Personal Message No. 1

"Hi mum & dad, got here safely, all Buddha'd out after today! Love you, Jenny."

  All four teachers from Haverigg safely last night in Kathmandu and were up at the crack of dawn this morning for a full schedule which included a trip to Swayambhu Buddhist temple, a ceremony with our family priest for education and teachers, a breakfast in Patan Durbar Square, a visit to Bal Bigyan school, followed by a sudden strike called by Maoist groups which led to gridlock across Kathmandu and our being unable to reach the Vice President of Nepal's residence for an afternoon tea party! Bugger.

The big stuff starts tomorrow with the launch of our teacher development programmes.

Meetings, meetings, meetings.

                                                                              
It's all starting to feel like work again, more breakfast meetings, presentations in board rooms, phone calls in taxis fixing yet more meetings ..... Oh dear!
This morning we had a presentation to make at 8.30am to the Chandragiri Rotary Club in Patan at which we were asked to give an overview of who we are, what we do, and what makes us different. Fairly straightforward, but they are extremely wary of all charities and NGOs here mainly concerning corruption, and we don't blame them. So much of our presentation focused on the governance issues from the UK Charity Commission for both Trustees and any charity overall so they can see the rigorous imposed as well as the high degree of self regulation. As usual such a group are quite stunned at how much we achieve with so little money and we are starting to think that they might trust us more if we said it all cost more. Anyway they are now intending to prepare a proposal of some sort as to how we might work together.
Another Rotary meeting fixed for central Kathmandu 8.00am Sunday 4th April.

Yesterday was also extremely busy and included a 2 hour meeting at the British Council offices with Vaishali Pradhan, Country Manager for Nepal's Global Schools Partnership programme. We got on extremely well and shared a great deal of information about each other's work. We are especially encouraged about how we can help each other to bring together UK schools and Nepali schools into the GSP which includes applying for grants to assist curriculum development and teacher exchange.
Tomorrow is potentially our biggest day with a meeting at 5pm with the directors of Chaudhary Group, the largest industrial conglomerate in Nepal! All the early signs are that we each have something the other wants which is a good way to start any first meeting. Keep reading for a report Sunday evening! 

No such thing as a free breakfast?

Today is a public holiday in Nepal, Ram Naumi. Not sure what it's for except that it's one of the 120 days public holiday or so in Nepal each year!
Anyway, this didn't prevent our meeting this morning over a breakfast with Sujeev Shakya. This man is so famous globally we are surprised he would even reply to our emails, never mind meet with us to discuss our work in Nepal. But when you meet him you immediately see part of the reason for his success is his warmth, focused interest and empathy.
The purpose of this first meeting was simply to share our connected interests and to brief him on the opening presentation he will make next Tuesday at the inauguration of our teacher development week. The key points we discussed are all from his book, Unleashing Nepal, and include the overall concept of globalisation, reducing aid dependency, including values in primary education and spending aid money on capability development as opposed to buildings and infrastructure. 
Generally we connected on many different levels relating to business and aid work and it was very interesting to discuss his approach to running his own consultancy business after many years employed in large corporations. More specifically we seem to share similar views on DFID (The UK's overseas aid department) which are not necessarily positive but I wouldn't want to misquote him here publically.
Next!

Nostalgia & cheeseballs!

Our first day in Kathmandu this visit and already I'm "spaced out"!
I suppose it began well enough with the teacher's hotel booking at Kathmandu Guest House being re-confirmed and a breakfast meeting set up with Sujeev Shakya at the Summit Hotel for Wednesday morning.Since reading his book and an exchange of numerous emails over the last 6 months this is our first chance to get down to brass tacks with him regarding his opening of our programme next week. We also intend to discuss with him the vexing issue of our schools being dislocated from their communities and how to bring them together.

As far as the nostalgia bit is concerned we ventured for a light lunch into Freak Street to call into the Monumental Palace hotel with it's rooftop bar. For the non cognoscenti amongst you Freak Street was the original hippie tourist street with bars, restaurants and general drug dens from the 60's and 70's. Not that I ever went there (much) but I have a strong memory of getting my first fish & chips lunch in Freak Street over 30 years ago! Today we went to the rooftop bar to find the views completely blocked by high rise houses with water tanks and an order for a fanta and tuborg somehow getting translated into pancake and cheeseballs! Buddha help me but Champa and I still can't stop laughing 4 hours later ...... welcome to Nepal!
Now the photo. This is the inside of a brilliant tea shop close to Bishal Bazaar called Himalaya Tea Corner and run by Navin Maharjan and his wife.It is a brilliant tea shop for several reasons; firstly the variety of loose teas they sell from Nepal, India, Japan, China. Second the all round friendliness and helpfulness of the owners. Third ....... they will brew ANY tea for you to taste!! If you are interested in tea or this sort of experience this is a place well worth a visit, cheap too.

Regarding general progress this week, visiting the venue for our training programmes on Thursday morning, meeting with British Council on Friday afternoon, presentation to Chandagiri Rotary on Saturday morning and waiting for a date/time to meet people from the Nepal Economic Forum. Keep reading.