Day 2 in Gaunshahar: The New House's Blessing of Rain

Dreary Gaunshahar

We woke to a dreary day in Gaunshahar. The heavy rain, thunder and lightning we heard during the night had stuck around. While the drizzle continued the beginnings of Shamser's new house being blessed got under way. The main part of this event was a cow being led into the kitchen of the new home and being left to munch on hay in there. Meanwhile, candles and flowers were taken through each room of the house and everyone was given a nice big blotch of red rice on their foreheads. Even the cow didn't escape.

Cow in the new kitchen

The holy cow responsible for blessing the house

The morning commute to school

When the rain cleared slightly, I assisted the carpenter who was making doors for the new house while Chris redesigned and drew up the new plans for the restaurant we are to begin the foundations for this afternoon.

The rain was still coming down as we walked to school and cloud was rolling down the hill towards and over us. From ten until eleven thirty we taught past, present and future tense to two separate class groups. It was a much more pleasant experience that the disaster that was yesterday afternoon. As we taught, the sky let hail loose onto the tin roof of the classroom making hearing impossible and getting the kids slightly wet. At least the sound drowned out their yelling though. Then...the clouds began to part. And it was stunning and we took every opportunity to poke our heads out of the classroom and take in the views.

The eternally snowy peaks that surround Gaunsahar slowly revealed more and more of themselves and it was absolutely breathtaking. As we walked towards home, slowly the sky turned from grey to blue and the thick cloud thinned to patches of fluffy white.

Once home we tried our hardest to capture the mountains on film while we waited for Shamser to finish up at school. Then it was time for the hard labour to begin.

In preparation for laying the foundations for the new restaurant, the ground need to be levelled and this involved it being taken down a foot or so. This was to be done with bare hands, broken shovels and a Nepali crane (a strong bag held open with two sticks of bamboo.) Hours passed as Chris and I carted load upon load of mud, clay and stone away that had been made heavy by all of the rain. The ground was so rough and the shovels so broken that it took two people, one with the shovel and one with a hoe, to load the shovel with debri before it could be put on the Nepali crane and taken away. It was slow progress.

Around 4pm, three new volunteers arrived. Kay, Creeping and E-jing from Malaysia. Shamser took us all on a short tour of the old palace and the village that is Gaunshahar. We saw traditional methods of de-husking rice, milling flour and traditional buildings made of beautiful stonework all while my stomach cramped and tumbled.

Once back home we sat around and chatted until a dinner of dal baht followed by more warm local honey wine. Then, by just after eight, we were all ready for bed. It had been a big day of good old fashioned hard work and our bodies were feeling it.