadore...that is Spain?”
“No it's actually...”
“But you speak spanish?”
“Yes, we speak spanish”
“You see, Spanish and Italian look very much like Nepalis”
“I suppose we all have dark features”
“Me pueden dar monedas para mi colleccion?” [double-take] “Miren ya tengo pesos. Un peso Argentino vale 60 rupees, y tengo unagrandecolleccion”
¨Sorry, we don't really have any colones”
“EsquehellegadodesdeIndiayestoyparamejorarmisidiomas. Hablosieteidiomas,itallianoalemanespañolinglesnepalinarawiyhindi, ymegustapracticarconlosturistasporqueellosmeentiendentodoslosidiomas...cough cough cough”

Omg, that was right in my face. I'm gonna catch TB and die in Nepal. He went on to demonstrate his language skills - all seven of them strung along in a jumble of words, spitting and swaying with the rhythm, enthusiastically showing off his beloved coin collection.

It was a good day.

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

The less positive side

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I have to say, this is a bit of a depressing country to live in. And I'm saying this with a full set of lights blazing over my head and a freshly filled hot water bottle in my lap so it's not like I'm exactly suffering from extenuating circumstances at this very second.

Maybe I should clarify. Visiting Nepal must be delightful. You get to stay in nice hotels with nice generators, you have all the taken for granted commodities ready at your service whether they be hot water, electricity or internet, you visit lovely restaurants with portable heaters quietly crackling away at your table, you can visit the buzzing markets in the heat of the sun and appreciate the vibrant colours of local handicrafts and exotic temples, then night falls and you fall to bed exhausted ready for the following day's first exhilarating steps on the skirts of the Himalayas...and when it's all over, you pack up your backpack and leave this beautiful country behind and head back to the comforts of your home with fond memories tucked away in the back pocket of your trousers.

But what happens to those people who on a daily basis have to deal with circumstances far from ideal in their home land, who after a hard day's work go home to watch their children struggling to read their homework by candlelight. What kind of future is that? An uneducated population because today's backwards leaders couldn't put their egos aside long enough to make a decision for the good of the country? All they have to do is ask for help and ensure full cooperation when the help is provided. Less than 50% of the population has access to electricity, and 90% of those live in Kathmandu. It is ranked 118th most corrupt land out of 160, has 6% female representation in parliament, and 4.37 computers to every 1 million people (2004).

It's just pretty frustrating I guess, when there are so many people, local and international, who are willing and able to provide the means, method and finance to move a country forward, but are simply met by a brick wall.  


More statistics on Education, Government and Health

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Birds

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Last night I discovered Nepalese beer, Everest Beer, and the horrible hangovers it induces after a mere 2 bottles. Therefore, my first free day (and it was a beautiful one at that with lots of sun and warm air) was spent lying in bed feeling like a sailor taking his first steps on land after at year a sea and ends up walking into ships anchor. There was a lot of pain and nausea involved. Either Everest beer is made with a ton of chemicals or one simply should not drink at high altitudes. Or both.

Nevertheless, I did get the chance to appreciate the sounds of Kathmandu during the day, which were actually really soothing. My apartment in the suburb of Patan has a view of an overgrown garden where lots of animals seem to have made themselves comfortable, and if it wasn't for the big trees and miniature jungle that has flourished in this little garden, I would have a fantastic view of the surrounding mountains. Never mind. Instead, I get to hear lots of birds in song, twittering and gossiping away at each other, making shrieks of alarm at the passing vultures, and sweetly calling their young ones to bed. In the distance, I could hear a man sending out his greetings to the world with many repeated hellos, as if chanting in not so silent meditation. Not once did I hear a construction site.

Tomorrow will be better. I will buy a bicycle, and make my way to the edges of Kathmandu city and explore the area. I will also buy warm sweaters, blankets and a pillow which is at the very least softer than a plank of wood.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Welcome to Nepal

I arrived in Kathmandu, Nepal on Tuesday, 4th January, 2011, and here I am three showerless days and one bad back later, having decided that my experiences here might be something to write about. Never before have I had to bathe myself with one litre of self-boiled water over a cracked kitchen sink, walked in a city which smells of incense and has walled, unlit streets, or had to patiently wait for the alloted 6 hour time slot of carefully rationed electricity to click in. At least not that I can remember. Who knows what wild adventures I may have been a part of when I was three. Still, it's refreshing to be in a country and in a situation so vastly different to normal every day life. That is why I'm here.

Granted, I will complain, cry and shout a lot because that's how we cope, but I will also laugh, enjoy and fall in love with the culture just as i did with Viet Nam.

Here's to more adventures.

Happy reading.