Not a bad view!

My role has changed a bit in the last month or so and so instead of working in the District Education Office (DEO) in historic city of Bhaktapur I am now working in the Department Of Education (DoE) for the under secretary for Early Childhood Development (ECD).

This is slightly nearer the flat and I can get a staff bus, which makes the journey quicker - although not so good for people watching!

And the office is much more grand!

The department building is probably only about three years old and no broken windows or furniture. I have a new desk and comfy new chair, can share a computer (with flat screen!) and phone, and I’m making some sort of pinboard with photos (good early years practice etc). It even has a canteen on site and lovely view from the balcony on the roof…


Not a bad view is it!


But, more importantly, I am involved in really interesting work, in a team which I was asked to join, planning for early childhood at national level. Early childhood development was one of the Millennium Goals and is the first goal in Nepal's strategic plan. There are strategy documents from 2004 for provision for early childhood education and care but not all has been implemented as yet. Sometimes I help write concept papers to donors, e.g. the production of a piece of film to help with training or, as I am now, helping to prepare training for the core trainers who will then train other early childhood teachers across the country - so It is useful that when back in the UK in July, I was able to bring back here some materials/books to help with this!

I still do not want to get detached from working with children and staff so will also have opportunities to go to settings/centres to monitor and support, hopefully across the country.

However, this week has been a bit on/off workwise as Wednesday was a public holiday this time in respect for those, many of whom were eminent in the conservation field, killed in the helicopter crash in the far east of Nepal over the weekend and now it is the festival of Dashain (the biggest festival here, a bit like Christmas at home when most people return to their families for the week long celebrations) so we’re making the most of a few days off and going on our hols…sort of!

Many of the volunteers are going trekking over the holiday period but Roshan and I plan to just spend a couple of nights over the weekend at a hotel up on the ridge of hills (near to those in the picture above) in a place called Dhulikhel, about an hour and a half bus ride from here (presuming I can work out where we get the right bus from that is!)

So, bye for now and photos and more news on our return to KTM,

Sheila

Forgotten when I posted last so a quick update

The official security line here is that things are a bit tense, we've got a whole load of political rallies coming up which are a bit livelier than the Lib Dem conference. They are mostly held at Ratna Park which is the centre of town so when they overflow or get a bit boisterous, it brings traffic to a halt for hours. No problem for us at the north end of town  but it does disrupt Sheila's commute to Bhaktapur (east via the bus park which is next to aforesaid Ratna Park). She had to take an expensive (about a quid) taxi ride back the last bit today when her bus was turned back on the outskirts. The main problems is for the volunteers who live in Patan, south of the Ktm. Unfortunately I have a 9am meeting down there on Weds and might get stuck trying to get back and have to walk it.

Power not too bad. We had our regular 1900 - 2130hrs  load shedding last night which we wile away cooking and eating by candle light. Nepal Electricity says no cuts during the Dashain and Tihar festivals coming up and the water level is high enough that we might escape without too much in winter/spring. This reverses what they said a couple of weeks ago and they claim this is due to recent heavy rain which seems pretty unlikely so I'm assuming this advice could well change again in a couple of months time.

Had our annual security conference last week with a briefing by our man from the Embassy (good to see someone in a suit once every six months or so). They think things could hot up in October (probably round about when the kids come over) but likely to be limited to peaceful street demos. They confirm there have been more burglaries since the ceasefire but no sign of foreigners being targetted. Maybe I should report the theft of my very old and tired bike from outside the house on Sat night. Shame, I kept meaning to take a photo to show you and now never will. Still, hope to get a slightly newer version from someone who's leaving next week and will take a photo immediately.

Cheers

Roshan

Back to normal?

Started this just after the lights came back on after they'd been off for 2.5 hours of load shedding which we now have once a week until the power shortage gets worse and they make it longer. A couple of hours is no big deal and as it only constitutes 1.5% of weekly usage, I wonder whether it will make any difference or if its just to gently prepare us for much worse to come. A busy week for demonstrations which brought traffic to a halt for most of 1 day and bits of another 2. The Armed Police (who look like Army but wear blue camo instead of green - presumably so they merge in with the diesel fumes) are back on the streets apparently after a tip off that a Maoist Special Unit was in Kathmandu. So what if they were, the Maoist leader now attends public gatherings here and peace talks are vaguely under way. Putting men with guns back on the streets hardly demonstrates trust in the peace process. Anyway, after 4 months or so of having things pretty easy these two factors explain the heading and give me an excuse for getting back to presenting this as being a hardship posting. Not true of course but like the tabloids (in fact, all papers apart from the good 'ol FT) I  know that sensationalism gets readers. By the way, did I mention that Elvis is alive and well in a remote village in Nepal. OK, that's a lie but you might have seen that we do have the smallest man in the world, unfortunately the Guinness Book of Records won't ratify this for another 4 years just in case he shoots up (in height not the other sort) in the meantime.

 

Aside from the above, its been a busy but stimulating week. Sheila's really got herself stuck into the heart of Early Childhood Development planning which means she is writing notes, concept papers etc late into the night. At Blue Diamond, my Admin & Finance colleague and I are busy trying to do day to day accounting whilst re-working budgets for UNDP (UN Development Programme) who manage the funding provided by DFID (keep up, I've mentioned this one before, it's the UK's Dept for International Development) and chasing them for money to pay August's salaries which we finally got last Thursday. Tomorrow we start chasing all over again in the hope that we can finally catch up and pay September's salaries on time which is all the more important because it's the Dasain festival at the end of the month which is an expensive time for everyone. Last Thursday, there was meant to be a beauty contest "Miss Queen 2006" organised by the Care & Support team (who run a hospice and care centre for people living with HIV & AIDS) at BDS. Following demonstrations on Wednesday near where it was to to be held and warnings that there might be more on Thursday it sadly was postponed. Shame but hopefully it will be rearranged although it might not be for 6 months. Volunteer meeting on Friday evening, out to visit Bouddha (30 min microbus/tuk-tuk ride away - both forgot cameras so no pictures of the Buddhist stupa) yesterday and both of us working today (Sheila, almost a full day in the office for an important meeting and me just an hour or so largely to give moral support to my colleague who was in for most of the day) rounded off the week. As I said, stimulating and we are both buzzing if a little tired. This week should be a bit more relaxing as we have a variety of VSO workshops on Weds/Thurs/Fri which hopefully won't be too participatory.

 

This was intended to be a very quick note which has taken longer than planned and it's after 11pm so time for bed.

 

Cheers

Roshan

 

P.S. Apologies to  Simon, Heather and Richard who I did not mention in my last P.S. but have written with their news and to say they read the blog. If I've forgotten anyone else, send me a nice gossipy e-mail to let me know.

 

P.P.S. Big news of the week is that Josie and Ben haved booked to come and see us at the end of next month. Only a week but it will be great to see them and for them to see where we live, work and play.

A weekend wander out of a town

I've been told I'm slacking on the blog front and so here's a quick overview of a trip out of town Roshan and I took last weekend...

Roshan and I had decided, well I decided and he agreed, that we needed to go out of KTM for a walk where the air was cleaner. So we took what we had expected to be two buses, but which was actually four because one driver said yes when the answer should had been no, the bus wasn't going to Changu Narayan Temple (all great amusement for everyone on bus no.3....and I thought my Nepali was getting a little better!).

The bus winds up the hill, frequently on single track. Lonely Planet advice to bikers is "it is a wonderful downhill run on the way back (30 mins) but quite a steep climb on way there!" Yes quite! But worth viewing another world heritage site in the KTM valley - Changu's history is said to date back to 3rd century AD. Hard to comprehend!


I knew from my list that there were schools in this area and the biggest, a government one, was in the buildings around the main temple, with classrooms above sheds of carts and furniture. On this occasion, as I had not made prior contact, I didn't investigate inside the school so I'm unsure whether students calling to us were standing by the windows for air, through boredom or because of shortage of desks. I suspect all three. Certainly with a metal roof, as many schools here have, there are problems with heat. I will return another cooler day to spend some time in Grade 1 and the ECD class, perhaps with my colleague spending time with the older children.


As we returned to the bus we spotted children in this brown and white uniform and all with shoes and socks. It would be a private school and from the board outside likely that most of the teaching would be in English medium. The Department of Education Office (DEO) has responsibility for monitoring government and private schools so am likely to return to both.


Oh and just to confuse you, I am now working for the Department of Education as well as the DEO. I am working in the ECD section at the DoE and am likely to much more busy! It is really exciting to see the national plans for Early Years, community based and school based, and these are to include training for facilitators, consideration of young children's holistic development, well equipped centres, inclusion and parental education...and the implementation will be the fun part - I'll keep you posted!

Sheila x