aimless writing

At the immigration office today I, while I was waiting to get my visa extended, I was having a conversation with one of the officials. He told me about his wife and daughter, it was really nice to have a conversation with a Nepali man, to try and gain some insight about the strange culture here, caught between the old and the new as it is. I ignored his flirtiness because he was a lot older and it was a bit absurd. Besides, men are often affectionate with each other - one image I will always take with me is the sight of army men in full uniform and rifles, holding hands as they meander down the road. But then it got a bit too much and I decided to go to the bathroom. He followed me in, and continued to pat my stomach and remark on how big it was. I didn't know how to take this, until he tried to put his hand under my t-shirt. Excuse me, but what the fuck? If homosexuality wasn't punished quite so severely here then perhaps it wouldn't get manically misdirected at me. Rather than kicking up a huge stink, I said no and promptly left. After all, I was applying for a tourist visa, due to whatever loophole, I must volunteer illegally. Not that anyone seems to mind much. At the airport a few weeks ago (on the way to Singapore), the customs lady asked me what I was doing here in a token kind of way, whilst stamping my passport. I told her I was a volunteer teacher, so she stopped, smiled, and asked me again. "Oh, I'm a tourist!" I said.

It is starting to become apparent that I will never actually fit in here. In a way I didn't really fit in back in Australia either, but this is different. The other bideshi, they are not that friendly. With the exception of my friends of course. I see that Australian girl I met at that party, and say hello. I can see the corners where that painted-on smile is beginning to peel. I crave to have more interaction with Nepali people, but this is fraught with difficulty. Taxi drivers and shopkeepers form the majority of my Nepali interaction. I can do prices, products, and directions quite well now. I walk around, or I sit, and I think about how I could have said what I wanted to say. The taxi man I walk past every day, I caught his taxi once, and now he pursues my business with dogged desperation, believing that one day I'll crack. Today he stuck his tongue out at me, and implored, "Every day I wait for you and you do not come!" 100 metres further down the road, the phrase "Kina pharkanuhuncha, ta?" formed in my mind. Why wait then? Sometimes it works, yesterday another taxi driver followed me slowly in his car, ignoring my friendly rebukes until I said "Malaai ghumna man parcha". I like walking.

Soon I will come back to Australia, and be poor again. I will have nice accommodation, hot showers, drinking water straight from the tap, beaches to swim in, public transport, live music, but I will be poor. And then I will come back to Kathmandu, and will have none of these things. But I will be rich. Oh, and peace and quiet, space and time. Here comes someone now

Another old journal entry: Amiga is a dog

I should be sleeping. This knowledge keeps me awake. This, and the cold, and the full full moon. So here I am, lying in front of the heater, blessed warmth. It’s just you and me now, words. We don’t need love, warmth, cuddles. Heaters and words, they don’t lie awake, thinking about how much they need to be alone, but jumping at every creak and rustle, thinking that it may be a certain person coming to lie with them. Objects, concepts, sitting in smug silence. And then, on the other hand, there is Amiga. Flying through the house faster than her legs can carry her. Crashing into things, making noise, waking everyone in her desperate search for love and attention. I am more like Amga than I am like the heater, though I would like to be the other way. Really, everything is fine, well mostly. I guess if I was going to imagine what I’d like my girlfriend to be like, I’d start with someone who was happy to see me. I think X is, sometimes it’s quite hard to tell. Mystery.

Words escape through cracked lips like weedlings through chapped concrete.

Pen on paper. This is a kind of alchemy. My four-colour pen has just this colour left, my least favourite of all. No-one likes the red pen, it is the colour of tick and cross, and other such judgements. Normally red things entice, excite and invite me, but red pen hits my eyes, the red writing is the uninvited guest whom you were nonetheless expecting. The remarks of one who is telling you how to write, how to express, how to be.

I know a girl who makes me lose my cool. Where did it go? I had it a moment ago, and now she asks me to produce it and it’s gone. She turns me into myself, horror of horrors, and leaves me to deal with it, to babysit myself until the cool comes back. Coffee, alcohol, cigarettes, destruction. The thought of being healthy is repulsive to me just now, what the hell is going on? There, it happened again, just hearing her footsteps makes me lose my cool. Rattle, rail, shake those chains. I would like to sleep now, but I am so alive! I should like to write myself sleepy. Lots of loud noises and angry voices happen on the street outside, a thousand terrible scenarios play out in my mind. Slep now, young Ivan, worry less, fear less, let go, sleep. They will sort themselves out, they are apt to fight their own battles. Listen, now they are laughing.

Scooby Doo

I am currently enjoying a moment of peace and stillness, in an Israeli cafe here in the heart of Kathmandu. The password for the internet here is Baba Ganesh. Get it?

My boss, and some other people from the office, have been away this week. They are in Tamil Nadu, India, on a rescue mission. According to a documentary I just saw, our charity has, over the years, rescued over 300 children. Each rescue mission is different from the last. Sometimes they involve being chased by dogs and men with big sticks. Sometimes they involve long hours spent in police stations, dealing with beauraucracy and corruption. Of all the rescue missions this is probably the most bizarre. This time they are rescuing young girls from Dr. Job's Mission, another charity.

I cannot write emotively, can only report. I would like to paint a picture, the landscape, the long journeys, describe faces, conversations, but the whole situation is too sick. Maybe later.

It is difficult to get accurate information, and of course each story is slightly different. Here, a death certificate was forged, so that the parents believed their daughter had died. There, the website shows profiles of girls, falsely claiming that they're orphans. Perhaps Dr. Job's Mission actually believes this. The agent that was responible for trafficking the children has a particularly nasty reputation. Usually the agents are so well-connected that it is almost impossible to arrest them. The families tell us that they had sent their children to Kathmandu to get a good education. Instead, the daughters were taken to India, given new names and put in an evangelical christian school, so that they can continue God's work. One girl managed to get in touch with her brother back home. She begged for help, claiming that they were routinely abused, that conditions were terrible. Word made it to our organisation. Some family members were brought along to make rescue possible. One of the girl's brothers, perhaps the same one who received the phone call, had a seizure on the plane, I'm told that if he hadn't been on that plane, there would have been no way that he would have made it to the hospital in time, his life would have ended in that village.

The crew from EBT moved quickly, and managed to rescue 30 Nepali children. Each family has agreed to take the children back.

I cannot help but think of that line from Scooby Doo, "And I would have got away with it too, if it hadn't been for those pesky kids". One girl made a phone call, and 30 children were brought home. Surely more investigations will follow, what will happen next I cannot say, but I am happy to see that Dr. Job's Mission's website is down for maintenance. You can still see the title, "Welcome to the Home for Daughters of Martyred Christians"