Visa Success!

Finally after a week of stress, interviews, forms, offices, letters and not being able to eat properly I finally have my visa for the foreseeable future in Nepal. I suppose I should feel lucky, as if I were Nepali trying to get a visa for the UK I would have probably failed dramatically. But being the other way around, I was able to put some pressure on people because of the lottery of where I was born and their interest in my country and way of life.

Life in the house is under quite a lot of strain at the moment. The electricity board increased the scheduled power cuts from 4 hours a week to 16, with several other unscheduled cuts also happening. The water is not reliable, so we don't quite know when it will come. And the house cooking gas has run out. All over the Kathmandu Valley there is a very limited supply, and on the black market a 14 kg cylinder is selling for 5000 rupees, about 45 pounds, when normally it would sell for 1200 rupees.

So at the moment the food is being cooked on a little wood burning stove that is built from a metal case packed with sawdust. The sawdust needs to be replaced every day. And being a wood burning stove, it turns the pots and pans black and makes everyone's eyes sting from the smoke. Also, as we are in the city, the supply of firewood is limited. I think we'll have to go on a expedition to get some wood soon.


The stove

Today is 5 months in Nepal for me, and I'm feeling a little better about the prospects for everything. I won't say much more for the moment, but I'm remarkably upbeat!

SAM