Namaste, Out the Road Blog

Hello Everyone,

Well I have spent my 45th birthday halfway around the world, and a world away from where I was born and where I live.

On January 12th we made our way to the airport, despite Kathmandu traffic, and recovered our last piece of luggage. On our way back to the Summit Hotel we witnessed another of the Nepali strikes and had to make a detour, but we made it back safe and sound.

As with the other piece of luggage everything inside was damp so we had to air it all out.

After our trip to airport, we made our way to Children's Home to pay a visit to Ellie's didi, Niru. Kathy and Clare, another adoptive parent and her daughter went to pay one last visit to Children's Home before they left today, Sunday the 13th. It was quite emotional for Kathy and she said the event brought home how real and final this part of the journey is, even more so than getting Clare's final papers.

You can see photographs of the reunion as well as some of the sights of Kathmandu if you click here.

The children at the home are so sweet and lovable and as soon as you walk into the room they want to he held and loved. Most of the toddlers in the Faith International room at Children's Home already have referrals the infants that have come in as of late unfortunately are not. We can only hope that the delay will not last much longer and these children will also have a new lease on life soon.

After our quite emotional and chaotic visit, Patti, Ellie, Kathy, Clare and I walked to the Red Dingo to have dinner. It is a nice restaurant with a western flavor. The food was great and the company was unsurpassed. We meet a new couple Elsa and Greg, who will be getting their son Nolan very soon. The minister has not yet signed off on their paper work and although they have him in the room right now he will have to go back to Children's Home this evening, heartbreaking but as they say in Nepal, what to do?

Ellie went down for the night without fuss and slept most of the night. She has had her first nap that lasted 2+ hours today and is up and feeling fine. Walking the balcony and tossing her Cheerios. We have a week now to wait for the final meeting on Friday and then we finalize plans to come back to the states.

Hope you all are doing well, despite Ellie and Patti having colds and my lingering Nepali cough we are doing well and cannot wait to introduce her to all of her new family and friends when we get back home.

Kathy and Clare left this morning and hopefully are on their flight to Bangkok and then to Los Angeles on their way to Memphis. We wish them all the best.

One of the great parts about being on this adventure has been meeting the parents and their newly adopted children. Lori and Graham left two days ago and should be home now. Now Kathy and Clare are on their way back and as we wait for our time to leave more families arrive and we make new friends.

Lots of love,
Andy

Hello from Nepal, I had expected to be able to write each evening for a few minutes but have not been able to manage it.

Patti and Ellie are doing well. Although Ellie had a problem throwing up on Tuesday and seems to be fussy this morning. I will leave most of the writing about Ellie to Patti. She is however quite an amazing little girl. She is very independent except now she seems to realize that she has someone to give her their undivided attention and she is loving it.

On our first full day here Patti had a meeting at the Nepali Ministry and is now officially Ellie's mom. Although, there are still quite a few meetings and paper work that have to be finalized before we can depart for home.

Kathmandu is not like any other place I have experienced. As a matter of fact nothing even comes close. The traffic is thick, very thick. But a gentelman, Michael from Western Australia who I meet last night, made a good point the traffic does not move nearly as fast as in the states, you rarely make it to 40 mph. There is some how structure to it all one "rule" is that you are only responsible for what is in front of you not behind like in the west. If you are merging left in the undefined lanes it is the person behind you who has responsibility not to hit you. Needless to say that there are lots of horns being blown in the streets.

I was able to get to two holy sites on Monday, the first Pashupati, the holiest Hindu site in Nepal. Every Hindu makes at least one pilgrimage to this site in their life time. There are 108 temples on the site and the river running through it is considered holy. The Hindu people do not bury their dead they are cremated at the banks of this river and the ashes are pushed in and are washed downstream. The only exception to the burial rule is for the holy men they are seen as having achieved the highest level of being and are buried in the ground.

I was also able to visit what is considered the oldest Buddhists, Stupa Bouddahanath, although unconfirmed. The two religions are very different and the telling of them would be much to involved to go into here. The Stupa is a beautiful structure and it is surrounded by many shops and interesting people.

On Tuesday it was a down day, only leaving the property of the Summit Hotel to shop for Ellie at the Namaste Supermarket since her suitcase with most of her provisions have yet to arrive in Kathmandu. Hopefully it will come today. As they say in Nepal "what to do".

For now goodbye and I will try to get some photos and more writing up soon.

Patti and I arrived safely in Nepal. Ellie is with us and adapting well. It was a long journey which we will both tell you about soon. Just wanted to get out a post to everyone letting you know we are here and that everone is fine. All our love to all of you.

Coming from a small town Tennessee boy let me tell you there is nothing quite like Kathmandu. More to come.

ANdy

Full name: Nepal

Population: 26.3 million (UN, 2005)

Capital: Kathmandu

Area: 147,181 sq km (56,827 sq miles)

Major language: Nepali

Major religions: Hinduism (official), Buddhism

Life expectancy: 61 years (men), 62 years (women) (UN)

Monetary unit: 1 Nepalese rupee = 100 paisa

Main exports: Carpets, clothing, leather goods, jute goods, grain

GNI per capita: US $270 (World Bank, 2006)

Internet domain: .np

International dialling code: +977

We are headed to Nepal. Keep coming back we will be updating the blog as often as possible with photos and stories. If you subscribe to this blog you will receive an email when there is an update.

Here is a link to a blog about Hindu Rituals. A great explanation of the Namaste greeting is given here under the third and fourth headings.

Namaste -andy