Game Day

This week is Sports Week. I learned that Sport Week was this week instead of next week on Monday at 11:15 when we came back from watching the world's only one-horned rhinos from the backs of elephants at Pobitora National Park. (Turns out Asian elephants and Asian rhinos are really big...the 2nd and 5th largest land animals in the world, respectively.) I walked into school and asked if it was Sports Week and was told yes. I asked if there would be classes this week and I was told no. I was supposed to be planning sports week...

On Tuesday, with Nabakanta's help, I rounded up teams for a basketball tournament. 'Kanto gathered seven three-man teams (we eventually found an 8th team to fill out the bracket) and I scouted the girls that play dang at lunch or had shown interest in basketball and they came up with two four-woman. At the end of the day one of the girls came to me with four more girls for another team...it warmed my heart to see them taking initiative because the girls are pretty shy and none of them had played before.

In the afternoon, after telling all the kids that I would see them tomorrow, I learned that there would be no school on Wednesday. Wednesday was spent watching a goat birth and doing stuff.

Thursday was game day. The boys quarterfinals were heated games to three. Sweat was dripping. My favorite team was Team Grass - undersized but feisty, they used their 4'8" secret weapon Babul to defeat their first opponent and come dangerously close to beating the taller, older, and eventual champions Team B.Boys. The girls played a three-game round robin tourney, alternating games with the boys starting in the boys' semifinals. The girls resembled pack animals all running together after the ball. They played hard and dirty but I saw no blood and blew no whistle and they made some great shots, especially considering the multiple fouls occurring almost continuously. Team Niha went undefeated in two games and was crowned champion, outscoring its opponents 6-3. Prizes were distributed.  

Making Funny with Unknown Stranger

I haven’t been very into writing since I got back from Darjeeling…interesting stuff is happening but nothing burning to get on the page.

There have been a bunch of changes around here lately. Prashant left – he showed up while I was in Darjeeling - born and raised in West Mumbai but has lived in the US for the past 16 years, mostly working for Cisco. He was an interesting guy and he tried to give Uttam some direction. Stuart, the first American I met in India, left today to go back to Reed after almost four weeks at Parijat. I actually miss him a little. Three American women showed up a week ago to stay for one month – Chantal, a newly-married, former community college sociology prof from Boston, her eighty year old mother Lily from North Carolina but born in Suriname and raised in Indonesia, and my favorite, Tat, Lily’s spunky, seventy-eight year old retired kindergarten teacher friend. I’m not thrilled to be around so many Americans but I gotta make the most of it - they are interesting people and cab fare is cheaper.

Students came back to school last week but the only classes were my computer classes and because of Bihu, there are no classes this week on Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. Uttam was out for a few days with gall stones for which he needs surgery tomorrow (as he says, gall bladder surgery or appendix also – whatever the “or” means) so on one day the headmaster and I were the school’s only supervision when a tiny new student desperately missed Mommy and threw his shoes at us. Every day last week there was Bihu dance practice for the girls capped off with a beautiful performance on Saturday in front of parents and 20 students from the University of Delaware, here as part of a month-long winter session in India. It’s pretty weird to be here and listen to people that say douche bag and talk about their sororities. Festivities for the Bihu harvest festival started this weekend with wild dancing and drumming, burning haystacks, may-gi, rice flower coconut roll-ups, pit-ha, fried pitha dough and assorted sweets. For the first time in India I’m a little bored without students for four days.

Yesterday in the Bihu spirit Uttam, Aimoni, our awesome weaver Ray-boti, Chantal, Lily, Tat and I piled into a sumo and made trips to see Aimoni’s family, both of Uttam’s sisters and Aimoni’s Aunt. At each house we had sweet tea, hot water, pitha, and coconut sweets. We would chit chat, play with the baby, and leave. It was Stuart’s last night and we were going to play Bananagrams and the only proper way to play Bananagrams is with beer so we stopped on the way home and after Stuart, Uttam and I all peed on wall together we walked to the wine shop.

We had asked for five bottles of beer, 350 rupees in total. As we waited for each bottle to be wrapped, we were standing Uttam   Shaffer               some guy, all facing the gated liquor window I had a 500 

                                                           Stuart

rupee note in my hand and I saw that Stuart’s hand was resting on the counter with a 100 rupee note between two fingers, presumably to pay for his beer. I had the larger note and he needed to pay me anyway so in one motion I took the money and pocketed it. Well, when I looked up the Indian guy was looking at me intently with his hand resting on the counter, two fingers still together and Stuart was not where I thought he was. As calm as can be I had stolen money from a complete Indian stranger, at a liquor store no less. His hand was dark-skinned, Stuart was standing RIGHT next to me – I have no explanation for my actions. In response the only thing I could do was to say “OOOOOOOOoooooooohhh” and return his money. I apologized in English, Stuart in Hindi and we quickly left. I have not been so embarrassed since Slippy stuck. The whole time the man didn’t say a word and didn’t move his hand from the counter. Uttam described his own thought process during this incident on the hysterical ride home like this: “At first I am thinking this man was known to Shaffer and that he was making a funny, suppose by making change from the 100 with 500 rupee note. But then I saw that this man was an unknown stranger.”

Grace, your package came. Rats chewed two holes in the box and got into both bags of Tim’s sea salt and vinegar chips and the beef jerky stuff. I was devastated to be so close to my mana and have to feed it to the cows. To the credit of the Indian postal service, they tied the two bags shut with twine and put them back in the box, which was also tied together. The Big Ideas magazine has some damage but should be readable; the book was undamaged and looks great! Thanks a lot Grace. It is very much the thought that counts J

The Eagle Has Landed

Great news: The basketball hoop is complete and the new pavement is being put to great use!! I taught the kids 21 (one vs. everybody else) and played 3 on 3 until we couldn’t see the ball anymore. Today we learned the legendary playground game Bump and the kids kept wanting to play. Man, it’s great to be playing basketball again. 

Uttam deleted pictures from the first two days...this is day 3

Day 3

Day 5

Starting the hole for the hoop. We eventually decided to
make the post concrete instead of metal - cheaper and
easier to install. 

Stuart and I gettin' dirty

Laborers posing with the first half of the post
right before they politely asked to be paid

Carpenters assembling the backboard and hoop during the Class 10 last day
ceremony. This is what the post looked like this when I returned from Darjeeling.
Everything was mounted within the hour

First shots fired

Nareswar puttin' on a clinic

End of the first day of festivities. It looks pretty good!

Applying the finishing touches. We still need to
paint the backboard and make a key, but other than
that it's done. 

  

The pavement itself has many uses as well. Here it's being
used to label the states of India. Notice the brick work around the trees...

Meditation before Bihu dancing

Bihu dancing

Stuart teaching geography lessons

Preparing for art competition

The competition

Thank you everybody for their love and support. I'm so glad to say this is my contribution to Parijat Academy but I really didn't do much - it was everybody else who made this project come to life.

Darjeeling

ICE, man

Darjeeling was everything I could hope for in a week-long vacation. The temperatures ranged from cold to really cold – we found ice at least 3 inches thick. The first night I slept in sleeper class, the cheapest way to travel on an overnight train. The bunks were triple tiered, with the back cushion on the bench seat swinging up to make the middle bunk. I slept right next to the train door and with no blanket, the wind kept my feet cold enough that I couldn’t sleep even with a shirt, turtleneck, wool sweater, rain jacket, shorts, fleece pants, hiking pants, gloves, hat, scarf, 2 pairs of socks and my shoes on. (I bought a fleece in Darjeeling.) I happily left the train in New Jalpaiguri (NJP) and waited two hours for our Tata Sumo share taxi (Sumo) to fill up with passengers. There were supposed to be six of us but two dropped out so it was me, Henry Teron (our guide and a friend of the family), Barun (19) and Atul (23), both part-time guides-in-training for Henry’s small adventure sports company. They were great guys to joke around with and we were pretty close by the end. The Himalayan foothills rise right out of the plains and the small houses and shops perched on the hillsides were all brightly painted with million dollar views. We drove through several picturesque villages before getting to Darjeeling proper where we walked around and shopped and ate at a little Nepali restaurant and actually saw foreigners - it was my turn to stare. We bought snacks, ate dinner, and went to bed. I was eager to get going.

Atul and Barun out on the town with
my camera

First good photo opp

Day 2 we caught a Sumo out to Dhotrey to start our trek. There were big traffic jams from all the people who were coming back from watching the sun rise from Tiger Hill but Henry said our views would be better. In Dhotrey, they wanted to send a guide with us but Henry told them off because he knew the way and he was better trained anyway, so he saved me about Rs. 3000. We had momo and noodles for breakfast and I practiced my juggling with the locals. The first day was relatively uneventful, though the pictures were good and I got to know the boys a lot better. We stopped for tea at the top of the hill and crossed the India/Nepal border, then walked a short distance to Tumling where spent our first night. To better acclimatize at 9000 feet, we walked back up the hill and spent a half an hour huddled together against the wind waiting for the sun to set over Kanchenjunga. That night Henry and I sat in front of the fire and talked about women and how to pick ‘em. It’s nice to know that different cultures still have similar ideas about finding a mate. Barun got some altitude sickness which badly weakened him the next day and my feet froze under three blankets so for the rest of the trip we had to rent hot water bottles for me at night.

Waiting for sunset

Calling home from Jowbari

Kalpokhari

Day 3 I got up to watch the sun rise because my feet were too cold. We ate Nepali roti for breakfast (sorta like fat elephant ears) and started off. Around 10 we stopped at a village for tea and I called home and talked to my family! My mom almost didn’t answer the phone because she didn’t recognize the 75 digit number but I’m think she’s glad she did. The five minute conversation cost about 40 cents. We hiked way down and then way back up, a total of 12 km to the lake Kalpokhari and then the village of the same name. The wind howled all night but the views were beautiful, the food was good, my feet stayed warm and I saw yaks. Next day we gained 600 meters in 6 km and made it to Sandakfu, the highest point in West Bengal at 3636 meters. From there we could see Everest, Kanchenjunga, Lhotse, and Makalu – the 1^st, 3^rd, 4^th, and 5^th tallest mountains in the world. It was not as spectacular as perhaps it sounds – the other three mountains were a long way away, but it’s cool to say I saw them. We drank a little rum and the three guys talked Assamese at me, though most sentences contained no words I knew. My feet were warm but the air was so cold and dry that it hurt my lungs so I used my turtleneck as a facemask to warm and humidify the air…I thought this was decent ingenuity for being mostly asleep. We watched an outstanding sunrise with all the fat Bengali people who brought their SLRs up with them in jeeps, then started our 22 km trek down the hill (12,000 feet is a hill with Kanchenjunga looking down from over 3 miles above) and descended 1400 meters.

RIGHT THERE, that's the tallest point in WB

India/Nepal border stone

Our trek looked across a narrow valley into Sikkim and it was a sight to fill the imagination with lives lived knowing only the steep face of a hill. I thought it must be 2000 feet tall, though Henry thought less. Either way it would be a substantial walk from the houses near the river to the top where business is conducted and back. I was really looking forward to a hot shower after three nights of freezing weather, but it only worked for 30 seconds so I had to take the usual lukewarm bucket shower. I was clean and my hair stopped hurting from wearing the same hat though, so I was happy once I got into my five layers. It was New Years Eve and we celebrated in style – eating seasoned, fire-roasted pork and chicken with our fingers while sipping rum and hot water and singing Assamese and English songs, watching the all the village lights in Sikkim shine like stars. I was too full from meat to eat much dinner and was grumpy and tired so they finally let me go to bed early. I slept like a rock.

In a sea of American
arrogance epitomized by the
Yankees hat in Darjeeling,
I found a ray of hope 

We all got hats together!

 At noon the next day we got in a Sumo and went up and down and up and down and up to Darjeeling, where we did more shopping and watched several movies before we fell asleep to the sounds of rats scurrying under the floors. Our last day was spent at the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute where Henry had done his basic and advanced mountaineering courses. The first field director was Tenzing Norgay and his memorial is just outside the museum and I met the man who holds the record for climbing Everest from 4 different routes! At 2:30 we started our journey back to Guwahati by Sumo then train and I arrived back at Parijat the next morning. You all should go to Darjeeling!