Nepal
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Asian Adventures: Nepal
(11.23.03)
Wow! Nepal was great. I loved it there. The people are so friendly and helpful.
Kodari
After careening down the road, arriving in the border town, walking through Chinese customs, careening down another road we arrived in Nepal in the lovely town of Kodari. We got our visas and got stamped in and everything and went out to arrange a bus to Kathmandu. It turned out that the next day the Maoists were calling a strike, presumably so they could blow some stuff up. So we were anxious to get out that evening so we wouldn't get stuck. It was getting dark though and the prices were really high. We finally agreed to pay an exorbitant price just to get into Kathmandu before the strike began. Then the driver decided it was too dark and too late and wouldn't take us. By then we were all getting a little worried to so we decided that maybe it was safer to just be stranded. So we walked back into town and found a hotel that would take all ten of us. So we took over an entire hotel and this is the fun we had.
BRRRRR
So after traveling for 6 days with no shower we were really excited to get into Kathmandu and take a nice warm one. The Maoists and their little strike got in the way of this plan. Many of the hotels we asked at didn't even have showers so when we found one that did we were so excited. We didn't even care that it was cold. Until we got into it! That was mountain water way up from Tibet that flowed down into Nepal that they pumped into the hotel. I couldn't even put my whole body under it. When I tried I felt like I was at Everest all over again. I couldn't breathe. So I had to wash each body part one at a time. It took me a good 20 minutes to warm up after the thing too.
Meet the Major
So after my lovely shower I went down the the hotel restaurant and met the other 10. We commandeered a whole huge table and plunked down and drank beers and ate dinner for several hours. It took them that long to get all of our food out. I think maybe they only had one pan. So we're sitting around the table and they've pulled all the grates down because of the 8pm curfew and in walks some teenagers with big semiautomatic guns. Behind then is a fat older guy not wearing fatigues or with a visible gun. Turns out he is the major of the Nepalese army and commands the more than 300 troops in the area. He sat down with us and had a coke and chatted. He was actually quite taken with Katie and me. He confirmed the strike and told us not to try to go to Kathmandu and stay there. It was safer. It was kinda cool to befriend the head honcho of the area army too.
The Monastery
So the next day, we took the major's advise and stayed in Kodari and hiked up to a monastery way up on a hill. Unfortunately it was closed so we just looked around and took pictures. Then a Western guy in full Tibetan monk dress comes out and greets us. He's French and his English isn't great. Enter French girl. She's finally good for something. All that talk about France and how much she loves cheese finally pays off. She talks to the monk in French and he tells us all kinds of cool stuff about the area and the Maoists. French girl translates. Then he invites us into the monastery which is actually a retreat center and we sit down and have some Fanta and apples and Tibetan bread with the monk and a nun. It was great.
The Hot Water Place
After our snack we ditched the Australian guy and French girl and hiked through everyone's rice terraces to the "Hot Springs". The major told us not to be naked because people here were very conservative. So I packed a pair of shorts and my tasteful one-piece. We get there and pay our small fee and walk in. This is not a hot springs like you or I would know. It is basically a chance for the Nepalis to pay for a hot shower. The men were there in their underwear and the women were completely topless. They were washing each other's hair and pumicing their backs and feet. The American guy was smart and had brought soap so we went to our respective sides and passed the bottle of soap back and forth over the cement wall. It felt so good to have a nice warm shower after so many days without and then a freezing cold one. Katie and I stood under that water forever. If the boys hadn't been there with their cameras I probably would have stripped down too. After the hot water place! , we didn't really feel like walking all the way back into town. It was about 30 min. uphill so we decided to hitchhike. So we hijacked a bus. There wasn't any room inside so we climbed on top of the bus and rode in the luggage rack. It was so fun!
Kathmandu
We left the following day for Kathmandu. Our driver was probably about 14 and had no idea where he was going. He drove over an electrical wire that got wrapped around our axle somehow. Took awhile to get it off. The whole trip took about 10 hours because we had to drive through maybe 12 military checkpoints. I've never seen so many people with guns before. Half of them looked like kids. It was a little scary. However we arrived in Kathmandu without a problem.
WHOA!
The streets are very narrow, crowded with people and then cars and rickshaws try to squeeze in too. I was walking down the street one day and looked to see if Katie was behind me. I saw her and a bus out of the corner of my eye. A look of sheer terror came across her face and I realized the bus's side mirror missed the side of my face by mere millimeters. I wasn't out of the woods yet because moments later I was still walking and a bicycle rickshaw ran right over my foot. It was bruised and I had difficulty walking for several days but Attila (the Hun) had some words of encouragement for me. He said "Your foot, it has a problem. This is a shame, but good thing it is not your face!" After that I decided he was right and a foot is just a foot.
The Barbecue
I'm sure many of you know that Hindus believe that a body is supposed to be cremated and dumped into a holy river. We went to the holiest Hindu temple in all of Nepal and we got to see this. They let you get right up close and take photos! Death is just business as usual. They wrap the body in white cloth and then they wash it in the river. Then they put flowers all over it and rewrap it really tight. Then they put it on top of a bunch of neatly stacked logs and light the thing up. The one we saw, the wife was hysterical and wanted to throw herself on the fire too. They literally had to carry her kicking and screaming away. When the body burns. It smokes a lot and then you get the wonderful smell of burning hair and flesh. Once the cloth has burned you can see the bones burning. It is really gross but we got some great photos of the whole process. 4 hours later the body is fully cremated and they dump it into the river...the same river people bath in.
Hashshshshshshshshshshshsh
If you want any, go to Kathmandu. They offer it to you everywhere. They say it very softly and they string the 'sh' part of it out so you can still hear it long after you've walked past. It was creepy. But quite a delight to many of the members of our group, which made dinner time all the more exciting!
10's Company...15's a party!!!
Well we added a few more people to our group. So we have all the people from before plus the Yukoners (Denis and Jessica) who we found after a day in Kathmandu. It was so fun to hook up with them again. Plus the two guys from their jeep: two Americans from LA, named Mark and Bodie. They are both in the entertainment industry so they have loads of connections everywhere. Plus there was Thomas the Swiss solo traveler who somehow ended up with the other 4. So add all of us together and we're one fun group. Katie and I never ate a meal just the two of us in Kathmandu. We always bumped into someone or were meeting someone from the group. It was so fun.
Stolen Rickshaw
Our last night all together in Kathmandu before many went their separate ways we decided to go out to the disco. We were trying to find it when a rickshaw man offered to take us. Denis told him that if he could pile all 15 of us in his 2 seater that he'd pay him 500 rupees (about $7US). Well Denis and I had climbed in when Ben (the Australian) asked if he could drive and just took off. Then he and Denis switched. Now, let me say that Rickshaw men (despite my earlier encounter) are very good at dodging people in the narrow streets. Denis and Ben were not so skilled. We're wobbling all along (they don't quite have the balance thing either) and I'm screaming because we keep almost hitting people. Finally they stopped and the rickshaw man and the rest of the party caught up. We ended up at a Nepali dance club but we went in anyway and would you believe that out of all of those people it was Katie, Attila and I that were the last to leave! Who would have guessed!
Pokhara
After our crazy night in Kathmandu, the next night we went to a hotel party at Bodie and Mark's swanky hotel. It was super fun but Katie didn't hear our alarm clock in the morning so we almost missed our bus to Pokhara. Luckily the Germans came by and gave us a hand. They were going too and so was Thomas. We were all on the same bus. This bus was much less eventful than our bus to Kathmandu and Pokhara is a beautiful town nestled in the mountains with few tourists and a beautiful lake. We went boating and just relaxed. Our first day we just lazed around. Katie a delayed onset of the Kathmandu Quickstep. The Germans did too. Thomas and I were fine. I think because we skipped the roadside lunch! However, I had a sinus infection and wasn't feeling too hot either. And after Katie told me I smelled like a sinus infection I didn't want to leave the hotel. (I didn't know they smelled. Leave it to the nurse) I did find a pharmacy that sold me penicillin over the ! counter along with just about any other medicinal drug I wanted. I got 10 500mg tabs of ibuprofen for 30 cents total! Day 2 we boated and had much more fun. We even felt good enough to rent bikes. Yikes!
Whaeeee Ow Ow Ow Aieeeee
We rented bicycles and spent the day biking through the countryside. This sounds nice and it actually was but our bikes were not so nice. They were flimsy and the pedals were bent. Katie's brakes didn't work and if I put too much pressure on my right pedal it would catch and wouldn't work anymore. Add in the fact that Nepal hasn't invented asphalt yet and you've got a great ride.
Anti-American Sentiment Abounds
We wanted to go trekking in the Annapurna region for a week or so but the Maoists have a stronghold on this area. They hold trekkers at gunpoint and ask for "donations" so they can buy more weapons. Then they give you a receipt so if you run into more you can prove you have paid. They demand anywhere from $5US to $30US from each tourist. It depends on the mood of the bunch that find you. They come in your guest house and wake you up or stop you in the middle of dinner or are waiting for you on the road. Now, this really isn't a lot of money but if they find out you are an American, the price triples. You have to pay in USD and you have to pay at least $100. We didn't hear about anyone that refused. We assumed the worst and opted to not trek. Besides we didn't think the "Yanks go home" and other slogans spray painted on the sides of houses would be very nice to look at even if the back drop was the beautiful Annapurnas. So we stayed in Pokhara and saw the mountains from our boat.
Chitwan
We went to the Royal Chitwan National Park to see what kind of animals we could see. We were told by people who had been just days earlier that they hadn't seen anything and it wasn't worth it. Katie really wanted to ride an elephant and I promised her that we could so we decided to chance it. Boy was I glad we did. We took a 3 hour elephant ride that turned into 4 hours. We saw a big rhino and then a momma and baby rhino. The baby was only 2-3 months old. It was so cute!! We were able to get really close because we were on the elephants. We also saw some peacocks and loads of birds. Email Katie if you want to know which kinds. Birds and just birds to me. So then we ate lunch and hopped in a dugout canoe. We saw loads more birds and a crocodile! It was just sunning itself on the shore. So then we got out of the canoe to go on our jungle walk inside the park. As soon as we stepped off the boat we saw some wild elephants. Our guide told us that there was no escaping a wild elephant that you were as good as dead. So we walked really fast to get out of their path. We had to stop and listen periodically and turn around and change directions to keep away from them. After they were gone our guide told us that last year a tourist died by wild elephant. Yikes! So then we are walking along and saw heaps of monkeys. We saw the brown kind with the red butts and also the grey kinds with the black faces. After the monkeys we saw bunches of red bugs and even another rhino. Our guide told us we were really lucky. Unfortunately we saw no sloth bears, leopards or tigers. Usually no one sees sloth bears or leopards and it's baby time for the tigers so no isn't a good time. We did see some very fresh tiger tracks though and that was pretty cool. So we had a very successful Chitwan park tour. Katie was thrilled and I had fun too! We left the next morning for India.
Finally after 24 hours of traveling, I am now in India. When they said there are lots of people here, they didn't lie. There are people EVERYWHERE! And where there aren't people there's cows, goats, dogs, cats, rats, urine, trash, betel nut spit, bicycles, rickshaws, excrement, rotting fruit. Do you want me to continue? I will in Asia Adventures: India. Stay tuned!