Daily life in Koraput

After struggling to use the VSO blogsite for a couple of months I've decided to move to this site which I find easier to use and hopefully I'll be able to create nicer looking blogs.  The VSO site is fine for just adding text (once you work out how to get round word-wrapping problems) but harder to add photos.  All I have to do now is take more photos!

People walk miles to get to work and school, here from the reservoir in the valley below the SPREAD office

 The first week and a half here has been a strange mixture of good and not so good.  People in the town have been really friendly and the guys in the office have gone out of their way to make us feel at home.  Rosie, a young woman who lives in a small house just around the corner greets us with huge smiles every time we see her, has invited us into her home to drink cha and talk to her (she speaks excellent English), translating for her parents who sit listening but not understanding much of what we say.  She said she was really excited to be able to talk to foreigners for the first time and has pledged friendship for life, wanting to know all about our families and why we had come to India.  Her family has very little possessions and their survival is clearly tough-going but they seemed very happy and Rosie is learning computers at college.  She is worried that she won't be able to get a job to help her family, it would be nice to think that the work done by us volunteers may go some way towards helping to improve work opportunities for the locals.  I wonder if I could employ her for a while to help me learn Oriya?

My new boss had to go away on business just after we arrived in Koraput and we haven't seen him again since although we've spoken briefly by phone and email.  Hopefully he'll be back soon as I am struggling to find work to do to occupy myself while at the office.  At times like this I wish I was a Communications Adviosr as you can make quick wins by looking at existing documents and proposing style improvements and standardising the formats, creating templates to help the process (that's Margaret's job).  However, I don't know that I can start to advise on creating an organisation development strategy without first talking to the NGO director!   I'm sure that when he arrives I'll be able to make a start and Margaret and I are likely to need quite closely together on some things and pool our expertise to make real headway.

But at least I've had plenty of time to settle in and sort out some of the essential things.  Except for opening a local bank account.  We are still waiting for the manager of the bank we've chosen to get back to us as he's waiting for special forms needed for foreigners accounts.  We've gone to see him a few times and each time he's said he'll chase it up.  Maybe it will be tomorrow?  The house is slowly drying out as the monsoon rains have slowed down a bit, I'm learning to live with those pesky mosquitoes and am getting a few more essential things sorted out.  We now have a saucepan that doesn't fall over on the stove and yesterday I found the spice stall and came home with little newspaper parcels tied up with string containing mustard, cumin and coriander seeds, cardomom pods and more fresh ginger roots.  I had another go at making baingan bartha last night and it does taste better with all the spices, much tastier.  I now need to find containers for the spices to keep the ants out and stop the seeds escaping all over the kitchen.

 

Morning view out of town

We entertained our first house-guest last night.  Mike, another new VSO volunteer arrived in town on Wednesday and is now living just a minute's walk up the road from me.  Mike has a very nice house but all the kit left behind by his predecessor has vanished from the place and he doesn't have a pot, pan, plate or anything to eat off.  So he now has our small saucepan that tips over on the stove to keep him going for a while.  Good luck Mike!  Mike is another British volunteer, working with one of the other Koraput NGOs SOVA, an organisation that specialises in HIV & AIDS issues. 

I reckon I'm losing weight quite rapidly in India.  It started in Delhi where it was so hot that my appetite disappeared and all I wanted to consume was water.  Koraput is much cooler and more comfortable but my diet has changed.  I'm now eating vegetarian all the time though at the moment this is very limited as I've not got round to doing any real stocking up in the house.  Banana sandwiches start to lose their attraction quite quickly when they're all you can find to eat for breakfast and lunch.  I'm sure this will reverse when I settle in more and find where to buy more different foods to give me more variety.  The office is right at the edge of town around a mile away and we walk to work every day and back home for lunch.  Nice walk when it's not too hot although there have been a few days when I''ve arrived at the office and proceeded to create a large puddle on the floor as the rainwater drains out of my clothing.  I put on a pair of trousers that I brought from home yesterday, deciding to revert back to home style instead of Indian clothes for once and they were far too big.  I now need to find a belt!

Morning commuter traffic on it's way into town, below our office