Annapurna home

Annapurna orphanage

  I’m now at the Annapurna Self-sustaining Orphan Home, so it’s back to cold showers, eating rice and vegetables twice a day and sharing a squat toilet with 25 others. Of course I have absolutely nothing to complain about – it is, after all, how these kids live every day and many Nepalis live without even running water or electricity. I’m just whining like a spoilt First World brat because I have to adapt again after my cushy spell in Lakeside. Give me a week and I’ll have forgotten what a hot shower tastes like.

 

               Shrijana and Shanta. 

            Safal, eating… something.

  The home here is run along similar lines to Nandumaya, with every attempt being made to achieve self-sufficiency in milk, eggs, vegetables, etc. There is also a sewing shop in an adjacent building which was set up six months ago and is staffed by local women who were previously homeless. The women now have a trade and profits from the shop will go to support the home.

 

Sarada (middle) with her sewing ladies.

  Annapurna home is run by a lady named Sarada, with the help of three other women, two of whom have children of their own and live here at the home. Sarada lives nearby with her own family and spends her days here, staying overnight if one of the other two women are away. Like Nandumaya, there are 21 children in residence; the difference here is that these children are significantly younger. There are six children under 5 years old, with the youngest being barely 12 months. The others range from 5 to 12.

 

Asha, aged 12, with Hari, one of the ladies who work at the home.

 The youngest, Sristi, who arrived at the home when she was just 6 days old, has taken something of a shine to me and presents herself to be picked up whenever she espies me. I think it’s because she likes the view and I offer a fairly stable platform – unlike, say, a hyperactive sibling or a multitasking mother busy cooking or picking up after other tots. I’m also quite good at rocking gently and making silly noises (pretty much how I spend most evenings). Sristi seems to regard me as her personal safari elephant and directs me around like a mahout. (Not literally by tugging my ears and hitting me with a stick. Well, not by hitting me with a stick anyway).

 

Sristi.

 

One gesture says it all. Sure, it looks like ‘cuddle me’. What she’s actually saying is, ‘Kneel, peasant, so that thou may carry me hither and thither, as is my wont’.

  Being a house full of toddlers, there is always somebody crying and nakedness abounds. 4 year old Sakar, in particular, has some objection to wearing pants and rids himself of them at any opportunity. I haven’t yet established the basis for his stance – be it on ethical, political or purely aesthetic grounds; he hasn’t deigned to confide in me his reasons, though he seems quite adamant. Our conversations on the matter have been limited to me pointing at his brazen nakedness and yelling, “Pants!” He points back at me and yells, “No pants!” and runs away. I know he has pants. I’ve seen him flinging them away with disdain. I just have to work out where he keeps them.

 All this will be old hat to those of you with kids. For me, it’s an introduction to toilet training, nappies, burping and getting a crying baby to sleep. I’ll be coming home with a much stronger baby-sitting resumé.

 

This picture of a titanic struggle between a giant cockroach and a spider taking place on the stairs up to my room is of no particular relevance, excepting it represented a dilemma for me as to who to root for. As much as I loathe the big cockroaches, I’m not sure I’m any fonder of spiders big enough to take them on. The spider eventually won by submission, with a figure-8 leg lock.

  The children’s daily routine is similar to that at Nandumaya and is dominated by homework and school, which takes place six days a week. The two main meals of rice and vegetables are taken at 8:30am and about 7pm. We are all tucked up asleep by 8pm and the youngsters make sure everybody is up by about 5 in the morning. I am living in the storeroom on the roof, with the potatoes and mice. (I tell myself they are mice. I believe they are mice. Please God, let them be mice). It is comfortable, despite the leaky ceiling, and offers me some guilty respite from the night-time tantrums and crying. 

Playing soccer near the home.

The school-age children all attend a private school just up the road. As at Phutung I will be presenting myself at the local government school to inflict my version of English as a second language on the hapless locals. I’ll let you know how I get on.