Sydney Price- The 9 days that changed everything for me…

I need to start off by saying that summarizing this trip into one, brief blog post is absolutely impossible. I’ve been home about five days now, and still when people ask me to tell them about all that we did and saw in Nepal I am unable to give an adequate answer. Not because we didn’t see or do anything of importance, but because we did too MUCH. I find my mind racing during moments like these where I think about telling one story, and halfway through that thought I have another about something different I want to talk about, and right then I’ll think of something ELSE (and so on and so forth). It’s like the vastness of all that I learned and experienced comes cascading down on me and leaves me tongue tied, because I truly have NO idea where to begin. That’s probably why I put off writing this final post… I feel like I just don’t have the words necessary to convey how incredible and life changing those nine days in Nepal really were.

(incomplete, will finish in the morning!)

Sydney Price- Oops! One more photo…

I almost forgot to post one of my favorite pictures from the trip! This is a view of the Himalayas from our plane as we left Nepal. So unreal!

Sydney Price- Words aren’t enough, so here are some pictures!

Sarah Marchand

This gallery contains 13 photos.

       Some pictures from the second half of the trip (Hiking in Dhulikhel, Boating, Children’s Orphanage, and shopping in Pokhara, river walk in Bandipur on our way back to Kathmandu, the Himalayas from the airplane to New Delhi)   … Continue reading →

Another Video from Reception- Nicole Johnson

Nepali Dance

Another Video from Our Reception- Nicole Johnson

Nepali Dance Performed by Students at Little Angels

Video of Our Cultural Reception at Little Angels College

A young boy playing Nepali drums

Sarah Marchand- Namaste

In Nepal, you use the word “namaste” as a hello and as a goodbye. That is kind of how I feel about this whole trip. I logged in hours ago to post my final comments but instead got completely lost in the posts of my classmates which I had failed to read during the trip. The posts were so vivid, funny and insightful. They took me right back to the trip, I laughed out loud at some parts and felt teary eyed at others. It’s safe to say this trip was life changing for all of us.

We got to visit arguably one of the most beautiful countries in the world and in the process truly bonded with our travel companions, professors and hosts. I felt so incredibly close to the people I traveled with, we had the time of our lives and learned a lot. For me, this trip cemented my dream of one day working in a health field with children. In Pokhara we visited the psychiatric ward of a well known teaching hospital. While many of my classmates were very interested in this field, I found myself craning my neck to try to catch a glimpse of the pediatric ward. We later visited an orphanage (more like a group/foster home) and once again I found myself intrigued by the well being of the children. As we made the six hour ride back to Kathmandu, I stared out the window at the beautiful countryside and daydreamed about returning to Nepal as some type of medical volunteer after college.

Aside from pointing me in the right direction career wise, this trip has helped me grow as a person. Today I was rushing to make it to a summer class that I’ve already missed the first week of (I walked into the wrong classroom… a drug and alcohol recovery class oops) and was feeling myself getting worked up about the situation. But then I thought of “Nepalese time” and put everything back into perspective. I feel like I now understand that there is so much more out there that drives people and makes them happy. We go through our days rushing and stressing about crossing off all of the points on our to-do lists while somewhere else in the world there are people who actually take time to enjoy themselves and those they love instead of always trying to get ahead. I went out to breakfast with my parents the day in Watch Hill after I returned home and couldn’t help but staring at those around me, thinking of what privileged lives they live on one hand, but how on the other hand they are missing out on so much more. In Nepal, happiness means so much more than what we understand it to be.

I hope and believe that this trip has opened up many doors for me. This summer I vowed to eat out less and shop less (we’ll see) so that I can save up for my next big trip. I want to see more of the world and at some point I NEED to go back to Nepal. Maybe I’ll even do some traveling with some of the girls!  So Namaste it is, not goodbye or hello, but like one of my classmates commented earlier, more of a see you again.

Carol Oliveri – My Final Post

On our last full day, we visited the Ayurveda Health Home, and were honored to have the Medical Director, Dr. R. R. Koirala M.D. (Ay), speak to us about Ayurvedic medicine, an ancient health practice that strives to achieve health through harmony and balance. He explained that our bodies are in a constant state of transformation, so health is also a dynamic process. I believe this to be true even from a scientific aspect, since we are constantly exposed to antigens that stimulate our immune system in an effort to protect us.
Where Ayurvedic medicine and biomedicine differ, however, is in their goals. Dr. Koirala stressed that the goal of biomedicine is to avoid death, and when someone is ill, the symptoms are treated with surgery or through prescription drugs. Ayurvedic medicine attempts to find the root of what causes the symptoms, which is often linked to the patient’s psychological state. For example, someone who has high blood pressure can be prescribed drugs to reduce his blood pressure. An Ayurvedic doctor will attempt to find the source of the stress that is causing the rise in blood pressure so that it can be reduced. Massage is a large part of the healing process used at this facility.

Now that I’m home, I’ve had time to reflect about my experiences in Nepal. Being there made me appreciate the comforts of home, such as having hot water, drinkable water from the tap, real toilets instead of grated holes in the floor, and the availability of toilet paper. I found Nepal to be a country of gentle people. I only saw one act of violence, on our drive to Pokhara when a man threatened another man with a wooden club. Even the beeping car horns that I first attributed to road rage were really just a way to let other drivers know that the car intended to pass them. I also had the opportunity to compare Nepal’s collectivistic society to our individualistic society in the U.S. This was especially apparent in the rural areas of Nepal, where family members worked together. I saw children carrying buckets of water up a steep hill to their home. In a society such as this, everyone knows their place and what is expected of them. This creates a cohesiveness that makes ‘we’ the priority, and not of ‘me’ like in the U.S.

However, the penalties for not adhering to this can be extreme. Women who become pregnant before marriage can be sold by their fathers into the sex trade, where they not only may service 5-25 men daily, but may also have their organs removed and sold. We saw women at Maiti Nepal who had been rescued from situations such as this. Even though this is a small part of the Nepali culture, I have a hard time justifying that it’s acceptable in any culture. In my opinion, it isn’t really any different than the slave trade in the South that was a major component of the Civil War. As U.S. residents, we have laws that protect us from crimes against humanity and I now realize that this is the major benefit of our society. I have the freedom to set my own goals. So, both types of societies have pros and cons. Finding harmony between the two can make each one better.

Everything is Different, Natalia Bustamante

So when you travel to another country all people tell you is “Don’t drink the water !”. Is that all we get out of it? No, of course not. This is what no one tells you about:
1. The toilets are weird. They are on the ground and they are sprays for your…yea. But hey the whole experience is about trying new things right? So I used a sprayer (which initially I thought was how you flushed the toilet, wrong) Used a bathroom in the hospital, a toilet on the floor with no lights and no TP. Used a hole in the ground at a rest stop, sprayed myself in the face. Awesome. When in Rome, do as the Romans do.
2. No one cares if your hot. It will be hot. It will get sweaty. Bring extra underwear and prescription anti-perspirent and get over it. The people there are used to it so they don’t understand why your complaining.
3. Water is a precious resource. Don’t take for granted your hot showers, brushing your teeth with tap water, ice cubes, pools etc. All water is precious. You have no idea until your drinking hot water from a water bottle in the back of a hot van.
4. Bring iodine tincture and/or a water bottle with a filtration system built in. Don’t add to another countries pollution problem.
5. Bring Anti-diarrehal, enough said.
6. Take pictures of everything and anything. Your memory will fade and you will want to remember everything and anything.
7. Cold food is amazing. When you can’t eat veggies or fresh fruit because you can’t drink the water, and the veggies and fruits are washed in the water you miss out. Cucumbers, watermelon, peppers, bananas, apples, oranges, juice in general and cold milk. You will miss these things terribly. Enjoy them.
8. Your feet are your first and best form of transportation. You will walk. You will walk a lot. And when you begin to sweat and get tired. Look behind you and stare at what you have walked so far and remember that people twice your age walk it 6 days a week to get to work.
9. Hills and mountains are not created equal. What the Nepali people call hills we call mountains, what they call mountains we call the tallest range of mountains in the world.
10. Namaste. It means that I bow to you. I respect that our inner God and spiritual being is equal to mine. I respect our differences and put them aside to acknowledge this oneness within us. So I put my hands together to represent that and I bow my head to show my respect.
11. Children all over the world love to be greeted with a smile and taking pictures of kids can make their day. As four kids playing soccer outside with a homemade ball and no shoes on told me when I showed them a picture of them “Nice! Nice! Nice!!!!”
12. We respect our elders everywhere. Anywhere in the world.
13. Not everyone in the world gets adequate access to medicine and medical treatments.
14. In Nepal all the women dress beautifully, the most exquisite cloths and the most beautiful colors. And they are very modest.
15. Education is so immensely valuable. All children deserve access to schooling, an education and a means of getting to their school. In Nepal going to school is a privilege and it is treated as a gift.
16. It is incredible easy for a U.S. Citizen to travel, it is not so easy for a foreigner to come onto U.S. territory.
17. The cost for an apartment in Kathmandu, with all utilities, rent and groceries is about 80 US dollars a month. My old apartment was 900 US dollars for rent alone. Just something to think about.
18. If someone makes 30,000 Rupees a month which is a considerably good amount they will make 450 US dollars a month. This is if you have a college degree.
19. The happiest people on earth don’t have very much at all in comparison to our standards.
20. When you step foot outside of a plane in another country everything changes. A shock goes through your whole body and when you look at a map of the world and see how far you have come you can’t help but think about how far you still have to go.

Nepal is the place of Never Ending Peace And Love
So grateful to have gone on this trip, it changed everything.