Peace Corps Nepal beginnings
First month impressions
Wow, this first month has gone by fast! We have experienced so much so far. We are excited what is around the corner as we await our move to our community in Parbat on March 28.
Summary
Nepali people are very friendly, lots of rice and lentils, lots of Peace Corps training, a few new adventures, and looking forward to what lies ahead. We miss you all!
Couple of beginning disclaimers:
Any opinions that we’ve shared or that could be extracted from this article are strictly the opinions of ourselves.
This Substack feed is in Steve’s name, and Liisa is half of the contribution.
What have we been up to?
After our initial staging in Philadelphia on Jan15th, where we first met our fellow 50+ Peace Corps Nepal cohorts (called N211 means the 211th Peace Corps group to serve in Nepal), we traveled by bus to Newark. We pulled the all-nighter to board a Turkish Airlines flight(s) to Kathmandu with a 6 hour layover in Istanbul. Total travel time of 30 hours, 24 of them air and layover. We left Newark at 1:00 AM on the 16th and landed by 1:00 pm Nepali time on the 18th. Overall, hassle-free flights and painless entry into Nepal (with support of Peace Corps staff meeting us at the airport). Wow, the Istanbul airport is a city that never sleeps. Old and young travelers are in such good spirits. There are so many food options. Lots of shopping. Beautiful architecture.
Our first week was an hour +/- east of Kathmandu at a site that had both housing and training facilities. As Peace Corps Trainees (PCTs), we had full days of scheduled training for language, culture, policies, and host family living preparations. We also had a number of medical briefings and got our final vaccinations. Highlights included meeting our USA interim ambassador (Charge D Affaires - the title given when the Deputy Chief of Mission fills in when no USA ambassador) and getting to know our fellow N211 trainees and Peace Corps Staff. All are very impressive individuals committed to an outreach from America to Nepal, and vice versa. As Peace Corps volunteers, we were told to consider ourselves USA ambassadors (with the small “a”) This was also the week we started eating Daal Bhaat (lentils & rice) with our right hand, no utensils. That was quite a new experience that has now grown on us.
On the second week, we were relocated 2 hours east of Kathmandu, to a semi-urban setting for the next 9 weeks. All N211 cohorts were moved into “training” host families. This host family relocation was a good next step of acclimating to our next two years as a volunteer. Our host pariwaar (family) has been very helpful and transitioned us over to our language immersion learning process. We’ve got our own room and bathroom (including a toilet - what modern convivences!) and even solar heated hot water. Our training host family includes two children under 16, with great English, along with parents and one grandmother. The dad is a computer repair technician in Kathmandu. He comes home on most Saturdays. The mom is super woman. She milks the cow, moves the dung (aka as cow manure) to the field, plants potatoes, fixes meals, and does all the religious things for the family. They’ve been instructed to speak only Nepali with us to help on language, but being able to use some English has been helpful as we gain Nepali words and sentence structure.
Peace Corps keeps us very busy with a 6 days/week training schedule. The standard work week in Nepal is 6 days a week with Saturday off. Most days start with a 7:30 small group language class, back to our host family homes at 9:30 for daalbhaat, 40 minute walk to town (includes 4 hills and one still makes us perspire) and with more language and technical training until 5:00. Not much free time with a 40 minute walk home to beat the 6:30 PM curfew. Yes, we’ve got a curfew. Our walks back and forth to town have given us a chance to interact more with local Nepalis. One gets a smile and a greeting from anyone that we see with a namaste, hands held upright together along with a bow of the head. It is really an amazing way to greet the one another!
Some sites we’ve observed on the way to town.
There’s lots more to share with all, but we’ll save those topics for later notes. Our goal will be once a month to post our experiences.
We think of you and pray you are all well.
Feel free to send a chat or call to WhatsApp, Steve’s connection is
May the road rise to meet you and the wind be always at your back!
Steve & Liisa
Love the hat. This is Jack kiely sounds great. My son in law was born in Kathmandu. His parents were missionaries. My daughter and grandson went back with him a few years ago.
Today catching up with you both. More reading ahead. Every day is extraordinary isn’t it?