Onions, recycling and colours that bite

Nearly four months since we arrived and although I feel quite settled I am still on a daily voyage of discovery. This was of course one of the reasons for coming here but I still find it wonderful. Some of the discoveries are a little more surprising than others.

The roving fruit and vegetable sellers load up their bicycles and then wander the streets shouting their wares. It takes some time for an untrained ear to tune in to exactly what they are shouting but after a few weeks I was getting pretty good. One Saturday I heard someone shouting and recognised the word for onions so I grabbed my purse and rushed down to the gate. There was a man with a bicycle bearing a huge bag of onions “one kilo” ( ek kilo dinus na) I said in my very best Nepali. “No” he said very politely. Hmmm here’s a puzzle, I have the money, he has the onions what can the problem be. Sometimes with things like potatoes and onions they like you to buy larger quantities so I thought let’s go for 2 kilos, but no came the reply. Now I was completely stumped and stood there looking rather stupid. Luckily a neighbour came to the rescue and explained, without laughing but only just, that the onions were only available in exchange for old iron! Well I support the idea of recycling but this is a new spin on “any old iron”.

There are regular language difficulties usually approached with much good humour by Nepali’s but it often means you walk away thinking “ if at first you don’t succeed…” Most people are only too willing to help if you show any inclination to speak Nepali. My local shop keeper is giving me daily lessons in counting at which I am pretty hopeless, you have to learn every number between one and one hundred individually. He never sounds exasperated but occasionally points out that I have had a particular number before.

People roast corn over little open fires in the street and I hadn’t tried this but colleagues in the office bought and shared some in the afternoon the other day. This is much more floury and dry than the sweet corn we eat at home and of course you don’t eat it by sticking it between your teeth, you have to flick off the kernels in to your hand and then dip them in achar made of minced chillies. Suffice it to say I was hopeless at it but it made my snack last much longer!

The Nepalis I have met through work have been very friendly and welcoming but there isn’t much socialising outside work. In the first place they generally work six days a week so they only have one day with their families. As you can imagine this is particularly difficult for women with children or anyone with care responsibilities. In addition many people will have different lives to us in terms of their accommodation and amount of disposable income. Because of the later even going out for something to eat would be fraught with difficulties. This is a great pity as it means that you are kept at arms length from people’s lives. I suspect this might change a bit over time but there is in fact little socialising between Nepali colleagues outside work.

Since the last blog the load shedding got worse and then better ( by one hour a week) The petrol shortages got considerably worse and then better and there now seems to be a much more positive view that the elections will happen on April the 10th.

We had our first visitor in the house for 4 days last week which was great; having visitors definitely makes you feel that your house is home.

The weather is getting warmer and the colours that Nepali women wear look even better in the sun and when you can see them better because they are not wearing huge cardigans to keep warm. Both the colour and pattern combinations are so wonderful and they go way beyond anything we would dare to combine. I don’t think I could get away with it. We had an interesting discussion with a carpet expert who explained that the colours that Tibetan carpet weavers use have changed to appeal to European tastes. His take on it was that in our European light the traditional colours “bite you” a lovely description and one I will never forget.

Namaste

Julie