elephant, transportation
Date: 1970 Location: Tribenisusta, Nawalparasi Description: Elephant (Ram Prasad) in sal forest, part of a royal family hunting party which included many elephants; at the time while working for the Groundwater Survey Project drilling test wells in this area our contract well driller, Carl Shanz recognized this elephant (he had previously drilled the first tube wells in the Kathmandu Valley back in the 1950's) and the elephant seemed to know Carl too from a time years before when 'together', they had led a hunting party that included King Mahendra and Queen Elizabeth!
elephant, transportation
Date: 1970 Location: Tribenisusta, Nawalparasi Description: Young elephant and tender in sal forest, part of a royal family hunting party that included many elephants. We encountered this party when we were encamped at a well site where the Ground Water Survey Project was drilling a 'test' well. The Ground Water Survey Project was a combined USAID-Nepal project to better understand the water bearing capacity of the Terai for future agricultural development. Many of the wells punctured an artesian zone of water under extreme pressure producing geysers! This project employed many Nepalis, including geologists, apprentice well drillers, mechanics, and laborers. In addition, three young American geologists were assigned to the project.
agriculture, animal, event, festival, mela
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Camels at the site of the Narayanpur Mela west of Butwal in the winter or early spring.
event, festival, mela
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Representatives of the district agricultural office based in Bhairahawa attending the Narayanpur Mela west of Butwal in the winter or early spring.
People, group photo
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Young women and girls with their babies in the area of Jogi Cutti, south of Butwal along the main highway.
Families, Family, People
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: women and young girl of a family living in Jogi Cutti, south of Butwal.
agriculture, grinding
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Neighbor woman milling corn on the porch in a hand mill (just out of view) which had two stones. The bottom stone was stationary, and the top stone turned by hand with a wooden handle. A hole in the top stone allowed one to drop in the corn kernels.
People, group photo, named person
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Children and young men of the neighborhood of Jogi Cutti, including Kanchha Dhai (in blue and white shirt).
Families, Family, People, named person
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Tuli, Mailee and male friend living in Jogi Cutti, south of Butwal.
People, portrait
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Neighbor girl with baby goat in Jogi Cutti, south of Butwal.
Families, Family, People, portrait
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: local seamstress and her son in front of their house in Jogi Cutti.
Families, Family, People
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Newar farmer with hookah and his wife and child in Jogi Cutti.
building, handicrafts
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Rebuilding a barn in Jogi Cutti after a fire (notice the charred main post being reused). Hot season winds whipped up a fire that destroyed several barns along the Butwal to Bhairahawa road in the spring of that year. The day after the fire several men from the community showed up, axes in hand to go cut timbers from the remnant patch of jungle nearby whether or not their houses or barns had been effected. Clearly this was a demonstration of how Nepalis support one another in a moment of need.
People, building, handicrafts, named person
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Kanchha dhai takes a break from tying rafter poles to the roof peak in the process of rebuilding a barn which had been burned by a fire during the spring of that year in Jogi Cutti.
Families, Family, People, agriculture, harvest, named person
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Rice harvest time in Jogi Cutti. Raila dhai, Kanchha dhai and family take a tea break standing in a paddy that has just been cut, looking across the fields yet to do. Once the break was over, everyone would again stoop to the task, hansia (small sickle) in hand of cutting sheaf after sheaf of the ripe grain, mowing the way across the fields. Harvest of this family's crop took about a week. It was a happy time of joking and singing and many bodies in motion, working together bringing in the harvest.
Families, Family, PC volunteer, People, agriculture, harvest, named person
Date: 1971 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Tea break during rice harvest in Jogi Cutti, incuding family, friends, and PCV Scoby Beer (JTA) working together to cut the rice. The ineptness of the young American was duly noticed by his Nepali family and friends, as many jokes circulated that he was about to cut his fingers off with the hansia and leave them in the field.
People, home life, house exterior, named person
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Ba', patriarch of local family in Jogi Cutti leans against the pillar of his home, a proud manifestation of his years of toil. Story his family told was that twice he had come south to the Terai from a hill village somewhere near Baglung to home-stead near Butwal, clearing jungle and building a new home for his family. The first attempt, he came with his eldest son and a bullock team. His son died of malaria and he was forced to return to his family left behind with the sad news. But again he came, this time for good.
People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Kanchhi', ever cheerful and engaging, she was the youngest daughter of a family of 'migrant' Pahardi's, who like many of their neighbors in Jogi Cutti had come to the Terai to resettle from the hills.
People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Mailee', second oldest daughter of the family in Jogi Cutti, taking an afternoon break from her usual work tending to the fields and animals of her family.
People, named person, portrait, rickshaw, transportation
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Kanchha-dhai', youngest son of the family in Jogi Cutti perched on his brother Raila's richshaw. Earlier that winter, Kanchha had suddenly come down with fever, moaning through the night. While his father held him for support, he was taken by rickshaw to the 'Paharbeti Doctor', a pharmacist in the Butwal bazzar able to diagnose. The 'doctor' diagnosed and treated him for malaria, and he quickly recovered from what might (without new anti-malarial meds) have been fatal. Here he smiles with his rickshaw having returned to strength.
Families, Family, People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Raila-dhai', proud father of his newborn baby girl, the first of a next generation of 'migrant' hill people now firmly settled in Jogi Cutti in the Terai, along the Butwal to Bhairahawa road. Jogi Cutti was the name given the bus stop where the road crossed over a little bridge spanning a creek, a branch of Tinau Khola. The name literally means 'the yogi's cutti or cabin'. In those years you could still see the smoke and fires of little encampments of wandering yogis and sadhus when you dismounted from the bus in the evening.
Families, Family, People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Ama' smiling, with the blue blouse and necklace at her family's home in Jogi Cutti. She is surrounded by her tribe, the women of the family, including Kanchhi, Mailee, and Baujhu (Kanchha-dhai's wife) The role of the daughter-in-law, not always an easy one, was made easier by Ama's good nature and Baujhu's willing hard work.
Families, Family, People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: Ama, at her home in Jogi Cutti with family and friends who here seemingly contemplate the photographer with some skepticism, if not concern. As the first Nepali generation to be the frequent subjects of this westerner's photographic documentation of his time in Nepal, there was the ever present mix of attitude perhaps here revealed: wary curiosity could co-mingle with outright delight But there also was the background reality that 'he' (the photographer) owned the camera, an object to which 'they', as yet, had little access.
People, named person, portrait
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Kanchhi', the cheerful youngest one in the family in Jogi Cutti. I remember once showing her a cabbage butterfly's eggs on the back of cabbage leaves in the garden, and making the connection to the little white butterflies flying around, -as well as the green caterpillars that later appeared. She delighted at making the connection.
Families, Family, People, named person
Date: 1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Ama', good matriarch to this family of resettled 'migrants' in Jogi Cutti in the Terai. Ama, as perhaps here revealed, was something of a worrier, not without good reason, as I witnessed the multitude of trials the family encountered in the short time that I lived with them, -including a spring fire that destroyed their barns, and Kanchha's sickness with malaria.
PC volunteer, People, elephant, named person, transportation
Date: 1970-1971 Location: Tribenisusta, Nawalparasi Description: Elephants and tenders of Nepal's royal family encountered by the Ground Water Survey Project while engaged drilling a tube well in this rural area. American PCV geologist, Scoby Beer who was working with the project is riding on one of the elephants.
Families, Family, People, named person, portrait
Date: 1970 Location: Bhairahawa, Rupandehi Description: Arun Karn, Roju Sharma, and Chitra Karn on the porch of the home of Asharpi Lal Karn and his family along the Paklihawa Road. This house was rented by 3 Peace Corps Volunteers in 1970-1971 who were all working for Nepal's Ground Water Survey Project as geologists.
People, child, named person
Date: 1970 Location: Bhairahawa, Rupandehi Description: Gita Karn and Roju Sharma with their 'skip ropes' on the porch of the home of Asharpi Lal Karn on the Paklihawa Road.
Families, Family, PC volunteer, People, portrait
Date: 1971 Location: Tistung Deorali, Makawanpur Description: Bahun woman with child, and Peace Corpws volunteer Steve Perrin (JTA) with Nepali friend in Tistung Palung..
PC volunteer, People, agriculture, named person, research location
Date: 1971 Location: Kakani, Nuwakot Description: Kakani Agricultural Station, with Peace Corps volunteer Dick Kauffman (Agriculture specialist) and Nepali staff in background.
PC volunteer, People, agriculture, harvest, named person
Date: 1971-1972 Location: Butwal, Rupandehi Description: 'Kanchha-dhai with Peace Corps volunteer Tony Guida (JTA) standing in rice field at harvest time near Jogi Cutti, looking north toward the first range of Siwalik Hills.
building, carpentry, handicrafts, woodworking
Date: 1972 Location: Langtang, Rasuwa Description: Peace Corps volunteer Doug Staiger (Forester) surveys the hand hewn timbers being used to build new lodge housing for Khampa (Tibetan) men resettling in the Langtang Valley, below and west of Langtang village. This was a somewhat odd encounter, as the Khampas (Dalai Lama's freedom fighters) settling in the valley may have mistook 3 young American PCVs for American CIA, from whom they perhaps were illicitly receiving funding and supplies. They treated us well! The interior of the lodge was a beautiful structure.
building, carpentry, handicrafts, woodworking
Date: 1972 Location: Langtang, Rasuwa Description: Khampa (Tibetan) men erecting a lodge from hand hewn timbers in the Langtang Valley below and west of Langtang Village.
building, carpentry, handicrafts, woodworking
Date: 1972 Location: Langtang, Rasuwa Description: Khampa (Tibetan) man carrying a hand hewn beam for use in construction of a lodge in the Langtang Valley, below and west of Langtang Village.
People, child, group photo, named person
Date: 1970 Location: Bhairahawa, Rupandehi Description: Nepali children including Gita Karn, Chitra Karn, Arun Karn, Raju Sharma, and two neighbor boys (twins), near the house of Asharpi Lal Karn along the Pakihawa Road. These children were best of friends to 3 Peace Corps volunteers who rented the house for one year while employed by the Nepal Ground Water Survey Project which was drilling test wells across the Terai to determine the water bearing capacity of aquifers in front of the Siwalik hills for use in the future agricultural development of the region.