Learning to read the cultural landscape of Nepal

There are real fears and then there are baby fears. Real fears are those where your life might actually be in danger, or at least you are in a potentially dangerous situation. Baby fears are the ones that I confront every day here in Nepal. Fears that are related to everyday things. When you boundaries of comfort are stretched or even overstepped. Like the other day. My sweet Nepali teacher pushed me out the door and ordered me not to come back before I talked to enough people and I had 20 new words to show for it. Wouldn't take no for an answer and just told me that unless I overcame my fear of being in the(my expression)idiot-phase I would never learn to speak Nepali. For those of you who has ever studied another language you know the phase I am talking about, when you know very little useful stuff, mostly grammatical structures and a bunch of words that don't seem to string together like peacock and I am late for class.

My teacher is a smart lady and she probably sensed my hesitation so she drew a small map over the area of central Kathmandu, patted me on the back and said -go find this market and then come back with your words and the name of the god that is in the center of the bazaar.

So I grabbed my Nepaali kitaab ra kaleb ra kopi (my book with Nepali glossary, pen and pad)

and went into the street. Figured I might as well get in to it and prepared a little speeach in my head that probably sounded very similar to this, but in Nepali then

- Hallo! Howareyoumynameismariaandistudynepali.Whatisthat?

At this point I certainly have the attention of the shopkeeper who look at wnere my finger in pointing.

-Eh...bread, he says in English. But I don't give up and repeat slower "Ma Napali PaDnchuu" which if I am lucky translates to I study Nepali but if not so lucky "I fart Nepali"... Nepali people might have a good sense of humor but they are also kind enough to recognize a good try. So after getting my first word and learning that it roughly translates into "white, sliced English bread" on I go At the tailors I repeat my speech. He looks scared when I point at the suits.

-No Madam. Not for ladies! It takes a while to calm him down and find out that suit is also suit in Nepali. That figures. Cashews sounds vaguely the same but almonds are 'peanuts from the Terai', the area near the border of Nepal that I soon will be working in.

The nicest word I learn was Maya, which mean love in Nepali. Nice one.