I finally arrived in Lalbandi in the late evening, it had taken me the best part of a day to reach there from Ilam, on 4 different buses and being squashed against several different strangers. Bhinajyu, Didi's husband, was waiting for me at the bus stop and I rode pillion on the back of his cycle the few kilometres back to their house in a village outside Lalbandi. They had finished planting their rice a week or so before and were now taking things a bit easier.
Didi's house, just outside Lalbandi
Didi's two sons, Bibek and Bipin - I did a lot of exploring with Bibek during my year in Nepal, see here
Lalbandi is in the Terai, the plains area to the south of Nepal. As such, during the monsoons it gets a lot of rain from the Himalaya above it, and when it's not raining it's roasting hot, normally 40 degrees celsius. I spent my few days in Didi's house sleeping and keeping out of the sun. It was great to just sit back and do very little, the walking in Ilam and then the bus journey had taken it out of my legs, they were not only aching a little, but bruised from the small seats.
When I arrived at Didi's house, Bhinajyu pointed at their buffalo and said that she was due to give birth any time soon. The pregnancy for a buffalo lasts about 11 months apparently, and they were now looking forward to getting some creamy milk. Even better, in the days immediately after the birth the buffalo produced a high colostrum milk, bigauti in Nepali, which was very tasty. Obviously the calf would have to have some of the milk to ensure it had all the vitamins it needed, but the buffalo would produce too much, so we would have that.
A few days later the buffalo began looking more and more uncomfortable, and in the evening, just before tea after a very short labour the calf was born. It fell to the ground and crumpled in a heap. We waited. The calf didn't move. Was it still-born? The mother looked up at Bhinajyu, it was her first calf and she probably wasn't sure what was supposed to happen now. The calf eventually gave a little cough and came to life.
The calf minutes after being born, Bhinajyu cleaning it up
Bhinajyu rushed in and cleared the calf's mouth from the afterbirth. The buffalo then moved in an started to show a little motherly affection to the calf, before returning to its food. For the next few days the calf got stronger, stood up, walked and one day drank all the milk from its Mum. We ate the bigauti, which when boiled for a long time became quite sweet, and full of vitamins.
Monsoon season is also the time for snakes in the Terai. I had been warned for the last few times I had visited Lalbandi that I would have to be careful about snakes, but I still had never seen one. I wasn't sure if I would be scared to see a snake or not, but I was just very curious. So, one day Bibek and I went to look for snakes, and to visit their fields that were now full of sugar cane - ukhu in Nepali. The snakes would come out during the day as the sugar cane fields wouldn't provide them anywhere cool to lie, and they would lie on the pathways between the fields. I had heard there were snakes the thickness of my leg that regularly sat out.
Bibek took me out to their fields, and showed me a field with banana plants in. Apparently an elephant had come through here a couple of nights before and eaten some of the bananas - I could see some of the footprints it had made. Then we walked through the sugar cane, looking out for snakes. But as we emerged from the field, we had seen none. I was slightly relieved, but a little disappointed as well. I asked Bibek what he would have done if he had seen a snake, he said he would run, and I have a feeling that I would have done the same thing.
Bibek with the sugar cane (left) and bananas (right)
However, a day later my curiosity about what my reaction to snakes was fed as a snake made a dash towards the veranda of the house where Bhinajyu and I were talking. I wasn't scared, it was quite small and I heard the reassuring words in my ear "it's not poisonous".
The non-poisonous snake. But still a snake!
Then all too quickly it was time to leave, from Lalbandi I was heading to Pokhara, the main tourist area in Nepal outside of Kathmandu. I was in Pokhara to meet Narendra Limbu, the chairman of the Pahar Trust. The Pahar Trust is an NGO that develops schools and community health posts in rural locations in the hills of Nepal. It is supported greatly from the UK by the Rotary Club. During a presentation to the IMechE in Bristol in March a supporter came and talked to me about the possibility of putting pico or micro hydro into any of these sites to electrify them. So, I visited the office and had a good chat with them. Although my research I'm doing I don't think will be able to directly help them, I was able to put them in touch with some people that can, which was great. I looked over some of their projects, and they seem to do some fantastic work. They have completed over £1 million of projects now, and are still going strong. I spent the rest of the time in Pokhara near the lake people watching and avoiding the rain, which at times flooded the roads.
Phewa Taal in Pokhara
From Pokhara I was going to head to a new place for me, Gorkha district, to visit a school supported by Learning Planet that wanted to install a pico hydro set to power some lights in the school. Quite exciting!
SAM
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