It's Gai Jatra festival again

Boy, it really feels like we've been here a long time now I'm saying to people "Yes, I remember what Gai Jatra is, I was here for it last year". I probably explained it on the blog last year so I won't try again in case I say something different. Basically it’s a traditional Nepali festival (festival of the cow) that Blue Diamond Society has adopted as a gay pride festival. With the metis (male-to-female transgenders) dressed up in their finery, we walk/dance (no, of course I don't dance)  along behind a band through the streets of Thamel (the main tourist area) before lighting candles for those who've died in the last year and returning back to our office for food - not quite on the scale of Sydney or Rio Mardi Gras (our metis would go down a bomb at those) but great fun. I'm knackered after, what was for me a long, very hot walk so no more words, here's some pictures.

 

 

Cheers

Roshan

 

P.S. Sheila went to the same festival (the strictly straight version) in Bhaktapur so she might have some photos of this to post in a couple of days.

Eyes likes jewels in a pool of wine

That's rubies in claret, we've both had a nasty dose of conjunctivitis for the last week. Sheila came down with it first and on Sunday morning with an eye like a cricket ball went to the clinic where the doctor told her it was the nastiest case he had ever seen (I bet he tells that to all his patients) and was given drops, cream and pills. I'd got it by the afternoon. A friend who came round for dinner on Sunday evening reckoned her eyes were itchy after a couple of hours with us (no hugs or kisses) before phoning us the next morning to say she'd got it. Just a bit contagious! It’s a seasonal thing I think, we escaped it last year although I do remember having it in Delhi (along with everyone else in the office) and it sounds like there is a mini-epidemic in various places in Nepal now. Sheila's eyes are still puffy but they have dried up so she went to work today. I haven't been at all this week because apart from struggling to read I was terrified of infecting everyone at the office or, even worse, our Care & Support centre where there are some pretty sick people who really don't need the added complication of "eye flu". One of mine is still a bit gunjy but hopefully will be clear in a day or so.

Josie wanted us to post photos of our horror film eyes. Since neither of us are fans of seeing photos of ourselves at the best of times and not everyone shares Josie's taste in technicolour medical pictures, we declined. Anyway, the camera is supposed to get rid of red eye.  Just take my word for it they were messy!

Should be back to work next week. It's Gai Jatra on Wednesday, the Nepali cow festival that Blue Diamond Society has taken over to be our annual gay pride rally where everyone dresses up and we do a march round Thamel. I will try to post some pictures of this.

Cheers

Roshan

Cowes Week winners

Having followed Cowes Week (the UK's biggest sailing regatta) on the internet and seen my ol' mate Howard Sellars was winning his class in the same type of boat that we sailed together about 20 years ago, I sent an e-mail to Cowes Radio wishing him good luck for Friday's race. I guess an e-mail from Kathmandu is a novelty for Cowes Radio so they read it out on air and apparently will be sending me the prestigious prize of a t-shirt! Modesty prevents me from mentioning my previous prize from Cowes Radio – oh all right if you must know, a bottle of champagne for pulling off a blinding start in 2004. Not sure whether Howard would consider it good luck to have yesterday's racing abandoned due to lack of wind but, if my calculations are right, it does mean that he has won Class 8 for the week whatever the result of today's race. I'm sure he and the crew had a few drinks last night to celebrate.

 

Cheers

Roshan

For those who like cake

A few months ago we inherited an electric table top oven from another volunteer. Real luxury as we all usually cook on 2 burners. But I’ve been a bit cautious – not wanting to make it any hotter than already in the kitchen, price of electricity and the possibility of load shedding half way through cooking – and so we have used it very little although expect to more in winter.


But when we returned from our UK visit I decided to experiment…

This was a successful recipe – and especially for my dad, Harold, and all those who also have a sweet tooth and may wish to try it!

Obviously changing or limiting the possibly excessive quantity of fruit would be fine, especially if proper sultanas are available. Alternative alcohol would also work or could be changed for smaller quantity of orange /lemon juice.

Recipe for Sheila style Sweet Kathmandu Fruitcake:

Place 2/3 spoons of rather dry local raisons (???) in bowl and cover with a couple of spoonfuls, or more, of local (very cheap) rum.

Add 1 spoonful of dried cranberries and pretend they are cherries. Also add 2/3 dried apricots, (yes, Roshan good for you as high iron content), but remember to chop very small as can then if needed pretend they are sultanas

Add about a heaped table spoon of finely grated carrot and 5/6 small bits (about size of small grapes) of peeled apple if available.

Eat rest of apple and or carrot. This is particularly good for those who would otherwise pick at the mixture as if too much mixture is eaten at this stage there may not be enough for finished cake.

Leave to soak for 20 mins or more but remember to cover very tightly as will attract ants and this cake should be suitable for vegetarians.

Place 3 approx 1 inch cubes of soft butter in bowl and add 3 dessert spoonfuls of local crunchy white sugar (hoping that any black bits in it are meant to be there and are not weevils or cake will be not suitable for veggies)

Add 1 spoonful of good soft expensive imported brown sugar (if available).

Add small spoonful of marmalade if in Kathmandu and such luxuries are available and mix to a creamy consistency. If the butter has not been taken from fridge in time, this mixture will tend to be lumpy rather than creamy but do not worry.

Whilst fruit is soaking whisk one egg with fork in a small bowl.

Prepare 5 or 6 inch cake tin with foil carefully saved from local take away "vegetable wraps". This foil conveniently is the perfect size to protect cake and cake tin and saves washing up. Alternatively new foil can be taken from the roll as this is available in Kathmandu.

Turn on oven if power supply is available. If not do not be concerned, combined mixture can be left and rest of recipe followed when power returns.

Combine mixtures by firstly adding fruit, rum etc and if any real cherries such as those imported into Kathmandu by previous guests, they can be added at this stage. Then slowly add whisked up egg.

Remember if keen to check the taste of the mixture by taking a fingerful it is probably not a good idea after adding raw egg. Add a small teaspoon of cooking oil, sunflower is ideal if available but others if not strong should do. This discourages the cook from picking at the mixture and probably helps to give good consistency to the finished cake.

Then slowly fold in approx 5-6 spoonfuls of flour after checking that it is in date and has no foreign bodies. The mixture should be a little more than dropping consistency but not nearly as solid as raw pastry. Better to have too little rather than too much flour.

The mixture should not come up to the top of the tin and foil should be at least an inch higher than the tin. This should protect the mixture when cooking, when the oven door is ill fitting or has to be opened.

Place in previously turned on oven and hope and pray that the power supply is not terminated in the next half hour. The temperature of the oven is difficult to judge if one is unable to read the dial, so cake cooking times may vary.

When cake smells waft from oven, any thing from 20-40 mins depending on temperature, stab at centre of cake with clean dry knife. If knife comes out clean then cake is done, or overdone. If knife is still messy from mixture, the cake needs a little more cooking, or the cook was over generous with the rum...

Remove from oven and leave to cool in tin foil or as long as one can leave before tasting/eating. Any cake left overnight needs wrapping carefully and storing in ant free zone.

And enjoy - I recommend the taste and as a good, nutritious way to spend a cold, uneventful afternoon!

Bon appetite, Sheila

Not just a vacuum cleaner

Useful though the vacuum cleaner is, an oven is more exciting. We bought a little table top oven from a departing volunteer a couple of months ago although until last week had only used it for grilling homemade pizzas (I'm not Jamie Oliver so that's what I call tomatoes on bread with a bit of cheese and a home grown basil leaf chucked on top). Last Sunday, Sheila had a play with it and cooked a veggie bake and a cake. Fantastic! Obviously the veg bake was delicious but to have a real freshly baked fruit cake was just heavenly. It was quite small and only lasted 2 days (as I finished it on Monday evening maybe it is more accurate to say 1 day) so having got the hang of it, she baked another one yesterday and is talking about flapjacks in the future. I'm looking forward to many more cakes in the winter because the oven throws out a lot of heat and I'm guessing Sheila will start to bake whenever she gets cold. Although the next household innovation is not exactly hi-tech, it is new to me even if almost every household in Nepal has one. After working out how to get the lid on and off, we finally got round to using the pressure cooker that we inherited from more departing volunteers last year. What a wonderful gadget it is; considering how much quicker they cook things why doesn't everyone use them to save on gas/electricity?

I hear reports of the floods in South Asia are now making UK news. In Nepal these were in the southern lowlands that form the border with India. It sounds as if the worst of the floods are over but there are still landslides and hundreds of thousands of people are homeless in Nepal, far more in India and Bangladesh. Most worrying is the disease and food shortages that inevitably follow a flood that has wiped out safe water supplies and crops. Red Cross and the World Food Programme are down there delivering emergency relief, however there are likely to be food shortages until next spring in many places. When you are a subsistence farmer, having all your crops destroyed is a bit more serious than not being able to go shopping because the local Tesco's is flooded. If a Red Cross collection box appears in your local Indian restaurant (which is probably run by Bangladeshis), think about having one less naan bread and donating the cost.

On a more cheerful note, another bit of modern technology that worked today is the telly on my laptop. I haven't tried it for ages because sharing a cable connection with the 3 or 4 households in our landlord's family means it is a pretty dodgy picture. But today I managed to get an only slightly fuzzy picture for Star (Asian equivalent of Sky) Sport and watched the Hungarian (or is it European?) Grand Prix. Bit short on overtaking and the most exciting bit was probably in the Ferrari pit during qualification yesterday when they forgot to put petrol in the car. My top tip for them is always put the chamois leather on the dashboard to remind yourself to fill up. Thinking Formula 1, in case anyone who knows him is reading this, does Spesh still get minute by minute updates on the Honda team sent to his phone?

Cheers

Roshan

 

P.S. Apologies for all the acronyms in Sheila's post yesterday, poor editorial control I know but apparently some of her friends will understand them. For others, INGO = international non-governmental organisation (a charity like Save the Children) and ECER = Early Childhood Environmental Rating (must be some measure of a child's carbon emissions).

Back from UK

Since we have been back we decided to finally give in and treat ourselves to a vacuum cleaner. With carpet in all three rooms, sweeping with our short Nepali broom, has never been a skill that we have accomplished well, so last Saturday we went to the supermarket and came home with a small cylinder one that is as efficient as any we have had in UK. Hopefully it will continue to work for the next 9 months.

An expert sweeper

We have had rain most days and every night but as usual Kathmandu has had an easy time and the most I have been affected is picking my way round puddles and cars on my way up to the main road. Sometimes the bus park has been a bit of a quagmire but my bus is usually parked by a convenient dry rock. This of course is very different to life in the south of Nepal, in the Terai where as you may have heard on the news there have been worse floods than any one can remember. This morning's paper shows another 300 families affected by last night's rain.

It was good to be back at work and to be greeted so warmly. Lots to do, including a useful report re the position of school based v community based early childhood centres to consider; planning for some ECD awareness raising on International Literacy Day next month, (more later if we do it), discussions and planning with VSO re extending future involvement in ECD here as well as being part of meetings with the INGOs and Nepali consultants who work in ECD.

Updates and materials gained from colleagues whilst in UK, are proving really useful. Thank you Sheena and Carole. It was certainly worth finding space in our bags for the new Foundation Stage 0-5 documentation from DfES and these along with other international ECD materials, including a particularly useful document from the Philippines, support our thinking as we begin to plan for compiling minimum standards and indicators for children in ECD here ( Any further suggestions for on line materials other than UK, NZ would be really useful, ECERs etc)

Work is not all meetings and office though and I have spent a couple of days visiting ECD provision alongside a Nepali colleague. The second of these days demonstrated the importance of monitoring minimum standards and the huge need for support for provision here. I stood in a very dark, low ceiling, long thin room with 20 grade I children packed onto benches facing a teacher one end and 22 3 and 4 year olds squashed onto benches facing the ECD facilitator at the other. There was hardly room for us even to stand just inside the doorway. The only resource in evidence was a blackboard at each end. No materials to support children's learning. This would be a difficult situation to work in for any one, but made even more difficult for the ECD facilitator, who having recently had training re the use of a developmentally appropriate curriculum with emphasis on children's right to learn through play, has less status and far less pay than the girl at the other end of this small dark room.

But, as the sun shines here in Kathmandu on a Saturday morning, Roshan and I are going out for breakfast and aim to have a fairly lazy day and tomorrow I am off on buses to see more ECD centres with my colleague and back in the office on Monday.

Love to all

Sheila