Pokhara, Nepali language & the normality of the bizarre

Independent Study Project (ISP) time has begun – actually a week ago – and the time is already flying. I am out of the Poo (Kathmandu that is) and will be investigating (sounds so fancy!) the experiences and abilities of maternal health professionals in decreasing the maternal mortality rate in two districts in the Western Development Region in Nepal. The research didn’t really get up and running until Thursday when I met my advisor and then it just took off. Conducting interviews in Nepali has been difficult, but a good challenge. And figuring out my way around a Nepali city (again!) is proving easier this time around. I even rented a bike for an hour and dodged traffic in a busy bazaar area and tried to circle Phewa Lake, unsuccessfully because the path is not continuous. At one point I had to carry the bike over a sewer and trash pit!

I have become a regular at one restaurant, on the bus route, and in a print/copy center. It is still funny to see heads turn when I start speaking Nepali to a store owner or my advisor when we are on the bus. The surprised look, laugh, and/ or accompanying phrase “Nepali bolna aauchha?” or “yo bideshi (kuiri) Nepali bhaashaa aauchha!” never cease to make me smile. (These roughly translate to “you know Nepali?” and “that foreigner (whitie) knows Nepali!”) I am still impressed by how doors open with a little Nepali – one time I asked for the nearest bathroom (charpi) and was shown into a woman’s home!

Now for a little thing I like to call…

“from bizarre to mundane”:

- - cows lying in the street
- soccer ball statues in the center of rotaries
- chiyaa being cheaper than water
- no traffic system or signals
- bargaining for ANYTHING and EVERYTHING (even in a fixed price shop…)
- throwing trash in the street
- cows, stray dogs, and chicken picking through the trash in the street
- trash piles burning in the street
- eating with your right, wiping with your left
- using a squat toilet and water
- hearing Usher and Justin Bieber playing on the bus
- having kids on the street scream “NAMASTE!” every time a white person passes
- load-shedding
- sitting cross-legged even in chairs
- brushing my teeth with purified water
- my hair falling out in chunks because of the water quality
- miss-calling people so you don’t have to pay for a call
- goat heads sitting on counters
- blood running through the streets from daily butchering
- crowded microbuses
- bus decorations (like something out of “That 70s Show”)
- advertisements for skin bleaching cream
- countless attempts to elect a prime minister
- no acting government
- the phrase “ke garne”… “what to do”/”oh well”
- Tang juice (soooo bad!)
- goats riding on top of buses
- chickens bawking from inside rice sacks

And I will end with a phrase my hotel manager (whom I call "didi") said after tea this morning:

“ek chhin bahini. ma pujaa garchhu.” (wait a minute sister. i have pujaa to do.)

Always,

Meghan/ Muna