Life

Outside of school, there really wasn’t too much to report in this first week of teaching. I was coming home from school every evening feeling utterly exhausted and certainly not keen to sample the local nightlife. One small coincidence did, however, shape my earlier experiences of Kathmandu and give me some relief from the, at first, endless work treadmill: Dawa, my Tibetan friend from my birthday, called out to me in the street as I was walking back to my new guesthouse after my first day of teaching. It seemed that she and her sister lived close by and she seemed keen to meet up again. Two or three times that week, we sat out on the terrace of one of the many cafes surrounding the Bouddha Stupa, drinking hot lemon and ginger while she told me all about her Tibetan background and explained to me the significance of the monument and the Lhosar (Tibetan New Year) celebrations that were ongoing at the time. Being far from the hustle and hassle of Thamel was pleasant – Bouddha being a far more relaxing quarter of town…just as well with the pressures of teaching! The downside to Bouddha could have been the enforced loneliness, with most of the other Westerners (including Edd, of course) residing in Thamel. While I appreciate my own company, having somebody to yak with at the end of a long day never goes amiss and with her cheery nature, Dawa seemed the perfect antidote to workday woes.
That first week was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to cope with. Without a syllabus or text books, I really had no idea what I was supposed to teach the kids. Couple this with my total lack of teaching experience and a suddenly blank memory on schoolyard games and I was spending every night and early morning racking my brains and designing ever-more-elaborate games and lesson plans. Dawa was great light relief from the stress and I really found myself growing to like her company. Come the weekend, I was more than ready for Everest Beer and pool at Tom and Jerry’s with Edd…and Dawa came along to join us. Saturday was spent chilling my beans at the Bouddha Stupa, enjoying the relaxing atmosphere, Buddhist chanting music and the fluttering of prayer flags. Behind the white and gold of the stupa the dark silhouettes of the surrounding hills marked the outer boundary of the Kathmandu Valley and, further in the distance, the snow-capped peaks of the Himalaya peered over their shoulders to complete the picture. I felt serenely peaceful and positive about the rest of my stay in Kathmandu.