The Nepalese Adventure: Day 15

Day 15 - Sunday

• Already awake at 7 but suddenly became more alert when I heard a carrier bag in the corner of my room rustling. Yes the mouse was back.  Switzerland also on my wall. Chased them both out. Then this in my room this evening. About 3 inches long. If these are the things I spot in my room, what is crawling over me while I sleep? Guess I just have to get used to this. For a while anyway.

Jurassic Park

• Whole village very busy at the moment due to impending elections due to take place next Sunday. Constant stream of trucks carrying supporters, canvassers and party members, all in their local party's T-shirts. Have to say the whole thing lends itself to a bit of a party atmosphere (“having fun” party, not “political” party!) Lots of loud music in the trucks, shouting and waving. Lots of 20 something’s basically having a good time. I did spot a few of the local lads swapping their T-shirts from one political allegiance to another as the next string of trucks rolled in! NB: I am talking about building materials transportation trucks, packed with people.

• Breakfast at 9. Something different: Curried chick peas accompanied by 3 sort of chapattis that were a cross between Nann bread and a poppadom. School for 10. Remember this is a 6 day a week job!

• The Wi-Fi guy seems too busy to come out so Parshuram collected a wireless radio device for us to see if we could get a signal ourselves. The higher you are, the more chance of getting a signal from the radio mast that is miles away through the hills. Near the school is a 3 story house (a bit like the one I’m in) with a shop downstairs. The owner is a guy called Sam. Really nice guy with pretty good English. He let us go up to his roof. Went into the house (which was a bit smelly) and started to climb the stairs, me with a 6 foot scaffold pole and my laptop, Parshuram carrying a bunch of cables, power extension (no plug on it of course) etc. When we got to the second floor, the reason for smell became obvious. The whole floor was dedicated to chickens! There must have been 100 or more of them. All young but no longer yellow Easter chicks! Of course, if you’re going to run a chicken farm, why not do it on the second floor of your house?

•  Got on the roof. No signal. Hoisted myself onto the top of the outbuilding which is on the roof and held the pole as high as I could. Still no signal! This is a bit of a disaster as this is essential for the school. There are other options. A repeater being installed at the school down the valley which we can practically see and know they can receive the signal. However, no chance of getting anything done before election is over. It seems to be making everyone very busy.

• Continued to paint classroom until lunch time. In fact, I ended up giving the white a 2^nd coat because I just wasn’t happy with it. Drew my line round the room (definitely straight this time!) Just the red paint to do now. Painting with the red is easy as its more of a dye than a paint which dyes the concrete. 

• Lunch: Dahl Bhat

• 2 computer classes today. Easy, as though they are for different school years (which contain kids of a variety of ages in each class - weird) I give basically the same lesson. Today they spent the whole lesson in “Paint”. There’s lots to learn but basically they are still learning how to use the mouse.

• After school I decided to go do some washing. Now here’s a lesson learnt: Don’t let just under 2 week’s washing pile up! Took ages! Scrubbing a bar of soap across my clothes laid out on the concrete until they looked relatively clean and then rinsing under the continuously running shower. I was soaked through myself by the time I'd finished. I long for that magic laundry basket at home where I just dump my dirty clothes in and they reappear, washed and ironed, in my wardrobe!

• Hung the wet clothes on the line back at the house. (I did notice some items still felt a bit “sudsy” but I was under pressure at the end to hurry up by the real people waiting to do their laundry.) No clothes pegs and I have to pick my towel off the dusty building site floor each day so was trying to devise a method to hold the clothes on. Shirts I buttoned round the line. Shorts all had ties on them so that was easy. Boxers….? Retrieved the safety pins from my first aid kit and in pairs, pinned them to the line.

• Confirmed - There is no school the rest of this week due to next Sunday’s elections. (I know, right!) However, rather than getting the week off, Parshuram has asked the kids if they still want computer lessons. Seems they do so I will open up just for computer lessons this week. Just as well, as 40 minute lessons are no way near enough to make any real traction. May skip Friday and head to town again.

• Dinner: Dahl Bhat

• Mouse in restaurant. Ran into the 3 inch gap between wall shelving units. I decided to head for my room when I could see Theresa bludgeoning it to death with the end of a stick she was using to reach it. All seemed to be taken in her stride. I’ll look tomorrow to see if carcass is still wedged in the gap.

 

Splat the rat!