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Wednesday, October 26, 2011
So we’re off on our trek. Having had a lovely first day, feeling exercised but relaxed and feeling proud of our Jack who had walked quite a lot and managed some difficult sections, within a split second everything turned topsy turvey. Surprisingly the situation was so grave that not a single expletive was actually uttered – I know, impossible to believe. So we’re making our way down into the valley between Ghandruk and Landruk down a very long staircase made up of uneven stone steps. We turn a corner and can see that our lunch stop is only a few minutes away and its only 10.30 in the morning. We’re looking forward to a long rest and relaxing lunch, listening to the calming sounds of the river nearby. Michael turns to me to make some comment along these lines and the next thing he’s lying on the floor. I do the usual “are you alright” bit assuming he’ll get up and get on with it, but oh no, he simply says “Its’ gone”. “What do you mean it’s gone” – “It’s broken”! AArrgghhh. We’re in the middle of a steep valley almost at the bottom with no easy way out. His foot is detached from his leg. We didn’t bring our first aid kit. Double AARRGGHH. Jack decides he’s a doctor and can help. A lady passes by and gives him some pain killers and - are you ready for this? – phones her doctor friend in New York for advice! An elastic bandage magically appears from her bag, we get his leg raised on bag and strap up the ankle, and off she goes. Natasha from America – Thank you.
Having been a bit annoyed the previous day that our guide seemed to spend a lot of time on his mobile phone, we were then extremely grateful that there was good coverage and that he had plenty of credit. A number of unconnected events before the trek had led to my printing off and carrying with me a copy of our company medical / emergency insurance policy. Many a call was now made between us and the tour operator in Kathmandu, the tour operator and the UK based insurers, between both of them and the emergency helicopter service, ambulance service and hospital, and between the insurers and me – a small issue of being of being insured for business trips only to overcome, which my overseas British imperialistic skill of assuming everyone is put on this planet to make my life easier and talking to the insurance guy as such, did the trick.
A few hours later a stretcher appeared to carry him down to that little restaurant we had been looking at – four little Nepali’s huffing and puffing and sweating buckets trying to carry this overweight foreigner the few hundred yards to the restaurant. A few more hours later, with one frantic episode to move Michael out of the way of a herd of donkey’s walking through the middle of the restaurant right where he had been lying and another batch of American passers by who gave us another load of strong pain killers, eventually a helicopter appeared over the ridge, went up the wrong valley, but soon returned to land on a miniscule patch of flat land with such skill that it was just amazing to watch. Very quickly the three of us and our bags are packed into the helicopter, Michael only just fitting into the stretcher area (good job he’s not tall) and off on one of the most spectacular air journeys I’ve ever been on.
This was followed by an ambulance from the helicopter to the hospital, sirens blaring all through town, some strange shenanigans with a collapsible stretcher that wouldn’t collapse and then wouldn’t go up, and we got into the emergency room. X-rays showed that both bones were broken where they meet the ankle, he was operated on the next morning, and now he’s home spending a lot of time playing Flight Stimulator on his computer – boring.
In the meantime, Jack and I had a very quiet Dasain, no staff to help out! I had to do cooking and washing up – what is the world coming to! Influenced by the Rugby World Cup, Jack has been busy dressing up in his Scottish and British Lions strips and playing various combinations of rugby and football with our gardener. Michael even tried to join in on his crutches.
There are too many pics to put on the blog – so have a look at my facebook page.
Posted at 08:51 am by Kirsteen
Sunday, October 02, 2011
Up, Down, Shake it all about
What an eventful week or so in Kathmandu! The day after our grand adventure on the hash, we got hit (from very far away thankfully) by an earthquake. Apparently it measured 6.8 on the Richter scale at its centre, but was equivalent to about 5.5 in Kathmandu. A boundary wall at the British Embassy collapsed and caused the only deaths in Kathmandu – it was a very old wall and had a reputation for being unsafe, so all very embarrassing for the Brits. We hardly felt it in our house. We're lucky enough to live on a bit of solid rock, so don't suffer the same ground movements as those on the soft soil down in the valley. We heard a commotion up in the village then felt the ground wobble – the wine in Michael's glass started doing a dance and the shelves in the kitchen visibly wobbled (not unusual as they sit on a rickety table). It was all over before we had time to react then we picked up Jack, who had gone to the window (exactly not what you're supposed to do!) to see what all the noise was about, and then went outside just in case there was another one. After a few minutes we decided it was all over and went back inside to our lovely roast chicken dinner and a glass of wine. Within about half an hour of the quake, we got a text message from the donor's Risk Management Office telling us the earthquake had hit and "to expect aftershocks – but when?" (yes, the message did actually say that – not very helpful). We were also very impressed to sit down to watch the Beeb and find it'd already made the news. The earthquake centre and newspapers have been busy since telling us all it was only a medium one and that the biggy is still expected. Anyway, it at least gave us the kick up the bum we needed to get all our shelves fixed securely and put straps across to help prevent things falling off them too easily. Our Go-Bag is packed and kept in the car, our emergency earthquake tool kit is outside, and our emergency trunk is still nicely packed at the bottom of a pile of junk in the store room – really must get that sorted out – it is supposed to provide us with 3 days worth of provisions!!! The efforts to help people in the areas badly affected by the earthquake have been hindered by the ridiculous amounts of rain we've been having. The weather has been so bad, it even caused (or so people think) one of the Everest tourist flights to crash on a hillside on the edge of Kathmandu – very near where we'd been hashing the week before and really pretty close to where we live, though we didn't see or hear anything and I was out running at the time. On the same day an aeroplane did an emergency landing, another burst its tyre on landing, and there was a bomb scare caused by a rumour about a flight to India! All not very inspiring as we're supposed to be flying to Pokhara next week, I just hope the weather clears up by then or we may just decide to drive instead! The bad weather has meant Jack is stuck inside all the time, and he's been watching his DVDs a lot, sometimes with very positive consequences. The 101 Dalmations film is a current favourite and he spends a lot of time copying Roger by playing on the keyboard and working in his office. This has meant he's actually spent time sitting down and practicing drawing and 'writing'. He even won the maths competition for his class at school with his drawing of a face made with circles, which he did with a little help from his mummy! He had to go up onto the stage at the family assembly to get his certificate. On Sunday we went to a birthday party and so much effort had been put into setting up games and fun things to do, but were all ruined by the rain. The traffic getting there and back was horrendous – probably because the big Dasain festival is coming up, so it's a bit like travelling through a city the week before Christmas – that we've decided we're not going to any more parties on that side of town. Wednesday was the last day of term – already - it feels like he's only just gone back to school! We made a spiderman costume for him to dress up in for the 'Super Hero' day. He loved wearing it, but got torn between the spiderman costume and just putting his red pants over his trousers and wearing his apron as a cape to pretend to be batman (red?!). Now we're off trekking for a few days. Jack still fits in his old carrier, though we've got a porter to carry him, and we're sticking to one of the easier routes, so we should have a good time. I just hope the weather dries out as there are still lots of leeches out and about – will have a tube of Odomos ready to hand in the day pack! Looking forward to chilling out, no computers of phones for a week, mmmmm.
Posted at 07:00 am by Kirsteen
Sunday, September 18, 2011
HASH HERO -JACK'S GRAND ADVENTURE
It doesn't happen often, but every now and then the hash turns into one almighty cock up, usually when the walking hare is normally a runner. We had one of those days yesterday!
Jack had fallen asleep in the car on the way to the run, but woke up just as we were about to set off and decided he wanted to come for a walk with us. Off we set up a big hill, and it started to rain. Not much, but enough to put on our rain coats. These keep you dry from the rain, but you get so hot inside and boy do they make you sweat - the temperature must still have been in the mid to high twenties with high humidity.
About 20 minutes into the walk, Jack is whinging - I'm tired, I want to go back .... But we persevere and get to the top of the hill, the rain has stopped, the sun is trying to come out, and the view over the whole Kathmandu valley is stunning. Jack has decided he's a train and is following the train tracks and now having a good time. We're well behind the other hashers by now, but keep on walking along the ridge, following their footprints in the mud, enjoying the view and fresh air.
We come to a village and have to ask which way the others went and eventually get pointed down a little trail which seems to be going in the right direction. It's slippery and we've already been going over an hour, but decide it must be the path home and keep going.
A short while later, to our surprise, we find a group of hashers standing around dithering over which way to go - the leaders got so far ahead they didn't know which way they'd gone. So we take the lead and carry on down the little path rather than the lovely new wide road that seems to go off in the wrong direction. This path gets steeper and slipperier and, frankly, bloody dangerous in places. We keep going. Michael and Jack and myself in the lead, following the trail where people had recently slipped on the muddy bits - you can tell you're following foreigners as we tend to slip and fall more whereas the locals just potter up an down the trails with ease.
Anyway, apart from a few minor hash crashes, and one time Michael slipping over and landing on Jack who cried through shock more than hurt, we managed to get to the bottom. We'd been going two and a half hours by this time and Jack had walked all the way. Seems he realised that any whinging was totally out of the question and manfully worked his way down the mountain. In fact, he did so well that he spurred many of the others on - how can grown ups complain when a little boy just turned four can keep on going. Then, at the bottom, we found that the nice road we had chosen not to take would have brought us out at exactly the same place, which happened to be miles from the actual finish!
And the adventure still wasn't over. The hare had come back to help others with children get down, and was still up on the hill so we didn't know where to go again. The villagers said there was only one road that went anywhere, but which seemed to be going in the wrong direction. Eventually the hare came chasing after us, led us back to where we'd come down, through a school, and there was a bus waiting for us. Even now, we didn't realise how far away from the cars we were. Jack was absolutely thrilled at having a bus ride, so we bounced along the bumpy road, made our way through massive puddles, listened to the girls at the back scream as the bus lurched through a particularly deep puddle and the bus listed to one side, and after about 15 minutes arrived back at the cars in the dark.
What was so nice was that everyone looked on it as a grand adventure and had a good time, despite the fact it was a total cock-up. The hare was extremely lucky to find a bus to take us home though!
Back at the circle, Jack stuffed his face with bread and chocolate brownies, while Michael conducted a quick circle then off home for a bath (we were very grubby) and a well earned rest. On ON!!
Posted at 08:38 am by Kirsteen
Saturday, September 17, 2011
With just a week, plus too many years to count, between them are Michael and Jack's birthdays. This year was Michael's big 60, so we went to Nuwakot Famous Farm for the weekend. A relaxing low-key place in the ancient capital of Nepal. Michael and I had a nice time chilling out - well actually it was bloody hot - while Jack played with the goats, went "fishing" in the pond, and played a being a village postman for some reason. Not just any postman, a village postman. On the saturday we went for a drive towards the mountains but had to turn back because of a land slide blocking the road. On the way back we stopped at a stream for Jack to go swimming. It was just a little stream flowing into the river, which was absolutely raging - we could even hear it from our hill top station. The place is nice for a night or two, but you get a pretty sore head after a while - constantly banging it on the door frames, yes if little old me!
Jack's birthday was, of course, a much bigger affair. He shares his birthday with Zara so they had a joint party - much easier for the parents being able to share the organising. The day we sent out our birthday invitations, we discovered that the boy who lives behind us was also having his party on the same day, with lots of the same friends - if we'd known we could have made it a three way party, but instead we just had two parties. Jack and Zara went to the other one first as it started an hour before theirs. A much plusher affair than ours and Jack got to have a ride on a pony just before we had to leave to make sure we got to ours before any guests arrived. It was a bit of a wet day - the first rain during the day for a week - but it managed to hold off just enough for the kids to have fund on the bouncy castle. Towards the end we did the cakes - a pink princess one for Zara and a fire engine one for Jack - both were delighted and interestingly all the boys had to have Jack's cake and all the girls, Zara's. We very nearly forgot, but the party finished with our home made colourful monster Pinata - it took two mum's to finally break a hole then, as the rain was coming in, I ended up just ripping it open and throwing the sweets out among the kids - reminded me of a scrammy wedding.
So two birthdays are done and dusted for another year, with my big 40 fast approaching. In amongst all this, nothing much else has happened, oh - except that the house next door fell down. It was a traditional house made of mud and bricks and the ridiculous amounts of rain we'd been having just tipped it over the edge - well, tipped the edge over more like. Luckily those inside weren't hurt, though apparently the noise of the bricks falling onto the side of our house was pretty scary. We've now had a few weeks of them slowly dismantling it.
        
Posted at 11:17 am by Kirsteen
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Wet and windy - Yep, you've guessed it, we've been to Scotland. Actually the weather was pretty good for our whole UK trip except of course for the day we decided to climb Ben Nevis. Even then, it could've been much worse. It was a short holiday, but we managed to fit in quite a lot - we did shopping, camping with Harry down in Dorset, shopping, drove up to Scotland to see the grandparents, shopping, climbed Ben Nevis, drove to Lincoln to see Matthew, drove to Guildford and Lily came to visit, shopping, moved our storage stuff from Burgess Hill to Guildford. I managed to tick pretty much everything off my list including eating chinese take away, and Indian meal in Fort William, and proper chips from a chippy - that should keep me going for another year! Ben Nevis - 1344m above sea level and highest mountain in the UK. It was 8km to the top from the car park (16 in total) and took us 8 hours to complete. Michelle was suffering from very early on, but managed to keep going all the way to the top and the back, which was more than many others did. It was Michelle and Michael's first monroe, so tradition dictated (and you know what a stickler I am for tradition - not) that we celebrate with champagne. It was too cold and windy at the top for this, so we got down to a sheltered bit where there was still snow on the ground - yes snow in August - for a quick pasty lunch washed down with a glass of champers, with another glass once we got further down and out of the wind, for medicinal purposes of course to ease Michelle's aching knees and hips.
    
Now we're back in KTM and its nice to be home. Jack's loving being back at school. Michael's left for a field trip less than 12 hours after we landed. I'm back at work, but just in the mornings while Jack's at school, and managed to go to my Yoga class yesterday. Felt much better for it, but ruined it in the evening by indulging in chocolate, baileys and a b&w war film (Carve her name with pride) - got my first full nights sleep since our return but woke up with a very thick head.
Posted at 04:27 pm by Kirsteen
Sunday, July 24, 2011
After visitors go you hope you can settle down to a quiet period, relax and enjoy the calm. Oh No. Having sat doing not very much for quite some time, Michael’s project kicked off big time so he’s been working long hours, I went straight back to work which has kept me busy right up until today (22 July!), Jack’s school decided to throw in a whole load of events to keep us all busy – sports day, swimming, carnival, party, and then he was on holiday – at home for three weeks with two parents out working and nothing to do!
Sports day. A special session just for the nursery children, which was good because it’s not easy to keep three and four year olds interested in things and most of them didn’t quite understand the purpose of the ‘races’. The girls were all cheering for Jack, so he slowed down to look at them and forgot to keep running. The bean bag race was the most successful, but the team relay had lots of them straying into different teams, forgetting to hand over to the next kid, or forgetting it was their turn to start running. The girls didn’t get the long jump, and just did a jump into the air not caring whether they moved forward or not. Jack, as one of the youngest, didn’t do so very well, but had a great time and got the biggest cheers for being dogmatic during the egg and spoon (bean bag on racket) race refusing to hold the bag on despite the fact everyone else did.
And then they did a couple of swimming sessions, just to get the kids used to the water and not be afraid. Of course, Jack already loves the water, always has, so got straight in there, playing at horse riding on the long floaty thing. The weather wasn’t great, so Jack got cold, so cold he was shivering uncontrollably when Michael made him come out to get dressed and warm.
So all this happened in the same week at school, plus a carnival on the Thursday evening and then the nursery class party on the Friday afternoon. The kids were all knackered, but still managed to play on the bouncy castle, which of course resulted in plenty of tears as they all bashed into each other. By 3.30 it was time to take Jack home, he’d just had enough, as had several of the others.
And then, what to do with the boy at home all day – DVDs get boring pretty quickly, walks around the village are okay but all the local kids are still at school. He did very well playing with his train set and pretending to be train drivers, singing along to his guitar (I have a fantastic video I’ll try and upload somehow). Then we asked Krishna the driver, who Jack loves playing with, and Sara didi (our housekeeper/ babysitter) to take him to the local Zoo. He loved it – not so much the animals, but the boat rides on the pond and being bought cheap tacky toys that his Mum and Dad won’t buy him (including a plastic gun on this last visit!). He enjoyed it so much, he’s been three times now, and even managed a ride on the old elephant.
During all this I’ve got braces put on my teeth. Only the top ones so far as they need to move out enough to be able to do the bottom ones. And, I’ve taken up running – well walking and running, but its getting better. This morning I did just over 5km in 38 minutes. I was impressed anyway. I’m feeling fitter and slimmer already, have lost a tiny bit of weight, but still a long way to go before I feel properly slim again and am able to run on the hash – am aiming for being able to run 10km just so I can do the hash comfortably.
Yesterday was our last working day before going to the UK on holiday. The shopping list has been growing longer by the day, with the usual strange mixture of items ranging from horseradish sauce to train track pieces and not forgetting the M&S underwear replacements. I am so very much looking forward to the trip, though as usual there’s too little time and so much to do, including a quick weekend trip up to Scotland.
Having difficulty with pictures (and lots of other things) on this blog, so have a look at my facebook page where I've uploaded some pics and the video.
Posted at 08:44 am by Kirsteen
Saturday, July 23, 2011
During Mum and Dad's visit we decided to pop across into India to visit Darjeeling and take a ride on the toy train – probably one of the most expensive 2 hour train rides ever, but worth a visit. Having gone through the saga of getting our Indian Visas (three visits to the embassy!), booked a travel agent to organise everything for us, we were off. The travel agent was late and we got to the airport just 15 minutes before the plane was due to take off. He had managed to phone to say we were on our way so we rushed through security, up to the check in desk, off to pay the airport tax, through the departure lounge and onto the bus that was full of all the other passengers waiting for us, and onto the plane with a minute to spare before our due take off time. About 20 minutes later we were in the air, bouncing around in the storm for 45 minutes to land in a very wet and soggy looking Bhadrapur airport.
Our travel guide was waiting and off we went – a long 6-7 hour drive up to Darjeeling. Our first outing was to the Zoo. As zoos go it was pretty good, but the usual thing of cages being too small … Jack had a good time stomping around, but especially liked the bear and sleeping tiger. In the middle of the zoo is the Himalaya Mountaineering Institute, with a display on all the big Everest expeditions from the early days. Pretty interesting, but Jack decided he was a mountain climber, so the only way we could get him to keep going around the zoo was to get him to pretend he was holding a rope and climbing. The next day we went off to see a Tibetan refugee centre, but on the way back saw the small training climbing rock where they let the public climb up using ropes. We stopped and took Jack up to see. The guide helped him climb a little way, but that wasn't enough for our Jack. So the climbing bloke tied him to a rope and off he zoomed – all the way to the top, the other climber trying to keep up close behind him, but not always managing to do so. When he finally came down again, being a mountain climber was the new in thing, even beating train drivers and firemen.
Then we went for the train ride – the whole purpose of the visit. We'd seen the train a few times at the station as we drove past it on our way to see other things, but now for the big event. A bit of confusion as to which carriage we were supposed to be in and someone sitting in our seats, but soon we were off. Heads out the window and chuffing along. Within minutes Jack's hair was changing colour from all the soot flying in through the window and Dad got a bit in his eye that irritated him for hours. We held up the traffic as we crossed the road, again and again to get around the corners, but settled in to a slightly bumpy and noisy ride through town along the side of the main road towards a little memorial park and the next town. A quick visit to the museum and back again. Not so very exciting, but an enjoyable experience nevertheless. Jack talked about trains for quite some time after, and topped up with watching Ivor the Engine and Thomas Tank Engine, he still plays at being a train driver on a regular basis.
We stayed at the Windamere Hotel, right up on the ridge and one of the smarter places. Very old fashioned, like stepping back in time. Lots of pics from the colonial era …. May is supposed to be a pretty good time to go for the views of Kanchenjunga, but it was very cloudy and wet the whole time we were there and we didn't get to see the mountains, but then you kind of get used to the whole Himalaya vista thing living in Kathmandu anyway. Darjeeling itself is just an old hill station for the tea plantation managers and much of the town is like a living museum, but full of tourist vehicles all plying the same attractions. An interesting side trip for a few days, but not a holiday destination.
Then back to Kathmandu via a tea estate (which we couldn't see because the clouds were so low) to buy some real Darjeeling Tea, only to discover that all the good stuff was exported so the stuff you bought locally was the poor quality dregs – Mum since discovered that someone in Scotland actually exports the Darjeeling Tea from the UK back to Darjeeling so the locals can buy and sell the good stuff!     
Posted at 11:19 am by Kirsteen
Thursday, June 09, 2011
During the Easter holiday, we just spent some time chilling out together, quickly getting used to having the house to ourselves again, but missing Lily's energy and presence, especially Jack who missed his playmate. He made up for it by pretending to be various characters, the favourites being Hunter and Farmer, though with Pirate and Astronaut always close behind. He also got his first (and last?) black eye, somehow hitting the corner of the bed as he climbed out. I actually saw him do it and still can't quite work out how he managed to get his head in contact with the bed frame!
 
Mum and Dad arrived at the end of April, the day of the Royal Wedding. We had people over to watch it on our TV, but just as Kate was about to walk down the aisle, the entire satellite TV system went down due to a storm - we then managed to make do with listening to the BBC online radio and pictures from a blog site - obviously not matching the commentary we were listening to.
The first weekend during their visit, Mum and Dad looked after Jack so we could go away for the weekend by ourselves. They spent most of the time going swimming and eating chocolate. We joined the Himalaya Hash House Harriers on their 1700th run weekend at Famous Farm in Nuwakot. We had an absolutely lovely weekend. The place was in the middle of nowhere and was so quiet and the village was surprisingly clean. The town / village was the first capital of Nepal, with the ancient palaces now turned into a museum. Our accommodation was in a renovated Newari house, with low doors, great views and just a great relaxing atmosphere. Definitely a place to take Michelle and other guests when they come to visit. The next weekend we went to Darjeeling, but that can wait until the next blog! |
 
Posted at 02:30 pm by Kirsteen
Wednesday, April 06, 2011
Such a long time – Why Mummy??!!
It’s been absolutely ages since I’ve managed to update the blog. Since the last entry we’ve had a wonderful holiday in Scotland (pics to follow soon), followed by a repetitive cycle of work and bad colds. Anyway, the weather has finally warmed up (though it did rain the other night), we’re all on the mend and feeling much better than before, I’ve finished my work for a while and Michael’s work has settled down – we even have a signed contract, not bad after 7 months of being here!
I had planned to talk about our holiday in Scotland – christmas, hogmanay, skiing, Jack’s first time in the snow, sledging and the snowman …. but it seems so long ago now. So I’ll just put up a load of pics on facebook.
So what’s happened since we got back? Well, we’ve both lost noticable amounts of weight – nothing drastic but the bloated tummies developed over christmas (I actually got so fat I reached my “day before Jack was born” weight!) have been lost and we’re slowly creeping down to healthy weights. I’d like to say this was all down to healthy eating and exercise, but I think the Kathmandu effect has had more to do with it – a few times since our return I’ve found myself sitting on the loo in the middle of the night with a bowl on my lap – not pleasant.
We had more hassles to sort out on the house:
Electricity shortages – 14 hour power cuts each day (now gone up to 15) with an inverter (power back up system) that was broken by some ‘silly’ electrician who left the immersion switch on and completely drained and dried out our batteries. The process of recharging them (with a few minor cock ups and blackouts along the way) took about 4 weeks during which we had to survive on only half the batteries and the power cuts went up to 14 hours a day! So everything had to be switched off as soon as the power went off just to keep the fridge and freezer going – well that’s my excuse for not using the computer or internet. But its all working fine again now and even manages to cope with the occassional sneaky use of the electric toaster – such luxury!
Water shortages - we ran out of water the other weekend and had to get a ‘Tanki’ in to deliver some. The Tanki decided to turn up at half past one, just half an hour after the power went off, so we had to wait until after 8 o’clock to pump it up to the top tank before being able to flush the toilets. Luckily it coincided with an ‘everyone feeling healthy’ weekend, so no major disasters.
Anyway, we have managed to get the house mostly sorted out. The pool table has pride of place in our club house and boy do we need some practice, the Wii has been set up and I’ve at least had a go at my new dance mat game (I’m absolutely rubbish!), and the other week we got satellite TV so we could watch the last few matches of the six nations rugby (which of course they didn’t show cos the cricket’s more important in South Asia) and discovered the added bonus of the CBeebies channel. Jack and Michael are mostly happy but occassionally the channels we want to watch dissappear. We even had our first party to christen the pool table.
 
Lily stayed with us for a couple of months in her gap year. She managed to find herself some volunteer work down at our local orphanage, which is within walking distance from the house and with a buddhist yoga and meditation centre which needed a management and administrative overhaul - I think this has given her some great experience, though her most lasting achievement is likely to be the mural she painted on the wall of their new yoga hall. Jack loved having her to stay and she took him down to the orphanage several times to play with the children, painted him like a tiger, and generally introduced lots of fun into his life.
 
And as for the boy, he turned three and a half at the beginning of March. He’s finally stopped sucking his thumb, with a little help from nothing more drastic than Winnie the Pooh plasters, though we sometimes catch him with his thumb in his mouth when he’s fast asleep – not much to be done about that for now. He has also stopped wearing night time nappies. So far just one little accident in his own bed, then a massive one in ours that caused much cursing as we had to strip our bed in the middle of the night and find clean sheets … needless to say he spent the rest of the night in his own bed.
He’s been learning lots and lots at school, and each time they pick a theme for the week, we have to relive it at home. His favourites are being a doctor (where I have to lie on the floor so he can listen to my heart and check my temperature), a policeman (where he wears his fluorescent cycle vest and blue cap), a fireman (with his red hat), a pirate (with fancy hat and eye patch) and a knight (with a chef’s hat and home made cardboard sword). Every morning when he goes to school he is pretending to be something different – he’s getting pretty well known. He’s also very well known in our local village as he goes and plays with the local kids of an evening. Now when we walk down to the shops we can hear people calling out to Jack, even the taxi drivers that park out this way.
He’s been learning to recognise his letters, which he can do quite well now thanks to those Letterland books (Thanks Nancy and the McCarns), and he’s learning to write some too. He can do a pretty decent J, but it’s difficult getting him to concentrate and sit still for more than a few minutes. When he plays at being a waiter or shopkeeper is the best time to get him to practice some writing.
He has also recently discovered the word “Why?”, so we’ve joined the ranks of zillions of parents before in trying to work out how to best answer the relentless questions to try and stop the next one coming.
Easter break starts next week – not quite sure what I’m going to do with Jack during a whole fortnight holiday. I’ve been collecting old toilet rolls, cheese triangle, cereal and tissue boxes so I feel some home made things with lots of messy glue and painting coming on. We might just have to have a delayed Easter so we can do painted eggs and all that Jazz when Granny and Papa Ron are here – only 3 weeks until their visit.
Posted at 02:50 pm by Kirsteen
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
When we decided to make the move back to Kathmandu, we knew that the power cuts would be long, that the water supply would be limited, that the political situation was dodgy, that it would be cold come December, but that it would all be alright because Nepal works on it’s spirituality. And we weren’t wrong, just that Michael has had to remind me a few times “it’s spiritual!”
The first week in the new house we sacked the old housekeeper. She has been called many names including the Dirty Didi, Silly lady, Stupid lady (which we don’t use anymore because it’s not a nice word), and one that Jack came up with all by himself – the F*%#ing up lady – Where on earth did he get that one from??!!
We spent our first week scrubbing the house, especially the kitchen and bathrooms, unpacking all the stuff from our shipment, working out where to put everything, buying furniture and equipment, and living in the dining room when the power was off as it was the only place with a light that worked off a battery and where our one and only heater was, not to mention the only chairs we had.
After having in the painters, the plumber, and the electrician, we have sinks that let the water drain, sockets that don’t fall off the wall and hang by the wires every time you use them, a nicely painted house that looks clean and bright, an inverter that means we have power all the time despite the 8 hours a day average power cuts, a wireless internet connection, more heaters and enough furniture to cope with for now. The house is starting to look nice and feel like home – just as we’re about to disappear on holiday for a month.
When we get back we are hoping to return to a house freshly painted on the outside, a bath tub installed (Jack is using a big bowl for now), a new table and raised work surface in the kitchen (it’s so low even Jack can reach it and it gives us back ache!), and some new shelves and toy boxes for Jack’s play room. Yes, I did say play room. All three of us each have our 'own room’ to use as we wish in addition to the bedrooms – somewhere for Michael to play flight stimulator, somewhere for me to work and play my clarinet, and somewhere for Jack to play and leave his toys out, especially the train set. There’s a small TV place upstairs, so the plan is to get a pool table and turn the living room into a club house.
I’m also hoping our new Didi (that’s big sister in Nepali, the easy name for the housekeeper) will have started and that the place will be all clean and lovely for us. Not only have we been doing our own washing up, but I even had to do some ironing the other day – what is the world coming to?
 
 
Other than the house move, we’ve all been busy. Jack has learnt to ride his bike all by himself and now takes it out onto the road and goes to the shops on it, under the close supervision of Dhana the gardener. He hasn’t quite learnt to use the brakes yet, but I’m sure he will soon after he has his first fall. Jack has also been busy during his first full term at school – posing for the school group photo for the calendar, singing on stage in assembly, playing an elf in the infants school play, been to a friend’s birthday party, and had his first school Christmas party. Despite having been very excited about the school play and really enjoying the first show, by the end of the second it all got too much for him and he made his big exit with tears streaming down his face. And as for the Christmas party, not sure what he ate, but he was sick three times that night managing to ruin the bedding on his own bed and ours.
 
 
Michael has been busy at work, but even busier at the Dentist’s. It think he had to go about five times to get everything sorted – talk about all I want for Christmas is my two front teeth, actually I think it was one at the back.
As for me, I’ve been busier than I’d hoped. No Didi means I’ve been looking after the house and Jack, but I’ve also been called in for work quite a few times, more than I wanted anyway. I even had to miss my art club twice!
So tomorrow we’re off on holiday and very much looking forward to it. I just hope the snow stays off enough for us to land at Heathrow and then drive up to Scotland on Christmas Eve.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
 
Posted at 02:26 pm by Kirsteen
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