Not Exactly Unusual

April 12, 2016 djarmul 3 Comments

As we get ready to begin our service with the Peace Corps, Champa and I are not exactly unusual in being not exactly retired. A surprising number of the other new volunteers in our group are also 50 or older — in several cases, considerably older.

Several weeks ago, we met for coffee with one of them, a commercial real estate broker from Cary in his late 60s. We liked him immediately and discovered much in common in our motivations to challenge ourselves and serve society in new ways.

One of the other new volunteers going to Moldova now heads a program at Howard University to prevent suicides among people of color. Another started a special needs dance program in Harlem and was a foster mother for nine children. Our group also includes an IT manager from Iowa, a software expert from Minnesota and others, all over the age of 50.

We’ll be joining several 50+ volunteers already in Moldova, one of whom is serving as a mentor for me and some of the other newbies. Before signing up for the Peace Corps, she worked for more than 35 years in Cleveland as an attorney specializing in business and employment law. Champa’s mentor is younger but worked for many years as a teacher in California.

Worldwide, 50+ volunteers now account for about 8 percent of the total. Peace Corps encourages them to apply, as at this website. NPR recently broadcast a fun story about the oldest volunteer of all, Alice Carter, 87, from Boston, who was serving in Morocco.

It's been less than a year since my farewell parties at Duke. Champa and I were not alone among people our age in saying goodbye to dear friends to pursue new adventures. — It’s been less than a year since my farewell parties at Duke. It turns out Champa and I were hardly alone among people our age in leaving conventional lives to explore other opportunities like the Peace Corps.

To be sure, many new Peace Corps volunteers are still recent college graduates, as well as people in their 30s and 40s. Whatever their ages, the ones who will be serving with Champa and me are impressive, with expertise ranging from social work to farming to financial analysis. Indeed, I am already inspired by many of the younger volunteers. I also know how fortunate we are to be in a position to join them, since we’re not tied to home by aging parents or children who still need active support. Financially, we figure Peace Corps will be a wash — no real income, but also little need to touch our savings.

How do I know so much about our fellow volunteers? Mainly through Facebook. Just like high school seniors getting ready to attend the same university, our group has its own Facebook group. We’ve been getting to know each other online. Several people have also met in person, as we did with our new friend from Cary.

It’s just one of the many ways in which Peace Corps has changed since I last served as a volunteer, in Nepal in the the late 1970s. Back then, I didn’t know any of my fellow volunteers until I showed up at staging. This time I’ll be looking for familiar faces, some of them as seasoned as ours.

Countdown to Moldova

April 7, 2016 djarmul 2 Comments

We drove 11,000 miles around the United States. We wandered around Nepal. But now, still less than a year since I stepped down from my job at Duke, Champa and I are entering the countdown for our biggest adventure yet.

At the end of May, we’ll leave the United States to serve as Peace Corps Volunteers in Moldova. (That’s Moldova in yellow on the right side of this map, the small country between Romania and Ukraine.)

We’ll initially gather with the other new volunteers for a brief “staging,” probably in Philadelphia. Then we’ll all fly to Chisinau, Moldova’s capital. Immediately after we arrive there, we’ll begin three of months of training — learning to speak Romanian and perhaps some Russian, studying the local culture and getting prepped for our jobs. If all goes well, we’ll then swear in as volunteers and be posted together somewhere in the country.

Champa will be a teacher in the Peace Corps program for elementary English education, drawing on her many years of teaching experience in both Nepal and Maryland. I’ll be in a program called “community and organizational development,” probably working with a local nonprofit group of some kind. We’re due to serve for two years, or 27 months if you add in the training period. That takes us to the end of the summer of 2018.

As someone who served in the Peace Corps previously, in Nepal in the late 1970s, I thought I knew what to expect as I approached the Peace Corps launch pad again. But I’ve encountered lots of surprises. Things have changed since then. So have I. My perspective now is so different from when I began my previous service at the age of 24. For that matter, it’s changed a lot even since I decided to stop wearing a suit every day.

During the past year, many people have asked me how I’ve been doing since I retired. My response has often been, “Well, I haven’t retired. I’ve just decided to do something different.”

That’s indeed what Champa and I have been doing and it’s also why I’m now giving this blog a refreshed look and a new name: Not Exactly Retired. There’s a new URL, too: notexactlyretired.com. I invite you to follow the blog by clicking on the button at the top-right of the screen, not just via Facebook. If you find it interesting or entertaining, please tell your friends. I’ve got some fun stories planned for the next few weeks, even before the real action starts.

Are you ready to join us on the journey? Welcome back.

Nepal Trip Video

Video November 27, 2015 djarmul 7 Comments

In the fall of 2015, as chronicled earlier in this blog, Champa and I took an extended trip to Nepal. We visited her home town of Ilam and a small village, Samalbung, and spent time in the Kathmandu Valley. During the second half of the trip we welcomed eight members of our American family for an unforgettable tour, highlighted by the two families coming together. This video has the highlights.

Peaks in the Fog

November 8, 2015 djarmul 2 Comments

Look carefully at the photo. Very carefully. I snapped it on Sunday morning at Sarankot, near Pokhara, in central Nepal. People come here from around the world to see the spectacular sunrise over Fishtail, Annapurna and other famous mountains.

Do you see those amazing white peaks, just behind the big hill in the middle of the photo? That’s where they’re located.

Well, we didn’t see them either.

We awoke early and left our hotel at 5:15 a.m., hoping to watch the sun cast a golden glow on these snow-covered giants. Instead, we saw fog — layers upon layers of dense fog.

We weren’t alone. All around us, people were poised with their cameras and tripods, waiting to snap a photo of a lifetime. Instead, they ended up taking photos of each other, or selfies.

November is usually among the best months to see Nepal’s famous mountains, especially at sunrise. As they say here, it’s peak season, long past the summer monsoons. But nothing is certain in this country, and Mother Nature has her own ideas about who gets to see her jewels, and when.

We experienced the same disappointment a week earlier when we visited Nagarkot, a resort town north of Kathmandu with a famous view of the eastern Himalayas. There, too, the sunrise and setting were beautiful but we saw only glimpses of the white peaks hidden by fog.

At Sarankot, we waited an hour, hoping the fog would clear. Finally, we gave up and drove back down the hill, stopping at the Bindhyabasini Temple to watch morning puja, or prayers. Sure enough, that’s when the skies finally cleared enough to give us a partial, but wonderful, view of the peaks. The video shows how we were able to see the mountains in one direction and the temple scene in the other.

That’s Nepal. It rarely works the way it’s supposed to. But if you have faith and patience, it usually gives you more than you hoped for.

Comparing Two Trips

November 7, 2015 djarmul 1 Comment

With only one week left before we return home, we know how fortunate we have been to have had not one, but two, great adventures since hitting the road in early July 2015. First we traveled around the United States, then in Nepal.

Here are just a few of the many differences we’ve seen along the way:

Memorable Mountains

Memorable Fish

FullSizeRender 369 — Weekly fish market, Ilam

Memorable Vehicles

Janis Joplin's Car, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Cleveland — Janis Joplin’s Car, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Cleveland

FullSizeRender 351 — Highway in Kathmandu

Memorable Snack Foods

FullSizeRender 368 — Plate of malpwa, Sanjaya Dewan’s kitchen, Ilam

Engineering Marvels

Moonrises and Sunrises

FullSizeRender 575 — Sunrise over Himalayas at Antudanda

Temples

Blue Devil Fans

Raj Bahadur Dewan (Champa's brother), in Ilam — Raj Bahadur Dewan (Champa’s brother), in Ilam

Two Lucky People

FullSizeRender 226 — Badlands National Park, South Dakota

Tikas and More Tikas

October 27, 2015 djarmul 4 Comments

One and done?

Not when it comes to getting tikas during Dashain, Nepal’s biggest holiday.

I received five from various friends and family members during the past few days, and was honored each time.

Tikas are a mixture of red powder, rice and yogurt, with a little sugar sometimes blended in. The person who bestows a tika is usually an older relative, to whom you are showing respect.

Here’s how it works: You sit at a table with your hands raised in front of you. The tika-giver uses his or her thumb and finger to apply a dab to your forehead, then places jamara — yellowish rice plant shoots — behind your ear or on your hair. While doing this, they chant blessings for your happiness and future.

Next, they give you a piece of fruit and an envelope containing a bit of lucky money. Three of the envelopes I received were adorned with swastikas, which are a traditional Hindu symbol of prosperity. People gave them to me with love and generosity, so I let pass what the symbolism might mean for a Westerner, especially one whose mother fled from Nazi Germany.

After you receive the tika, you bow towards the person and thank them for their blessing. You’re supposed to wear the tika for at least the rest of the day, if not longer. Later, you can wash it off easily in the sink.

This year I gave someone a Dashain tika for the first time, as you can see here. That’s Mamata, whose mother Usha, gave me a tika just a moment earlier. I watched Usha didi’s technique carefully but, even so, was relieved that I didn’t screw up and commit some religious faux pas.

During the first five days of the Dashain season, people travel from house to house, receiving tikas from grandparents, parents, uncles, aunts and others. Each visit is accompanied by delicious snacks before the tika and an even more delicious meal afterwards. This year, tika season ended with the full moon on Sunday. Next year’s season is now less than a year away. I’m already getting my thumb and finger ready.

Nepal’s Death-Defying Taxi

October 23, 2015 djarmul 4 Comments

Americans who complain about potholes in their roads should take a ride on one of the taxis that serve Samulbung, a village in eastern Nepal.

These four-wheelers climb and swerve along unpaved roads made of potholes. They bounce over cobblestones along the better stretches, then struggle across longer stretches where the pockmarked dirt often becomes mud.

During the monsoon season, the mud resembles a swamp. Even when rain is intermittent, as it was when we visited a few days ago, water collects into pools. Drivers have to place one tire on either side of a pool and avoid slipping into the middle, or else charge through and try to reach the other side before losing traction.

Sometimes the driver doesn’t make it. That’s what happened when our driver, Arpan, was a split-second late in down-shifting over a depression in the road. Since his four-wheel-drive was temporarily broken, he swerved into a ditch, as shown in the photo, then nearly burned off his left rear tire trying to regain contact. We all had to get out as he and his assistant gathered stones and gravel to provide traction. Eventually we got back on the road.

Tires puncture regularly, which also happened to us. Once again, we disembarked as Arpan and his assistant made a quick roadside repair, as you can see here.

Such repairs provide a break from a journey that routinely steers to the edge of precarious roads lacking side barriers. If the vehicle went over the edge, it might fall hundreds of feet before crashing amid the world’s biggest mountains. Keep in mind there is no Life Flight helicopter service here. For that matter, there are hardly any doctors.

Just to make the experience more interesting, the vehicles are piled high with luggage, grain and goods, all of which raise the center of gravity and reduce stability. Fortunately, the vehicles are usually crammed with passengers, who provide a counterweight

Many of the drivers are young men, who remain cheerful despite working long hours and earning little money. They stop regularly to pick up passengers and goods, and also to run errands — such as delivering a cell phone or money — for people along the route.

Champa and I took two trips and found them simultaneously terrifying and hilarious. As happens so often in Nepal, we soon got used to the situation and begin joking with the other passengers at each new unexpected turn. We embraced the “No Tension” sticker on the driver’s door.

Our fare for four passengers to travel three hours to Fikkal, the local town, was $11, luggage included. If you find that price unbelievable, well, you’re right: It’s not what you’d expect. We paid nearly double the usual fare to ensure we had only one person in the front passenger seat (me) and only three in the second row. Champa and Bindu, shown here, shared the second row with Bindu’s husband, our nephew Shankar. Business class rocks.

Prayers at the Stream

October 22, 2015 djarmul 3 Comments

These faces of devotion are gathered along a stream to wash away curses, evil spirits and bad luck, to be replaced by prosperity, health and good luck.

Their maanghope ceremony, all but unknown in the West, took place Saturday morning along a stream in Samalbung, a small village in eastern Nepal. Families gathered to pray, light candles, beat drums and toss flower petals and grain into the water.

Jai Kumar, with the large white hat, led the ceremony. He is the local sikhsamba, or religious leader, for a growing number of Kirati people in this part of Nepal who have begun turning away from Hinduism and returning to animist traditions. They also have rejected animal sacrifices. Instead, they follow the teachings of Falgunanda, whose temple in Kathmandu I described in a previous post.

Jai Kumar, a second cousin of ours, expects no payment for leading the ceremony, which calls on everyone to pray not only for themselves and their families, but for the entire community. He lives next door to the home of Champa’s older sister, Sumitra, who died earlier this year. A day earlier, he led another ceremony at the house to coincide with our arrival.

Champa and I came here from Ilam along a breathtakingly bumpy road to pay our respects at the graves of Sumitra and her husband, Naina, and to visit with our nieces, nephews and extended family.

They and their neighbors are the people you see in the photos, gathering as they do every year during the harvest season for the maanghope ceremony. Another annual ceremony, ubhawli, occurs during planting season.

Few Westerners have ever observed the ceremony, which lasted about an hour. I felt honored, as a member of the family, to be invited to participate. The sights were even more colorful and dramatic than you see here. The drums, cymbals and chanting voices blended with the flowing water and chirping birds to compose a symphony of serenity that still lingers.

The Animal Market

October 21, 2015 djarmul 1 Comment

Being a goat in Nepal during the Dashain holiday season is like being a turkey in America just before Thanksgiving: Your odds of surviving aren’t great.

So it was for these goats being sold in Ilam’s market this past Thursday. Farmers brought them there by the hundreds from throughout the surrounding area. Shoppers came to buy a goat or two for their family feasts, and wholesalers bought truckloads to sell in Jhapa, about three hours to the south.

Dashain (pronounced: dah-sy) is Nepal’s biggest holiday, taking place during a week each October. (This year, Nepal’s government extended the holiday by a few days to ease scarce petrol supplies.) Schools and offices close and people travel across the country to their family homes. Almost every day during the festival, they perform designated forms of puja, or worship.

Ilam’s animal market takes place every Thursday, part of a larger market centered in the main bazaar. As Dashain approaches, business booms, as we saw for ourselves from the window of Champa’s house, just up the road. For hours on end, goats bleated their way past our gate.

Families typically hire a butcher to slaughter the goat and prepare it for consumption. Likewise for pigs and buffalo, if they eat these. They usually slaughter chickens themselves.

For a Western visitor, all of this can be grim to watch. However, if you’re someone who eats meat, it’s also more honest than going to a local supermarket and tossing a package of steak or chicken wings into your cart without giving any thought to its origin. Here in Nepal, there’s no avoiding the question. In Ilam and many other towns across the country, the answer can be found in the weekly animal market.

Cheese ‘Factories’

October 15, 2015 djarmul 2 Comments

Rural. Artisanal. Pristine.

Two of those of those three words apply to the cheese factories we visited Wednesday.

Located in Bakhor, a tiny village north of Ilam, they are part of a growing industry in Nepal. Western styles of cheese are still new here but they’ve begun catching on with restaurants and consumers in Kathmandu.

In Bakhor, which is 10 miles away from Ilam but more than an hour’s drive along a winding road, several businesses have responded by opening “cheese factories” — actually small facilities like the one you see here with the green sign.

The factories we saw were — how shall I phrase this? — less obsessed with cleanliness than in, say, Wisconsin or Switzerland.

Each produces a single variety of cheese. There’s no Camembert, Fontina or mozzarella, just “cheese.” Artisans in other parts of Nepal do produce fine cheeses, some made from yak milk, but not here.

Still, we were impressed by what we saw: wheels of cheese and strings of churpi, a traditional local cheese so hard that two Nepali entrepreneurs in the United States now market it as dog treats, as featured on “Shark Tank.”

I bought a string of churpi from Kusum Rai, the girl you see here, and plan to bring it home for our dog, Bailey, and perhaps for some other lucky dogs.

You can see strings of churpi drying above Champa’s head.

Let me close with a personal message to my brother-in-law Joel, a cheese enthusiast who is joining us in Nepal along with several other members of our family later this month. Joel, we’re sorry you couldn’t join us today for the tour. On the other hand, since we know you love cheese so much, perhaps it’s just as well.

Finally, a travel note: We leave Ilam tomorrow for Samalbung, a much smaller town located on Nepal’s eastern border with India. I’m not sure about the wifi situation there. As with everything in Nepal, we’ll see what happens.

"Not Exactly Retired"

Not Exactly Unusual

Countdown to Moldova

Nepal Trip Video

Peaks in the Fog

Comparing Two Trips

Tikas and More Tikas

Nepal’s Death-Defying Taxi

Prayers at the Stream

The Animal Market

Cheese ‘Factories’

Join us on the journey.

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