Week Number 1: Culture Shock or Not

So, airline rides are never very much fun, but one that takes "technically" three days is a bit more stressful. But I got through it. Vancouver has a nice airport, and Hong Kong was not as different as I thought it would be, just the lack of English writing in most places, that was about it. And lack of knowing where to go and what is there to do. So I wandered around downtown Hong Kong and things were good.

Now on to Nepal...

So, all in all, things have been going very well so far here in Nepal. Any culture shock I faced was pretty immediate when I arrived on Wednesday the 19th. The roads we went down and the neighbourhoods I glimpsed in the darks were manly ramshackle buildings thrown up it seemed. Also, there really aren't a whole lot of rules to the road here, so driving mainly entails vehicles and pedestrians dodging one another, which is wildly different from the ordered roads I'm used to back home, to say the least.

On Thursday things began to even out a bit though. I met another volunteer from Texas and we went to Swayembu', the monkey temple, which is the second largest Buddhist stupa (temple-shrine type thing) in Asia. It has a wicked amount of steps though! There were people praying and making offerings but it's also a large tourist draw so it was a bit of a strange mixture. And, lo and behold, there were monkeys! (But still many more dogs and pidgeons.)

I got taken to my host family on Friday and met them and the other volunteers staying there. Everything's great there too, everyone's nice and the food's delicious. It's mainly traditional Nepali food, dal bhaat, which is rice with a lentil soup and such. There's also curries and those kind of things. It's all quite good. There's also a large amount of stray dogs in the area of the Kathmandu valley where I'm staying, called Boudha or Boudhanath though, so it's wierd listening to fighting and barking dogs all night, but I'll get used to it. It's also kind of odd to wake up to shops opening up and vendors setting up their carts as well, but that's what Nepal is like.

There was an outreach program on Saturday in an area south of Kathmandu, called Patan. It was a one day free gynacological clinic where they gave free check-ups, advice, and medication to those who came. It was a fun-filled day of putting things in places where no one really wants them to go. I helped out with that all day and it's nice to know that even though I didn't start my volunteer placement until Monday, I still had a chance to do something productive and positive here.

Unfortunately, I just found a charger for my camera battery today, so I don't have any pictures yet, but I'll add them next time if it works, so hopefully it does! Stay tuned next update for my first time at work and the Buddha Jayanti festival, which is apparently Thursday!