03 Love Letters to Kathmandu (EN)
It's a bit of a shame that I only tell my stories when they're already over, rather than while I'm in the middle of them. This time it is like that again. I left Kathmandu already on Wednesday afternoon, and right now, Sunday evening, I am already typing these lines from Phnom Penh. Definitely too fast moving were the last 10 days since Manfred's and my return from the Himalayas. My brain is having a hard time processing all the impressions: The days with the Gautams in Kathmandu, the short, somewhat stressful one-day stopover in Bangkok from Wednesday to Thursday, the arrival in Phnom Penh on Thursday evening, the first working day at the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) on Friday, followed by a spontaneous party night with one of my colleagues and his friends*. So yesterday and today I took it easy. Physically and mentally, I was pretty wiped out this weekend, but nevertheless I am currently happier than I have been in a long time - and that despite the fact that 2022 has actually been one of the most beautiful and intense years in my life so far. Before I write about my first days in Phnom Penh, I would like to tell you about the incredibly educational, beautiful and enriching time with Niraj and his family in Kathmandu. I hope my words will do it some justice.
Last week Friday it was time for Manfred: His flight back to Munich was coming up. The day before his departure Manfred, Niraj and I visited the Swayambunath Stupa. also known as the Monkey Temple. The name says it all, it was hard to tell if the "real" monkeys represented the majority of the temple population or their smartphone-addicted relatives who abused the monkeys as accessories for their photos (*cough cough* Manfred *cough cough*). The trip was entertaining in any case, especially because Manfred was robbed. By a monkey. Who was after his ice cream. And was successful. Niraj and I still had to laugh about the incident days later when we thought about it. :D For more details just talk to Manfred at the next party.
This memorable day was rounded off with Mo:Mos in one of Niraj's favorite restaurants, and the Mo:Mos fully delivered what Niraj had promised us - simply delicious and the sauce served with it had the perfect degree of spiciness. At least for Niraj and me, Manfred on the other hand.... Well, it was a day full of privations for him. Good thing he had plenty of cooling beer at his side. Jokes aside, we just had a lot of fun together on this last day before Manfred left. And for Manfred it was really time to come home. There you could see again how different we both are: While I was looking forward full of anticipation to the next three months in Asia, already imagining thousands of encounters, places, experiences and learnings, eager to throw myself into the great unknown, Manfred was mentally all set to be back home and looking forward again to mom's food, Bavarian wine festivals in autumn and his construction sites. And I could understand his joy and was happy for him. It's nice that everyone is so different and can just do their thing.
Before leaving for Nepal, I must admit that I was a bit afraid of Manfred's departure day. I thought that saying goodbye would be terribly difficult because I would have to say goodbye to the last remaining link to my family and to Germany. And yes, it was sad for me to hug my brother at the airport in Kathmandu and to know that I won't see him for months now, and to know that our parents would not pick up two children at the airport in Munich later, but only one. But on the other hand, that "now I'm alone in a foreign land" feeling was missing. Simply because Niraj and his family continuously gave me the feeling of not being a stranger. On the contrary, I immediately felt like part of the family. Neither Niraj and Nishma's parents nor their grandmother speak English. But nevertheless, within a short time a very nice feeling of familiarity developed between me and the Gautams. And for that, no words are needed. Or rather only the 7.8 words I learned in Nepali during this time, which mostly had to do with food. When I travel, I hardly need classic sightseeing. It is much more important for me to satisfy my curiosity, to learn and to broaden my horizon, and above all to see how people cope with the small and big problems in everyday life in the most different ways in the most different contexts. And exactly such an experience I was allowed to make during my last days in Kathmandu, and this experience contributes to the fact that I am doing so unspeakably well at the moment.
Since Niraj's father is self-employed in food distribution and Niraj wants to take over the business to give his dad a little more peace in life, Niraj was unfortunately quite busy at work. This was partly due to the fact that the Dashain festival was just around the corner. Dashain is the most important festival for Nepalese* and comparable to Christmas in terms of family importance. And just like at Christmas, a lot of food is eaten during Dashain, and accordingly a lot was going on in the company of Niraj and his father. Of course I would have liked to do more with Niraj, but on the other hand I could also understand that he could not get out of this situation very well. Nevertheless, there was a bit of quality time every day, and we knew how to fill it with lots of good, nice conversations about all kinds of things. There are those people you don't know for a long time, but you have the feeling that you know them forever. I'll come back to Nepal anyway, and then I'm sure Niraj's time management will be better. With my hundred thousand hobbies and interests and all the university stuff around me, I'm definitely the last person to reproach others for that.
Niraj's sister Nishma, on the other hand, had a lot of time - and spending time with her was a lot of fun! Well, when two veggie feminists meet.... We exchanged lots of feminist input and book tips, tried vegan Nepali street food, went to the gym almost every morning, went to the premiere of an indie art house movie that a friend of Nishma's had made, visited a pretty cool fair for Nepali startups, and talked a lot about life in Nepal and in Germany. From her I learned a lot about the caste system and its problems, the Hindu culture and about difficulties for young people in Nepal in terms of education, participation and love life. If I had spent all this time in Kathmandu in the hostel, surrounded by international backpackers, I would have remained completely blind to all these things. In general, I took a lot of impulses from these days for my professional development. My desire to work in the NGO sector or for a political organization was once again strengthened. Behind all the problems, such as garbage on the streets and other deficiencies in public infrastructure, which can be observed superficially in developing countries, there is always a structural cause. In the case of Nepal, this cause would be a corrupt government that is not particularly interested in its citizens*. So you can't just throw money at the problem because of the corruption and lack of transparency. Finding alternative solutions to dilemmas like the one described here actually pretty much describes the impact I want to make professionally. Sorry, digressed briefly.
There was obviously a lot of politicking during these days at the Gautams, both with Nishma and with Niraj. Too much talk about politics can be quite depressing. That this didn't happen, I owe to Niraj's Mom and granny. Because two things that reliably always make me happy are food and the exchange with other cultures. When food and culture merge, nothing can go wrong for me. And that's exactly what happened. In my short time with the Gautams, I learned to prepare mo:mos and roti myself, was decorated twice with a tika by Niraj's grandma, and was taken to the Hindu temple (but not let in because I don't have a Hindu ID - was a bit of a dumb situation.). In addition, according to Niraj's mom, I qualified as a very good match in the Nepalese marriage market because my roti apparently turned out perfect (you can see how globally moms just want to match you with somebody all the same). Moreover, me trying to cook Nepalese food was excellent content to her TikTok Channel. Since I tolerate spicy food pretty well for a European, I thus fulfill essential checkpoints to pass as a South Asian. ;)
It was very nice to be hosted with so much warmth and care by the Gautams, and I immediately felt at home. My Nepali vocabulary was also expanded by a few more words every day, had I stayed longer, I would have definitely picked up the language at a halfway passable level after some time. Although there was such a big language barrier between the older Gautam generation and me, the interaction was still very open, natural and warm. Leaving Nepal therefore felt much more like goodbye and departure to me, and I cried quite a bit on the plane to Bangkok. Somehow I feel that this family will stay connected to me for a long time and that this was definitely not the last time I was visiting there. I have already invited Niraj and Nishma to come and visit us in Europe. I would like to give back what I was able to experience at their home. And of course I really want to show them Bavaria and my favorite places in Italy. Well, one thing at a time. First of all, I have to get used to the fact that I have been racing through three countries this week (Nepal, stopover in Thailand, Cambodia) and tomorrow I will already be entrusted with my first projects at KAS. I will tell you more about that and about the first time in Cambodia soon. To be continued in any case.
Bacioni a tutti*e,
Vroni
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