So much has passed, so much is beginning

Well I must say first that writing a blog brings one to be acutely aware of one's ability to maintain it.  Blog posts (at least the ideas!) get written in my head on daily and weekly bases.  But the execution becomes a much greater challenge, as with anything.  And now, almost two months after the last post, I am coming to a point in my life and career where execution and commitment mean everything.

First of all, I am back in the States, in Portland, Oregon, my home for 11 years now!  Wow.  Three weeks in, it feels so familiar and yet in moments I am finding it to be so foreign.  The main reason for this, aside from that I was away for four months in a very different place, is that Portland changes quickly these days.  I believe I can safely say that it is one of the most hopping cities in our country, there is so much going on, new restaurants and cafes pop up all the time, and so returning after four months with a mind that is twisted in bewildering directions brings ever more confusion as I try to navigate where to be and when.  This may sound vague, but it is.  My process coming back, "reintegrating", has been vague, weird, unexpected, and really really hard.  And now it's time to start my career.  This is where the execution and commitment, and discipline, and energy, and organization, and yes, "putting on a good face!!" come in.  In any case, in addition to being excited, I am also terrified.

In moments of inspiration and excitement, however, I am reminded of some commitments that I made to you as readers, to friends back in Nepal, and to this blog.

First, I want to bring awareness to an extremely exciting venture happening in Chapagaon, just outside of the clinic grounds, in front of the mom-n-pop shop where we had tea (or beer!) almost every day, The Forest View. 

Satyamohan (pictured near the bike) and his cousin Aneel (holding the stick in picture below) came up with a plan in early February to initiate a clean-up effort in their immediate vicinity--just outside of the Forest View, and in the ravine and bus park across the street.  They began meeting every Saturday morning to pick up trash, and create awareness around the kind of efforts that need to happen on a larger scale in Nepal.  Among their aims are to create a greener space around the bus park, and in time (and with contributions to the cause) build public restrooms for the drivers and microbus caddies, and the general public.  I recently checked out their facebook page, and it looks as if they just did a tree planting!  Things are appearing lush there, most likely a result of the monsoon season that comes to Nepal around this time of year.  What a great time to nurture some new growth and make it even greener.  Please check their page out:  https://www.facebook.com/BeautifulForestGroup

In mid-March I had the privilege of doing trash pick up with them, on an early Saturday.  I have to say it wasn't fun, but it was heartwarming, and considering small efforts as tiny ripples in a pond that may someday turn into large waves with the right momentum coming from other forces of nature, it was incredibly satisfying.  I wish them the best of luck, and I hope to return in a couple of years to join their efforts once again with my own hands.

If you would like to contribute to their cause, please let me know by email (jmaynard9221@gmail.com).  I will be in communication with them to see how this is possible.  When I find out, I'll send out a bulk message to those expressing interest.  With donations they will be able to buy trash bins (or rubbish bins or garbage bins, so termed by my British and Australian cohorts, respectively), as well as begin to save for their other long term goals.  One of these is to educate and bring awareness to younger generations so that change can occur on a larger scale throughout time.  Believe me, they get some perplexed stares and are not immune to scowls by the older ones set in their ways, who just don't understand the point...

In addition, Thank you!  For reading, for your support of them through thoughts, "likes" on facebook, and monetarily, if we can work that out.

Okay.  Well, perhaps some of you heard that I went on, yes, two treks while I traveled in Nepal after clinic.  The first was guided by my dear friend Tsering and his uncle.  I was joined by my friend Kax, who came to Nepal on her spring break, her friend Brian, who joined for fun(wow, you guys--still can't believe you came to Nepal for 10 days...sooo awesome), and Kax's good family friends Marie and Dustin.  We had a great time, and found out how challenging hiking up and up for days at an altitude of 10,000+ feet really felt like.   Please see photos below, as that has been my mode of communiqué:   


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150595090867574.364311.567832573&type=3


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150603589777574.365516.567832573&type=3

Upon our return to Kathmandu, I then met up with clinic buddy Elissa, who became my travel companion for the next month.  We traveled east to Pokhara and embarked on a short trek to view the Annapurna range. What is a challenge to depict in pictures, if one wants to remain respectful of the local people, is just that: the people that line the trails, pass by with a "namaste" if they can muster it under their loads sometimes equal to their body weight, and are a huge part of the landscape and beauty that one encounters on a trek in the Himalaya.  These people are incredible, and for the trekker provide a humbling reminder of the luxury of carrying a comfortable pack, of wearing sturdy hiking boots, and of carrying poles and getting fed at the end of the day.  But they request to not be photographed and I respect that.  Here is a link to my posted photos of that trip:


https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150645710602574.370077.567832573&type=3

Enjoy, and I'll see you soon.  Wish me luck as I embark on my future!!!!!  (I approach it all with the same amount of bewilderment as I did as a young soccer player--my preferred spot is to stand on the side lines and watch...it's now time to get in there and PLAY.) 

Bandipur!

It’s been almost two weeks since clinic finished.  I’ve been in Boudha for most of that time, resting and recovering a bit, hanging out with my beloved  compatriot Seven, to celebrate her birthday and a couple days later to bid her farewell as she travels to Thailand. 
I was unable to kick a cold that started now almost four weeks ago, although diligently wearing my dust mask in the polluted city of Kathmandu, Boudha being sort of a suburb, if you can call it that, where the air is still filled with dust and particulate, along with diesel fumes etc.  So this week I decided to skip town and travel down the highway in the direction of Pokhara, climb the hill by microbus, and land in Bandipur.  What a retreat, and a wonderful way to kick this cold to the curb. 

Main Drag, Bandipur

Bandipur is car-free in it’s center, with slate cobblestone separating the two sides of mom and pop shops, many of which have opened their doors as modest guesthomes running about $5 a night.  Life here seems relatively undisturbed by the recent tourism, at least when you leave town, and the terraced hillsides remain teeming with rotated crops, and families herding goats and cows.  As I walked a trail yesterday a man and his son urged a slow-moving ox along, plowing the field in preparation for the next planting. 

When I arrived the first day I popped into the Old Bandipur Inn desiring a night of luxury.  It was a bit more expensive than I anticipated, the guidebook I am using 3 years old (although the most recent edition, ahem, in need of an update!), but yet with dinner and breakfast included, I decided to be lavish and splurge.  As I went through various emotions of slight guilt, feeling inappropriate, undeserving etc etc I realized:  I couldn’t find a moldy, run-down, podunk motel on the side of I-5 for this price!  (Amazing how relative it all becomes once out of the familiar expensive economic environment of the US) And, this place is absolutely fantastically gorgeous.  After walking down the street a ways, checking out a couple of guesthouses 1/6^th the price, or less even (and agreeing to spend two nights at one in the following days, curbing my extravagance...) I found I desired greatly to get back to the Old Inn and sit and relax with tea and my book.  It’s a small haven!  And I am ever-so deserving, I finally allowed myself to accept. 

Nice view!

The following day two new friends arrived in Bandipur, Marie and Dustin, from Pokhara.  We will be trekking together with another couple of friends, Kax and Brian arriving from the states in a few days.  Kax is the mutual friend bringing this whole group together, and it was a fun coincidence that Marie and Dustin were planning to detour up to Bandipur at the very same time I had decided on it, me in need of fresh air and a break from the city, they on their way from Pokhara to Kathmandu.  We shared a lovely dinner over candlelight, where they placed a small American flag on our table (is that so necessary?  I joked, and Marie exclaimed how she wants to fly the flag, reclaiming it from the meanings it has taken on...yes! I agree), and were serenaded by the local musician with his nightly gig, and made to dance by the friendly wait staff.  Magical. 

We hiked to a cave the other day, a good hearty hike sure to build a little stamina for our impending trek in the Langtang range.  It was huge!  And I was happy for the company, having almost made it on my own the day before but knowing I would not have explored it to the extent we did as a group.  We picked up Matthew, a new French friend who had hiked on his own, his girlfriend recuperating from sickness back at their place. 

Tomorrow back  to the valley, where we will meet up with Tsering, our guide for the trek!  It will be a fantastic adventure, no doubt.  Pictures of the grand Himal to be posted upon our return. 

Ok, a preview--Langtang Peak viewed from Nagarkot

 Also, stay tuned for an environmental update, showcasing Beautiful Forest Group, formed in Chapagaon, initiating local clean-up and environmental awareness and education.  Totally inspiring.  Wonderful to witness this happen the final weeks I was in clinic. 

At Kopan Monastery last week

                                                                                                                                          

One final week

Okay!!!!  Out of clinic now, this was the final week's post, then the internet broke...
So here it is.

I am so sorry to not have put anything up for so long!  Things got crammed, then I got sick.  Now on the mend, my energy, thankfully, is up again and ready for one last week of treating patients.  It has been a wonderful ride.

What has it been like?

Well...what a phenomenal experience (in all senses of the word) it has been to work at the Vajra Varahi Healthcare clinic.  I can't even begin to tell you how much kneepain , back pain, and gastric pain we have all treated.  We have treated stroke sequella and other hemiplegic disorders such as Bell's palsy,  numerous sciatica cases (which can often be lumped in with back pain), shoulder and arm pain, numbness and tingling (in Nepali they will say 'zum zum zum zum' or 'cutta cutta cutta' for various sensations, tingling and aching, respectively) in any part of the body, headaches, and common colds.  There are plenty of complicated cases, difficult at times to suss out, even harder to get straight stories, which obviously makes sussing out all the harder.  I am treating a young patient with cerebral palsy and epilepsy, whose mother's only goal is to help him communicate when he is hungry, and when he needs to go to the bathroom. The only time I have ever needled DU-8 was on him, and I did it without knowing why.  Thankyou, intuition.  (Pardon the shoptalk, non Chinese med readers). 

A patient with whom I have had the deepest connection is a patient with Parkinson's disease.  I so deeply enjoyed working with her, and was terrified of her at the same time.  Treating a virtually untreatable disease is incredibly challenging, especially when the patient you are working with desperately wants to be cured, and seeks numerous avenues to determine if someone can give this 'cure' to her.  I've told a story about part of my experience working with this patient in a blog published on the ARP website.  Please find it here:

http://www.acupuncturereliefproject.org/news-blog

Not too long ago I wrote this in my journal:

I dreamt of my patient this morning.  She was young, agile, interacting with her family with an extreme lightness of character and laughter, jumping even.  I was astounded, waiting for her to come in for treatment.  Then I turned and there again she was, in  her red sari and yellow scarf she wears every day, waiting quietly, still in the body she has come to know only in the past few years.  But she didn't look sad.

If sickness strikes any one of us, or any of our patients, changing reality to a degree unprecedented, and if we can maintain any semblance of a dancing, joyful being inside, if that is what is possible with any form of medicine, then we have succeeded, somehow.

Blink, another week has passed

Amongst power clicking on and off at strange hours and a work schedule that kicks everyone’s butt, it is certainly hard to get to posting.  Add to it that everyone in the clinic jumps onto the internet when we have electricity and the garbled waves cause it to be as convenient and speedy as snail mail....ok, exaggeration.

But anyway.  Here I am.

And here's the recap....

Monday:

Elissa and I headed to Champi with our interpreters, Prajwal and Mishal.  We heard loudspeaker chanting and music across the valley as we hiked up to the village.  Arriving, we hear that it is a day for puja, this celebration nine days in length.  Our lunch break consisted of hopping over to the tent where we had tikkas placed on our foreheads and were made to dance.  I loved the feeling of being so welcomed.  

Tuesday: 

Normally one practitioner goes by motorbike to Godhavri  but today we were two.  Reason?  To leave early afternoon, meet other team members in Sathobado  and taxi out to Boudha where we would have dinner, crawl into bed at a decent hour and arise the next morning at 5:30 to meet the jeep and taxi who would take us up to the stairway leading to Nagi Gompa, where we would then climb to the monastery and commune in ceremony with the nuns, offer a kata to the Rinpoches, get bonked on the head by what looked like a deck of cards by Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche and brother, receive an “empowerment”, eat Tibetan breakfast, meditate over yak butter candlelight while we are tied in by katas that connect the entire room of two hundred people, descend back to Boudha and find our way back to Chapagaon by evening.  That was a description of....

'stairs' to the gompa

Wednesday:

Thunderstorms break out early morning, which bring a soggy adventure ascending to the Gompa, taxi getting stuck in the mud, which allows a little hiking, yay.  All transpires what was said before, it’s beautiful, comfortable, colourful!  Windy, cloudy, rainy all day, the likes of which is strange at this time of year.  I elect to brave the motorbike back ‘home’ to Chapagaon with Tsering, and am happy to not shop, save for a scarf to replace the one I lost at the Buddhist temple.  I hope a nun is keeping her neck warm by it.

Tsering takes me to his aunt and uncle’s abode in Boudha where we are picking up a bag of Tongpa, fermented millet that is steeped in hot water and refilled, a warm alcoholic specialty that is drunk in the cold months (and perfect for a rainy chilly day).  Tsering cordially declined any being the driver.  His uncle made us Thukpa (noodle soup), the best meal I’ve had yet in Nepal, with buff meat.  We had to wait out the rain, and crossed the city in perfectly dry air, over muddy streets, making it home before the rain began again, soaking the night. 

Felt huge shifts in body and spirit before and while sleeping. 

Thursday:

Awoke, a new person.  Just like any other day...

Treated 23 patients.  Felt pretty good. 

In the evening had a party for Alison, our team leader, who left us the following day.  Drank Tongpa, my new favourite!  And red wine, which is a great treat in this part of the world for us westerners.  

Friday: 

Treated patients again, all day, said goodbye to Ali at lunch :(, hit a wall in the afternoon, wasn’t sure I could continue for a minute but made it through.  Kept calm through it, good good. 

Saturday (today):

Adventure walk down the road, taking pictures of dwellings and landscapes. Finally encountered the lake we were told to find, where we would also find food (or beer, or tongpa! In my case) at one of the restaurants surrounding.  Followed the nose towards home, through fields of spring onion, wild mustard and the brick yards, getting stares from the locals.  Slightly nervous, hoping to find the right road, but knowing we were headed straight for Chapagoan, companions naming me the human compass once we found our way to a familiar spot.

Sunday (tomorrow):

Treating in Godavri, beginning the week of packed patient schedules.  Wheeeeee! 

Until next time...

Trash Talk

Feb 4

I wrote a page in my journal during the first week in Chapagaon, concerning my concerns about the trash situation here in Nepal.  From that point, it has been interesting to observe within myself the transitions in emotion and perception surrounding the topic of trash.  From a Western perspective, Nepal is, literally, littered.  There is trash everywhere, the places free from it are mostly the agricultural fields, but even then you may find a stray plastic bag trampled into the worn, narrow path. 

And so.  Here are my feelings from almost a month ago.

Jan 15

Smita (one of the clinic workers) took Seven and I on a walk today, through Chapagaon and its streets, and to a cafe, and then back to the clinic through fields of young fava beans, and flowering wild mustard.  It’s still dusty here in the village, but the diesel fumes are less and so the dust is simply dusty and not sticky-dusty, as it is in the city.

Smita shed some light on what I have termed for myself “the trash situation” as we walked past small ponds, greyish-brown murk with a thin fluorescent green algae bloom towards on end.  She explained that it was not always this way, that when she was a child, twenty years ago, these ponds and canals were clean and clear.  It’s not so hard to imagine how beautiful this place must have been, it’s quite beautiful now.  But the plastic, of every imaginable color, litters every block, every embankment, every edge of beautiful green field, a huge disappointment at the state of the environment here for me, a softie for the earth and easily triggered by lack of care for it. 

I remember the anti-“litterbug” campaign of my own early childhood, and the advent of yellow metal trashcans on every street corner around town.  I remember also, in the sixth grade, our teacher talking about Tenney lagoon and how it used to be a swimspot, the water crystal clear, you could see to the bottom.  Not saturated in a rainbow of plastic trash, like the Vishnumati or the Bagmati Rivers, that run through Kathmandu, but saturated with algae, seaweed and lilypads due to the unregulated Wisconsin farm-water runoff.  The concept of a crystal clear Tenney Park lagoon was about as conceivable as martians joining us for volleyball at the beach.  So my thoughts and questions about my own country, before the yellow trashcan invasion, which provided a constant reminder to us to ‘Keep Clean!’ our city:  did this type of thing ever happen  when every sort of plastic packaging for any sort of good first came on the market?  Was “disposable” considered by the majority of our population as game for simply tossing to the side of the road?  And finally, the fact that we have mechanisms set up to collect, consolidate, and “dispose” of this plastic, among other things (i.e. put them out of site, cover them up etc. etc.) doesn’t make it go away now, does it? 

 

I consider plastic one of the greatest tragedies of the 20^th century.  

In any case.  Smita did not allude to either negative nor positive feelings over the matter, but my heart breaks as I think of our globalized economy and witness first-hand what it is doing to the towns and cities of Nepal. 

Their solution?

But it's interesting, the longer I am here, the less I see the trash.  It blends into the landscape.  And I wonder, is it complacency, or coping?  Or is it the sense of Buddhist impermanence?  Although majority Hindu, Buddhism pervades and mingles amongst the Nepali character.  If I am empty, so is the world, and the trash that I see with my mind is only a concept, created by the idea itself.  If I don't see it, is it really there? 

Yes!

Quick news of the day: 

The hot water was fixed (yessssss!!)

And the monkeys were chased off of our roof as the sun went down by a teenage monk from next door, all the other young monks looking on, laughing.  A show ensued on other rooftops as women baring sticks and cups of water sent them away.  I did see the big 'bastard' snatch an apple and eat it casually... 
They scurried quite quickly from the cup of water.  Duly noted.

Boudhiful exhaustion

So it's starting to become real, folks.  We've treated for six days straight, 4 days for me at the home clinic, and 2 days at satellite clinics:  Godavari by motorbike (see previous post) and Champi by foot (pictures to come).  After a full day of treating at the home clinic on Friday, having seen almost 200 cases collectively throughout week, Seven, Alison, Elissa and I hopped onto a micro (a minibus, think vanagon with 3 rows of seats), then a bus, (where we puffed past the beginnings of Friday night life in Kathmandu, running parallel to a wierd-looking tractor for 20 minutes that puffed black smoke into the air), and then a tuk tuk (a 3-wheeled truck) that carried us to Boudha.

Stupa maintenance!  On top of this they keep it sparkling clean.

We spent a day of sight-seeing the next day, circling the stupa that we kept calling a square and then laughing because it really is a circle, and we intermittently shopped and ate.  In the afternoon we went to witness the Puja, regularly done at the Gompas around town on a Saturday, Nepal's holy day and rest day.  We then taxied home, a much simpler and of course more expensive (but really only a Portland bus fare each) way to travel, exhausted but happy with our day. Please see the video below to experience a brief moment of the ride! 

Stupa cleaning

So. I have to say that I would have VERY MUCH looked forward to, at the end of our tourist jaunt out of town and back, a nice warm shower.  Perhaps I've mentioned the water at the clinic was solar-heated, and that if the day was sunny (which is 9 out of 10 times the case), one was gauranteed hot water (even enough to turn on the cold) if one desired. Was.

However.  And this happened Friday, just as we were finishing up our treatment day.... 

I hadn't seen the monkeys for a few days, but here they were all of a sudden, the whole family this time, scrambling down our building, past the treatment room window, running quickly across the alley, and scaling the building across the way.  These monkeys, on the first day of arrival, were introduced to us by our delightful, wickedly smart, and witty clinic director, Nicky (who is British, fyi), as the 'Bastard monkeys'.  Out of curiosity and and a hesitancy to judge, I hadn't quite accepted this title for them, although I knew they stole food and such and really, are slightly nerve-wracking to have around.  A wild animal nimbly climbing up and down our two-tiered roof while eating breakfast, who could easily be carrying rabies is not, well, let's say, calming to the nerves.
So anyhow, a few minutes later, we come to find out that the monkeys have taken off the water pipe on the roof (a normal occurrence) and smashed one of the glass tubes (not a normal occurrence) that holds our precious water, warmed to perfection by the sun, now spreading out over the roof and raining on the ground outside our clinic backdoor.   

Well, even if we knew who to call to have this fixed, it might take ages.  So sponge baths it is.  And that is what I did, out of a bucket of thermos water, still warm, when we returned.  It is amazing what one can adapt to.  Enjoying the ride! (most of the time!)

On a last note, our taxi ride home was delightfully given a soundtrack by the driver, and in the bliss of a good day, and in the exhaustion of all the travels, I attempted a recording of some sights and sounds.  I hope it works!