Home to Stay

I woke up early so I could pack up my suitcase and leave for my homestay house. I had taken out a surprisingly lot of stuff, so packing took much longer than it should have. I was a bit sad to leave my hotel, as it was super nice, but glad that I could finally unpack everything and set myself up for the next two and a half months.

My room!

After arriving at the homestay and throwing my things in my room Yanik and I walked down to a European bakery for some breakfast. I had a delicious cup of coffee and a cheese croissant, which was warm and gooey. The food here is simply amazing! When my language teacher arrived we walked her to my homestay so she could figure out where it was, and Yanik left so I could have my first language class.

The living room

Having a one on one language instruction is really interesting because there is no way to slip under the radar. You have to repeat every phrase almost perfectly before moving on, and she expects you to be able to come up with the phrases on your own pretty quickly. She seems like she’ll be a really good teacher, and that I’m going to learn a lot. Afterwards my brain hurt a little, though. Hopefully it’ll get easier as time goes by because the first class took a lot out of me.

After the language class was over Yanik came back and we walked over to the RHEST office. It’s a short walk, and pretty easy to figure out thankfully. The office itself is really nice, and I met the office manager and the woman I’ll be working under. I’m still not quite sure what I’ll be doing exactly, but it seems like I’ll be helping the employees with their English in the late afternoons. They eat lunch at 2, and seeing as it’s about 70 cents a day I think I’ll probably eat with them most of the time. It’ll help me practice my Nepali, and it’ll be nice to get to know the other employees.

After walking back to my homestay I spent the rest of the day relaxing and hanging with the family. I bonded with my brother over are mutual love of Glee and Castle, and we watched the Disney channel together. It’s amazing how widespread American media is. You hear a lot of American music playing in shops, and most of the movies at the movie theater were from Hollywood. I had a chance to unpack too, which was nice. I really like my room, and am excited to live here for the next few months.

Lemon candy

Dinner was delicious! I’ll have to remember to take a picture next time. It seemed like it was pretty standard Nepali food, with dhal bhaat, rice, pumpkin leaves, and spicy chicken. Super yummy. My stomach is still adjusting to being in a new time zone, so I wasn’t able to eat as much as I wanted, but it was still an awesome dinner.