Yesterday, I was given a written invitation to attend an event to launch the Orientation programme for the Hotel management course at KGIST (a sister college to SPA in Dhangadhi.) I was not eniorely sure what that might involve, but I was very happy to take any opportunity offered to me. Yogi and I walked the short distance to the Riddhu Siddhi Party Palace, where it was taken place.
And quite the event it turned out to be. We were greeted at the door, presented with decorated scarves, and shown to our places on the front row of a large auditorium – it seemed I was a guest of honour. As such, I was expected to give a short speech, and I have to confess that some sort of instant plan for this did occupy my thoughts for quite a while.
There was quite a crowd. The front row was filled, on an array of sofas and armchairs, the various dignitaries. And behind us, one side of the hall had the new intake, smartly dressed in formal black trousers, white shirt and tie, with their parents and supporters filling the other half. There were a number of speeches, delivered in English, Nepali, or a mixture of the two (one gentleman, whose speech was otherwise entirely in Nepali, did emphasise that the key qualities were “discipline, discipline, discipline”, which rather put me in mind of Tony Blair.) But I was particularly entranced by the songs and dances which interspersed them, the dances mostly in traditional dress, and all different, and a variety of songs to various backing tracks, including two Nepali rap numbers. One dancer in particular grabbed my attention (and luckily she was involved in several dances.) Not only was she a terrific dancer, she was clearly enjoying herself immensely, her personality pouring out. In the couple of dances she performed with a partner, which clearly seemed to be telling a story, she imbued her character with life. She was also, incidentally (or not) beautiful.
My own contributions went well enough. I did present each student with a scarf and a namaste as they came past me. There were lots of them, and it inevitably became something of a production line, aided by a lady with a pile of scarves, and a man unfolding each one. And then my speech. I know, of course, nothing about Hotel Management, except from the point of view of a customer, so that was what I focused on, telling them that in my opinion a great hotel did not depend on how many stars, the marble in the foyer, the size of the swimming pool, but the people, the management and each person the guest encounters. Of course, I don’t know how much of it was understood, but I was pleased enough with what I had come up with.
(NB – photos of this event to follow)
And then I had to make my excuses and leave, for I had to take a taxi (or rather, so far as I am concerned, the taxi) out to the airport to meet Val. It was small enough for me to be able to wander around the side of the terminal building to take some photos; I had hoped to be able to catch one of the plane coming in, but it caught me by surprise, and I had to be content with one of it taxi-ing in to the terminal. And of Val making her way off the plane. Strange that, for the second time, only forty years apart, I found myself staring through a chain-link fence at Val descending the aircraft steps.
In the evening, we had been invited to dinner at Anu’s house, travelling there in a tuk-tuk with Aparna and Eva (braving some rocky terrain over the extensive roadworks.) And a splendid evening we had. It’s true it did seem to take forever for dinner to arrive, but we passed the time pleasantly, chatting with Anu’s husband and son, and with her mother-in-law determined to squeeze some bangles onto Val’s wrists. It was no easy matter – Val has big hands – and several bangles came to grief, but persistence paid off, and eventually Val had two on each wrist.
Dinner was splendid. Anu had very kindly left out most of the spice, for our (my) benefit, but it was all delicious. It helped that, for the first time since I arrived, I had an appetite. But before that, it had suddenly occurred to me that we ight have a serious problem getting back into our building; I had been warned that it would be locked at nine each night. But a swift message to Yogi, and we were assured there would be a key waiting for us at the college gate, with security. The guard came with us to unlock the building… only to discover it was not locked, but bolted from the inside. Which did mean there had to be someone there. The guard made a phone call, and in a couple of minutes a couple of surprised people came down to let us in. Home.
