The end.. for now..

It's ovvveerrr.... :(
So I haven't had any updates in my last month because i was too busy living and enjoying every moment I had.
The last month at NCH was amazing, fabulous, glorious, dery dery ramro. Leaving was one of the hardest goodbyes ive had to do. I dont think you can understand unless you've lived with 80 kids loving you unconditionaly for 5 months..

I painted the babyroom before leaving, putting cartoons and dr.seuss all over their walls!
we had balloons and a samosa party one of my last days and I read a poem i wrote in nepali with one of the older boys to all the children and staff. they loved it!
Sunday morning i took the bus to kathmandu at 7am, but i still made it to Namaste for 6am to do yoga with the kids before leaving.
i have 2 days in ktm before flying. tomorrow night i start my journey back home..

I can't say I'm ready for home.. If I had the choice I think I would stay a year with these kids.
I plan to be back in Nepal in one or two years if I can afford it.
I'll upload my last pictures once i get home, the internet connection is much better!
I'll see you all pretty soon!

Love,
Caro Auntie

Nepall! home again

wow being back is the best feeling in the world.
I can't put into words what its like walking through the gates of NCH and having 75 children and staff running at you, excited that you're home again.
I was gone 23 days.. and I can already see a difference in the children. everyone seems a little bit older, the baby of the house can now say "aunty" and "didi". when I first arrived he had just learnt to walk and now he runs and is starting to talk!
The new school that the kids are going to is beautiful and the education is much better. I've been helping the older ones in math, and the youngest ones still in the alphabet. "A, a-p-p-l-e apple!"
Their getting better and better, It's really cool to watch them grow.
One month left... today.
My nepali is getting so good! i think a couple more months and I'd be fluent :)

I uploaded more pictures to flickr. 100 or so! from Holi, & Thailand.
Holi(the hindu festival where everyone throws paint on eachother) its suppose to demonstrate the fight of good against evil and the paint symbolizes the blood of the evil.
Enjoy them, it took me forever to upload them all!
Much love.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/carostravels09

Thai new year & Islands

On monday was the thai new year! they celebrate by having a huge water fight that lasts 3 days. Everyone in the streets have buckets and water guns, cars get blocked on the roads and water is everywhere!! there is music, dancing and partying all day long in the sun. It is such a wonderful way to celebrate the new year. In bangkok they missed the first two days because of the demonstrations and fighting that was going on, but its calmed down now! yay! & koh lanta, the island that ive been staying on for the past 2 weeks, celebrated the new year over only 1 day, but it was one of the best days ive ever had! You're running around in the streets in bare feet completly soaked. Some locals also had ice powder that they rub on you in addition to the ice water!
Yesterday it was Raphi's 29th birthday! one of the volunteers that I was with in Nepal. We had a boat trip day, took a longtail boat out and visited a bunch of little islands around koh lanta. We swam in green water and had watermelon throwing fights.. then rested in the hammocks on the remote bubu island.
a couple more days here then back up to bangkok to catch my flight to nepal!
Also, I am getting a fabulous tan :)

corrections..

oups! i didnt realize that my last post before this thailand one was about me going trekking. that didnt happen.
i ended up cutting open my töe really bad, a pretty dramatic seen for the nepali locals that were around, and i couldnt go trekking. but i did go to chitwan and it was fabulous. i saw rhinos, and bears, and crocrodiles, and saw tiger footprints. AND bathed an elephant! it was sooo cool. if you get the chance to one day bath an elephant, DO IT!
thats all..
:)

Phase 3: Thailand

sweat and sunglasses is how i sum up my first 2 hours in thailand!
coming from nepal it really is walking into the future. bangkok airport is huge and beautiful, nothing compared to kathmandu. Pokhara (the country side where i live) to Thamel (the tourist ghetto in kathmandu) to thailand really has been like getting one step closer each time to what it will feel like being home again. me and aisling, one of the volunteers that im traveling with, were impressed by everything from the traffic queues with nice new cars to sky scrapers and real office buildings. thailand is hot and busy but so interesting!
the flight from kathmandu to here was very nice. I got to see mount everest this morning from the plane window!!! super super super clear, and impressive. i had goosebumps
we were told maybe 3 days ago that last year, nepali airlines (who we flew with) had a problem with one of the airplane engines and that one of the crew men had a dream that if they sacraficed 2 goats on the runway it would be fixed. and they did!! the story made it in the news paper, with a picture of the dead goats and the plane. (ovbiously it wasnt fixed) so this morning as we were walking up the stairs to enter the plane me and aisling were looking for dead animals.
I havent booked a flight out yet, but the plan is to be here for 3 to 4 weeks, then back home to nepal for a month with the kids before montreal! i might be in thailand for only 3 weeks instead of four depending on when the first day of school is for the children because i want to be back for that. they äre now on a 3 week holiday (its like summer vacation for them) and when they go back they move up a grade.
im spending 2 or 3 days in bangkok then busing south to the islands and meeting up with friends. i cant wait!!
I love you all and im wishing for amazing adventures to all of you who are also currently traveling.

new plans!

Big changes going on for me! I bought a ticket to bangkok last week! kenya is now out of the picture for this year, and im spending a month in thailand relaxing on the thai beaches for a month before finishing up with my last month in nepal.
sooo im extending my trip one more month! thailand for april, nepal for may, and montreal for june! im also heading to chitwan to bathe elephants this weekend, and im doing the annapurna base camp trek starting monday. its a 10 day trek that were doing in 9 days, because i want to to spend some more time with the kids before fyling to thailand. There will be 4 other volunteers that im meeting up with in thailand, most of which have already been to thailand many times and know exactly where to hangout.
Lots of the volunteers have just left, and its a hole new group of people now at the orphange... it takes some getting used to. We started making a vegetable garden at the orphanage, each room group has a plot of land to grow the vegetables that they want, they have to maintain the garden and do everything themselves.
I did finger painting with the babies on firday, it was very successful!

I will most likely not post anything untill after my trek, so enjoy home as i adventure off into the himalayas!& i will write all about it upon my return.
xoxox

photos!

so what new to share with you today..
nepal really has become my new home. im into such a routine here, walking in the streets and waiving to the locals. the cows in the streets now seem pretty normal, and dal vat is getting better.
The volunteer group is really fun right now, we went for a night out in town on saturday. so much fun!!
We hosted a nepali wedding at the guest house last week. lots of dancing and drumming!

im sorry theres not much new news! im currently uploading photos to flickr so you can see for the first time what I see everyday!
Im sorry they're not in order... oups
Enjoy them :)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/carostravels09/

smiling faces

today has been such an unbelivable day!

its saturday (which is a mass day off for the nepalise) the only day the children dont go to school, its sunny & hot (shorts, t-shirt and flip flops) the sky is clear so we can see the mountains and theres good energy in the air.

Not being sick makes all the difference. its the first time in since ive left home that i really feel happy to be away and loving nepal, I still have 2 months left and im getting nervous about having to leave. I basicly live in the baby room, so theres about 13 kids from the ages of 1 to 6 years old that i spend most of my time with. Im getting so attached to them and I want to stay here for years and watch them grow to be teenagers. Monika, Giri, Alleh & Sagar are my top 4. I know i shouldnt have favorites but i do... I will take pictures of them soon and upload them so you can all be jealous of the adorable faces i get to kiss, wipe tears from, clean snot off of, & watch laugh and smile.

I was given the bio-book a couple days ago, which is a book with each kids story, what happened to them and why they're in the orphanage. Theres some really shocking stories, and you can read about some of them on the site if youre interested: www.orphanagenepal.org

its crazy, with most of the children you could never tell. they are so happy, always playing & smiling. NCH has done such a good job in changeing these kids lives, they have so much support and love here.

time to go back out under the hot sun and sit by the lake for the rest of the day

I hope you enjoy your day today as much as i am

:)

sick sick & sick

so its been a while since ive updated this blog. but its because i was in bed sick for a week, 1: i didn't feel like going to the internet and 2: even if i did i would have nothing to tell you guys!
so being sick in nepal is possibly the worst thing ever. everything here is dirty, and i frequently find ants and spiders crawling in my bed. they only eat rice and this spicy curry where i live, so i had to go out and spend so much money everyday on SOUP. ghaa! sometimes the water isnt working or its not hot so you cant just shower when you want to. And all you really want is to be at home with your mom bringing you tea.
so i got super homesick! yes.. nepal is not only nice mountains beautiful weather and holy cows roaming the streets.
good news: IM BETTER NOW!
i went back to the orphanage yesterday after being gone for a week and it was wonderful. the children are so amazing. i made popsicle picture frames with them, painted and made baskets out of plastic bottles. being an art teacher is the best job
i would write more but i have no more money to stay on the internet right now.
i hope you are all happy at home, go out and make snow angles! enjoy the snow.
muchos love

everyday life

It's now been about a week since i've moved to pokhara, and so far so good.
A daily routine in the life of caro:
-wake up 6:30am
-breakfast (tea & crackers) 7:00 am
-walk to the orphanage, arrive 7:30 am
-homework with the kids untill 8:30 am
-breakfast with the kids (dal vat aka rice & curry & this wierd lentil soup that goes ontop of everything) 8:30am
-help the children get dressed for school
-walk them to school 10:00 am
-back to the orphanage to sweep & mop the place
-lunch (dal vat) 11:30 am
-free time/ random jobs untill the kids are back at 3:30 pm
-playtime /art time for me!
-snack 4:30 pm
-homework (again) from 5 on
we leave to go back to our house around 5:30 pm
-dinner at home (dal vat) 7 pm
-free time
usually in bed by 9 or 9:30

crazzyy days.
we can take up to two days off a week if we want, i took sat & sunday.
Saturday me, raph, julia & ramona hiked up to Sarangkot, a village at the very top of this mountain. it took us mabey 2 & 1/2 hrs up, & 1 hour to walk to the mountain from the road.
sooo beautiful! we stoped at this yoga place along to way just to check it out & we got free homemade tea! the view was unbelivable. from the top we could see on one side the lake & pokhara, and the other side the himalayas and a big valley with a tibetan refugee camp.
we took a local bus down the hill. haha oh man... what an experience. it was ridiculously packed and a couple times i thought we might tip over. I was trying to focus really hard on the road through mabey 20 heads standing infront of me, ( and i was at the front of the bus) so that i wouldnt get car sick and puke on everyone. a lady sitting 2 rows down from me was throwing up out the window. wonderful
& today, sunday, me and 6 other volunteers rented boats (they look like big canoes painted in all these bright colours) and had a picnic out on the water while we sunbathed... just to rub it in, Im in shorts today!
so our days off have been really fun. we always try to plan an adventure or something to do!

oh btw, in the news paper today, they said they're extending the power cut to 16hrs a day.
& a downside about nepal, it is super poluted. there are no garbage cans anywhere along the roads so the streets & much of the water is filled with garbage. they have no "garbage pick up days" so everyone burns the garbage in their fields. it smells terrible and is so bad for the environment, it sucks.

ps. i had a dream last night that i went home for the weekend just to see everyone & then came right back

sending you all love

Phase: 2 NEPAL!!!

Namaste! (translation: hello, it also means the light inside of me bows down to the light inside of you)
you ALL need to come to Nepal!

so I got here jan 2nd, the airport is a big joke. I spent 2 days in Kathmandu, more specificaly Thamel, which is the tourist ghetto. Shops like you've never seen, all selling the same things. Jewlery, pashminas, knitted clothing, trekking clothes etc. restaurants everywhere! the smallest streets ever packed with taxis, rickshaws and motorcycles. Motorcycles in Nepal is like Bikes in montreal. There are millions and they're everywhere! I met a bunch of backapackers, most heading for the mountains to trek. I then took a bus to Pokhara, the next biggest city & its closer to the mountains. The bus ride was like nothing ive ever been on before, its a 5 hr trip, you are in these sketchy old school buses & you drive through the mountains to get there. There are so many little villages on the way that are beautiful!
Im staying at the handicraft center/guest house. its super nice, and has electricity! its a 30 min walk from the orphanage, but it only takes 15 by bike. there are 72 children!!! they are sooo cute & nice. I met them all for the first time today, and im trying to learn all the names by the end of the week. (trust me its hard, the names are Nepalise and i cant pronounce half of them)
The orphanage reminds me of camp, its such a happy place and if i was any other child who lived near by I would be jealous to not be a part of it.
they call me auntie! and they call the boy volunteers uncle. there are 8 volunteers here right now, but people come and go at different times. I live in Damside, and Lakeside which is where all the tourist are is 15 mins away. Lakeside is full of stores and restaurants and bars, (its like thamel by the water) so the volunteers can hang out there, and we can spend our days off there aswell.
theres so much to do here! I want to do a 5 day trek in the mountains, and go paragliding, and go to the national park and wash elephants!
in the morning out the window from my room i can see the himalayas. they are right there! during the day they're covered in clouds though.
oh also! theres 14 hr cuts of electricity per day!! so ive stoked up on candles.
and the time difference from here to montreal is 10 hours and 45 mins. so im living life 10hrs & 45 mins before you! haha. this also means its very hard for me to call home ever, seeing as when I possibly could there is usually no electricity.

I hope you are all well & send me e-mails I love hearing from home!
bisoux

Phase 1: Lebanon

Ahhh okay,
lebanon. My 10 day trip in and around Beirut:
highlights

It's a beautiful country, one side the mountains, the other the mediteranian. its nice yes, and has amazing food, but i got very sick. I think it was from the water or something I ate, but I spend 2 days in bed and the rest eating bread and rice & im still feeling the effects.
New years: wonderful! best part of my trip there. I spent the day with charlie prince, & we went to a market and there were all these little stores one just selling buttons, all kinds of buttons. one selling eggs; brown, white, light & dark one. boys selling fireworks on the street, which we later bought a bag full of from. and fireworks being set off sparaticaly!
we took a city bus & ate the best falafel i have ever had! (sorry dad)
at midnight, we went onto the rooftop to set off the fireworks, it was amazing.
such a thrill being on the rooftops in beirut just like everyone else, setting off fireworks in the sky.

Introduction

hey!
okay, so ive resorted to writting a blog to keep people updated because im having troule keeping track of who & who doesn't want to be receiving e-mails!

I have tried writting long detailed messages about my adventures so far, but internet wherever i go is not so great, and tends to either shut down or run out as im in the middle or finishing my message. this is why none of you have heard from me yet!

when i can, I will come on and update in a couple phrases and pictures, what im up to!

I do think of home often even as i travel, and I hope you are all well and enjoying the new year!
i love you guys!