Travel Musings as of Week #2

Interesting turn of events so far:

• Mero naam Nafisa ho, ra ma IDS Nepalmaa kaam garchhu. Impressed?
  I have been taking Nepali language classes for 2 weeks, ending this Friday. So far, the locals do respond well to our sincere efforts to learn the language but, more than anything, I think they like it because it provides them a whole lot of comedic relief.
• On Saturday, Fatima and I crossed our first big intersection. This is a pretty big deal because no one uses traffic lights in Nepal and the street chaos is NUTS. Other than the claw marks she imprinted onto my arm, I'd say it went pretty well!
• No one in this country seems to believe I’m from Canada; everyone says I'm brown so I must be from India. When I try to explain that though I do have Indian ancestry, I was born in Canada, they don’t believe me. Apparently you have to be white to be from Canada, and your parents must be black if they’re from East Africa. Someone needs to teach them about immigration and globalization!
• On Sunday morning, Fatima and I moved into our new place and we both have nice, big rooms. Unfortunately enough, good sleep is still lacking because our neighbour is a dog breeder (11 dogs counted so far) and the barking continues into the wee hours of the morning.
• The LARGE majority of Nepal’s streets are unnamed so getting directions is just about impossible. Shopkeepers will either not recognize the place you’re looking for, or they’ll point you in completely different directions. Instead, addresses are based on main points of interest; for example, someone would say they live two rights and a left from the Trendy Café, behind the blue gates.
• Saida, a fellow INDEVOUR, finally arrived to Nepal late last night. We’re very excited to finally have her here!
• Nepal has rolling blackouts that happen 2-3 times a day, up to 5 hours at a time. This can be a bit of a pain in the butt, and its best to plan your schedule around the outages. If you’re lucky enough, your house will have inverters (similar to generators), which gets you through the outage. Storing food is much more difficult because fridges require too much power and can’t stay on during the outages; you essentially need to buy what you’ll eat and cook that day or that week.
• Lucy, Cassondra, Fatima and I have been witnesses to two accidents thus far, both involving our own car. The term accident is loosely used as they were minor, but the first involved the other car being severely dented and the second was with our SUV and a motorcycle (enough said.) At this rate, we will have been involved in 32 accidents by the end of our stay!