Cows and UNICEF

The language class actually went better today. I think Sushila tried a different approach with the verbs, only giving me about 15 to go over and mostly making sentences with them. It was much less frustrating than trying to straight memorize them. RHEST was fine, but what keeps happening is that they will give me a job to do and then halfway through they’ll be like ‘oh I forgot to tell you about this part of it, now you have to go back over all your work and change it’. It’s not super terrible, just very frustrating. And they seem to think I’m slow because I didn’t do it right the first time, so they’ll explain things extremely slowly over and over again. It’s satisfying work, though, because I know how important it is to keep good records.

After RHEST I was walking home from work when I got hit by a cow. Yep, you read that right, a cow. They have herds of them walking down the backalleys that can barely fit one car usually around the time I get off of work, and generally I’ll just step around them. This time however, I was stuck between the wall and the cow, so I tried to quickly step around him. He had decided that he really didn’t like me for some reason, and rammed me with his head, with enough force to actually lift me off my feet.

This hurt like hell, but wasn’t that bad except where I landed happened to be in the path of a taxi. Luckily it wasn’t going very fast so they were able to stop in time. I was shaken, and my stomach still kind of hurts, but mostly I find it funny now. Cows are holy in Nepal, so my friends were joking that I’ll become wealthy.

After that experience I meet Trishna for a beer. Trishna is the reporter I’ve mentioned before, and a really interesting woman. Because she works as a criminal investigator she's gotten threatening phone calls and messages from people who don't want her to run a certain story. It's dangerous work, and from what I understand women don't usually do it, but she seems pretty unflappable. She was surprised when I told her many of the girls that RHEST gives scholarships to have six or seven siblings, and is thinking of doing a story about the organization. 

After the beer Hayley and Oz came and picked us up and took us to dinner. We were having dinner at his Aunts house, and I didn't realize this beforehand, but all of his Uncles from that side of the family were also attending. It was such a big affair they actually hired a live band to play, and this man sang amazingly beautiful Hindi and Nepali songs. The snacks were amazing, momos and chicken and vegetables and french fries. I thought that was supposed to be dinner so I filled up on them, although the huge portions of rice and dhaal came later.

At the dinner I met one of Oz's Uncles who works for UNICEF. We got to talking, and he actually works for their education department. It is so amazing to meet and get to talk to people who have the job you want. I really want to work on the education side of development as well, so learning how important before school education is was very interesting. Most of the children in the developing world haven't seen a book or even a  pen before going to school, which can make it much harder for them to learn. He's working on ways to support before school education in those areas.

What's even more amazing is that after inviting me to visit him in New York, which is where he works, he said that if I email him he can set up a meeting with the head of education department of UNICEF in Nepal. Just to ask questions and get a feel for the organization. What an incredible opportunity, it's amazing how easy it is to meet people and network here!