Another mad friday and picture books

Another good Friday and one I wish I could have videoed.

Going to Bhaktapur this morning on local bus, at bus park in street, I sat in seat near front. Instead of starting off, suddenly the driver backed bus across the road and then bus boy and another pushed it backwards into a petrol station. I assumed it was for fuel - buses do refuel with their passengers on here - but no, something to do with starting problem so we sat there until it was bump started. I had sat next to a woman probably a bit younger than me who spotted the picture books in my carrier bag, so for a while we looked together talking in my limited Nepali about the pictures - she couldn't read the text - and we were then joined by bus boy.He could read the short Nepali text as I could hear, and having taken a book was then standing on the bus step shouting for passengers and taking fares, whilst reading picture books! Suddenly a nudge on my leg and I had a very large goat tied up next to me. Later the woman next to me and the goat got off and I was joined for the rest of the journey by a woman, her husband and a girl of about 7 sat in front of us. Her mother explained quietly / sadly to me "my daughter is mentally retarded". (I think she probably has Downs Syndrome). I asked if she goes to school and was told no, her mother taught her at home. Then this mother also showed interest in the picture book in my bag, reading then turning it over and seeing the shop name and price on the back. A quick few words with her husband and I like to think that maybe sometime that little girl will be looking at picture books too.It was lovely to see the father holding and caring for this child on the bus, encouraging her to say Namaste to me, as here much of the lives of children with special needs is hidden away, shunned, in the home. All smiles as we went our own ways.

Then to the ECD facilitator training where I had a couple of hours again sharing picture books, puppets, feely bags and low cost materials to encourage curiosity and problem solving with young children. Rushing from there to try to get back here while power on, got on bus and then stuck in jams. Finally got off at ring road hoping to pick up another the other side. No, even more jam probably back into centre . I knew if I walked I would not get back whilst power on so gave in and got in cab to go round another way. 20 mins later, after hearing on the radio re jams in centre, my taxi driver shouted at a friend who said he was charging flat rate as jams so bad. My taxi driver turned off meter and said a ridiculous amount. I got out and paid what had been on meter and to his surprise walked off. Walked a bit and then got another cab, this time on meter rate but soon stuck in another jam. Got out again and walked and later picked up a third. He drove me most of the way home, but a bit put out when I got out, because I like most Nepalis generally do not tip, and would not round the fare up by a third! Home and had 2 hours of power and should get 2 more on battery to do some of the work on early learning standards that I have not managed to do all week.

So another good Friday, much warmer than yours and a day off tomorrow but masses of work to do. Then back to the training on Sunday.

Oh and have just paid Rs105 (£1) total for 3 dvds, Australia, Benjamin Button and Slumdog Millionaire.

What will I do from late May?

Lots of love and keep warm

Sheila

Poesie & the Fags

A pleasant afternoon at a concert. I met these Dutch guys last year when they visited Blue Diamond Society; one is here teaching at the Kathmandu Jazz Conservatory, they are both talented singer/musicians. They have a band called "Poesie & the Fags" (Poesie is the nickname of the 3rd member of the band - a girl - pronounced "pussy" in Dutch). Apart from playing at various hip, trendy (and therefore ones that we don't go to) venues in Ktm, they have been coaching a choir from some transgender members of BDS. The concert this afternoon was the first public performance for the Transgender Choir (or as Sunil, my old boss, said the Queer Choir).

And a great success it was, particularly their rendition of Om Shanti Om, a big Bollywood hit from a couple of years ago.

And, by the look on their faces, they obviously all enjoyed it. A great confidence boost for some of them who are still on their journey of being "out".

Charlie Haviland, the Beebs man in Ktm (hijacked by Sunil from the leaving do of our top UN man which both of them were at) did a couple of interviews so if its been a quiet day for news, this might yet make it on BBC. My only fear is that any publicity will get the Performing Rights Society chasing the choir for royalties on the CD they have made.

Shouldn't be saying this seeing the weather forecast for London today, but the temperature here is gradually rising. Very pleasant during the day and not too cold at night. If it does snow in London tonight, I think my friend Sanjay, who is there on a short work trip, will be happy to have experienced it although he must be freezing. I did warn him that London in January could get very cold but he was probably not ready for -7 windchill.

Way past our normal bedtime (8pm) and the powers off until 4am so good night all.
Roshan

Update
It did make the BBC news, we heard a short piece on World Service radio news on Monday morning and its now on the BBC News website.
Nepalese choir with a difference

Happy Australia Day!

I did a double-take as I walked past the Radisson Hotel's storage house (next door to us) yesterday. I didn't register the kangaroo pictures but I did think the funny pink things looked like the Opera House and sure enough that's what they were meant to be. I guess they are having an Australia Day party - shame the Radi is too expensive for us!

Load shedding reduced - only 14 hours per day!

Cheers
Roshan

P.S. There's something for Mardi Gras - turn the Opera House pink.

More about my new job

Bit of a crazy week, dramas on the selection of organisations that will receive grants from a major donor in the HIV programme (Global Fund www.theglobalfund.org) so lots of lobbying which I get involved in to help write petitions/e-mails that say more than "We woz cheated, it's not fair!". We'll see what use this does, I'm not optimistic about the outcome and therefore pessimistic about the programmes being delivered well (if at all in the case of some) by the organisations that have been selected. But enough of that, it just gets me bitter and twisted about the way things work in development.

I promised to tell you more about Richmond Fellowship Nepal, the organisation I will spend most time with for my remaining 4 months here. It runs addiction programmes, mainly for drug users although there is one in Kathmandu for alcoholics as well. The drug programmes focus on rehabilitation and reintegration with the HIV angle covered by education and a Harm Reduction Programme (needle exchange – if a drug user does not want to give up, at least make sure s/he gets a clean syringe etc so the risk of transmitting HIV and/or Hepatitis is significantly reduced). The main office where I work is based at a rehab centre on the outskirts of Kathmandu – makes absconding more difficult – and there are about 35-40 clients in residence at any time. Almost all of my colleagues are alumni of the programme, i.e. they were drug users themselves, so they are teaching me about how rehab works and what it feels to be a client. So what am I going to do at Richmond? Still working this out but my main reason for being there is to discover what, if anything, they need from a long term volunteer so VSO can find someone with the right background (and I'm thinking that isn't an ex-Chartered Accountant with experience of private equity investing!). Admin work is really becoming a challenge with electricity and therefore computers off for at least half the day. As this means we adjourn from the extremely cold office to sit outside in the sunshine, I am not heartbroken when the power goes off. From this week, I'll be a lot warmer as our new load shedding timetable of 16 hours per day started today. On a good day we will get 4 hrs of power during office hours, on a bad one, 2 hrs.

A lighter moment this week was the draining of a pond – more like a mini-reservoir - at Richmond. Flopping around in the mud was a load of catfish which the guys bailing out the pond managed to catch by hand and we had fish (macchu) for lunch. Fun to watch and good to eat. Sorry I didn't take pictures of the fishermen at work

.

Being on the upslope of the hills that are the southern border of the Kathmandu valley, we get a good view back to the city and beyond. Its still a bit hazy at this time of year, I'm sure there will be better views in a couple of months time.

In case you are feeling sorry for us having to manage with such long power cuts, don't worry, we are managing fine. The problem is that the country is suffering badly; hospitals are grinding to a halt, factories are laying off staff and kids can't see to revise for exams. Even those with invertors (batteries that get charged whilst the power is on) can't escape as 4 hrs is not enough to charge the batteries. And the few places with generators are discovering how expensive it is to run them. Apparently the current demand for power is 500MW during the day and 800MW in the evenings with generating capacity only 300MW. If (and it has to be a big if!) a new hydro plant reaches full capacity and a transmission line from India is repaired, things are meant to improve next month. Meantime, although the government cannot magic up electricity, there have already been some demonstrations and I'm sure there will be more as the effects spread. To put this into perspective, something like 40% of Nepal has no access to electricity at all and the electricity usage per person in Nepal is one-eightieth that of the UK .

Time to go, only got just over an hour to get this and piccies uploaded.

Cheers

Roshan

A quick couple of photos

I'll tell you more about Richmond Fellowship Nepal, the organisation I am now working with, another time but a quick photo of our Christmas tree:

The centre I am based at runs a residential drug rehabilitation programme and my colleagues very thoughtfully found out when and where Christmas church services were for one of our Christian clients. He went but never came back.

Yesterday I stopped off at a Blue Diamond Society centre on the way home for their New Year's Eve party. It was load shedding when I arrived so singing and dancing was only accompanied by a small drum. This is called dhori (probably not spelt like that) where groups of men and women (or, it being BDS, metis) sit on opposite sides of the room and sing backwards and forwards to each other. I'm afraid I didn't stay long enough to see New Year in with them, I cycled home in the dark (always an adventure) and joined Sheila for a quiet night at home with a DVD on my laptop.

Powers gone off now (8pm to 2am then 8am to 2pm) and its cold so I'm off to bed.
Best wishes for 2009 to all.
Roshan