The orphanage etc...

Internet here is very expensive. By Nepali terms. Unless you walk about half a mile out of town. So here I am :D.

I apologise for the condensed and somewhat rushed nature of this post, but a lot has happened in a very short time and I only have a limited time to write in, so here goes:

There have been riots and strikes in Pokhara since we have been here. On the day we arrived we ended up in the middle of one: two stories going round...1. a little girl got killed by a truck, causing the town to charge out in uproar, throwing stones at the police, who retaliated with riot gear etc. 2. The university campus political party groups started throwing stones at each other, causing the police to surge into the town to prevent it spreading. Either way, there were stones being thrown somewhere along the line and there were definitely a LOT of police. There was a large motorbike protest the other day, about 40 bikes driving down the road with flags and placards (all in Nepali, so I unfortunately have no idea what this was about). Every so often you can't phone out of Pokhara so you know the police have panicked about something or other. I think the people have a right to complain though; with 18 hour powercuts and very limited water supply I think we'd all get a bit cranky. The toilets in the orphanage sometimes do not get flushed for 12+ hours at a time because there's no water available...as you can imagine, with 33 kids and 8 adults this can get pretty smelly. It's amazing how quickly we would be reduced to third world country status with no electricity or water (if we didn't have the money or technology to import water, which they don't have here). I'd give them 48 hours.

The kids here only bathe once a week (owing to lack of water), and share beds (4 to a single bed). As such, we currently have a massive breakout of impetigo...it's spreading like wildfire...additionally, lots of headlice! We had a mass de-lousing session the other day, some of them were as big as my little toenail, big fat buggers who'd obviously been there a while. Most of the girls have had their heads shaved to help prevent this happening. We had one nit comb between 42 of us...slow going.

The walls are mouldy (although now painted and looking much better), we have a mice infestation and I have had cockroaches crawling over my toothbrush for the past week (finally managed to kill them yesterday, having perfected the art in India). So much for magnamity where diseases on my toothbrush are concerned. The kids have one set of clothes each (plus some well-worn school uniforms). We eat dal bhat twice a day (lentil stew and rice), with meat on Saturdays if the kids are lucky. Lots and lots and LOTS of rice and tea.

So, at the moment, we're trying to contain the outbreaks and improve the hygiene and health education of the place. Ann used to be a nurse and has been an invaluable asset to this exercise.

We teach English for an hour each morning - John and I have the 6-7 year olds. At school their learning revolves around rote recital, chanting the words to tunes without having any real understanding of the words they are saying. So our teaching has revolved around trying to get them to use the language in a practical sense, using role play and lots of games! They love games, hehe. There is a lot of equipment here for games, badminton rackets and such, brought by other volunteers. Nobody brought nit combs, nit lotion, bleach, scrubbing brushes...well not anymore. Super Ann is at it again, generously splashing out on new clothing and practical items that will actually be incredibly helpful. The 'fun' equipment creates a lot of rivalry between the local kids and the orphanage kids - a lot of jealousy and fighting. The locals decided to kick down the bamboo goal posts at the park, probably to spite us. I decided we should stop taking equipment to the park to help prevent this.

Two of the staff members are incredibly dedicated and helpful. The others are pretty useless and more interested in chatting to one another than doing any cleaning or supervision...we came to the orphanage one day to find that the girl who had been left in charge had buggered off and the kids were completely alone (one of them running around with a machete). The kids are very independent and responsible here...they have to be. They are holding candles to go up to bed by the time they can walk (already had a girl set her hair on fire...she was fine, thankfully - short hair - but it really stank the place out).

Have to go now!!! Back for dal bhat yummmmmm! :) actually very very tasty, so long as you don't mind monotomy.