A day at the office

In my introduction I said I would write about my day during, and after office hours. However the after office hours stories seem to become quite dominant. In fact, some people even started wondering if there is an office, just to prove this (oooh, somebody's being a bit defensive here) a short impression of what goes on in our little place.
We work on the first floor of the 1905 restaurant, in the centre of Kathmandu (Kantipath for those who like google earth), here, Rene, Verena, Ajay, Bhimsen, Ramesh, Pavrita and me are squeezed in a little room, together

a meeting with the local partner BKN

with a bunch of computers, a large amount of paper and an even bigger amount of ideas. The last bit of free space is occupied by the generator of this all; a coffee machine! (remember, caffeine will save you boys and girls).
I check in around 9 o clock, meeting Rene there, quickly we discuss what the homework was for our Nepali class, which starts around that time. After learning that, for some reason, there are 14 ways of saying 'a little' and even more to say 'nothing', we go up again to meet the rest of the staff. After a short update, everybody starts with his tasks. Rene trying to clone himself, running in and out to write and meet people that are sponsoring the Ingo, people that are ordered by us to do something, other organizations helping, other organizations that we help, etc. Ramesh and me will focus on the paperwork, giving shape to the projects, defining roles and responsibilities between us and other organizations, checking the sponsor children reports, etc. Ajay will work with the volunteers, Bhimsen will visit the sponsor children and Verena will focus on the early childhood development projects.
As suggested in my first post (the final quote) Ramesh has a healthy appetite. Once again, his self control was put to the test when Verena entered the office this morning, in her hand a shiny red apple. She casually put it on the desk, about 20 centimeters from where Ramesh was typing, excused her self for being already late for an appointment and ran out. At first everything seemed fine, but as time past by, I noticed that Ramesh typing rhythm sounded increasingly irregular. Looking over my screen I could see him trying to force himself to look to the screen. However, every now and then his eyes would drift of te the apple, lying there all alone. In the mean time the work went on. Whereas Ramesh was facing his challenge, mine is making phone calls. This seems like a simple thing to most of you but here most of the times I try to reach someone, the following conversation takes place:
Hello?
Hello Namaste, this is Jimi from SVN, can I....
Hello?
Hello this is Jimi, can you hear me?
Namaste
Namaste, I am looking for....
Where are you from?
Euuh, I am from Holland, I work with SVN can I maybe..
Hello?
Hello, who's this? Can I speak to Sonam?
Hello?
Hello this is Jimi, I...
You call from Holland?
No I...never mind, can I speak to....
Hello?

This will continue for a while since it is very normal here to get to know the person on the other end of the line, even when you will probably never speak with each other again. Ramesh is only typing with one hand by now, the other tapping restless on the table. Rene's on the phone, he's caught up in a strike, organized by people because there are too many strikes (this did actually take place!), on his way to the project, so will be slightly delayed, convincing people not to cut his tires. I detect little sweat pearls on the face of Ramesh. Bhimsen comes back in from the field, panting because he spotted a student that stopped for unclear reasons a while ago, ending up chasing him through the suburbs, loosing him on the end. He sits down with Pavrita to give her all the info she needs on the other children. I am not sure but I think the apple has been moved a little. Rene walks in, cursing strikes and everything connected with that in his best Nepali. Ramesh has taken the apple for a close look and asks if anybody knows who's apple this is. The lights switch of the generator takes over. Verena comes in enthusiastic about the meeting she had but before she can explain us Ramesh interferes: 'Excuse me Vererna, is this your apple?' 'Yes.' 'Than why would you put it in front of me for the whole day?' It's six o clock, we have a meeting with our local partner after which we will go home and dream about smooth telephone conversations, apples, open roads and non sportive children. From the little SVN headquarters in the middle of Kathmandu,

namaste

Jimi

back to teaching, more strikes and Pokhara

Namaste from a Katmandu were the monsoon still holds its breath, making it a hot and dusty place. I might have mentioned it before, but due to circumstances, our volunteers at the airport school decided that they had to stop teaching. This was a big loss for this school, that is positioned just outside Katmandu, existing out of a few tiny classrooms. Here, children from the surrounding area that have no possibility of going to another school can join for little or no money. This also means that there is little to no money for maintainance or hiring extra staff. When the volunteers left, it was decided that we should still conitnue for some time each week teaching there, a nice opportunity for me to get away from my number stuffed computer for a couple of hours a week to see if teaching was still rock and roll.

After some preparation with one volunteer who also has the time to help out there, we arrived at the school. First there was class one, I had explained a little about teaching in Nepal and what level we could expect in this class, the latter part needing quick revision: "Hello class, today we are going to make words with the first five letters of the alphabet" around 30 little faces, of which 5 seemed to be asleep, 7 focussed on doing something else, another 7 on what those 7 were doing, 6 smiling in delight at those two strange persons in front of the class while something green was trying to connect their nose with their mouth, and the rest looking at me with a big frown, showing vague recollection. My mistake, let's first start with the base: "the letters of the alphabet, who knows the first one?" Thios question pushed a few of them from one category to the other: "What comes after A?" Aah, at last the red button, the class straightened their backs and started firing of mthe letters in the correct order towards where we were standing, except from one little boy, staying asleep. Walking by I gently lifted his head without paying further attention, the soft bumb I heard when I moved on told me he was not ready yet to leave dreamland.
We are alreday coming to the school for a few weeks now and things are going relatively really well, occasionally you will find the word mango under the question 'write down five names of animals' but there's still time untill the next exam.

This time last year, the king was forced to end his dicatorship by massive protests, connecting all the indigenous parties. Tens of thousands of people marched the streets and paralysed the public life, leaving the king no choice but to give in and reinstall the parlement (who stripped the royal of all his duties the day after). This movement became known as the '2nd andola'. Now, exactly one year later, things are still shaky with everybody waiting for the elections, which are supposed to make Nepal a real democracy, their date being exponed already twice since nobody can garantee a fair and transparent election. This leaved a country without a real government at the moment. The interim government trying to keep the good peace between the political parties (the maoist being one of them now), indigenous parties, and anybody else who feels his rights are endangered. Whereas the 2nd andola probably has been good in the way that it started the process of dethroning a dictator, the organisers behind it decided that all should remember this day by organising another strike. For me it is a riddle how not allowing the children of your country to go to school for yet another day, or people to make business in order to buy food for their families is 'a huge success', as the head of the organization behind the strike called it the next day in the newspaper.

Luckily, the strike only lasted a day, enabling us to leave for Pokhara with the group of new volunteers, which will be the topic of next weeks blog. A big goodbye to everybody from an ever more hot Pokhara were fortunately, it does rain every once in a while,

Jimi