I’m quite far behind in posting about my trip to the hills two weeks ago, but it was a great experience and I think it merits a separate post. To be fair, I’ve been out of the office 7 out of the last 10 work days. I’ll be posting again tomorrow, because the creative “posting juices” are now flowing.
I’ve been fortunate enough to travel a lot in my 25 years. I’ve seen few sites that rival the beauty of these hills. It's breathtaking.
It’s an hour and a half motorbike ride out of Kathmandu and through the hills to the villages we visited in the southern part of the valley. A very bumpy and muddy trip. The first village was reachable by motorbike, but the other two were best reached on foot. Because the schools are on separate hills, however, you have to climb down and then back up again to reach many of the other towns. There is one bus that travels between several sites on the hills once a day. Other than that, there were few vehicles in sight. Because we did the trip in three days, we could take our time descending and ascending again, which is good because it was ridiculously hot and my tennis shoes aren’t exactly idea for walking down these steep footpaths. Each hike took several hours to complete. The locals, of course, climb them in sandals in half the time that it took me.
The first night of the trip, ECCA staff member Binod and I stayed overnight at the house of one of the school’s teachers. It was reminiscent to me of the mud homes constructed by Native Americans in the southwest U.S. Load shedding happens outside the valley as well, so we sat in the dark with the teacher and his family, eating our dinner by candlelight. The house overlooks a number of hills to the West, and watching the sun set behind the hills is indescribable. The second night we stayed in the community’s research center, which overlooks the Kathmandu Valley. Amazing.
Life here, however, is hard. The majority of the people earn their living by farming (vegetables, mainly corn) or milk production (goat and water buffalo). Trucks come every morning to pick up the milk from certain stations across the valley, which means that most families must haul their huge milk cartons up or down the hills every day. Farming also takes place on the steep hills, so farmers must construct terraces and practice rudimentary irrigation techniques. The entire Valley has not received much rain in the past 10 months, which has had a detrimental impact on crops and clean water. Two of the three communities we visited were very low on watr.
To reference the title, nearly everyone has a water buffalo in these villages. Because cows are sacred (hence the reason they’re hanging out in the streets of Kathmandu), water buffalo is the meat of choice here. Seeing as how I’m usually vegetarian, I so far have avoided sampling “buff.” I did, however, also get to try some “local” fish, delivered to me in large chunks in a bowl, head and all. I had to gnaw the fish off the cartilage while the family watched. Easier said than done, people.
The houses here are very similar to one another: two story, mud and stone homes. The goats, water buffalo, and chickens are kept close to the side of the home. Kitchens are located downstairs, and those who can afford to build toilets have them located in little outhouses near the home (or group of homes). Bathing is often done outside in buckets.
In each village, we met with the principal, the teacher in charge of each school’s library, and the executive committee of the nature club (all students). The nature clubs have been established by ECCA in more than 250 schools (and they’ve trained organizations to establish another 300 in other parts of Nepal, Bhutan, and India). The clubs are hugely popular in the schools, and are run 99% by students with teacher/principal oversight.
The clubs encourage student awareness of environmental and sanitation issues facing their communities. Through the clubs, students learn and teach proper hygiene, waste disposal, and water conservation. They work together to publish school-wide magazines, hold academic competitions, paint murals on school grounds, and a number of other really impressive activities that improve the overall school environment. Many of these schools have very few resources and little funding, so ECCA also runs a number of other projects, including: water purification, the development of school gardens and playgrounds, training teachers in good teaching methods, and creating libraries. Each school is different – this is reflected by the diversity in the activities of each nature club and the types of programs that ECCA has in each.
Binod and I met with each executive committee to assess how things are going. It was very interesting and heartbreaking at the same time to hear about the things that the students had to accomplish on their own. One school was proud because they’d raised enough money from their nature club fees (about 10 rupees a year per student – maybe $0.15) to purchase trashcans for each classroom. Another school talked about how several students had taught their families how to dig waste pits at home to dispose of trash. The third nature club was offering loans to students who couldn’t afford to buy books for class.
I’m not trying to be political here (Hi Republicans! Hi Democrats!), but there’s a complete disconnect between the government (national and local) and the local communities in Nepal. Anything that would be done by the national, state, or local governments in the U.S. (waste removal, development of bathrooms, provision of water and electricity) has to be done independently by the schools and the communities here. I personally find that appalling. Everyone should have access to water. Period.
Anyway, here are some photos. It’s your reward for reading this entire blog post.
Fascinating!! You're not the only one who has been gnawing on whole fish, it's a staple here as well. Great pictures! And thanks, now I have the water buffalo song in my head : )
ReplyDeleteI finally saw the video/heard the song! Priceless!!! I miss buff momo....
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