• Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Byers Without Borders

My WordPress Blog

  • Home
  • About Us
  • Blog

happy life

Retching Record

December 2, 2018 by byerswithoutborders 2 Comments

We’ve been doing this sort of thing for decades, Jen and I. We’ve negotiated transport and driver countless times. You think by now we would have learned to ask if the road is paved the entire way. I guess we’re slow learners.

This weekend’s excursion was to Rwanda’s western border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Unlike the flat savannahs of the east, western Rwanda is mountainous. So our five hour, partially-paved trip was overflowing with twists, switchbacks, and hairpin turns. Stella beat her Bhutan record and threw up four times during the ride. What a trooper, she collects airsickness bags from all our flights, knowing that we’re likely going to force some nausea inducing adventure on her.

Not helping matters was our driver’s aggressive acceleration-braking, characteristic of those who drive with two feet. Perhaps a technique for our zealous driver to more effectively overtake and pass every bicycle, car, minibus, and lorry that had the affrontery to occupy the road ahead of us. Through a complex semaphore of horn-honking and turn-signal flashing, he would communicate to the other motorists his desire to pass at the next convenient blind curve. Fatalistic drivers like this one always earn me a seat as shotgun. Jen knows that my life insurance has the higher payout. So instead of watching our driver attempt to squeeze three abreast, between an endless succession of buses and oncoming dump trucks, I focused out the side window, at the passing mountains of western Rwanda.

Around 5000 feet, the topography of western Rwanda reminds me a lot of Appalachia. However, being situated on the equator the curvature of these hills are clothed in a very different flora. In place of the mixed temperate forests of NC or VA, these mountains play host to a more tropical variety. Immediately outside of the capital, the land is parceled in an endless quiltwork of gardens, and small subsistence farms. Broad leaved-banana trees surround homes and run up to plots of corn, peas, sweet potato, melons, cassava. There are stands of bamboo, avocado trees, passion fruit vines. The valley floors are all sectioned into rectangled rice paddies. If any naked earth shows it is the red dirt of my childhood in GA. Shades of green and red are the dominant palate of these hills.

After a while I notice something missing. I’ve not seen any draft animals in Rwanda. There are no oxen tilling those paddies, no donkeys pulling carts of produce. I guess it makes sense. Rwanda is Africa’s most densely populated country. Labor here is cheap. We’re constantly passing bicycles laden down with small mountains of plantains, sweating men and boys pushing them to market.

Tea Plantation

As we get closer to our destination, the patchwork of gardens gives way to industrial-scale tea plantations. The waist high shrubs are so tightly packed, they make entire hillsides into bright green topiary. The only break, the occasional blue-grey stand of eucalyptus, identifiable by its scent as much as its silvery leaves. The plantations are community co-ops. In addition to a source of local income, these fields form natural barriers around Nyungwe Forest National Park.

Colobus Monkey

Nyungwe is Rwanda’s most important area of biodiversity. 1000 plant species, 13 species of primates including chimpanzee and colobus monkeys, 275 species of birds, 120 different types of butterfly. When we cross into the park we enter a world of nature left to its own business. Now the hills are obscured by curtains of green wild rainforest jungle. Blue monkeys eye us from the roadside and hornbills glide along the valleys. There is so much green it makes a racket for the eyes.

Rwandan soldiers also watch us from the roadside. In body armor, with an impressive array of machine guns, they are a reminder that we are on the border of the DRC. From our hotel room, we can look across Lake Kivu and into that no man’s land of civil war and Ebola. It’s like looking into North Korea, Syria, South Sudan, Yemen. Like standing at the edge of the grand canyon or the top of the Sears tower. It gives you the willies. Some travelers (with a poor sense of self-preservation) actually cross that border tracking gorilla, looking for adventure, hits of adrenalin.

For Byers Without Borders, the hotel buffet was adventure enough. Lily and I spent the majority of Monday prostrate on the cool tile floor of our bathroom in Kigali.

Filed Under: Family, Health Volunteers Overseas, Medical Volunteers Overseas, Travel, travel with kids, Uncategorized, Volunteer Tagged With: adventure, africa, family adventure, family travel, happy life, health volunteers overseas, Medical Mission, rwanda, travel, travel with kids, volunteer oveseas

Farewell & Thank you!!!

April 12, 2017 by byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

And just like that it’s over. A decade of wishing, a year’s worth of hard planning and scheming, and here we are looking out at the frighteningly short and narrow runway of the Paro airport, awaiting our departure. None of us want to leave, the time went too quick, evidence that our life here was too perfect.

And it was a perfect community of friends and loved ones who made it all possible. Thank you for supporting us with your insanely generous donations. Thank you Hunt Regional CRNAs for working your VACATIONS! Thank you, to all who didn’t doubt, question, or discourage this dream. It is without a doubt that Jen and I are at this place in our lives because of the myriad interactions we have had with each of you along the way. We are a web of lives, each touching the other, pluck one of us and who knows where the vibration will resound. You have all made this trip with us, you have all helped the people of Bhutan.

Thank you our gracious hosts and new friends.

 

Farewell

Filed Under: Bhutan, Health Volunteers Overseas, Kids Yoga & Mindfulness, Medical Volunteers Overseas Tagged With: Bhutan, byers to bhutan, family adventure, family travel, happy life, health volunteers overseas, himalayan adventure, living in Bhutan, Many thanks, Medical Mission, overseas volunteers, Travel Bhutan, with gratitude, Yoga anywhere, YoPlay International

YoPlay Away! Kids yoga can go anywhere.

April 10, 2017 by byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

Prior to my arrival in Bhutan, I reached out to the Early Learning Center, in Mothitang, to organize some volunteer work for the girls and myself. Having spent two years teaching English in Japan, volunteering in ELC’s English Literacy class was a no-brainer. However, when principle Madam Kueron discovered my current passion, YoPlay, my true role in Bhutan revealed itself.

Founded by Madam Deki, ELC is a very progressive school (grades K-12) that puts as much emphasis on kindness and respect as it does on academics. Every class period begins and ends with 2 minutes of quiet meditation (they call it brain brushing) because the teachers believe an upset, angry or distracted child can not be expected to learn. Therefore learning is preceded by prepping the mind. Imagine my enthusiasm when they asked if YoPlay could take the place of their performing arts class for the month. Turns out, that class was lacking a teacher during our time here. Serendipity.

Of course it was a mix of excitement and trepidation I felt as I started my first day of YoPlay-Bhutan. Their school culture is so different from our own; worry about how my program would translate sat like a rock in my stomach. Their day begins with morning assembly. Rows and columns of children in the courtyard, standing in near military formation. The National anthem is sung, prayers are said, announcements are made and achievements are recognized (acts of kindness, recycling efforts, gifts to the school). The whole thing can last up to an hour. And then there is the cold! Unlike our schools, Bhutanese schools have no central heating, shivering children are taken outside to “warm up” in the sun. Even answering questions is different in Bhutanese schools. Here children stand up when speaking, and must address their teacher as Sir or Madam. These and a thousand other little differences.

Worry, anxious prepping, nervous introductions…

And it’s was all for not. For all our differences, we are still so much alike. It is a fact that despite country or creed, children can not form themselves up into a circle. Partner poses will always illicit rowdiness requiring shushing and stern looks. And all children, no matter where they are from, love to pretend (a bonus for my guided meditations). Basically we’re all the same; born in Bhutan or Texas, kids are kids. If there is a tree they’ll try and climb it, if there is a puddle they’ll find a way to get wet.

After a month of classes I can say YoPlay-Bhutan soared! The children, so kind and appreciative, would swarm my girls during snack time. Each vying for the opportunity to share their Bhutanese snacks with the foreign visitors. The instructors requested a teacher training that was enthusiastically attended one Saturday. And even after my departure, the school surprised me by posting a yoga video for international children’s yoga day.

Stella often likes to say she has 108 hearts. And she’ll name each one, “My daddy-heart, my mommy-heart, my puppy-heart, my ice cream-heart…”. As the children of ELC sang us farewell at our final morning assembly, my tears and cracked voice were evidence of my very own, new Bhutan-Heart.

Filed Under: Bhutan, Kids Yoga & Mindfulness, Uncategorized Tagged With: Bhutan, byers to bhutan, family adventure, family travel, happy life, himalayan adventure, homeschool, kids yoga, living in Bhutan, mindfulness for kids, overseas volunteers, Yoga anywhere, YoPlay International

Bhutan, Advanced Settings:

March 30, 2017 by byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

Bhutan, Advanced Settings:

Bhutanese consider it impolite to say no. So they have many different forms of yes ranging from “very unlikely” to “it is certain”. If they say yes three times it’s definitely not happening. 

Bhutanese Ngultrum is the local currency. A one Nu bill is the smallest denomination; there are no coins. So when change of less than one Nu is owed, it is paid in hard candies or throat lozenges.  “Your change sir, 27 Nu and two peppermints”. 

Most Bhutanese parents take their newborns to the temple to receive auspicious names. Unfortunately, the monks don’t concern themselves much with surnames or gender. So Sonam the office girl who helped us with work permits is not Sonam, the boy who took us to Tiger Nest Monastery. Tashi Wangchuck one of my residents is no relation to the royal Wangchucks. 

My typical day starts with a short 20 minute walk to Jigme Dorji Wangchuck National Referral Hospital (JDWNRH). The pinnacle of the Bhutanese healthcare system, and where I will spend the morning in the OT (operating theater), doing hands-on clinical trading with two anesthesia residents. My afternoons are spent lecturing or various anesthesia topics. 

Until very recently Bhutan has been unable to train its own healthcare providers. Instead, doctors were trained in Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand and Cuba. JDWNRH and the attached Khesar Gyalpo University of Medical Sciences is trying to change this. It is the only teaching institute in the country and it is crawling with students, interns, and residents.


Filed Under: Bhutan, Health Volunteers Overseas, Medical Volunteers Overseas Tagged With: Bhutan, bhutan basics, byers to bhutan, family adventure, family travel, happy life, health volunteers overseas, himalayan adventure, living in Bhutan, Medical Mission, overseas volunteers, Travel Bhutan, typical day in Bhutan

Bhutan Basics

March 23, 2017 by byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

Bhutan basics:

National Bird- Raven

Favorite Food- Anything with chilies 

Fridge settings-Winter, Summer, Monsoon

Toilets- squat (bring paper unless adept at the Asian bidet, water bucket and a scoop)

They drive on the left, so step off a curb and look RIGHT not left (that lesson comes quickly).

At day 23, life here is starting to feel normal. Everyone is settled into a pleasant routine. 

With only three sets of clothes each (one for wearing, one for washing, and one backup) Jen’s day usually starts with some laundry. You have to hang it out early, so it will dry before the afternoon weather rolls in (cold fingers hanging up wet clothes in 30 degree temps). Our little washer is on the balcony with the clothes line. It took some practice figuring out what the “fuzzy” cycle was about. Also, to power the washer Jen has to unplug the microwave, and run the extension cord from the electric blanket through an open kitchen window, but the chore no longer produces the profanity it did early on. 

On teaching days her and the kids bundle into a taxi and head across town to the school where they teach English Literacy and Yoga. 

Without the rush to make morning assembly, they usually choose to walk back home, picking up ingredients for the evening’s dinner on their meandering. Back at the apartment, Jen is still the teacher, and it is time for the girls to do their own schoolwork. 

On non-teaching days, the girls all head straight to the pine forest above the apartment. Schoolwork is still on their schedule, only now their classroom comes with a view. They always seem to negotiate time to build a fort or play among the prayer flags at the end of their lessons. After, it’s back down into the valley for the day’s shopping, a visit to the telecom office, or perhaps a coffee with another volunteer. 

I normally catch up with the gang around 3:00. After snacks and snuggles, we try to go out on some adventure together in town. A trip to the National Library, Tashi Dzong, the archery grounds, or just a taxi ride up to the telecom reflector tower. 

Evenings… the same dinner, bath, hair-combing, teeth-brushing routine as home. Except it is Indian cable that provides the background chatter instead of DirecTV. Occasionally a power outage triggers some flashlight games. And a game of Uno is never far from reach. 

We certainly are lacking many of the comforts of home here. We’re cold a lot, and we haven’t yet found a decent slice of bread. But there is something to the simple life here. It’s like the difference between those diabetic desserts and those made with real sugar and lard. One is richer and more satisfying.

Filed Under: Bhutan Tagged With: Bhutan, bhutan basics, byers to bhutan, daily chores, family adventure, family travel, happy life, health volunteers overseas, himalayan adventure, Home away from home, homeschool, living in Bhutan, Medical Mission, overseas volunteers, Travel Bhutan, travel overseas, travel to Bhutan

Primary Sidebar

Recent Posts

DOWNtime

May 1, 2020 By byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

COVID Response Team

April 25, 2020 By byerswithoutborders 24 Comments

Luang Prabang

December 3, 2019 By byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

Train Trials

October 25, 2019 By byerswithoutborders Leave a Comment

Airport Schooling

October 15, 2019 By byerswithoutborders 3 Comments

Categories

  • Adventure
  • Africa
  • Bhutan
  • bus life
  • Bus Life
  • COVID-19 Response
  • Events
  • Family
  • For Parents
  • Health Volunteers Overseas
  • Hope
  • kids yoga
  • Kids Yoga & Mindfulness
  • Medical Volunteers Overseas
  • Mom Blog
  • nomad life
  • Rwanda
  • skoolie
  • transportation
  • Travel
  • travel with kids
  • Uncategorized
  • Volunteer

Archives

Footer

Latest Posts

DOWNtime

COVID Response Team

Luang Prabang

Train Trials

Airport Schooling

Follow Our Adventure

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube

© 2023 Byers Without Borders · Developed by Renaissance Web Solutions