Wednesday, 16 December 2015
Hello everyone
It is now mid-December. Where did another year go? I want to wish
everyone a great Christmas and New Year.
I’ll also fill you in with what has been happening. I am back in Laos after a nine-week jaunt to
Uzbekistan and India. I LOVE being
back.
I’d written this letter and found a whole lot
of photos to put in it. Of course when I
went to send it, the file was way to big to send. So what I’ve done is made a blog post with all
the photos. margsgapyear.blogspot.com
I think you all know the story. In June-July I
studied for a CELTA certificate (Certificate of English Language Teaching to
Adults). This meant moving to Melbourne
to live with friends for the 5 weeks. It
is the hardest study I have ever done. It was over 20 years since I had lived
in the city. Some things had changed,
but many had stayed the same. 25years
ago I lived in a house in Scotchmer Street, North Fitzroy and this year I moved
back to stay in the same street! (different number)
In August after packing up my life in
Australia I travelled to Laos with the intention of doing volunteer English
teaching. I spent time helping at a number of schools. My favourite being @My Library run by an
American woman Carol who has created a very special and successful space. Generally I’d say that young Lao people are
very eager to learn English and are a delight to spend time with. Age is no
barrier to them and they seem to genuinely like being with you.
I also spent time helping my young friend On
to improve his English. We didn’t spend
nearly as much time on me learning Lao.
In many ways, this is a relatively easy place
to live. There is quite a large expat community here- many volunteer teachers
and people working for NGO’s. There are
some very dedicated and impressive people.
I could probably say I have more of a social life here than at
home. There are also quite a number of
retired people who visit a few months a year to help teach English.
After about 8 weeks in Laos I went off for 9
weeks in Uzbekistan and then India. This
had been planned for well over a year, even before Mum died and I decided to
come to Laos.
From the hot, humid wet season in Laos to
Autumn in Uzbekistan was a lovely change.
Autumn leaves and trees changing colour and beautiful autumn days. Uzbekistan is a former soviet state. The architecture continually reminds you of
that, and it’s not all bad. (Beautiful mosaics on the side of “Stalinsky"
buildings (buildings built in the time of Stalin). The Registan in Samarkand must be one of the
wonders of the world. You can’t grasp
the scale until you are actually there.
Uzbeks don’t do small when it comes to public buildings.
The tour I did was an artisan tour and was
wonderful – amazing textiles – ikat being my favourite. We saw woodblock printers, weavers, dyers,
woodworkers, instrument makers, potters, miniature painters and on and on it
goes. The Uzbekistan I experienced was a very refined place, with our lovely
guide Mirza quoting poetry to us. I know
there is also corruption and poverty and over 5 million Uzbeks have left the
country to find work. I know too that
the people are extremely friendly and
welcoming and grow the best tomatoes in the world. (How’s that for a statement!!)
And then India on the way back to Laos. I did an Intrepid tour as I’d never been to
India before and thought I may find it overwhelming. (I was right there!) It is amazing and there are incredible things
to see, but I didn’t find it an easy place to be. There are people with very little in Laos but
in India, the poverty and desperation
were multiplied, probably because of the large population, and just so
“in your face”. I felt at times
that I could just disappear and no one would notice.
There were however, saris. saris and more
saris. And the beautiful tops and pants that women wear. No matter how much money women may have they
can still look stunning. The sari is a
very elegant item of clothing and I love the unusual colour combinations that
people put together.
Our tour was mostly of Rajasthan so as I said,
we saw amazing things. The three J’s
-Jaipur, Jodhpur and Jaisalmer, also the beautiful Uidapur. (We stayed next to where part of Marigold
Hotel was filmed.) Varanassi was very moving and we visited Sarnath where
Buddha preached his first sermon.
The Taj Mahal is absolutely stunning. It was made more so when we sat drinking
G&T’s on the terrace at the Oberoi Amarvilas with the Taj in the
Background. That was one of the
highlights. What a hoot, it’s in the
blog
margsgapyear.blogspot.com
After the tour I went to Gujarat and up to
Kutch because there are many different communities who each have their own
style of textiles. Not as populated
there. Lots of places I was the only
foreigner. People often ask to have
their photos taken with you. There will
be lots of family snaps with me in them and the baby of the family with a
horrified look on it’s face thinking “who is this strange looking person my
mother wants me to be next to?”
And back to Laos and it was festival time in
Luang Prabang. Lao people love a festival. So what is to celebrate you may
ask? Well there was the Luang Prabang
film festival which showed about 20 films from South East Asia over 5
days.. Then there was 20 years
celebration of Luang Prabang receiving world heritage status and 40 years since the monarchy were ousted and Laos
became a “Peoples Democratic Republic” and lastly the elephants came to
town. Laos has been known as “the land
of a million elephants” but only 900 remain. A group of people walked with 12
elephants from Sayabouri province to Luang Prabang and educated people along
the way about the importance of preserving the elephants.
Luang Prabang is a beautiful city surrounded by “mountains”
(or else pretty big hills) covered in lush green vegetation. There is French colonial architecture and
what feels like a temple on almost every block (there are 34). It is the ancient capital of Laos and the
second largest city in the country but only has a population of 76 thousand, so
it’s smaller than Bendigo. The
population of the whole of Laos is only 6 million so for south east Asia it has
a very small population. The old city is
on a promontory surrounded by the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers which certainly
adds to its beauty. Having dinner by the
side of the Mekong at sunset is what dreams are made of.
People are friendly and shy.. Even I run into
people I know. I smile at every novice
on the street because there are novices in all classes. They are all boys/young men with shaved heads
and saffron robes, so unless i have got to know someone well, I wouldn’t know
if I have met them before. And smiling is a good policy I’ve decided.
I have picked up English teaching again and
will build up classes over the next little while. One young man I am helping learnt Vietnamese
and did his nursing training there. He
now has a job in a hospital here and needs to pass an exam in English on
“Decontamination and Sterilisation” with a view to working in what was CSSD
when I trained. The textbook he has been
given is incredibly difficult (for me, let alone him) so we are working on
that. It’s amazing how many medical
terms are stored away in the back of my brain, but I’m also learning lots. He
is a very impressive young man tackling a very difficult task. And I help the monks and novices at my local
temple learn English. I go to their
chanting in the evenings about 4 times a week which is one of the things I love most about being
here.
I’m sending my CV around in the hope of
getting govt recognised volunteer work or paid work as I’d love to stay. I’m also sending it to the Lao Friends
Hospital for Children. This is a
wonderful venture and funded mostly by donations. The mortality stats for
children are terrible with 6% of children dying before the age of 5 - and most
die from preventable diseases such as malaria and dysentary! The Hospital needs volunteers and though I’m
no longer a nurse the skills from my previous job may be of use to them because
they go out to villages doing health education.
I know Christmas is only a little over a week
away but it doesn’t feel like it.
Being a buddhist country, there is no fuss and hype here, or the crazy
busy buildup to Christmas, which is delightful.
For you, I wish a peaceful Christmas and New Year spent with
those you love.
Love
Marg
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