Our first days at Maya Universe Academy

Nepali "local bus"

We have a fairly easy trip from Kathmandu to Damauli (the nearest large town to the school) – there is an empty taxi outside our hotel that takes us to Kalanki bus station (really just an area where minibuses constantly circle around an insanely busy roundabout, until they are packed to the rafters with customers). Someone pounces on our taxi as soon as we pull up, and herds us into a minibus bound for Pokhara – he seems to understand that we want to go only part-way, to Damauli. Our backpacks are strapped to the roof and we board the bus, to find all seats taken except 4, 3 of which are on the back row. We had noticed on previous journeys that many people refused to sit in the back row, especially women, but we're not too sure why. We're about to find out.

The driver refuses to leave Kathmandu until the last 2 seats are filled – his “salesman” and his “bag boy” are working hard, and find one customer quite quickly – but no one will accept the last vacant seat at the back of the bus. One elderly lady even goes so far as to sit down on this seat, have an argument with the salesman guy, and then storms back out of the bus. Finally, the driver faces facts and starts to head out of town with the one back seat still empty (leaving more space for us, hurray!). The salesman stays behind but the bag boy is shouting out the window “Pokhara, Pokhara” as we drive along, even at groups of 3 or 4 people – I'm sure they could squeeze in somewhere...? He does eventually pick up one fellow who squeezes in next to us, but gets off a couple of hours later.

We soon identify the issue with the back seat. As well as having no brakes, the bus appears to have no shocks. Every bump, stone & pothole (and there are a lot on Nepali roads) is felt by us as we fly up in the air and back down with a thump. Here I was thinking I'd catch up on some sleep during the 4 hour journey – not a chance.

After a toilet break at a random roadside toilet, and a lunch break at a particularly lovely restaurant overlooking the river, we bump & jolt our way into Damauli. Our timing is perfect, 2pm, as the bus we need should depart at 3pm. We disembark and set out to find “Mr Bupal” at Bupal Hardware – Manjil has assured us that he will help us to find the right bus & stop for the school. Everyone is helpful and points us in the right direction, and one of Mr Bupal's customers is going to Chisopani (very near the school) so we follow him to the bus. A small lad who looks about 12, but is much stronger than me, hauls our backpacks on to the bus roof and straps them in, and we set out in search of lunch. The restaurant we choose has very welcome fans (Nepali buses are invariably hot & sweaty affairs!), but as usual there is no cheese, so our cheese sandwich dream is abandoned in favour of banana lassis.

We trundle back to the bus to find that all the seats are claimed with bags, clothing or delicious-looking snacks (giant cheesie sticks?!?, in bags that are the size of a small person). A 2^nd, older bag boy appears and assures me that “this seat is free” as he moves someone's bag from it; he does the same for Chris (once again in the back row). An elderly man who'd greeted us very enthusiastically when we boarded the bus comes back to have a conversation with us – in Nepali, so it doesn't go too well. We THINK he might have some grandchildren at the school – he clearly understands we are going there, and he keeps making small & medium signs with his hands. He's also really keen to touch us (we later notice that he has this habit with other passengers too – clearly someone who doesn't need personal space!). A few more passengers appear and we are shifted around accordingly, but then two passengers who had claimed seats offer to sit on the roof so that we can have seats. The 3pm bus doesn't leave until almost 4pm, and is fully loaded (including several people on the roof with the luggage and 3 boxes of one-day-old chicks peeping away at the front). The bus heads uphill over a crazy excuse for a road.

Main building - home for volunteers, as well as a storage for books, toys & food, and the kindergarten classroom

Bamboo classroom

We arrive in front of the school (after some debate amongst the passengers about our desired destination) and head up the small access road. We are greeted by Manjil and a few students who have stayed late to work on homework (or perhaps just to meet us - they're really excited and take our hands, sit on our laps, and ask a million questions). We also meet some other volunteers & staff – Vishnu, a local fellow who used to be Manjil's bodyguard & driver, and now does lots of useful things around the school's farm (and makes delicious food, as it turns out); Suman, another Nepali who studies in Thailand for most of the year; Fanny, a French girl who has been in Nepal for several months and has mostly been WWOOF'ing, but has been at the school recently and came back for a week after they requested her help (they are very short of people right now). Missing is Suriya, who is sick in bed (we later find out he has chicken pox ugh). He is also Nepali but will soon leave to study in the USA.

Our new house in the woods!

We settle into our beautiful bamboo hut in the forest (reserved for couples apparently – other volunteers & Manjil sleep upstairs in the main school building), and then it is time to walk up the hill to the home of Krishna, one of the students. He lives with his grandparents, who are too old to come to the school and help for 2 days per week (this is the agreement made with parents, because the school is free but needs lots of help). So they make dinner for everyone once per week.

The walk is really interesting because the path passes directly in front of each house. It feels like walking through a dozen front gardens!  There is plenty of opportunity to say "Namaste" to the local people  =)

Dinner is on the front porch of the house – we take off our shoes and sit on a mat. We start with raksi (local alcohol – very mild) and some small pieces of chicken. Mine includes a piece of the chicken liver. The main dish is dal baaht (lentil & rice) with more chicken. Everything is eaten with our hands – Fanny shows us how to use our thumb to scoop the rice on to the tips of our fingers. We all enjoy the dinner, have a nice getting-to-know-you chat, and head back down the hill to sleep.

The next few days are spent getting used to the routines at the school. Chris will teach some British history to the highest level students (A class). Both of us will teach reading & writing to this class & also B and C classes. There is a kindergarten as well, but for now we will not teach there. Altogether there are about 50 students, including 10 new ones who start on our first day- children whose families live at the top of our hill, on land given to them by the Christians.

Teachers & volunteers

Lisa's main jobs will be to look after the rice fields, and finding more volunteers & getting some international media attention. This will mean regular visits to Damauli, which is good news for the blog!

Also we need to get used to the food – often curry for breakfast; lots of rice (usually dal baaht); no milk products and very little meat. The spicy food is particularly worrying since we have a typical Nepali toilet – ie. squatting over a hole, no seat!

We get to know Manjil & the other volunteers a bit better on our 2^nd night, when we play a game of “Vampire” where one person in the group is the “evil anthropologist”, and everyone must guess which one. This mainly consists of accusing people & gauging their reaction, forming “alliances” where you agree to vote against the same person; or “taking responsibility" in a bid to get EVERYONE to vote with you against one person- if your accusation is wrong, you will be the next to get voted out. It reminds me of “The Weakest Link” game show ;-)

In our next post, we'll detail our first weekend in the village, which included a puja (a ceremony, which in our village involved a large number of chickens), lots of visiting the neighbours for drinks, and an influx of presents!