John Tyman's
Cultures in Context Series
NEPAL 
PART THREE : LIFE IN THE MIDLANDS 
A Child's Day
414-446
www.johntyman/nepal
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414. Though children are unlikely to wake up quite as early as their parents they may well be up before the sun, and after washing themselves at the spring, they will be given a cup of tea ... and some popcorn too, if they’re lucky.
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415. After that they will  be given chores to do -- like carrying manure from the farmyard to the fields with the help of a basket (dhoko) and rubber thongs.
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416. If the family has ducks they will be taken to the pond.
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417. And their goats get their first meal of the day.
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418. Alternatively, there may be enough daylight now for children to finish their school homework, and get checked for head lice before they leave home.
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419. For “lunch” they will eat the same food as their parents -- the usual  mixture of rice, dhal, and vegetables, and/or may be porridge. Afterwards they will head for school with their friends. Classes start at 10.00 o’clock.
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420. The school at Ramja Thanti was built 27 years ago by local people, using brick as well as stone, with financial assistance from overseas donors, and some help from UNESCO.
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421. It has classes for grades 1 to 10, with one class per grade, and a total school enrolment of around 600  -- though the total number of people actually living in or close to Ramja Thanti is scarcely more than a thousand.
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422. Many villages are too small to have schools of their own, and children must travel to the nearest one ... sometimes walking for an hour and a half  each way. They do not bother with school uniforms.
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423. The teachers working in the secondary department  are all college graduates (or close to finishing their courses) but not those working in the lower grades.
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424. Low caste children like these have very little chance of ever going to school, not because they are excluded by their status but because their parents could not afford to send them. Education is supposed to be free, but parents have to pay for teaching materials. And many children are also required to stay  at home ... to work.
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425. Instead low caste children, and those of the poorest Brahman families, will continue doing chores, work alongside their parents in the fields, or take their family's animals (or those of neighbours) to common pastures high above the village, and look after them there all day.
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426. Those lucky enough to attend school you will sit on benches. They have books to write in and pencils to write with, but there will be no other equipment: no computers or videos or tape recorders; not even a library.
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427. They will learn mostly by writing down what the teacher tells them and repeating it again and again till they know it by heart.  This has been the traditional method of education throughout the Indian subcontinent. Every month or so they are given a test, to make sure they don't forget. [Video Extract 11]
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428.  Till recently the school did not have a toilet block, which was clearly a health hazard for a school of that size. They now have one with views to Annapurna!
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429. And this explains this school assembly. Some years earlier I had been able to pay for its construction -- providing employment for a team of workers over several months -- and when I visited Ramja there was a civic reception. [Video Extract 12]
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430. There was the usual round of speeches with typically Nepalese tributes, involving vermillion paste and garlands of rhododendrons.
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431. A small choir entertained the audience in a bracket of  songs, with a harmonium accompaniment, much as school choirs do at assemblies in other countries.
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432. And  there were folk dances, too, including one entitled: “Why tell me you are a good traditional girl when you dress the way you do?” [Video Extract 12]
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433. At the end the teachers distributed a stack of lollies I had brought from Australia, and there was a near riot!
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434. Ramja had the only secondary department in the area but there was a very much smaller primary school an hour or more’s walk away.
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435. I arrived during their sports period when everyone was outside for a game of "Cat and Mouse" -- in which two players were blindfolded and made appropriate noises, to allow the cat to chase the mouse and the mouse to flee from the sound of the cat, while the others provided a safety barrier. [Video Extract 13]
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436. This was followed by another game -- kapardi --  which I vaguely remember from school in England, in which teams tried to penetrate the territory of the other side without being tagged.
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437.  These were both team games and part of  the school’s program, but I also saw  individual children compete in juggling  pieces of bamboo before school -- in a game known as dandibiawo.
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438. In the middle of the school day children have a break but are unlikely to have any food. There are no tuck shops here, and most parents cannot afford to give their children anything to eat then. The few children who have money in Ramja can spend it at the sweet shop.
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439. School will finish at 4.00 p.m., when children will return home for another round of chores. Some will have a snack first -- of popcorn or bread --  but many will have nothing to eat then. Some will now help around the house, maybe grinding flour for the evening meal.
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440. Others will return to the fields, to spread manure perhaps or help with irrigation; or they may collect leaves from the bush -- either dead ones for the compost pile or green ones for the animals to eat. Leaves may also be burnt in the fields to add ash to the soil.
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441. Their parents will have been working all day, either in the fields or in the woods, and they will return close to sunset. The evening meal -- usually identical to that eaten in the morning -- will be ready in an hour or so.
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442. After that children often listen to their parents talking, since it’s now too dark for them to do their homework (though some may struggle to do so by candle light). Having no TV to watch, people here enjoy each other's company, and talk at length.
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443. Children attend school for six days each week -- from Sunday to Friday. Saturday is their day off -- at least they have no lessons then. Instead, they must help their parents --  maybe collecting firewood or fodder from the forest, or dung deposited on upland pastures.
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444. To do this they will leave home after “lunch” at 10.00 a.m., having completed their morning chores, walk for two hours to reach the forest, work there for an hour or two, and then walk for another two hours to get home in time for their evening chores. [Video Extract 10]
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445. The children of occupational castes are likely to work at home. The blacksmith's son will help in his father’s workshop, working with steel, and maintaining the traditions of his group.
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446. In the same way those born to a family of tailors are likely to spend their day off making clothes, so they can  follow in their parents' footsteps one day -- which they are almost certain to do, since they have little chance here of escaping the limitations imposed on them by their birth.
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NEPAL CONTENTS


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