Waking Up in Nepal

         Waking up in Nepal is some days normal, some days out of place.

         It's rolling over in my bug net, and pulling my feet back in from the outskirts to make sure they don't get bitten by any lingering mosquitoes. It's running down our concrete stairs to the bathroom and stumbling in the dark if the electricity is out again.

        Waking up in Nepal is sometimes pondering over strange dreams involving U.S. people and places that force me to reorienting myself and bring my mind back to Nepal. Sometimes the dreams temporarily convince me that things I've been looking forward to in Nepal - travels with my teachers, events with students, my final goodbye - have already happened without my knowing.

     Sometimes waking up in Nepal means waking up with a fever, or a headache, or a sore throat choking back my ability to swallow. Then it means my family lingering over my health, sharing all health details with passing neighbors, and blaming the changing climate for anything and everything. For the past two weeks it's meant waking up with my ears plugged up - creating a muffling affect that makes understanding Nepali that much more difficult.

       Sickness, homesickness, and general this-would-never-happen-in-the-US annoyances aside, waking up in Nepal is something I suspect I will miss, even crave when I'm back in under my own covers five months from now.

       Because waking up in Nepal means a soft face full of sunlight at 5:30 in the morning as a gentle reminder that I can sleep until 6.  It means the sound of water running, chicken flocking about, and steam hissing as it shoots out of the pressure cooker full of boiling dahl. It means greeting my Ama, Bauju, Bua, and little Sachina with a smile and a "good morning" (with maybe some extra tickles for Sachina). It means Sachina falling into me for a morning hug, wrapping her arms around my legs and letting me hold her up as her morning sleepiness slowly wears its way off.

          Waking up means steaming milk tea in the front of the house, perfectly contrasted by the morning air, chilled by the valley's fog. It means three easy hours to sit cross legged on our wooden benches and write in my journal or to watch my Bauju cook in the kitchen as I ponder over lesson plans. It means watching neighbors pass with loads of grass and wheat on their back, looking up at me as they pass, the weight of their load attached by a strap to their forehead, their arms wrapped as support around the backs of their heads. It means peace. It means refreshment.


           Eventually, it means realizing the morning is almost gone, rushing back up to my room and speedily cutting out endless words and drawings on paper to accompany whatever I've come up with for the day - large cut outs of insects, verbs written out on small slips, six or seven sets of the months of the year all rubber-banded together for a game.  Teaching classes of 30-40 students means lot's of teaching supplies - my teachers are always questions what is inside that big bag of mine.

        Then, in the midst of throwing together all my supplies for the day, my Bua's voice will echo up the stairs "Aarati! Abaa Kana Kanne!" and I'll make my way down to plates of steaming rice and curried thakari (vegetables). I'll eat small balls of rice, lentils, vegetables, and salsa mixed together with milk poured on top to make the curry a creamy soup. Like my family, I've learned to each with my right hand, mashing bits of each dish together with care, feeling it's texture before each bite. It's a practice I might have to adhere to every now and again in America - as I agree with the idea that the food tastes better when experienced with all sense.

        By the time the students start filtering down the path in their matching blue button up shirts, by the time the school's noise weaves it's way through our walls, I know the morning is finished - and I step out into the sun-kissed, not-so-early morning to be greeted by approximately 26 Nepali teachers and 866 Nepali students.

         Falling asleep is short and sweet compared to my sizable mornings. After the school's chatter has finally fallen silents and the sun has sunk behind the hills, we will eat our last dahl baht together before retreating upstairs where I'll play cards with my Bauju by fluorescent lamp light. On some nights, I'll lay in the dark with my phone pressed to my ear - linking me all the way to the other side of the world. But after finally closing my eyes, it only takes five minutes before I easily drift into sleep. The so common sounds of Nepal will fall to a silent hum, that promises once again, to carry me forward into another Nepali morning.

I suspect waking up in the US, five months from now will feel "justai" - sometimes normal, sometimes out of place.