Gastro, Bhandas, and Festivities

These are the three things that, for me, take the most time away from doing any actual work here - and they've all happened in the last few days.

The festival was Sonam Losar for the Tamang community, and appears to fall in line with the Chinese New Year. This festival actually wasn't disruptive to my own plans - and it was fun to see lots of women dressed in traditional Tamang clothing.

The gastro was much more on my mind. It's never fun to have the voms - but when I only got started on work a couple of days ago it put a bit of a dent in newly forming work habits. It's also less fun when there's not a decent shower to be had, nor enough electricity to allow me to spend all day watching DVDs in bed.

The bandha is on today. For people new to Nepal/this blog a bandha is a work stoppage - where everyone from big factories to street vendors stop work for a morning/day/several days to protest something. This one is over the rising price of petrol and LPG - it's been a while since I've seen one quite this effective. Normally one can head off the main streets or into the tourist area to find life kicking on as usual, or things will start out serious and then ease off by about 2 when everyone is bored. But this time things are still well shut up at this hour of the day (if you don't know where to look).

All I can say is that I'm glad I didn't have to go anywhere more than walking distance today!

Nepali cinemas banned from early session

One of those "only in Nepal" stories today, from one of my favourite Nepal blogs that is not written by an ex-pat in Nepal or a Nepali-overseas; X-Nepali.

Their most recent post was on the news that the Film Development Board of Nepal have decided to act as moral police and stop early film screenings to stop students cutting classes. X-Nepali point out many good reasons why this won't work, and what other problems face school-age children in Nepal. But why I find it delightfully and typically Nepali is that the ban is on films before 11 am. In Nepal it is completely typical to see a film at 8:30 in the morning. Until I went to a session that early while there I don't think I'd ever set foot in a cinema before about 2pm.

I have no idea whether this ban will come into effect, but it will be interesting to see how the FDB fare coming between Nepalis and their beloved cinema.

Happy birthday Rajesh Hamal!

Today is the birthday of one of my, and one of Nepal's, favourite actors - Rajesh Hamal.




Debonair, with a good voice and the ability to land a flying kick, Rajesh possesses all the skills needed to be one of the top actors in Nepal, which is why he has been for many years, and still continues to be. His youthful long hair allowed him to play a university student journalist in last year's Desh (my review here).

He's also king of Nepali product endorsement. It wasn't his fault that after his endorsement for Real Juice there was evidence they were selling out of date juice. During my time in Nepal I've also seen billboards where he's spruked concrete and canola oil - not to mention the dozen or so films he is in every year. Even turning 47 today Rajesh shows no sign of slowing down. Happy birthday Rajesh!

Stuff that (linguistic field workers) like

I've been reading 'stuff expat aid workers like' since it started up six months ago. I was put into it by a friend doing aid work in Nepal - and while I occasionally find it hard to relate there are some posts that really hit home for me. For these you could do a find-and-replace with 'expat aid worker' and 'field linguist' and it would basically be a post on this blog. For these occasional gems SEAWL is the only 'stuff X like' blog that I always read.

The most recent post about 'having a guy for that' is so on the money with how I run my life in Nepal. I have my tailor, my shoe guy, my fabric guy, my Nepali sweets guy, my jeweller, my travel agent, my bookshop guy, my paan guy and all number of other specific people for specific jobs. Like the blog above mentions, I really like introducing friends and colleagues to 'my guys' and, of course, if you're going to Nepal I'll happily put you in touch with them.

Although the SEAWL post gives the impression that this set up is to make one feel more impressive when showing off in front of fellow foreigners, there are also other more practical reasons as to how these relationships develop. It's partly out of laziness - places like Kathmandu are big and if you want something but don't know where to start looking it can be a slow slow process. Once you found someone who'll get you what you need why go back to looking? Also, being such an old-ball giant white Nepali speaker means that going back to the same people every time circumvents the 'yes I do speak you language/no I'm not rich/I don't have kids/etc.' conversation. And finally, in a place where if always takes a little while to feel like you've got social connections, it's nice to have familiar faces to say hello to on your way though somewhere.

RIP Sai Baba

Anyone who has spent time in Nepal will recognise the image of the afro'ed orange-clad Sai Baba. An Indian Hindu mystic, his picture can be found in shops, homes and micro-buses alike.



Sai Baba died last night - you can read an obituary in the Kantipur Times here, or a slightly different take over at my friend Brian's site here.

Soshan: film review

A critic of Nepali cinema can't really afford to be critical. To pick on the problems that plague Nepali cinema would really be to miss the point. It doesn't really matter if the flashback to the hero's mid-90s childhood involves flat screen televisions. Nobody cares that the music from the dramatic points are taken directly from other films (tunes from both Star Wars and Indiana Jones made it into Sashan without a shred of Post Modern mashup irony). And lose plot points don't really bother anyone (where did the female lead's grandmother disappear to during interval?).

So if we're to ignore the plot errors, shoddy editing and occasionally woeful acting then what's left? Well clearly more than enough for Nepali audiences, who exhibit an enthusiasm that Australians usually reserve for a game of football. It's completely appropriate to cheer on the hero as he rescues the love interest with some improbable fighting skills. It's fine to turn to your friend and offer your opinion of the film as some kind of live audio commentary. And if it's getting dull call your friend and offer a commentary to them.

Sashan is the story of a rich man and his son. Our hero turns up at one of his father's villages to open a new hospital dedicated to his mother. There he falls in love with a local village girl. Cue many song and dance numbers and many costume changes (which are a way to show off ones budget). The hero stops a local bad man from kicking the girl's family out of the village (by grabbing the sharp end of a machete - Nepali heros have some improbable qualities), and realising their love for each other they get married. Our hero must dash off overseas for something important, leaving his new wife waving goodbye as his helicopter flies off over the mountains (again helicopter = impressive budget).

This would probably be enough material for a whole film, but it's just setting the scene. The girl's family are eventually bested by the baddie, and seek help from the hero's father. When they arrive at the palatial house nobody knows about the marriage. the son has a girlfriend and is frankly rude to the woman who loves him. The rich man lets the girl and her father stay. While there we watch her heartbreak - then the hero's older brother kills the girl's father because he finds the hero drunkenly harassing the girl who's really his wife. The police find the girl with her dead father on the road and arrest her for murder. By this point she's also quite clearly pregnant, to add to her woes.

Still following? Just when things can't get worse it transpires that the hero has a twin brother, thus solving the mystery of his rudeness. But our hero is heartbroken when his dad tells him that she is dead - it's ok, nan breaks down and tells him she's in jail when she can no longer bear the guilt of knowing that the hero's mother was killed by his father because he thought she was sleeping with the chauffeur. And the hero's older brother? Actually the son of the chauffeur. The elder brother goes crazy and kills the whole family as a very slowly delivered revenge. He kidnaps the hero's very pregnant wife and stages an improbable death for her - letting the hero have a chance to come in, guns blazing, and singlehandedly shoot down a battalion of thugs and save his beloved - who has quite forgiven him for not being his nasty twin. Cue happy ending with hero, heroine, cute new baby and hero's nan who has somehow survived. There was also something about the UN security council but I can't say I understood that.

Nepali films are generally fairly similar to each other. They all have a good mix of fighting, romance, family drama, song, dance and unpredictable plot twists. Like Desh, this film had several didactic monologs from the hero exposing the many virtues of good Nepalis. Like my favourite Nepali film Kusume Rumal this film also had one dance scene full of cross dressing. I'm not sure if this is a common feature of Nepali films, but I'm sure there's a great thesis in it.

One thing I've noticed is that every time I go to the cinema I understand more. I can't say I really follow the intricacies of the plot - UN security council? And how did the girl not figure out that the hero had a twin? - but I can figure out how people are related to each other and the general gist of what they're saying.

Going to see a Nepali film is like I imagine Indian cinema was 30 or 40 years ago. In many ways it would be a shame if they stopped dubbing the dialog in post-filming, and if car breaks didn't squeal every time a car stopped. The charm of Nepali cinema is not in the quality of its production, but in the enthusiasm that the audiences bring to it.

Funerals

I've finally got around to adding a couple of photos to the post I wrote about the village funeral I went to a few weeks ago. I was reminded because yesterday I went to not one, but two Buddhist funerals.

These were slightly different to the last one, as both of them were cremations. The previous ceremony I attended was about helping the spirit move on to the next phase of its existence, while both of these were about fare welling the more physical elements. In the more northern parts of Nepal and in Tibet sky burial is a common way to return the body to the world - leaving the body exposed to birds of prey and other animals. However it's not so practical in Kathmandu or the hills where I work and cremation is preferred.

Like the village funeral both of these events involved a lot of butter candles, a lot of feeding people and whole lot of incense. What was interesting at both of these events is that there seemed to be a lot more gender segregation - with women doing the majority of the cooking, praying and crying.

It is perhaps something of a shame that I didn't get to stay to see either cremation take place - but after visiting Pashupatinath I think I've inhaled enough ashes of dead people for one trip to Nepal.

Another wedding

During my last stay in the country I got to attend another wedding. This one was smaller than the last, and because I kind of had a hang of the format and basic Tam conversation I found it all a lot easier than the last one.

This wedding was interesting because the couple already had a 2 year old daughter. While having children before marriage is becoming increasingly more common back home it's not something I've come across here a lot. Or at all. Courtship is usually a bit of a whirlwind here (or taken care of by one's parents) so there usually isn't time for a pre-wedding bub.

People I talked to in the village said this kind of arrangement is becoming more common, and there certainly seemed less scandal about it than I would expect in Kathmandu.

Losar

I was really excited that this year my trip coincided with Losar - the Tibetan New Year. I arranged everything so that I'd be in the village for the festivities and was looking forward to sharing lots of anecdotes and photos with you.

However, Losar turned out to be a bit of a fizzer. The uncles who usually organise the party were working overseas this year, and no one stood up to fill their place. Most of the people who wanted to dance and party went to a village a few hours away and so the rest of us had a very quiet night of it.

Although Losar may have been a fizzer I learned one important lesson - it doesn't matter what type of New Years you celebrate, if you just rock up on the night and hope for an entertaining evening it's usually a flop.

Going to a funeral

Funerals are never something you really want to go to. But when it's for a 92 year old woman you've never met who died peacefully in her sleep, and you've never been to a Buddhist funeral before the idea of it doesn't seem too bad. At 92 she well outlived the Nepali life expectancy of 67 years.

Much like a Tam wedding, a funeral is a protracted, multi-day event involving many people, much food and a good deal of socialising, dancing and more eating.

It was an hours trek to the village – once again we left so late that we were scrambling in the dark by time we drew near – many of the party having walked all the way from the main town 4 hours away.


The tent that was erected for the funeral

That night was all daal, rice and sel roti - which is the default party food, and great for serving to large crowds. Thankfully, unlike weddings, funerals are a vegetarian affair so there was no need to worry about what I was eating this time.

The first day was a flurry of activity, it appeared there were mainly close family around, and lots of priests who had come from across the community to help celebrate the event. There was a large tent set up, and inside funeral offerings were set up. These are called torma, and are red sculptures made of flour and decorated. They look amazing all set up - from a distance they reminded me a lot of Russian Orthodox architecture. These sculptures take a whole day to make and are destroyed after the event.



I should probably mention there was no corpse, Buddhist funerals are about helping speed the spirit on to the next phase and much less about the corporal farewell that Western funerals are so focused on. The body had been cremated a fortnight ago and the local cremation site. This event was being held 21 days after death – These Buddhists have a thing for odd numbers, and especially seven.

The day after many more people came from all over the place. There were more prayers, more eating and hundreds of candles made of butter were lit in batches of 108 (another auspicious number). As soon as they were burnt down they were refilled, left to set, and relit giving the whole affair a buttery odor to mix with the incense.


[photos will follow when I'm back in KTM]

That afternoon, evening and late into the night there was dancing – but I'm afraid I missed this as I had to leave to call my little sister on her birthday. Also, after two days of sleeping on the floor being spooned by middle-aged women and woken at 4 am I decided it was about time I got some sleep in my own hard bed.

It was definitely a great experience, and I'm glad I was invited along. Again, no one really questioned why a Christian was there talking part, in fact a lot of people were very kind in explaining what was happening. Once again my halting Tam conversational skills were a bit hit and I met a lot of really interesting people. There was some weeping (and a very awkward moment involving me climbing over a hysterical 70 year old who threw herself down in a doorway and couldn't be moved) but on the whole it was a very positive and optimistic affair.

To the villages! One last time...

Once again I've stuff everything back into bags, said my round of farewells at my usual haunts around town and I'm ready to head back to the village for my final stay.

I'm looking forward to it, with excitement and trepidation. Trepidation because whatever I fail to collect on this trip wont get collected. Excitement because I'm getting more comfortable there with every visit. Also, with Kathmandu experiencing 'load shedding' (i.e. no electricity) for over 12 hours a day I'll actually have more consistent electricity in a tiny backwater village than in the capital of the country.

It should be another adventure-filled adventure. I'll be there for Losar, the Tibetan New Year, as well as my birthday (not that I'll likely be telling them that) and I heard from a friend that there's a funeral scheduled in one of the villages in a few days time. I didn't know the person, but like Tam weddings that seems to be a minor concern regarding my attendance.

Making News

After a lovely long Christmas lunch that also filled up a couple of the early hours of the evening, the Handsome penpal/fake Husband and I decided to walk around the tourist area of Kathmandu enjoying the festive ambiance.

While trying on silly hats at a roadside store we got chatting to a couple of people also playing with the merchandise. One of them was a reporter for one of the Nepali language newspapers writing about how Christmas is celebrated in Kathmandu.

We chatted for a while, mainly in Nepali, about Christmas here, and how it compares to the warm weather in Australia. He asked if he could quote me, I said sure, he took some notes and we went on our way.

The next morning we picked up a newspaper, and low and behold there was the report! I was rather impressed at getting my name into a Nepali newspaper. As I read on (largely with the help of a dictionary, my written Nepali skills aren't great) I also became highly amused.

There was the usual low-lying Nepali male misogyny to kick off the piece - where I was introduced as the "Australian beauty" - but that was pretty par for the course and not too much of a surprise.

What was more amusing is that, for much of the three or so passages attributed to me as direct quotes I had to look up the words in a dictionary because I didn't know then. According to the article I referred to the "waataawaran" (environment) of festivities and the "jhilimilii" (glittering) lights. These weren't the only words I had to look up before I could understand what I had apparently said.

It's not surprising the quotes aren't word perfect, considering he was scrawling dot points into a notepad. In fact, I'm rather glad he made my Nepali more eloquent for me!

Happy New Year!

After a lovely few weeks holiday I've sent my own personal Porter back home - with a chuck of my ever-growing book collection. Having time off over the Christmas and New Year period was lovely, and certainly a different experience to this time of year back home. I'll share a few of our adventures over the next week or so before I head back to the village and leave email behind me for a few weeks.

One of the social highlights of the holiday was New Years Eve, when we met up with some friends, and a few of their drunk friends and ended up at a jazz bar drinking cocktails until the small hours. Of course, the Western New Year isn't that exciting in Nepal - it's one of at least a dozen that crops up.

There's the Nepali New Year which is in mid-April - it's based on the Bikram Sambat calendar also used in India. We're currently in the year 2067, which actually makes 2011 seem a little behind the times.

Then there's the Newari New Year - Newars being indigenous to the Kathmandu Valley, and their calendar is the Nepal Sambat. For them, New Year falls in around Tihar, so some time in November and we're only in the year 1332 right now. There's a push among certain groups to get this recognised as the official calendar of Nepal.

Next is Tibetan New Year, known as Losar, and celebrated by various ethnic groups in Nepal that are Buddhists of the Tibetan schools. But, to make things complicated, there are no fewer than three different dates for Losar. The first is Sonam Losar, which follows the lunar new year. The thing I like most about Losar is that it is celebrated for two weeks - which sounds like a proper party to me! This is the Losar date that Tam speakers celebrate - and for 2011 the first day conveniently falls on my birthday. The second Losar, Gyalpo Losar, is celebrated on the 5th of March in 2011. It's celebrated by Buddhists from Tibet and several Buddhist ethnic groups in Nepal. Finally, the Gurung ethnic group celebrate Tamu Losar as a fixed date every year, as opposed to basing it on the lunar calendar. These guys actually kicked of the Losar season, with Tamu Losar falling on the 15th of Poush, on the Nepali Calendar - which this year was the 30the of December - meaning they were recovering from their hangovers just when Westerners were embarking on theirs.

The Tharu ethnic group in the Terai - the flat lands in the south of Nepal that are heavily farmed - also celebrate New Years on a different date, although I should find out more about them. And there is a small but not insignificant Muslim population in Nepal which means that they recently celebrated the Islamic New Year on the 26th of November.

Debate O'clock

Over at the Economist they're running an online debate about that old linguistic chestnut "does the language you speak shape the way you think?" Check out the fisticuffs here

I'm sure most of the comments will just degenerate into "I speak language X and in my personal opinion..." but it's always a great topic. It's subtle, and messy and, if argued with any sophistication, nuanced - but it goes right to the heart of why we use language, where (or if) the boundary should be drawn between language and culture and just what happens in our heads.

Also, it's always exciting for linguistics to get a gig in the mainstream media!

Iron stomach

On this field trip I am cursed with the twin good fortunes of being well-fed by the friends I live with when I'm in the village, and also having a very robust digestive system.

Last trip I was also relatively well fed - but spent more time living alone in KTM where I had more autonomy as to what I would eat, and how much. Also, for most of last trip, I was - to a greater or lesser extent depending on the week - quite sick. It's not something I really mentioned on the blog partly to prevent unnecessary worry and partly because it was so persistent it wasn't worth mentioning. So even with an unhealthy diet and a lack of exercise routine last year I still managed to come home not looking too different to when I departed (I did lose a heap of weight in the middle and ate a lot of cake to make up for that).

My iron digestive track has lead to the development of a stomach a little less solid and a little softer.

I have never eaten so much in my life as I do in the village here - and growing up with a Polish grandmother I can tell you that is not a flippant statement. How they eat so much rice is beyond me. The strangest thing is that after a week we had to sit down and have a serious conversation because my friend has been concerned that I'm not eating much. I pointed out that Nepalis eat a lot more rice than Australians - I didn't point out that since they won't let me do any work I'm not as hungry as she is after 8 hours in the fields.

Of course, having a more robust digestive system has made me much more cavalier about where I eat and what I eat. I still don't ever think I'll be able to eat the fresh coconut sold on the streets of Kathmandu, no matter how much my mouth waters every time I walk past - but I have eaten all manner of questionable things on this trip and remained unscathed.

I'll just have to hit the salads and bike riding when I get home.

Wedding (pt. 2): Taking your new wife home

[note: now with photos! 13/12/10]

Part one can be found here.

To date: the 7 hour party trek to the bride's house ended in celebrations, eating, dancing, singing, and all-night carousing.

The party was in no way over. Once again, we joined the celebrations when they reached our village, the band was heard long before the party arrived. When I say the groom was taking his new bride home I mean it quite literally. The bride was covered in a large blanket and carried all the way to her new village by her new husband. That's a good 7 hours of walking, a large part of which included steep ascents and descents on poorly maintained stone paths.



The groom's village was a place I hadn't visited, so I quite liked the walk. The pace was set to something between meandering and wandering and there were lots of stops along the way. The groom lived down in the valley near the river, and closer to a large town, so when we arrived there was a much larger open space as well as plastic chairs and electric lighting.

By this point I had perfected my mantra of answers I would repeat in every conversation “Australia”, “yes, he's in Australia”, “no children yet” and “2 ½ months” conveniently I'm half way though my trip so this does for both questions “when did you arrive” and “when are you going.” Answering such questions in Nepali provoked the usual response of amazement and wonder, but answering them in Tam left most people utterly bewildered. There were lots of people there that hadn't met me yet, and none of them had ever heard someone from beyond their own social group, let alone a foreigner, speak their language before. I was instantly adopted by more than a few old women over the course of proceedings.

There was more singing (the same songs), more dancing, more eating and more drinking. Some people again celebrated throughout the night, but I once again accepted an offer of a bed and a chance to sleep.

I thought the next morning would be a low key, sober end to proceedings – but realised I was probably wrong when I was a woman preparing a large saucepan full of chang (home made millet beer) at 7:30 am. There was another feeding and more of the kind of carousing I was becoming used to. I could even join in on a few of the songs by this point.



When we left at 12:30 pm the party showed no signs of stopping, more than 48 hours since it commenced. I loved how easy-going everyone was. I didn't even know the families but nobody thought to question why I was there. Everyone and their whole family were there. Even the bride wore socks and sandals.

Wedding (pt. 1): Collecting your wife

[note: now with photos! 13/12/10]

A Nepali wedding, like most things in Nepal is exuberant, has the appearance of being shambolic, involves a large, complex web of relatives and takes on an organic life of its own. I've split this post up over a couple of days, partly because there's so much to mention and partly because I'm still recovering.

The basic format of the wedding was like most in Nepal. First, the groom's family walk from his family's house to the bride's family's house. There is a ceremony and then they return to the groom's place, or a party destination, to celebrate. As it was a country wedding, the walk from the groom's village to the bride's was a 6 hour walk up and down hills and the whole wedding went for two and a half days.

We joined the celebrations as the groom's party passed through our village at 4:30 in the afternoon. It was quite easy to tell when they arrived given they came with their own processional band:



There is nothing quite like a Nepali band. Comprising of a variety of woodwind instruments and percussion the noise is distinct. To the Western ear here is something distinctly atonal about the melodies – which meander around to a never-ending improvised tune. The party had left at 11 am that day, and there was much drinking and merriment along the way:



That guy clearly isn't drinking Sprite... it's like the guys hold the buck's party on the way to the wedding.

And so we set off with them. There was something distinctly magical about walking along the edges of terraced mountains as the sun set and the band played on.



The descent into the bride's village is one I've made before – it's steep, and the stairs are small and prone to slipperiness. Factor in that the sun had just gone down at there were few flashlights and it actually became a rather stressful walk. People who know me well know that I'm not great with stair-based situations (which is, of course, why I work in Nepal) and while I've gotten better negotiating paths around here this was particularly stressful. It amazed me that people were capable at negotiating the path and they weren't even sober.

We arrived at the bride's village at 6 pm. Several of the terraces had been given over to a massive mass-dining area, where people lined up and were fed in batches from giant pots. The process went on for over an hour, and was repeated again the next morning by the bride's family and again that evening and the following day by the groom's. I was surprised that I flummoxed them by not eating meat. It appeared that I was the only vegetarian among 300 Buddhist guests – but thankfully someone rustled up some daal for me. This was repeated for every meal for the rest of the wedding, and most people were mystified by my strange dietary preference. Most people here can't afford to eat meat more often than once a week or fortnight, so to pass up the rare opportunity seemed to them a folly.

While we were eating there were some formalities that were taking place. The groom and his family entered the bride's house, where the local Lama was waiting to bless them all. This happened again at the groom's house, and I got to watch that time. It appeared, on the whole, that these proceedings weren't actually that important to anyone but the immediate family and everyone else was much more interested in eating, dancing, singing and drinking.

Which is what we busied ourselves with too. Impromptu groups of singers would strike up a tune, and happily sing along to the same song for up to an hour. Some men and women would get up to dance, and they received money from the other guests. I'm not sure what the money was for, or where it went.

A friend had found a place for me to sleep, and given that there were several hundred people and not many beds I took the offer gratefully. I fell asleep to the sound of singing, and woke up throughout the night as singing gave way to drunken singing and then was joined by the crowing of roosters. They had partied all night and when I woke at 6 am some were drinking morning tea while others were starting the morning with more home-distilled alcohol.

We sat around, sang some more, visited friends in neighbouring houses, ate once again at the mass serving area and then took our leave ahead of the main party. They would catch us up in our village on their way back to the groom's house, but the kids needed to be sent to school and some of us needed a nap.



While that would be the end of a great party at home, it was only the first half of proceedings. The wife still needed to be taken to her new house, which will form the second part of the story tomorrow.

A Nepali Picnic

Today I took a break from study, having been invited by a friend to attend a picnic. This friend runs a school for kids who are at risk of dropping out of society. It's a small school where children are socialised into education before the organisation supports them in mainstream education.

The 18 or so kids were all excited to be having an excursion, which was in a small park a short bus ride from the Kathmandu. It was, in many regards, like most other picnics I've been on. Excited children, games, a quiet-ish park. But when it comes to catering Nepalis do picnics like no one else.

Basically, the picnic involved bringing the kitchen along - including two gas cookers and a large gas bottle. At one point there were no fewer than 6 of us preparing food:



It was rice and curry - but being a picnic there were lots of exotic ingredients that aren't in the usual meal; tofu, mushrooms, egg, sweet curd. It was truly a sight to behold, and has certainly set the benchmark rather high for future al fresco eating.

Tihar: Sel Roti

The last few days have been full of candles, marigolds, fireworks, singing in the street and food. You can see lots of pretty photos of those first few things at my friend Amos' blog here and http://www.consonantaspirations.com/2010/11/more-rangoli.html, so I thought I'd let you know about Tihar food. I know this is supposed to be a linguistics blog and not a food blog - but after 3 days of continuous eating food has been somewhat at the forefront of our attention.

Tihar is a very positive festival, and part of that is you eat lots of luxury food to celebrate - amongst other things - Laxmi, goddess of wealth, and cows, the sacred animals of Hindu. So there's lots of dried fruit, nuts, curd, fresh fruit, meat and all those things that are a bit too expensive to eat too much of most of the year.

Another thing that's eaten this time of year is Sel Roti, which is something like a doughnut, but less fluffy. They're deep-fried rings of sweet bread made from rice, and this year I got to watch my friends making them. I took enough photos to be able to bring the Sel making experience to you guys as well - but be warned, you might find them slightly less appealing after reading this!



SEL ROTI

Ingredients:

3 kg of uncooked rice, soaked overnight in water
1/2 kg sugar
1 lt liquid ghee
6-8 cups plain wheat flour


step one:







blend up the rice, ghee and sugar in small batches. Doesn't that look yummy already?


step two:



blend in the flour, you may need to feed small batches back in to the blender. Do this until you have the right consistence - something that will still flow but isn't too liquid.


step three:



Fry! To get the attractive ring shape one must have the batter at the right consistency, then swirl it around deftly into the bubbling oil.

Repeat, more than a few times, and there's your Sel:



Those white dots are grains of sugar that have come in contact with the oil, and give a crunchy counterbalance to the smoothly blended rice dough. Those who cook might have noticed that 3 kg of rice is a lot of base ingredient to start with, and you'd be right. All up our friends made around 100-150 Sel, which took about 3-4 hours just for the frying alone, and this in a small household. It gives you an idea of just how much eating goes on here over Tihar!

My Husband

Before I keep talking about my village-side adventures there's someone I need to mention.

Much to the dismay of Nepalis, and my grandmother, I am a happily unmarried 25 year old woman. In Nepal this makes me rather old to be unmarried, while most of my friends my age here have kids in primary school. That's not to say I'm single either, the Handsome Pen pal, as well as being me favourite international correspondent, is also my long-time (and long-suffering) boyfriend.

This causes a bit of difficulty in Nepal, because here there's really only a binary difference between 'single' and 'married' - I once tried to explain to a shopkeeper that in Australia it's verycommon for people to live together without being married, and he asked if the government makse that hard for people. How do you begin to explain that the government actually make it easier by legislating for de facto relationships?

And so, to make life easier here, the handsome Pen pal very kindly masquerades as my Faux-Husband. I don't really feel too bad about lying because it means people don't think I'm single, or crazy. Also, as most of my lying is done in Nepali it doesn't feel as weird because more often than not I'm talking about my 'sriman' and not my 'husband'.

Of course, the standard question that comes after asking if you're married is to ask if you have kids. The answer, as it is to my nan is always 'later'.