Pokhara, Nepal, 15th October 2024

Dear all

We have been here in Nepal two weeks now so it's time for us to be in touch. As is often the case with travel and new experiences, it feels to us much longer but things are going really well, the inevitable ‘ouches’ not withstanding, and we feel settled and grateful to be back!

Our arrival into Kathmandu was smooth despite all the recent floods, evidence of which was all around us. We are in awe of the Nepali people who face endless natural disasters, more than enough to break the soul of any country, with incredible resilience and acceptance; no wonder a fatalistic outlook is embedded in their language. So just a week after the city had been under water, we were able to drive to our guesthouse and contemplate the road to Pokhara the next day.

The Kathmandu to Pokhara road is a tough one even in the dry season. We took a different route out of the valley to avoid a major landslide bottleneck and actually enjoyed this prettier more off-road route, the road being too small for all the big trucks and buses. But we were soon back on the main trunk route and slowly made our way past more land slides along the whole way with huge boulders that had been shed from the mountainside; no wonder our driver occasionally looked upwards as if to assure himself that more weren’t coming down . In the end we managed the trip in 12 hours, not bad all things considered, and we were simply grateful to be safe and to have arrived.

Pokhara was less of a surprise to us than in May and the air is now clearer and brighter with spectacular mountain views every morning so these are all things we are really enjoying.

Our accommodation has been more of a challenge. It’s more rustic and less private than we had anticipated, so it’s been interesting to experience the ‘cold turkey’ (as Alex called it) of coming off our dependence on comforts and the luxury of private space. We are living in a flat that is essentially the upstairs rooms of a house, lived in downstairs by our landlord. We have a shared entrance, a communal stairway to a communal landing and a shared kitchen downstairs. Upstairs there are numerous bedrooms with beds and a bathroom. One room has a two ring gas cooker and a fridge; we use this as our ‘kitchen’ and tend to use the bathroom to wash-up in to avoid going up and down the stairs. The largest brightest bedroom we use as a lounge/dining area , draping covers over the three beds and adding a few wicker chairs. It’s all perfectly fine from a practical point of view, the biggest challenge being not ever knowing when our landlord is next going to appear outside our bedroom! Private space is less sought after in a land where homes are generally small and shared and where it's assumed you'd be lonely if you are on your own! It’s perhaps not easy for him either; he worries a lot about security after a recent break in, and is keen to ensure we lock up sufficiently as we come and go. So we are all adjusting but he is kind and welcoming and we are finding our way. And a real positive is we have shared Wi-Fi, and a fabulous hot shower, heated in pipes that criss cross over the roof, so that is a daily joy!

Alex started work the Friday after we arrived on the Wednesday and has since facilitated several days of workshops with the leadership team, which seem to have been helpful.

But as I write, we are enjoying the fun of being on trek, high up in the Himalayas , with our daughter and son in law, who arrived in Pokhara on Monday for a short stay, coinciding with Dossain, a big national holiday in Nepal. We are walking the Mardi Himal trek. It’s wonderful to be back in rural Nepal, enjoying the sounds and sights of this mountainous world; mule trains, monkeys, buffalo and yaks, rhododendron forests, endless tea shops and lodges and porters and trekkers with stories of what we have yet to come! Being Dossain we stopped yesterday to watch a high altitude volleyball championship reach its semi final, a competition between nearby lodge camps, the trophy a tethered sheep looking less than happy but unaware of the part it was to play in last nights celebrations!

So we are grateful for this precious family time, a chance for Ellie and Tom to visit the land and place where she was born and to be together in this high altitude adventure. It’s also proving an amazing language re learning opportunity for us as well which is good so early on in our time here. Our guides/porters are patient teachers as well as loving a game of cards at the end of each day with us too.

Alex is working in Kathmandu next week with INF's sister organisation, UMN, so we all return there on Tuesday (that road again!), Ellie and Tom fly off on Friday and we return to Pokhara on Saturday. Thereafter I will be starting my work and Alex will pick up his INF work again too. But more of that in our next email…

Thanks for all your prayers so far. We feel dependent on them!

Sending much love

Claire and Alex

You can learn more about the work of the INF here  There are also photographs on this page of some of the work carried out by the charity.