Collage Video

Home at last.

Day 7: Prashant's House

Prior to leaving Nepal, we were treated to the best meal of our entire visit: a homemade feast cooked by Prashant's mom at his childhood home.  We got to meet some of Prashant's other family members who are doing some amazing nonprofit work in Nepal and also got a chance to stroll down memory lane through photos.

Breaking up the group at the airport was sad and truly marked the end of our trip.  4 of us have already completed the first leg of the trek back home and are now sitting in a restaurant in the Dubai airport.  If you love duty free shopping,  then this is the place to be.  The duty free store is more like a duty free mall here. There's even a Pinkberry!

The first thing we all enjoyed when we sat down - some ice cold water.

Day 7: Yaaaaaay!

Wow, a week has already gone by and it is time to part ways.  This has been such an incredible experience.  As we look back on our pictures from the last week it is hard to believe that we actually went to all of these places and had all of these experiences.

Before we head off to a home cooked meal by Prashant's mom, there are a number of people we want to thank. 

First, thank you to all the wonderful people at PLAN who we met and who are doing amazing things in this country.  Your work is inspiring and we look forward to seeing what you do next.  At the corporate level, our partners have been fantastic.  Althea did such an amazing job in organizing this trip and preparing us for it.  Lindsay, it has been such an awesome experience to get to know you and we loved hearing your stories of your previous work in Africa, about your sons, and about the work that you and your team at PLAN USA is doing to continue to create better opportunities around the world for needy children - especially with the empowerment of girls.  We have had a blast with you and the DC team looks forward to seeing you again soon.

Thank you to the Hobsons committee that picked us all.  We feel so fortunate to have been selected for this trip and hope that we have represented our entire company well.  We couldn't have asked for a better group.  We loved getting to know some of our global colleagues better and we will always share a special bond.

Prabin has made this trip what it is.  He has been with us around the clock, including when we decided to take our Everest plane ride last minute at 530 in the morning.  He has provided us with experiences (especially culinarily) that we would have otherwise not had, is a wealth of information, and has just been a ton of fun to hang out with.  We could not have asked for a better guide and we will miss you!

To all of the blog readers, thank you so much for following us on this journey.  We wish that we could have taken each of you with us, and knowing you were reading along made us feel like you were always there by our side.  We hope that you have been touched by the same things we have and have learned more about Nepal and its people alongside us.  We have more to share when we get back and hope that you will be there to listen, ask questions, and provide feedback.

Thank you to everyone at Hobsons worldwide who has donated time and money to our PLAN initiatives.  As you have seen, you are truly helping to make a difference in the lives of those less fortunate.  This trip, this project, these school improvements would not exist without you.  

Finally, thank you to the people of Nepal.  Never before have we experienced a place with such hospitality and warmth.  Your kindness will never be forgotten and you will always hold a special place in our hearts.

A few candids from our experience:

The foot that we made! This has been hung in a local restaurant. Go Hobsons!

Lots of cotton candy

Matt's reinactment:)

This pole is said to be healing. Maybe their backs hurt?

The load shedding schedule at the hotel

Jordana at the knife store:)

Farewell dinner: live blog!

Group dance!

Since we have wifi at our farewell dinner, we have decided to live-blog our experience!

We are at a traditional Nepalese restaurant for a traditional Nepalese feast. We are front and center for live entertainment reflecting the Nepali culture.

We first were treated to rice wine and fried potatoes. Rice wine happens to be some strong stuff!

Our next course was everyone's favorite (especially Jordana's) momo's. yummmm...

The entertainment now is a peacock dance. Mr. Peacock is stopping by each table to collect money from the patrons.

 

Quote from Kyle: "I don't know what a peacock needs money for...I assume to line his nest?"

Trays are set for the main event!

Here it comes!

Here it is: rice, spinach, lentils, wild boar, chicken, and vegetables.

It's tradition to eat with your hands in Nepal

Annnnd done. Most are members of the clean plate club!

More entertainment. For some reason we keep hearing "Sherpa" in each song??

Final course: Yogurt (a Nepalese tradition)

Toast to our travel guide! Prabin has been with us night and day catering to our every need. Cheers!!

More rice wine!!

And we're off! Thank you Nepal!!

Day 6 Continued: A Day of the Sights

So, if you followed our last post, you know that we rose early this morning to catch a post dawn glimpse of Mount Everest and finally got to see the Himalayas.  It's amazing that we have been here almost a week and cloud cover, smog, and location have prevented us from seeing the mountains requiring us to hop a plane to do so.  Nepal seems synonymous with the Himalayas, but only about 17% of the country is in the mountain region.  The rest of the nation is in the "hilly region" (still 12000+ ft peaks, but the locals don't consider them mountains because the tops are green rather than snowy white) and the plains.  We've spent most of our trip in the hilly region.

After returning from the trip and eating breakfast, we were on the road for a day packed with sightseeing and shopping.  We popped some tags and now have $0 in our pockets.

We started sightseeing in old Kathmandu which houses the former palace of the king and was the site of one of the original 3 kingdoms of Nepal (you might remember that we visited one of the other former kingdoms yesterday).  For those of you who are Game of Thrones fans, the king's throne might not be as menacing as the Iron Throne, but it looks a ton more comfortable and we would love it to replace our office chairs.  Unfortunately, it is behind glass and declaring it through customs might prove difficult.  The area is also surrounded with amazing temples.  It seems like every corner we turn down in Kathmandu, we are smack in the middle of another ornate, old, beautiful temple with fascinating architecture. 

Old Kathmandu

One temple we visited was the "house of the living goddess." This is a temple devoted to the worship of the goddess of power, and a young girl is selected to actually embody this goddess and live in the temple until she reaches puberty.  The chosen girl needs to be from a specific ancient family in Kathmandu.  She then lives in the temple where she is looked after by the family at the temple and her parents can visit but not stay over.  She is homeschooled as she cannot leave the home and eats all meals except breakfast by herself.  Nepalese folks can visit her to get blessings,  but foreigners cannot although they may see her if she comes to her window. In those cases, she is not permitted to speak to the foreigners or smile so she can come across as looking quite sad even though she may be very happy.  Once she hits puberty, she leaves the temple to resume a normal life and a new goddess is chosen.  If you are interested in learning more about the practice and the life of a former goddess, check out the book titled "From Goddess to Mortal."

We were very lucky in that our guide was able to request that the living goddess come to the window during our visit and we were able to see her for a few seconds, although we were not permitted to take pictures.  This was really special and Prashant remarked how he had only seen her one other time in his life.

In walking through Old Kathmandu, we also passed through the market which is housed on the busiest street in the city.  We passed tons of stalls, many with copper pots and pans adorning the street.  We also passed through the glass bead market where married women purchase the beads that only they are permitted to wear and where beads are purchased for brides.  As you can imagine, the stalls were quite colorful.

Bead market

Our next stop was Swayanbhunath which is an ancient Buddhist stupa/temple that is over 2000 years old.  Tomorrow is Buddha's birthday, so there are beautiful multi-colored flags throughout the city and at the temples in particular.  It takes 400 steps to get to the temple, but luckily; we took a shortcut and didn't have to climb them all.  The temple has an amazing view of the valley and city below - which you would hope it would after 400 steps!  This temple is also known as the "monkey temple" because of the monkeys that live there and roam the grounds.  We were not disappointed and saw a handful of monkeys during our visit.

Our final stop was Patan, which is the final former kingdom of Nepal.  For whatever reason, wherever we go, we get to hang out with a group of excited school children.  Today was no exception and we took pictures and had high fives with a huge group of kids in Patan.  Kyle got them all to do the wave and our signature "Yaaaaaaay!" Which has become the phrase of our trip.  Jenny almost got swallowed whole by a group of kids who were so excited to take a picture with her.

In Patan, were able to visit the former palace, as well as a number of other temples including a beautiful, golden Buddhist temple which was the favorite of several members of our group.  This temple has special monks that oversee it, and much like the living goddess temple, it is an honor to be selected and a rotating position.  Two monks, one under age 12 and one adult are selected each month to run the temple.  During this month, they can only eat one meal a day and must wear the same set of robes the who.e time.  We actually saw the 2 monks playing a game in an area of the temple and they told us they had been there for 2 weeks.  Their formally white robes were already a light shade of brown.

After the temple, we went to a free trade marketplace where we learned about healing bowls and their powers for meditation, relaxation, and physical therapy.  We each felt the vibrations of the bowls after they we hit with mallets and even had the opportunity to stand in a large bowl, and/or place the bowl on our heads and backs.  There is definitely power in those vibrations and each of us felt a wave of relaxation after our healing treatments.  Sugath's eyes may have even rolled back in his head at one point.

Healing bowls

We bought a lot of great gifts at this and another free trade location, where the goods were handmade by local villagers and the profits are returned to them.  The best news is that many of us bought items to bring back to our offices where we will be auctioning off the goods for PLAN as part of International PLAN month.  So, for those of you who weren't able to join us, you will still be able to take a piece of Nepal home for yourself or as gifts for friends and family.  So, be on the lookout for more information as we return.

After an exhausting day, we are now on our way to our last dinner at a local, Nepalese restaurant.  It is hard to believe that tomorrow is our last day and that most of us will be heading to the airport.  We will make sure to have at least one last post for you before we go, though.

The quadruple power chug!

Day 6: Mountains Finally!!

We haven't been able to see any real mountains since we arrived (just big "hills"), so this morning we decided to take a mountain plane ride to Mt. Everest! The one-hour trip was well worth it for the breathtaking views!!

Boarding Buddha Air!

Big plane!

Our path

Mt. Everest (they let us take pictures out the front window of the plane!)