The house is large : On the ground floor there is the "boys room " which sleeps 4 , the dining /common room and the kitchen . The first floor has the "girls room" which sleeps 5 , two family rooms which sleep 3 each and the living room . I have to say that the bed isn't much more than a piece of plywood attached to four legs , but after buying a foam mattress for camping and adding a blanket under the sleeping bag , Im kind of getting used to it . The aches every morning seem to be getting less and less. There is a bathroom shared amongst approx. 5 . The shower is just a tap at an awkward height but it gets ya clean so whatever..
The second floor sleeps the two guys who run the "Volunteer Nepal " and also Kalpana who is our "Didi" - the girl who cooks and cleans in the volunteer house . We get two meals a day . Breakfast which is mainly toast and eggs and dinner which switches between pasta and "Dhal Bhat" which is the Nepali staple diet of rice and lentils. Its great to be cooked for ! The kitchen consists of a couple of gas burners so at least you can always boil water .
The electricity comes on irregularly ...mainly we eat dinner at 6 in the pitch dark except with candles and torches. I think the schedule for electricity changes week to week ...so certain areas get it for 6hrs in rotation ...this week its on from around 8am . We get hot water from the solar panels on the roof ( that's if its sunny ..which hasn't been too common in the last 10 days) , plus you need to hit the right time of the day to get a warm shower before all the other volunteers fight you for it . Might be nice to get a luke warm shower and be clean again but its rare that you can dry your hair afterwards due to the electricity black outs. The washing machine consists of a bucket , a stool and a cold water tap on the roof ...I did try but even if you can get the clothes clean you then leave them to dry on the line in the Kathmandu pollution ...so I gave up and will go into Thamel once a week and pay for my laundry to get done ! Also a perfect excuse to eat a pizza or some western food !
What you cant see in the photos is that its SOOOO cold !! It can reach around 16C during the day but at night its between 1 and 3C and when there is no heating its as cold inside as it is outside . Often you wake up or go to bed and you can see your breath . My worst nightmare ...big change from my 24C heated home. I had to buy a new sleeping bag because the piddly wee summer thing I brought wasn't much more than a sheet . So with that plus two blankets plus wearing all my ski thermals, pyjamas and a primaloft gilet plus my big yaks wool socks I can finally sleep at night . Sitting around the volunteer house consists of wearing the thermals , plus another 3 layers plus a blanket . Baltic !!! Bring on summer !
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