The Hills Are Alive....
30th June, Sunday....at home in Heriot!
Early yesterday morning I was sitting in Kathmandu airport waiting for my flight home and watching 'The Sound of Music' on one of the TV screens. Quite surreal and strangely moving...I'll not try to explain why, (but I admit to being a self confessed fan of this film) and the Reverend Mother singing 'Climb Every Mountain" somehow added to the poignancy of the occasion...my farewell to Nepal!!
Rewind further to last weekend...
While staying in Bodhnath I was invited to have lunch with Samjhana and her family who live in a small village nearby. I was introduced to her parents and grandmothers, her husband and daughter, her sister and aunt, her uncle and cousin brother and cousin sister and niece who all live in the same village. After a delicious lunch of rice, dhal and vegetable curries, we drove into the hills to Nargakot, the highest point on the edge of Kathmandu valley. It was so good to breathe fresh air and to see the hills though the high peaks of the Himalaya were obscured from view by cloud.
We passed through many small villages surrounded by terraced paddy fields, in the distance, the woman hard at work planting the rice, and on along the narrow rutted road, in places turned to mud and almost made impassable by the recent heavy rains. These same rains have caused severe flooding in the far west of Nepal bordering India where whole villages have been swept away and much loss of life. This happens to some degree every monsoon but this year it has been particularly devastating.
Samjhana has been involved at work with organising relief supplies to be sent to the disaster area.
Some more pictures from here and there.....
We passed through many small villages surrounded by terraced paddy fields, in the distance, the woman hard at work planting the rice, and on along the narrow rutted road, in places turned to mud and almost made impassable by the recent heavy rains. These same rains have caused severe flooding in the far west of Nepal bordering India where whole villages have been swept away and much loss of life. This happens to some degree every monsoon but this year it has been particularly devastating.
Samjhana has been involved at work with organising relief supplies to be sent to the disaster area.
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| Samjhana on right and her sister Srijhana |
Some more pictures from here and there.....
In the Garden of Dreams......Kathmandu.....
Happy me.....
And so my journey has ended and what an extraordinary time its been!
"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Quick now, here now, always
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of things shall be well."
T. S. Elliot
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