First two days in Nepal with The Leprosy Mission.

I am writing this blog post from my room in Anandaban Hospital’s Training Centre; it has the most beautiful view of the local village and hills out of my window, but I also get the sound of the honking, clattering trucks as they drive along the rugged roads through the village.

Driving here is very different to the UK, I experienced this when I first arrived in Nepal on Tuesday, even driving out of Kathmandu Airport’s car park was an experience of harsh breaking and clashing horns. I think the highway code in Nepal states that if there is a car in front of you, you have to honk your horn and overtake it…. even if there’s monkeys, ducks, goats or people in the road.. they’ll move out your way! The roads leading up to Anandaban are rugged, with steep drops at the roadside, with no barriers to protect the cars from falling… this only unnerved me when we were inches from the edge while overtaking wide trucks. Honestly though, I did have complete trust in the driver, despite the chaotic road system, I have not yet seen any crashes.. so there must be method in the madness!

Upon arrival at the Hospital we were greeted by some of the staff and then given some Nepalese food from dinner, a welcome taste after the aeroplane meals I’d been munching on over the past 12 hours. We then went upstairs for the evening devotions, when I say upstairs I mean we had to climb the 365 steps that separate the Training Centre from the main hospital compound, as Anandaban sits neatly on a hill. 

Sleep quickly engulfed me after arriving back from the devotions, the next morning I awoke to birdsong (beautiful!) and the clatter and honking of trucks (not so beautiful!). After figuring out the complex shower system (with a three tap combination) and tucking into a tasty breakfast we got stuck into a day of touring the hospital, self care, and research facilities - which also involved climbing up and down the 365 stair path two more times today, I think my legs will be pure muscle when I get home! It was great to learn more about leprosy, meet a few of the patients, see the facilities, and hear about how the research into leprosy is developing.

(A sample of leprosy bacteria)

Today came to an end with a walk into the local village, this was an amazing way to start our first full day in Nepal as it gave context to the lives of the leprosy patients before they entered the hospital, and the lives they will come back to when they are cured and leave Anandaban. It was also an amazing opportunity to meet some of the locals and the children especially enjoyed our visit. 

And so our first full day in Nepal has come to an end, and I am excited to start capturing the lives of the people in the hospital and who attend the clinics around Nepal. I will be flying to a satellite clinic in the Terai area of Nepal from Thursday till Sunday, so I'll update you on that when I'm back!