the hills are alive

Sorry for the long delay. The past month has been an emotional roller-coaster -- the older wooden variety though, nothing too overwhelming. Between homesickness and sickness-sickness, there have been a few days in which I really want to nap on my family room couch and watch Father of the Bride. But, as books often convey a powerful message the reader needs to be reminded of in that moment, I read The Alchemist on one of my low days and realized "If you can concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man... Life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we're living right now," and I have been thoroughly enjoying my days since.

The work site has still been moving slowly. We're still moving sand into the building to make plaster for the walls. But the paid construction workers have not been on site for most of the month because it's raining too hard to work or the festival has kept them home with their families. Not to say that they don't work extremely hard when they are on site. I am constantly amazed at the strength of these three 20ish year old girls who carry probably 60 lbs. of bricks in a burlap bag on their backs connected to their foreheads by a piece of rope, up two flights of stairs -- and by stairs I mean a wooden plank with little wedges for your toes to grasp onto -- for hours on end. Hopefully the progress will pick up again soon, but it might just be a Nepali way of (not)accomplishing things. Either way today two new volunteers are replacing the two volunteers that are leaving this month, and they are ready and excited to move sand. A breathe of fresh air.

The festival Dashain was a really beautiful celebration of family. It reminded me of the Jewish high holidays, and the first day actually fell on the same day as Rosh Hashanah. I have noticed several similarities between Judaism and Hinduism that I never knew existed. Probably because both religions have been practiced for several thousand years, and both depend (at least partially) on the lunar calendar, the same symbols and similar words appear in both. On all Hindu gates, the Star of David is a recurring pattern for the ironwork, though I have yet to understand what it signifies for Hinduism. The Nepali word for mom is aama and the Hebrew word is imaa; father is baa and aba. I also could have sworn I heard my brother playing the shofar (an animal horn used to create musical tones representative of those from the ancient temples during the Jewish high holidays) every morning of Dashain, but it turns out to be a seashell that is blocked on one end and when blown into creates a similar sound. Because it was Rosh Hashanah, I went into the village next to mine and bought apples and honey for my family. They looked at me like I was insane, cut my apple for me and made me eat it in my room, alone. I convinced one of my sister's to try a piece dipped in honey, knowing that they love anything sweet, but I couldn't decipher her reaction. I wondered whether they would think I always want honey with my apples and didn't understand it was for the Jewish New Year, but I have been given apples since, sans honey.

The other traditions I noticed during Dashain was the ringing of bells every morning (to connect to the realm of the spirits in which earthly voices would not do justice) and the slaughtering of 108 of several animals, several days. Let's just say that the non-vegetarian volunteers got a lot of mutton those two weeks. Though the Hindus that I asked about the significance of the number 108 didn't know the reasoning, either because "there is no reason" or the tradition has been passed down without the explanations, I learned in a book a recently finished called Zen Baggage, about a Seattle native's pilgrimage through China to the temples involved with the major Zen Buddhist patriarchs, that for Buddhism 108 represents the number of afflicitions broken down as: Three Poisons of Greed, Anger and Delusion during each of the Three Periods of the Past, Present and Future throughout each of the Three Realms of Desire, Form and Formlessness, and in each of the Four Directions: 3 x 3 x 3 x 4 = 108. So perhaps Hinduism has a long history of similar symbols with Buddhism as well.

One of my favorite nights with my family was when we sat in the hallways peeling corn for four hours. Apparently every six months the huge fields of corn get torn down and re-harvested, providing all the local families with great entertainment during blackouts. My brother started joking around with me and took the "corn hairs" to create a very fashionable beard. My aama jumped in and grabbed some tape to enhance the great look. Some things are universally humorous. I have really come to enjoy the non-language that I have with my aama, in that we both can't fully speak each other's native tongues, but we sure can smile and nod.

And I have fully come to terms with my name being "Rietcha." In fact, when introducing myself to some cousins, my sister corrected me when I told them my name is Rachel. It reminded me of when my mom (mom not aama) went to pick up my sister (Nora) from her middle school music class and introduced herself as Mrs. Isacoff (Is a coff) and was corrected by the middle school teacher, "You mean (I sa coff)?"

In accordance with having all of your family members older than you tikha (the red painted rice that is put on your forehead if you believe in God[s]...in this case used as a verb) you during Dashain, I travelled with my two sisters and my aama to where my aama's family lives -- a six hour bus ride away to Nuwakot. It was the most breath-taking scenery I have ever experienced during a bus ride. The rice paddies are so interestingly developed, and the heights on the mountains on which people actually live is simply impressive. While we were walking to mero hajuraamako ghar (my grandmother's house), we stopped at my aama's four brother's houses and received tikhas. In Badikhel, walking to my house is always a nearly impossible navigation of rocks and cliff edges, but walking through the rice paddies to my grandmother's was just impossible. Just as Ferris Bueller was reminding me to stop looking down at my path and enjoy the world around me, I fell into a rice paddy swamp. Some advice, if you stop to look around, STOP first. And my camera came right along with me. My aama was so sad because the reason my camera was out was because she asked me to "photo catch" her in front of her old house. About 24 hours after she tikha-ed my camera case and prayed for it to work again, the camera was nursed back to health and has worked perfectly ever since! My aama has some real praying power. After two nights and a small mis-communication that led to me drinking a bowl of sugared-boiled-butter (tasted like cookie dough, until I found my dictionary and felt ill), we woke up at 4am (only 45 min earlier than the rest of my family usually rises) and climbed one of the local mountains on which an ancient Durbar Square was built. After the three hour climb, I was completely stunned by the views around me and the architecture of the ancient temples at the summit. Such skill and beauty. Too, the Trisuli River runs through the main town, and looking down on it reminded me of Cinque Terre, only instead of the Mediterranean and surrounding Italian villages, it had a river and rice paddies.

Aside from spending time with my family, I have been able to take a couple days to visit friends at their placements. A bunch of us met in Bouddha where my friend Kevin teaches English to Tibetan refugees for his birthday. The town is my favorite area so far. In the center is the largest Buddhist stuppa in Nepal, and with 30+ monasteries in the area, you are constantly calmed by chanting as you walk around the city. We cooked a great meal (he lives in an modern apartment with a fellow English teacher instead of a Nepali family) and ate on his rooftop, talking with all of his students (including a monk) until 3 in the morning about the meaning of life. It was a perfect reminder of why I'm in Nepal.

Tomorrow I am going rafting in the Trisuli River and then going trekking in Himilayas on the Langtang trek with Kevin, Adrienne and Brooke, three of the people I truly connected to that night on the roof. I will be back on the 23rd with stories and hopefully pictures I can upload! Until then, I hope you are all doing well. Love and miss you!