Knock Knock Nepal

If You're Taking a Short Trip to Nepal - We Recommend...

2010-06-30T10:43:00.005-04:00

The following was written to a relative going to Nepal for a short trip by my girlfriend Meredith.

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A Lonely Planet is most necessary, especially for a short trip. The other essential document you will need if you plan on doing anything outside of the city center (and you should) is the "Tourist Map of the Kathmandu Valley". It shows all the hiking trails andsmaller roads and villages and stuff.

RECOMMENDED ACTIVITIES and FOOD

There are a few things you absolutely have to do that are on the beaten tourist track, but are on there for a reason:

1. Pashupatinath Temple - Hindu temple complex where they do ritual cremations on the Bagmati River. You can watch the cremations but shouldn't take pictures, as there are real funerals taking place.

2. Boudanath Stupa - this is the main monument in the Tibetan part of town. Tibetan Buddhists will be "circumnambulating"the stupa (a prayer practice where they walk in one direction around it multiple times) and there are lots of touristy shops around the path to look in. Some of the best Tibetan restaurants are there with roof gardens and great views of the stupa, and it's nice to go around sunset if you can. The entire neighborhood (called "Bouda") is a Tibetan neighborhood and there are tons of smaller temples, monasteries and monuments scattered about. I think the Lonely Planet will list them, but if not there's a list and map painted on a wall at one end of the main stupa area. It's a great place to spend a day or a few hours wandering around.

3. Swayambunath (the monkey temple) - one of the most important Buddhist stupas in the city, and has monkeys running around freely on its grounds. You have to walk up a very steep, long set of stairs to get to it, and there are incredible 360 views of the city when you getup there. If you can't do stairs there is a way to take a taxi up to the top.

4. Kathmandu Durbar Square - the main temple/palace complex of the city. You will have to pay a fee to get in, and people will try to get you to hire them as "guides" to show you around. We did it once and it was fun, but not necessary. (Lauren thinks you should get a guide, just set the price beforehand, should be about 500 rupees) Check out the temples, the "Kumari" (a child goddess) house, and wander a bit around the neighborhood - this is a great place to just walk and get lost. In any direction is real Nepali urban fabric - not so touristy and with genuine shops and markets catering to nepali people. In one direction is a market that sells beautiful metal ware.

4. Bhaktapur - the Newari people are the original inhabitants of the Kathmandu Valley, and this is their city, still almost perfectly preserved with all the architecture being from (I think) the 12th century or something like that. It's about 10 miles from Kathmandu,and will be about 2 hours on public transportation. In a taxi it might be about 1 hour. You should spend the day if you get a chance.

5. Patan Durbar Square - Like I said on the phone, "Kathmandu" is really made up of 2 cities - Kathmandu proper and Patan, which is continuous with Kathmandu but separated by the Bagmati river. Patan is the greatest - we lived there and it's just much more chill and less touristy, though there is a definite tourist presence. Patan has its own Durbar (palace) square, similar to the one in Kathmandu -Lauren and I think it's even more impressive. The neighborhood around it, likewise, is a maze of shops and smaller temples and monuments, great for wandering.

Lonely Planet has a fantastic walking tour for Patan Durbar square and neighborhood, and actually also one for Kathmandu Durbar square - definitely do those two when you are in those neighborhoods and any other of the walking tours in the book if you get a chance. They are generally very helpful and you see a lot of stuff that you otherwisewould have missed.

Since we lived in Patan we have lots of places that we love and could recommend, but not sure if they're appropriate for such a short trip -a lot of it is expat stuff. One thing you have to do if you go to Patan is eat at our favorite restaurant, Mustang Thakali Kitchen. There are no street names, so the best I can do in the way of directions is this: Get in a cab, and tell them to bring you to Namaste Supermarket in Pulchowk (pronounced Pool-choke). From Namaste you walk directly across the main road and down a smaller road that runs perpendicular to the main road, and after about 5-10 minutes the restaurant will be on your left. There is also a really good German bakery on that road, as well as a sort of health club where you canuse the pool, get a massage, sauna, etc. If you walk around the neighborhood, called Jhamsikhel, you'll find several businesses and venues catering to expats, there might be some good live music or something around so keep an eye out. That spot is about a 20 minutewalk from Patan Durbar Square, so you could make a day of it.

Anyway, at the restaurant you should order the Thali plate. This is the standard Nepali meal and comes with rice (or you can try Dhendo instead of rice, sort of a buckwheat paste indigenous to the Mustang region), a vegetable curry-thing or two, a spicy tomato condiment called achar, yogurt, a few slices of fresh cucumber and radish, and dal (lentil soup to pour on the rice). Also meat if you want it. This is our favorite place for Thali, but it is ubiquitous in the cityand throughout the country, and in all but the most touristy restaurants you get free refills ad infinitum. Try it everywhere, it is always a bit different and always delicious. Other tasty things to eat include bara - a newari pizza-like snack with egg or meat, roti thali-a thali with flatbread instead of rice, momo - nepali/tibetan dumplings, thenthuk - noodle soup, and newari snacks - small, tapas-like plates of different stuff.

THAMEL

Thamel is the tourist ghetto in Kathmandu, which is not to say that it isn't fun. Nightlife centers around this neighborhood and there are tons of shops and restaurants to try out. There's plenty of live music at night. There is a great spa there (a real one, many are brothels) to get massages, treatments, sauna, etc called Serendipity on Z Street. If you like spas it's the best. Another great place in Thamel is Thamel House, an upscale Newari restaurant, where our friend Susila's husband is a chef. They used to have a traditional Nepali dance show nightly. Other than that, Thamel is just a place to hang out and be a tourist. Eat, drink and be merry and so on.

Near Thamel is a neighborhood called Lazimpat, which is a cool spot with restaurants and nightclubs that both expats and more worldly Nepalis tend to hang out in. Do some research on the Google if you want to know if there's stuff happening over there.

BUSES and HIKES

Kathmandu Valley has a massive network of hiking trails, and in general you take a bus somewhere up near the rim of the valley, which is like a big bowl, and walk down, in some cases all the way back to the city. You mostly get the buses out into the valley at the main city bus area, Sundara, and it's a pretty crazy scene and very confusing. The buses, also, are usually more like vans, but sometimes will be actual buses. Different numbers go different places, but sometimes the numbers aren't clearly marked so ask the drivers where the bus to your destination is at until you find it. If you can, ask someone at your hostel what bus to take. They leave all the time, there is no schedule.

In order, our favorite hikes are to:

1. Changu Narayan - a beautiful, extremely well-preserved, and not-so-crowded temple complex in the hills. You could take a taxi to the trailhead, in an area called Chalantar I think (there isn't anything there) and take like a 45 min hike to Changu and then walk downhill back to Boudanath (for a sunset meal) or to Bhaktapur. Alternatively, you could start in Bhaktapur (maybe if you stay overnight there one night, or go very early in the morning) and take a bus up directly to Changu, then walk down to Bouda.

2. Dashinkali - another Hindu temple that has continuous animal sacrifices on Tuesdays and Saturdays. It's very unlikely you'll see other tourists there so you'll feel really cool. You take a bus (or taxi) directly to Dashinkali temple and then hike down to Pharping, a little town with a “Pilgrimage Route” through various Buddhist and Hindu temples/monuments. It's pretty far from the city so when you're tired of walking take a bus back.

3. Shivapuri National Park - You take a bus to the town just below the park, called Budanil Kantha. In town there's a famous Vishnu templeto check out, with an impressive snake sculpture. From town it's a mile or 2 uphill to the park entrance and there's no bus, so take a taxi - or you could hitchhike like we did. It costs 500 rupees to get into the park. Inside the park we hiked up to a Buddhist Nunnery called Nagi Gompa (where for a few rupees they'll probably feed you dal bhaat, means dal and rice) and then had a three hour hike down to Boudanath Stupa through the small village of Kopan along a gorgeous ridge through a pine forest. The trail gets pretty rough in one place just after the nunnery, it's just clamboring down a steep hillsideover a bunch of rocks, but it picks up again and is one of the best hikes we did. As long as you keep going downhill, you'll always endup in the right place.

From anywhere in the valley, almost any bus you get on should go backto Sundara, or at least somewhere in the central city - so if you get lost or tired, just hop on one to get home.

There's other awesome stuff in the valley to do besides these hikes, so look in the lonely planet and see if anything catches your eye.

BANDIPUR

If you want to get out of kathmandu for a few nights and see how rural Nepalis live, go to Bandipur. It's a 3 or 4 hour trip on a public bus, and you should probably plan to stay 2 nights. It's in the mountains and is just ridiculously gorgeous. There's a small town that has a bunch of tasty restaurants, and places to take short hikes to, like a silk farm, all overlooking incredible views of terraced farmland and Himalayan forest. The hostels there are pretty grody, but try to get a room with a view of the valley and it's not too bad. If you want a little more comfort there is one very nice inn, that I think will run you $30 a night - kind of a fortune in Nepal. Lonely Planet has all the info you need to get there, or ask someone at your hostel.

People might suggest that you go to Pokhara as a trip outside ofkathmandu, but don't listen. Though it has a beautiful lake and somenice hiking, it's mostly a tourist trap and you might as well just stay in Thamel.

WHERE TO STAY

Since we had an apartment while we lived there, we never got really well acquainted with hotels and hostels, so it's going to be hard to recommend where to stay. In the case that there's strikes while you're there (they're very common), I suggest you stay somewhere around Kathmandu Durbar Square which will be a good central place to walk to various sites. It's about a 20 minute walk to Thamel from there, and near Sundara, the central bus area. You could also just stay in Thamel, as there are plenty of hostels and it's near the nightlife. If there were no strikes (called Bandhs in Nepali) I would probably encourage you to stay near Patan Durbar Square, but I think you should play it safe and stay near Thamel/Durbar Square since things are a bit uncertain right now.

A decent room in any budget hostel should be about 600 - 900 rupees a night.

MONEY

Whenever you buy anything, especially in tourist areas or with taxis, people will try to overcharge you because you look like an easy mark. If you can, try to ask a nepali friend or hotel concierge what the acceptable price for any given thing should be beforehand, and feel free to haggle the quoted price down for pretty much anything. You will probably end up paying a premium anyway, so best to make peace with that - anyway, you can afford it as the extra is still next tonothing for an America

Now I'm Back

2008-12-13T11:31:00.002-05:00

I've returned to NYC. I should probably do a post about what I learned in Nepal, but I think all my posts - 49 of them! - speak for the experience. Maybe I'll feel compelled to do one later, but for now I'll say goodbye.

Thanks for reading!!

Dogmandu

2008-12-06T01:52:00.010-05:00

It's really easy to take the name "Kathmandu" and change the first syllable into another word that fits with whatever theme you like. Like: Dogmandu. Mapmandu. Madmandu. Stupidmandu. It all works. I don't know why.

That had nothing to do with this new post which is, you guessed it, about Dogs. As I get ready to bid farewell this strange and wonderful city, I think about the things I will miss the most and they are: Meredith (she'll be staying on for a bit), the Dogs, the people, especially: Shusila; Sara; Pia; Netus; Prajwel, Dal Bhaat, my apartment, tikas, and the mountains.

So here's a tribute to my favorite pups (and one alternating goat).

In no particular order, except that I mention my favorite dog at the end.

Warning: There will be an indecent amount of anthropomorphizing in the following statements. And some sad stories, also.

1. The Couple

This is a pair of dogs that Meredith and I met when we moved into our new apartment in Sanepa after having lived for a month in Kupondole at Alberts' place. We've been at this apartment for 3 months and have only just convinced The Couple that we won't hurt them and want to be their friends. After months of saying "hello" to them, trying to pet them, and occasionally offering them food, we finally got to pet them for the first time a few days ago. I didn't feel as triumphant as I thought I would have. In fact, I felt a little silly considering how much I wanted them to like me.

These dogs are never apart. They almost move as one. We never really gave them separate names, except for that I started to regard the skittish, nervous, slightly interested one as representing me, and the relaxed, aloof one as Meredith. So, I would say things like: "Oh, look, there's me. I'm licking my butt."

2.Mangy Reynold and Mangy Benji

To earn a name that has a "Mangy" in front of it, is no easy feat. You really have to be dirty, scabby, hairless, eyeless, and smelly to deserve the Mangy adjective.

Mangy Reynold and Mangy Benji were two of the first dogs Meredith and I named. They live a few blocks away from our apartment, on a small road with a few shops. They would sit there together (never touching) all day, waiting to scavenge for food at the mini-restaurant. They never wandered from their home. Ever. I would see them there day and night.

Sad story: one day I went to do some errands and noticed Mangy Benji lying near a pile of trash. When I came back a few hours later, he was in the exact same spot. I thought it was strange, but dismissed it as a comfy position. The next night Meredith and I were coming home from dinner and I noticed he was still there, in the same position. There was no doubt about it, he had died. There he lay for almost a week before someone took his body away. It was really sad. I wondered if any of the shop owners had become attached to him (from a distance, because this was not a dog you touched or cuddled) and were sad, too.

I don't have a picture of Manjy Benji, but here's Mangy Reynold, who seems to have soldiered on despite the loss of his buddy:

3. Crazy Eye

Crazy Eye is a dog we see infrequently because he lives farther away from us than the rest of these dogs. There were times I thought maybe he had an owner because we was so clean and shiny. We call him Crazy Eye because he is one of the most beautiful dogs, and you think this until all of sudden you notice his slightly off-center eye. And you only notice it because of his all-around studliness.

4. Bloody Eye

Poor Bloody Eye, his eye is bloody and I'm always avoiding him. I noticed this fella one day with an eye full of blood and pus and a large blood-covered protrusion that may have been his eye but probably was just an inflamed part of his eye socket. His eye healed daily and for a while was just bloody with a weird white string poking out from his socket. Now, it's just bloody. Here he is:

5. Changba

Changba is my least favorite thing in Nepal. Like, worse than all the trash in the street and oglers who stare at my chest. Changba sucks and I live with him. He's our landlords' dog and he lives right next to the entrance to my apartment. Despite the fact that we've lived here for three months, he still barks at us like we're about to rob the place. We fed him food a few times and he would bark ferociously in between mouthfuls. He's mean. The guy who lived here before us got Changba to stop barking at him and be his friend after a year. Except one night Changba took a bite out of his leg. Here's his stupidface in all its glory:

6. Mangy Griselda

Mangy Griselda is a boy dog, but Meredith named him without checking his privates first. Now we notice his sad little balls and feel bad for calling him a girls name - but it's too late to change. Mangy Griselda seems to have an owner, but the owner only feeds him and puts a cardboard mat outside the house as a bed for him to sleep on. His eyes are small and seem to be covered with a weird film that makes me think he can't see very well. His tail and the back part of his torso is virtually hairless. He's not a dog you pet with your hand, but he clearly wants affection. We've started pulling small branches off of trees to pet him. I don't think he realizes the difference. He's a sweet little thing:

7. Death Row Goat

This is not a particular goat that we love, but rather a weird phenomenon that happens on a street near our apartment. It's a goat that is tied up in front of a butchers, like an advertisement. He or she sits there munching on greenery until someone decides they want mutton for dinner and that's that. One goat made it for almost two weeks, and we'd always wave at him with disbelief at his staying power.

We can't take credit for this name (Death Row Goat), our American friends Keri and James made it up. Here's one goat, creepily smiling:

8. Baby Daddy

This big boy has clearly sired many of the little pups in our neighborhood. He is a bossy, big shouldered, manly dog that wants to have puppies and then move on. Meredith thinks Baby Mama (see below) is his steady girlfriend - I'm not so sure. We've pet him a little bit, but he really only comes around when we have food.

9. Baby Mama

Finally, I come to the best dog in the world (besides Bodhi) that makes me reconsider leaving Nepal. She is the sweetest, most lovable little thing and was the first dog to make an effort to get to know us. We started noticing her around about a month and a half ago. I don't think she has an owner and mostly resides around our neighborhood and down our little dirt road. At the beginning, we would pet her as we left our apartment and say a little hello. She's pretty clean, a little oily and some scratches, but nothing too bad. Sometimes when we would come home at night, she would meet us a few blocks away from our apartment and escort us home. Sometimes Mangy Griselda would be there with her and we would hope he didn't notice us only petting her.

One day, we noticed Baby Mama had a huge cut on her eye. Mainly it was on the bottom part, but it was a pretty nasty abrasion. I thought it would heal itself, just like Bloody Eye had healed on his own, but as the days went on it seemed to be getting worse and she was looking exceedingly fatigued. She stopped roaming around, and would sleep all day near our apartment. I tried calling some local veterinarians, but no one would pick up.

Finally, my brave little Meredith took matters into her own hands. She started washing the wound with water and applying Neosporin to it. We got some antibiotics that were designed for kids and gave her bread soaked in it. It seemed like she wasn't getting better and she started refusing to eat anything. She was barely walking and would shake when she stood up. We thought it was over for good and she would surely die soon. It was really depressing.

Then, suddenly she started getting better! She would eat more and was wandering around and her eye seemed to be healing. Now, she's back in full health. She eats ravenously and (sadly for us) is barely around our apartment. She roams the streets during the day and sometimes stops by to visit a neighbors puppy we believe she is either the mother or grandmother of. We see her maybe once a day. Last night we came home later and she escorted us home. She was so excited when she saw us, that she started whinnying like a wounded horse. It was adorable.

Here we are:

And that's our Dogmandu.

Making Do Thanksgiving (Or, How To Cope With a Baking Holiday When You Don't Have an Oven)

2008-11-30T08:14:00.008-05:00

Thanksgiving this year just wasn't the same. I don't really mean that in a bad way. Given the option I probably would've chosen to be home for this holiday, but my friends here and I scraped together a pretty fine substitute that I wouldn't trade for anything now. Sure, it was hard, and took three days, and didn't turn out perfect, but it turned out pretty good enough and after I ate I got that too full feeling that is indicative of yummy Thanksgiving.

This endeavor began because our new American friend Sara has the same enthusiasm for Thanksgiving as I do. When we met on November 5th it was one of the first things we brought up and decided, then and there, to do it. Since, Sara and her friend Keri had to leave Kathmandu before the actual day, we had it 6 days early. The preparations began on Wednesday. Sara, Mer, and I went to Bhat Battini Supermarket - a 5 floor monstrosity of food and clothing and other goods that would only be common place in the States. There we found a frozen $80 turkey that was too puny and too expensive for our tastes. However, this was a triumph for me because no one would believe there were any turkeys in Nepal. We gathered all the big supermarket items that we wouldn't be able to find in the local Nepali stores (things like confectioners sugar, whip cream mix, peanut butter) and had two cups each of this weird perfect corn stuff.

On Thursday we started gathering more ingredients near our houses. Sara lives in Patan and has a great open air market near her. Here's James (Sara's roommate), Kumar (Sara's boyfriend), Mer, and Sara walking to this market all Reservoir Dogs Style:

At the market, Mer busted out one of her many thousands of lists. I wish I had gotten a picture of all the lists together, but basically there were about ten lists all of which had the same ingredients on it, just in different orders. Here's Kumar, Sara, and Mer (with a list) at the market:

Then we headed to Sara, Keri, and James' apartment to cook the baked items. We had convinced a bakery called Fiji to bake some of our food items at around 7pm that evening. We made a pumpkin pie with fresh cinnamon, here's James grinding it in a bowl with the bottom of a wine bottle:

Sara instructed us all on her specialty: the no-bake peanut butter squares. Here's Mer doing her special double-boil-thing to heat up the chocolate and peanut butter:

Keri doesn't cook, so she hung around and kept us company:

At night we rushed over to Fiji Bakery to bake our pumpkin pie and stuffing. There was only one available oven and it didn't even go high enough to rightly cook the pumpkin pie. We knew we were going to be there for a while. Here's the owner (who studied cooking/baking in Japan), one of his daughters, a bakery employee, Mer and blurry Sara:

While we waited, we played with the owners kids doing boring things like shooting rubberbands and making funny faces. Here's Sara being less boring and tossing them around, they LOVED it:

After two hours of waiting and the pumpkin pie refusing to be finished, we went home with the promise to come pick things up in the morning. The next day we all went our separate ways: Sara picking things up around town, Mer cooking, me picking up things around town, James cooking at his apartment. Shusila came over early to help us finish up the cooking and make some saag:

Shusila brought her nephew Netus with her, and Kumar and I started playing cards with him. I taught them how to play Spoons and they taught me a Nepali card game. Here's them playing:

Sara made some excellent home-made apple cider in a coca cola bottle. She would heat it up and you could mix rum in it. Shit, it was good:

And here's the final spread (there's salad in that red bucket)

For my own reference, here's who came:

1, 2 Lauren/Mer (USA)
3 Sara (USA)
4 Kumar (Nepal)
5 James (USA)
6 Keri (USA)
7 Bhakta (Nepal)
8 Pia (Finland)
9 Naba (Nepal)
10 Albert (USA)
11 Rich (UK)
12 Arielle (USA)
13 - 17 Shajjan + 4 (Nepal)
18 Saroj (Nepal)
19 Shusila (Nepal)
20 Netus (Nepal)
21, 22 Min + 1 (Nepal)
23 Komako (Japan)
24 Mike (USA)
25 Danielle (USA)
26 Miriam (Austrailia)
27 - 30 Landlord and Co. + 4 (Nepal)

Changu Narayan

2008-11-28T23:30:00.008-05:00

Another great hiking place in the Kathmandu Valley is around the Changu Narayan temple. Mer and I did this hike a while ago, and I'm writing about it now because I don't want to forget it or pretend like it was any less than the other hikes we went on. Anyhow, we were dropped off about 40 minutes away from the temple and then hiked up to it along a little hill ridge. The best view was from the hike, where you could see the steeples (I know that's a church word) rising above the trees. When we got there we found only a few other tourists, which I always consider a success when visiting special places. I mean, as a "foreign resident" I think you're entitled to explore the secrets of the city and be seen as cool by the natives for being one of the few foreigners to know about those secrets. Here's Changu:

Changu Narayan is supposedly the oldest temple in Nepal. Though, I've also heard that a temple in Panuati is the oldest. When I asked my landlord if Changu was the oldest temple in Nepal he said "Yes." When I asked him if the Panuati temple was the oldest, he said "Yes." So, that's helpful.

The best part of Changu besides the requisite Kali slaughter/sacrifice temple, were the dogs going around eating the wax after the candles expired:

Then we started our hike back to the city. This is when we started realizing that if we were not specifically in a hiking zone, no one would direct us to the dirt road hikes - only the main paved roads. Luckily, we found a few roundabout dirt roads on our own that led us past farms and the like. Here's a picture to prove it:

Back on the paved road we started feeling real dorky for pretending like we were hiking when we were really just walking on the main roads. Especially when there were buses going by us every ten minutes headed to our destination. So, we hopped on one of them and headed to Bodhanath Stupa.

We hung out at the Stupa for a bit and then ate at our favorite restaurant there called Tibet Kitchen. We took my Dad to this place when he was here, too. This is our standard meal there:

Potatoes with cheese sauce (Bhutanese)
Sampa (Tibetan thing that you mix yourself: wheat, tea, butter, sugar)
Brown Flour Momo's (Nepali - large dumplings)

Not healthy unless you count the Brown Flour. I do count it.

Mer wasn't ready to quit the day, so we walked over to Pashupatinath. It started getting dark and this is where Mer and I butt heads many evenings. When it gets dark, I start walking really quick and getting really nervous. When it gets dark, Mer acts like it's light out. So, while I'm trying to get to crowded places with lots of activity and light, she is just taking her sweet.....old.....time. For her part, we've never been threatened in any way at night. However, our old landlord always warned us to get home before dark and he's old, so he's wise, and must know.

Anyhow, Mer decides that it would the most awesome if we went up the back way around Pashupatinath. The back way is kinda like a hike. Which, I mean, wouldn't really be fun in darkness, but that doesn't matter! We find the back way despite a bunch of people trying to direct us to the front entrance. As we hike around the back of the temple we see a bunch of deer and monkeys playing together which, I guess, makes it worth it. Finally we come upon the temple which is all lit up with singing and dancing and people. According to some people who were there, the jolliness happens every night, but none of the Nepali's I've ever questioned have heard about it.

After getting stared at for a while, we went home.

Better and Better

2008-11-23T22:59:00.003-05:00

I feel morally responsible to brag about the fact that I went to temple that is only open one day a year. It wasn't that fun, I didn't intend to visit it anyhow, and Mere took more pictures of it than I though humanly possible - but nonetheless, I've been to a temple that you probably haven't been to and I wanted you to know that. This temple is on a little pool in the middle of Kathmandu - if you live here you probably have seen it and thought "that's pretty" and then promptly moved on to more important things. Here's one of millions of shots Mere took:

The most interesting part of being at this temple were the Cool Nepali girls giving tikas. I assumed that you needed to be ordained or at least sanctioned in same way by Hindu priests to give out tikas - but I doubt these Cool girls had been authorized by anyone. Nonetheless, they seemed to having fun and making money.

Just thought I'd share.

Daddy Blog #5: 1000 Places to See Before You Die

2008-11-23T01:45:00.004-05:00

The book,"1000 Places to See Before You Die," includes Nepal's Royal Chitwan National Park. What they don't tell you is that you have 1000 chances to die on the drive from Kathmandu to the park. It was the most harrowing drive of my life made worse by the thought that my daughter would die as well. (I didn't want Mer to die either.) The highway twists and turns through beautiful mountains and river valleys with picturesque villages scattered along the road. Fortunately I took a lot of photos along the way because there's no way I could appreciate the scenery while contemplating the final moments of my life. The problem is that sleep deprived and often drunk truck drivers pass each other on the winding, turning road. If they're going uphill then one truck is driving 8 mph in a valiant attempt to pass another truck going 6 mph. Its like a glacier race. Which would be so bad but who wants a head on collision with a glacier? I asked our driver (we hired a car and driver for the trip) if he liked his job. The 19 year-old young man said "No." He said the drunk, sleep deprived truck drivers make his a rather hazardous profession not to mention the cost of petrol. He wanted to complete his schooling and get a safer job. After we got to Chitwan I really enjoyed looking at all the photos I'd taken along the way.

Royal Chitwan is almost 400 square miles that were once the private hunting grounds of the King of Nepal and his guests. According to Wikipedia, its one of the finest protected forests and grassland regions in Asia. (That's good because King George V on one trip shot 39 tigers and 57 rhinos.) The best part are the elephants and their capable mahouts (handlers) who stood ready to take us into the jungle in search of rhinos, Bengal tigers and assorted other creatures. (I could have done without the leeches.) We weren't there for it, but one of the guides said elephant polo matches take place during one of their holiday festivals in December. I bet that registers at least a 7 on the Richter Scale.

Happy to be alive, we met one of our guides, Shiva, at the hotel and safari camp. He took us on an early evening walk as the sun was setting over the river where we relaxed and watched dug out canoes floated leisurely by. It was lovely. However, it took a while to get used to Shiva's 'instructions'. His words were friendly but his tone didn't match. He must have been in the military or a dog trainer before the hotel job. It felt like he was barking orders at us to enjoy ourselves: "Sit here!!! Watch sunset!!! Do you want lemonade!!! Enjoy!!!". Later Shiva turned up again as one of the servers in the resort dining area. I was afraid he would be yelling at me to eat my veggies. But no. He was really a great guy and after dinner made a special effort to take us to visit the elephants in their outdoor stalls. Shiva calmed down and we had about an hour just standing in the moon light with the elephants. They are truly magnificent, awesome (I hate that word) creatures and I felt privileged hanging out with them. I resisted the urge to set them free.

The next day after the three hour safari on elephant back into the jungle (we saw a rhino mommy with her cute baby in a muddy little lake) we got to help give them a bath.

After a hard day of carting tourists around the elephants enjoy cooling off in the river and getting a bath. We were allowed to ride elephant bareback into the river with them. The mahouts gave them the signal and they shook us on into the water. Then they filled their trunks with water and sprayed us. It was a childhood fantasy come true. Fortunately when they plopped over for their bath they didn't crush any tourists in the process. At least I didn't see any. I did see some mighty elephant turds floating by but I reminded myself that elephants are vegetarians. Organic poop can't be that bad.

It was reassuring to hear that the new Nepalese government has done a lot to save from near extinction the one horned black rhino. There is also a wonderful elephant breeding area which we were able to visit. Unfortunately, pollution from upstream industries is endangering the rivers flowing into Chitwan. Dolphins have dissappeared from one of their prime habitats and the main species of crocodiles are barely hanging on thanks to special efforts from an environmental group. As usual, tourists are a mixed blessing, but at least our dollars help make the animals worth a little more alive than dead from the poachers and pollution.

The end of our time in Chitwan came too soon. As we got into the car for our return journey to Kathmandu and for part two of "1000 ways to die...", we waved goodbye to Shiva and his enthusiastic approach to herding tourists.

Hiking Frenzy

2008-11-16T03:44:00.005-05:00

Mere and I are still obsessed with hiking the entire Kathmandu Valley. However, day treks in Kathmandu have their ups and downs (wah wahh). Here’s a list that I’ve compiled:

Good Things About Hiking in KTM Valley

1. You end up getting to see beautiful, remote stupas and temples
2. There are less tourists in the hills and the temples
3. I get to/have to practice my Nepali
4. You get above the pollution that blankets the city
5. You get to see the cycle of the Nepali crops and their various beauteous versions
6. If you hike in the north part of the valley you can end up in Boudha Nath which is THE best way to end a six hour trek
7. You get to try really good traditional Nepali food, like Dal Bhaat (lentils and rice)
8. Taxis are relatively inexpensive for foreigners so you can take them to the hiking starting points

Not Great Things About Hiking in KTM Valley

1. If you ask for directions you usually are directed to paved roads instead of dirt roads – and if you’re trying to hike, then you’re not really hiking anymore or you are but it’s more of an “Urban Hike”
2. There are maybe two directional signs in the entirety of the Valley
3. If you’re a foreigner, locals like to look at you – a lot
4. You might not get above the pollution that blankets the city
5. Buses take a while to get to the starting points

Recently, Mere and I decided to hike around Dakshinkali and Pharping, which is southwest of the city. We took two buses, which ended up taking about two hours to get to the famous Dakshinkali temple. A taxi would’ve been around 700 rupees ($9) but we are trying to be thrifty.

The Dakshinkali temple is situated at the bottom of a hill and has animal sacrifices on Tuesdays and Saturdays. We happened to be there on a Tuesday - Mer was psyched and I got a stomach ache. Goats and chickens met their doom inside the temple where only Hindus can go. However, the temple isn’t entirely enclosed so tourists can view the majority of the ceremonies and headchops. Here’s a picture of the pools that lead to the temple and people waiting in line to go inside:

I watched people get their tika right outside the temple and noticed one man getting his incredibly awesome tattoo of Shiva tika-ed as well. I went to go admire his arm and as I tried to initiate a conversation in Nepali it turns out (of course) that he lives in Texas and is just visiting his parents here.

According to our hiking map there was a little uphill hike from the Dakshinkali parking lot to Pharping, which is a little town with a “Pilgrimage Route” through various Buddhist and Hindu temples. The 45 minute “hike” consisted of a short dirt path straight up hill and then the main road the buses go on. On the main road we came across Sekh Narayan, which consisted of little pools and temples:

After walking a little further down the paved road and trying to weave through the various villages to make things more interesting, we came upon some women dealing with their rice harvests. Mere took a great picture of the rice on the woven mats:

Finally, we came to Pharping and the “Pilgramage Route” route. My favorite part was this strange monument of Padmasambhava in a glassed box:

Neither Lonely Plant nor my our hiking map was specific enough to get us to the “true” hikes of the Pharping area so at 3:00pm we started making our way home. Although we were unsuccessful in terms of hiking the hills of nature, we managed to see nearly 10 different temples and stupas and get pretty tired.

Tika Galore

2008-11-09T08:44:00.007-05:00

This is a brief interlude from my fathers blogs.

Right after my dad left, Nepal got ready to celebrate Tihar. This is the festival that everyone describes as "my favorite festival." Now I understand why: there are pretty lights everywhere. It's basically a combination of Christmas and Fourth of July.

Anyhow, Tihar is five days long and the following things are worshiped on each succeeding day:

1. Crows
2. Dogs
3. Laxmi the Goddess of Wealth
4. Oxes
5. Brothers

I had question about the crows: Don't crows eat crops, and since I know that's true, why would you spend a day worshiping them? I got a good answer, but still I feel this is a valid question that shouldn't go unasked.

The best part was day two when every mangy dog in Kathmandu had a tika on their forehead and a garland of marigolds around their neck. Like this pretty pup:

Even Changba, the horrendous dog at my apartment, had one. Which was awesome because his attempt to be fearsome was thwarted by the ridiculousness of the red mark on his forehead and the flowers around his neck.

On the Laxmi day, Nepalis took really pretty vermilion colors and made pathways to lead the goddess of wealth to their abodes. Here's Prajjwel, our landlords son doing just that:

At night on Laxmi day everyone lights candles to brighten their vermilion pathways and sets of fireworks because they're fun. Groups of singers and dancers go around to houses to perform for rupees. Everything is lit, everyone is awake until late.

On brothers day (which is really brothers AND sisters day but only called brothers day - yes this is indicative of Nepali culture) siblings give each other the most extensive tika in life. Seven colors of vermilion are applied to each others foreheads and garlands of flowers placed around their necks. They also exchange money, clothes, and other presents. Below is Prajjwel and his nephew who have both been adorned with their tikas by their respective sisters:

I'm jealous there's no U.S. holiday to celebrate the bond between sibling. Right??

Dad Blog #4: Ashes to Ashes

2008-11-05T20:47:00.004-05:00

Today we hit a few 3000 year old Buddhist and Hindu temples including Pashupatinath (pronounced,posh-potty-not). It's the holy of the holies for Hindu followers of Shiva (she-vah). Shiva isn't a she, she's a he and no one to mess with: God of Destruction. I learned from our guide that Hindus have literally millions of gods and are coming up with new ones almost daily. I'm okay with that because there's a holiday or festival associated with most of them. Nepalis don't get a lot of work done but they're incredible partiers. Posh Potty is an amazing enclave of temples, shrines, half naked sadhus (wise men - most of them extremely colorful, hash baked con men beckoning to be photographed for a few rupees). According to legend Shiva supposedly discovered the transcendental powers of ganja (marijuana) which grows wild in Nepal. With each hit the sadhus chant "I am Shiva".

Advertisement for one of the most famous Sadhus: Milk Baba.

Then there are the cremation ghats. These are concrete platforms next to the river. After they burn the body down to ash someone sweeps whats left into the river. The sight and smell of public cremation is pretty raw. If its a dead parent the process begins with the oldest child placing a burning stick into the mouth of the deceased. (My mother died less than a year ago making all of this a bit overwhelming.) Then the man in charge gets the pyre going like a huge backyard bar-b-que. (At this point I made one of my many broken vows to become a vegetarian.) Adding to the atmosphere are wild monkeys just hanging out and grooming each other. We were warned to keep a safe distance from them. They reminded me of the flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz. I wanted to click my heels and go back to Kansas but had to settle for a wonderful balcony dinner with Lauren and Meredith at sunset overlooking the city as it quieted down for the night.

Pashupatinath:

Dad blog #3: Playing Ping Pong with the Yeti

2008-10-31T23:53:00.006-04:00

That's right. The abominable snow man loves table tennis...but as usual I'm getting ahead of myself.

We got up at 600AM the next morning to catch a one hour flight to Mt. Everest on Yeti Airlines. Sure, you can spend a minimum of 3 months and $100,000 trekking to Everest but for $150 do the whole deal in 60 minutes. Either way you get a certificate of having done the mighty Chomolungma ("Mother Goddess of the Universe") as its known to the sherpas.

I had recently proven my manhood by enduring the 24 hour flight from LAX to Kathmandu not to mention having finished Peter Matthiessen's "The Snow Leopard" on the plane. Matthiessen's detailed account of what its like to spend the night in a rain soaked sleeping bag in the Himalayas (as he pondered the koan given to him by his Zen Master: "All the peaks are covered with snow---why is this one bare?") is the Eastern counterpart to Proust's 50 page description of a Madeleine cookie.

Back on the ground we faced a danger more frightening than doing Everest without oxygen: the taxi ride back into Kathmandu. There is no other way to do it. We'd been invited for breakfast at the three star hotel managed by two of Lauren's Nepalese friends. I won't give their names or the hotel because then I couldn't say how much I envied their life of managing the hotel by smoking the best Nepalese grass and playing ping pong all day on the viewing deck on top of the hotel. We had a delicious Nepali breakfast and then got out the paddles.

I was expecting to be easily beaten by anyone who plays hours of daily table tennis but I hadn't factored in the world's most powerful majijuana. I could have beat them with my eyes closed. I probably had some kind of contact high because I began to see my worthy opponent as a yeti with gold jewelry. Then he morphed into cookie monster. We went back to Lauren and Mer's apartment and took a three hour nap. I was beginning to see the attraction of this place.

Dad Blog #2: Held Hostage for 75 Cents

2008-10-27T01:47:00.004-04:00

Day 2 started off innocently enough. We were invited to the rice harvest at a farm about 2 hours South of Kathmandu owned by the son of Lauren and Mer's landlord, Projjwal Khadka. I was looking forward to getting out into the pristine countryside after less than a day in Kathmandu. After being on an cramped airplane for 24 hours and then in Kathmandu (which I swear means "Klaustrophoia" in Nepali) I was ready for the wide open spaces of the green terraced hillside farmland I'd see in travel guides.

So after some embarrassing bargaining with a taxi driver (I felt like the fare we bargained for would probably mean one of his children would starve to death that night) we were off. It was a delightful day. Projjwall is a Che Guevera tee shirt wearing, four gold earring humanitarian farmer (and Kathmandu DJ). Here's Lauren and Proj inside Proj's families house where they're storing and drying the corn they harvested before the rice:

He is trying to introduce organic farming back into his region of Nepal. Through a combination of successful results and his low key charisma he is succeeding is changing decades of destructive farming practices by his fellow Nepalis. We watched the rice harvest where they used centuries old methods for gathering the rice, threshing it using a pedal driven device, and then seeing women carrying 100 pounds of rice up the hill for eventual transport to the mill. Hopefully this blog entry will be accompanied by at least one photo of this backbreaking task (which never seems to break their back and for which they are richly compensated, about $1.50 per day).

Threshing:

Carrying:

We had lunch with the rice field workers that was as good as any Indian (Nepali food and Indian food are indistinguishable for me) restaurant meal I've had. I was completely inspired by our day which felt like an Asian combination of Walden Pond, Johnny Appleseed and a Winslow Homer watercolor painting. I felt all warm-and-fuzzy and very "clean" as we got into the same taxi for our ride back to Klaustrophia.

After about an hour of bumping down pot hole ridden roads a young man suddenly stepped into the road in front of our taxi. I caught the look on the taxi drivers face which gave me a bad feeling, I didn't think the young fellow in the road needed a ride into town. No, he was a Maoist guerilla and he was demanding money. He didn't ask for our wallets, he didn't make us get out of the vehicle. He was extorting us for about 75 cents. I guess his mother taught him not to be greedy, but come on. . . what kind of self-respecting terrorist asks for 75 cents? And then he wrote us out a receipt which would allow us to get back any other Maoists we might encounter on the way home. I think I'll check the receipt for the guys address, I'd like to send him some more money. Feel free to send me any contributions you feel moved to donate. However, it occurred to me that maybe the taxi driver and the "Maoist" were in cahoots and they've developed a small business (shake down the tourist) with a microbanking loan courtesy of Muhammed Yunus ("Banker to the Poor").

Dad Post: Day 1

2008-10-25T11:14:00.006-04:00

Below is my father's account of his arrival in Nepal:

I loved every minute of my stay in Nepal, but couldn't wait to leave. But I'm getting ahead of myself so back to getting off the plane in Kathmandu after a 25 hour plane flight from LA. I knew I was in a Third World country when they unloaded the 300 passenger jet onto the runway and we walked the final 100 yards to the terminal (which had the feel of a Midwest high school auditorium in desperate need of repair (and fumigation). All my initial doubt and skepticism vanished however when I saw Lauren's wry smile among the crowd of Nepalese locals waiting at the gate. I knew from that smile that the fun was about to begin. We found a taxi (slightly larger than a MiniCooper but with more of a Neo-Tijuana look and a driver who couldn't have been more than 16) and Lauren started bargaining on the fare. Later I would find out that she was going toe-to-toe with the guy over 50 cents. Would we pay 250 rupees ($3.75) or 300 rupees ($4.25) for a 40 minute drive half way across town? I'd never seen Lauren bargain before but she seemed to know what she was doing. Turns out this was nothing compared to the near sadistic glee Meredith would later show as she trims rupee after rupee off the slave wages fare where most cabis start the bidding. I had a lot to learn and would probably need these negotiating skills given the way the US economy is going. Forty minutes and a harrowing taxi ride later we arrived at Lauren and Mer's apartment in the nicer part of town. When I say harrowing I mean bumper cars with no bumpers, I mean the only thing saving everyone from head on collisions was that there was so much traffic everyone was forced to drive under 35mph. If not there would certainly have been massive pile ups and loss of life. Once in Lauren's apartment everything was calm and quiet. We had some tea in her living room which had a front row window seat to the back of the North Korean Embassy. The Axis of Evil in our back yard! I suddenly felt very Republican. Its not a good feeling. The next thing I know I'm being introduced to Projjwal, the son of Lauren's landlord. He's wearing a Che Guevera tee-shirt, 4 gold earrings (in one ear), and spoke with a British/Southern drawl. I'm told he's a DJ,a businessman, rice farm owner and. . .I forgot the rest. He invited us to participate the next day in the rice harvest at his farm about 2 hours South of Kathmandu. We accepted not knowing we would be stopped by a Maoist guerrilla and shaken down for 75 cents as we returned to Kathmandu from the rice harvest. Again, I'm getting ahead of myself.

The Peace Corps is Homophobic

2008-10-23T10:53:00.001-04:00

Lauren,

Thanks for the email and your interest in serving in the Peace Corps. Since the Peace Corps is a federal agency we are required to use the Federal standard/definition of marriage and would not be able to place you and your partner as a married couple.

Michael Salazar

Kazakhstan 2001-2003

Recruitment Coordinator

Peace Corps Los Angeles Regional Office

2361 Rosecrans Avenue, Suite 155

El Segundo, CA 90245

Telephone: 310-356-1110

Fax: 310-356-1125

Dad Is On A Plane

2008-10-21T23:28:00.003-04:00

My Dad left yesterday afternoon for the States. We had a great time and he has promised to write the whole trip up in a detailed account of what we did and how we survived. I'll give him some time to re-adjust and then start pestering. Maybe I'll do my own version too. Here's a sneak peak:

My Dad Is Here!

2008-10-16T00:28:00.000-04:00

My dad is here and we're busy doing things!

Shivapuri Hiking

2008-10-11T23:57:00.008-04:00

I'm still sore from the hike Meredith and I went on two days ago. We went on a six hour hike through the Shivapuri National Park. We took two microbuses up to the park and then had to walk 2 km to the entrance. Meredith stuck out her thumb to a huge car and they stopped and took us the 2 km...hmmmm.

We paid 500 rupees to get into the park and then started hiking up up up to a Buddhist Nunnery called Nagi Gompa. It took about an hour to get there. We were hungry, so we asked if they would feed us and they gave us some of the best dal bhaat I've had so far. MMMM. We also met a Belgian woman who was doing her Bachelors research on the nunnery.

Then we decided to walk to Boudhanath, which was a three hour hike along a ridge and into the city. The Belgian woman said it was kind of complicated to get there and that it wasn't the best idea. Luckily, we met three Nepali boys who were on their way to Kopan, which is on the way to Boudhanath. They were like mountain goat sprites and had to wait for us to catch up. (See if you can spot them below...)

They would etch arrows into the dirt to make sure we were going the right way.

The hike was gorgeous and we saw beautiness like this the whole way:

We made it to Boudhanath before it got dark and had some Vegetarian food at the Saturday Cafe. We were tired and went home to sleep.

This is me blogging with underwear on my face.

The Wedding

2008-10-11T06:05:00.005-04:00

I went to a Nepali wedding. It's ironic because I've been desperate for someone in the States to get married (c'mon friends, speed it up...). Whatever, I'll take what I can get and this was quite an interesting ceremony. Not for its intricate systems, but its brevity.

Shusila, my friend and cook, got married to her boyfriend Tara. They are of different castes so it was probably rushed on account of this possible/probable tension for their families. I found out the wedding was happening about a week before it occurred. They decided to have it on "Tika day" which is one of the holiest days of the year. Usually you have to check with an astrologist to make sure you're having your wedding on holy/lucky day, but Tika Day is perpetually awesome so no consultation was necessarily.

At around 1pm Meredith and I took a taxi to Bhaktapur, where Shusila's family is from. Bhaktapur is only 15-20 minutes outside of Kathmandu, but is amazingly rural and pastoral. Before the wedding we wandered around Bhaktapur with Shusila's brother Saroj. He took us to one of many brick factories.

He also took us around the rice paddies that are just busting to be harvested. There are these nice little pathways that you can walk around to see all the paddies. We found this ladies shoes and basket but had no idea where the lady was:

We also did the requisite fondling of baby goats. This one is two days old!!! Jesus.

We hung out with Shusila and Saroj's relatives that live in Bhaktapur. It's strange how much the clay Bhaktapur houses look so similar to some Native American abodes. Here's Mer sitting under their clay house. (This paragraph is crap)

Then we watched the wedding. First, Shusila and Tara sat in a small room and got tika's from the main relatives:

Second, they stood up and exchanged rings and lei-like things:

Third, the stole my camera to take awkward (to me) and unsmiling pictures of the family. Here's me and Mer in the wedding room (yes, I'm wearing a cute vest):

Goat Sacrifices

2008-10-07T21:47:00.003-04:00

It turned out that our neighbors/landlord downstairs were slaughtering their own goat for Dashain. They asked us if we wanted to watch the ceremony and sacrifice. Meredith said yes. So, around 11am they told us they were starting and despite all my thinkingthinkingthinking I still hadn't decided whether I would watch! We could see what was going on from our third floor balcony so Meredith positioned herself up there and so did I. The goat was tied up looking around and bleating and it was so sad to see him have no idea what was happening while they sharpened the knife and got the boiling water ready. But, I liked all the flowers and colored powders of the ceremony so I watched some of the preparations. But as they prepped the knife I decided that i would go to a place on my balcony where I couldn't see: but I could hear. I sat there for a while and suddenly it was like there was an earthquake and the whole world shook. So I didn't watch, I just felt it.

I decided to go look at the damage and there was a headless goat and lots of blood. This part wasn't too bad; I saw this scene at the local butchers. Then I watched them prepare the goat to eat by taking off the hair and cleaning it.

Later on we went to the main square to watch more sacrifices/ceremonies but there was nothing going on and we didn't care to search them out.

Nepal Appoints 3-year-old As New Living Goddess

2008-10-07T21:34:00.002-04:00

KATMANDU, Nepal - Hindu and Buddhist priests chanted sacred hymns and cascaded flowers and grains of rice over a 3-year-old girl who was appointed a living goddess in Nepal on Tuesday.

Wrapped in red silk and adorned with red flowers in her hair, Matani Shakya received approval from the priests and President Ram Baran Yadav in a centuries-old tradition with deep ties to Nepal's monarchy, which was abolished in May.

The new "kumari" or living goddess, was carried from her parents' home to an ancient palatial temple in the heart of the Nepali capital, Katmandu, where she will live until she reaches puberty and loses her divine status.

She will be worshiped by Hindus and Buddhists as an incarnation of the powerful Hindu deity Taleju.

A panel of judges conducted a series of ancient ceremonies to select the goddess from several 2- to 4-year-old girls who are all members of the impoverished Shakya goldsmith caste.

The judges read the candidates' horoscopes and check each one for physical imperfections. The living goddess must have perfect hair, eyes, teeth and skin with no scars, and should not be afraid of the dark.

As a final test, the living goddess must spend a night alone in a room among the heads of ritually slaughtered goats and buffaloes without showing fear.

Having passed all the tests, the child will stay in almost complete isolation at the temple, and will be allowed to return to her family only at the onset of menstruation when a new goddess will be named to replace her.

"I feel a bit sad, but since my child has become a living goddess I feel proud," said her father Pratap Man Shakya.

During her time as a goddess, she will always wear red, pin up her hair in topknots, and have a "third eye" painted on her forehead.

Devotees touch the girls' feet with their foreheads, the highest sign of respect among Hindus in Nepal. During religious festivals the goddesses are wheeled around on a chariot pulled by devotees.

Critics say the tradition violates both international and Nepalese laws on child rights. The girls often struggle to readjust to normal lives after they return home.

Nepalese folklore holds that men who marry a former kumari will die young, and so many girls remain unmarried and face a life of hardship.

Kites

2008-10-03T23:26:00.005-04:00

I know this post will force you to reconsider your thoughts on my intelligence. However, I ask you to suspend your judgment for a moment because that would be nice.

In Kathmandu and I'm guessing most of Nepal, kids love to fly kites. All over the city you can look up into the air and find a least one kite soaring over your head. Currently, it is the biggest holiday of the year. It's called Dashain and one of the traditions besides the public beheadings of goats and oxes (they eat the animals) is kite flying.

I took Shusila's 12-year-old nephew Netus rock climbing the other day and since I was in kid mode (maybe I always am?) I decided we should buy a kite. Netus is a really awesome kid and speaks almost perfect English. He prepped the kite while I did some work and then we set off to fly it. The wind was a bit pathetic, but I forgot that mattered. We tried unsuccessfully three or four times and then ripped our kite. I fixed the kite with some tape, but our spirits were defeated to try again. Plus, I figured it was the wimpy winds fault. Right?

The next day Meredith and I smoked a cigarette and then decided to try flying the kite because that's easy to do. Plus, look how pretty the view from our roof is:

Our roof was, like, made for kite flying. It basically has a runway to throw the kite up into the wind and then run with it to keep it flying. Meredith and I tried 10 or 12 times with no success and then broke the kite. Then we tried to imitate the knot Netus had tied:

Is this boring? Not for me.

The whole point of this story is that we broke all the kites I had bought and didn't get the kite higher than 9 feet in the air and couldn't keep it up for longer than 10 seconds. I can't do something that the 8 year old on the adjacent roof can do. His kite was so high in the air you could barely see it.

P.S.

2008-09-29T08:17:00.003-04:00

Today Mer and I went to this "basement" climbing gym and turns out: it's awesome. There are five bouldering walls within four rooms, some of which are connected. It costs a measly 200 rupees ($3) a day or 3000 rupees ($42) a year to climb there whenever you want. The manboy who owns/runs the place built it in his ancestral home. He must be rich because most Nepali's would need to rent or live in this space. Also, it's right in the middle of Patan (south of me) and the land value is shooting up up up there. He also said he has a "party" space upstairs and invited us to come hang out there after he finishes climbing a mountain he claims is harder to climb than Everest. Who knows.

Mer had never been climbing before so this is what she thought she would be doing:

We bouldered for about an hour and I pretended I knew what I was doing. Here's Mer knowing what she's doing:

Cute.

Letter to Christine

2008-09-26T23:12:00.004-04:00

Dear Christine,

I think you know that you were the person to introduce me to rock climbing. I'm pretty sure I was aware that climbing existed, but you brought it into my life, like religion or alcohol. So, thanks. I remember going climbing at Rockcreation and loving it at first fall. Then we went somewhere outdoors with your step-father, Rae, and Alexis. Didn't my parents insist on talking to your step-father about precautions and safety and all that? Anyhow, it was great being outdoors and understanding what the faux handholds in the gym were supposed to really feel like.

I went a few more times in Los Angeles and then I went to undergrad blahblahblah. But, I got super into climbing while I was in Berkeley the year after I graduated. My job gave us a free membership to a great climbing gym and I would go all the time with Abbey Gordon. Remember, Abbey? I hate waking up early and I would get up at 6am to climb before I worked. It was fantastic. I even went bouldering in the Berkeley hills:

When I moved to New York, my heart sank because seriously there is no climbing. Unless you have a car and have time to drive to the "gunks" you are subjected to small, unchanging, expensive walls. I wrote you an email recently in which I said: "In other words, no, I have not been climbing at all lately. Though, I hear there may be a good wall in Kathmandu and I will go check it out once my stupid shin splint heals and/or I grow some balls."

Guess what? I grew some balls and my shin splint healed. It took me three buses to get to Maharjgunj, where the Pasang Llama climbing wall is. The man working there said he would belay me and I did approximately three ascents on this wall:

On my last ascent three Nepali boys gathered to watch me struggle up the wall and fall midway. The best news is that it turns out someone built a bouldering wall in their basement and that basement is like 10 minutes away from me on one bus or walking. We'll see how that turns out...

Point is: thanks for introducing me to this sport and congrats on your competition and maybe I'll see you in South Korea.

Best,
Lauren

Friend Min

2008-09-25T03:19:00.005-04:00

Let me introduce you to Min. Min Bham is my friend from Aarohan (the theater I volunteer for). He co-directed/co-wrote and had a bit part in the theaters most recent smash hit Karnali Dakkhin Bagdo Chha (the Karnali River flows southward). For a muddy review that I still can't tell whether is positive or negative see here.

Min is from Mugu, which many Nepali refer to as one of the "backwards" areas of Nepal. Try to find it online - there's almost no information. They still employ arranged marriages out of necessity, have little to no education, and suffer from lack of food and medical care. On the other hand, Mugu is gorgeous and has little tourism, so it's very untouched. Mugu is only accessible by a 13 day walk or a plane. Mer and I are going there on October 1st.

We had been planning on going a while ago but Min can get a little distracted (his play is soaring to new heights: invitation to perform in India, new theater being built in Mugu) so we hadn't been able to secure a date. Plus, Karnali Dakkhin Bagdo Chha was extended twice. Since Mer has to work hard until October 1st we told Min we needed more time before we could go. He called today and said that we (Mer, Min, and me) were leaving for Mugu at 4pm TODAY. HAHAHAHA, oh Min, no we're not.

Min is a tiny man of 23 that dresses stylish and has small dreads. He wants to be a film director and make it big in Hollywood. He is very well educated and was married at 13. He goes to the only film school in Nepal, which is located in Kathmandu. His father is the chief of Mugu. Here's Min and Meredith acting cool:

A few days ago we went on a wild goose chase to get to the Karnali Dakkhin Bagdo Chha cast party. They were having it in Godawari, which is a few kilometers outside of Kathmandu. Godawari is one of the places Lonely Planet says is not really necessary to visit - and this is true. It has an overgrown botanical garden and some not-so-unique/interesting stupas and temples.

The cast party was a picnic in the botanical gardens. They had already been there for five hours when we arrived and ended up staying for hours after we left. They were psyched for dancing, but load-shedding (no power) was killing their party. They half-heartedly tried to sing a cappela and did some gambling with cards while they awaited power:

Mer and I explored the gardens, saw a crappy music video being shot, picked leeches off ourselves, saw huge spiders, ate incredibly good food with the cast of Karnali and got really depressed that their were no trashcans. No trashcans mean that people throw their trash on the ground and in the river. Not so pretty.

So, we're supposedly off to Mugu on October 1st. We'll see...

In Conservative Nepal, a Tribune for the ‘Third Gender’ Speaks Out

2008-09-19T12:40:00.005-04:00

This is a New York Times article published on September 19, 2008:

SUNIL Babu Pant likes to take advantage of the frequent delays at Nepal’s newly elected Constituent Assembly. As the only openly gay member, he takes every opportunity to work on his homophobic colleagues, trying to convince them that contrary to what they were taught growing up in this very conservative country, homosexuals are just like any other people.

Mr. Pant, 35, a computer engineer by training, opens his laptop — an object of fascination to many in the assembly, who come from the rural hinterlands — and gives a PowerPoint presentation wherever he finds his audience.

“Kalpanaji, come join me,” Mr. Pant said during a break recently to a fellow parliamentarian, Kalpana Rana, inside a tent that serves as a canteen. Other lawmakers, there to kill time, began to move closer to his laptop.

“I have prepared this presentation for members of this assembly,” he said, giving them a beaming smile. The female members were too shy to join the crowd.

“There are some people on earth who consider themselves neither male nor female” he continued. “They like to be called third gender, which comprises roughly 10 percent of the total population.”

A man interrupted. “Oh, yes, I had seen this term in a medical book I have at home,” said the man, Mathabar Singh Thapa, of the rightist Janamukti Party in the 601-member assembly. “But, I have a question. Do they have genitals?”

“They do,” said Mr. Pant, trying not to giggle. “But, they don’t have natural sexual orientation.”

He then put a political spin on his presentation. “South Africa’s Constitution already has a provision that the third genders are not to be discriminated against,” he said. “Following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, led by V. I. Lenin and Leon Trotsky, Russia became the first nation to legalize homosexuality.” The members listen attentively until the bell rings, summoning them back to the assembly hall.

If Mr. Pant, who represents the tiny Communist Party of Nepal (United), recognizes the long, uphill battle he faces, he never admits it. In a society where premarital sex is strongly taboo and where a leader of the ruling Maoist party, Dev Gurung, once called gay people “the product of capitalism,” it is a lonely fight.

But all is not bleak for Mr. Pant. This has been an extraordinary time in Nepal, with the declaration of a democratic republic in May, the abdication of the king in June and a new constitution in the works. Moreover, the now-dominant Maoists emphasize that theirs is the party of the poor, the minorities and the disadvantaged, and they have recognized “third gender” people as “sexual minorities.” The phrase “third gender” has been used to refer to gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, the transgendered and others.

Mr. Pant, always a good student, came to Katmandu, the Nepalese capital, from his home village in hilly Gorkha district in 1990 to pursue his studies. Two years later he won a scholarship to study computer science in Belarus, where he first heard the word “homosexual.”

By that time, he knew that he was attracted to other men but did not realize that this placed him in the minority. “I thought everybody would be like me, having the same feeling,” said Mr. Pant, who has never married.

HE learned differently, particularly during a police crackdown on homosexuality in Belarus in 1994. “There were many secret police officers deployed to crack down on gays and lesbians,” he said.

He got his first taste of sexual freedom in 1997, when he had a chance to travel to Japan. “I got to learn about gay rights,” he said. “I started visiting clubs and restaurants for gays.”

He stayed three months then returned to Nepal, determined to exercise the same freedoms. He started handing out condoms at a gay hangout in Katmandu — a daring act in conservative Nepal. “It was like a tool to initiate discussion with people,” he said. “I used to talk to people who would come there, discuss H.I.V./AIDS, ask them if they know anything about sexuality, ask them if they had heard anything about gays and lesbians.”

In short order, he had a good grasp of the city’s clandestine gay culture (“After you know two or three people, then you know everyone,” he said), and he was determined to bring its problems out in the open. Just a decade or so ago, it was hard for gay people to live a normal life in Katmandu, he said. The police were brutal. Many friends, he said, were driven from their homes, and others endured torture in police custody. “I thought nothing would improve unless we organized,” he said.

He tried to found an advocacy group to fight for the rights of gay men, lesbians, the transgendered and others. But government officials said they would register the group only if it devoted itself to converting homosexuals into heterosexuals.

To get around that, Mr. Pant said only that the group was dedicated to defending human rights in general and working on health issues and H.I.V./AIDS. Today, the group, the Blue Diamond Society, has offices in 20 districts and has 120,000 registered members.

WITH Mr. Pant’s heightened profile, it was inevitable that his sexual orientation would be revealed to his family. He said that his mother, who could never understand why he did not marry, was very upset. “But things cooled down in about a week,” he adds. “Now, my parents live with me in Katmandu and have stopped insisting that I get married.”

But Nepal remained officially hostile to sexual minorities. Mr. Pant said that 13 transgendered people were exiled to India and that two were killed in Katmandu. The Nepalese Army removed two female cadets for engaging in “an indecent intimate relationship.” In August 2004, 39 members of the Blue Diamond Society were imprisoned for 13 days.

But last December the Supreme Court ruled that “sexual minorities” were guaranteed the same rights as other citizens. Since then, at least one gay man has received his citizenship card with “both” written under the “gender” category.

Relations with the police have improved, Mr. Pant said, and the government is preparing to ask local authorities to issue citizenship cards to gay men and lesbians, transsexuals and others that recognize their preferred gender status.

Richard Bennett, representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Nepal, has urged the state to respond in line with the court verdict, “to enact new laws or amend current legislation to accord equality and end all discrimination against members of sexual minorities.”

Though Nepal’s politics are in flux, Mr. Pant is optimistic that the Constituent Assembly will soon adopt a stronger and more “inclusive” constitution. “In the past, it was like ‘Don’t kill us, recognize us.’ Now, it will be like changing our livelihood. We will focus on equal justice, economic and cultural rights.”

But Nepal still has a way to go before it comes to terms with the new realities. Inside the Parliament building, Mr. Pant said, “Some male members take me to a corner and whisper questions like, ‘Why do you promote sex which doesn’t give children? What if everyone becomes homosexual?’ As if they think that this is not something to talk about in public.”

“I have found a good platform to raise the issue,” said Mr. Pant, who is already thinking of new issues to tackle, like pollution and the environment.

Not that he is about to drop his signature issue, or even that he is lowering his sights. “There is a lot yet to be done,” he said. “There is not even a single person from our community holding a high government position.”

Mystery Place

2008-09-19T12:40:00.004-04:00

Now that I’m done traveling for a bit, I’ve been able to settle down into a somewhat “normal” routine. I hate myself for using quotes, but it’s hard to consider anything I’m doing normal because it doesn’t involve a job/making money. I wish I could enjoy this (oh so) temporary life of leisure and exploration but without a next clear step, I’m finding it difficult. So, beyond looking for a job in either Nepal or South Korea or the US or Mystery Place, this is what I’ve been doing.

Studying!
Guess what sucks? Having people talk shit about you in a language you don’t understand but you still know they’re talking shit about you because they’re pointing/laughing/staring. I want to be able to have a good Nepali retort besides “hajur” – which is the formal way to say “how can I help you?” Anyhow, Saroj has been teaching Mer and me Nepali. He comes about three times a week for a lesson that lasts as long as Mer and I can concentrate (usually about ten minutes). Here’s Mer studying hard:

Wandering!
I’ve pretty much exhausted most of the Lonely Planet tourist suggestions about what to do in Kathmandu. This means I have started wandering the streets and it has been extremely difficult to do because I despise not having a plan or a goal. But it’s good for me to get out of that regimented mode or something. Plus, I end up seeing cool stuff that I wasn’t expecting. Like, boys bathing in pretty pools with water that may or may contain giardia:

I went to the Nepal Tourism Council to check out their brochures (aka I had nothing else to do) and I came across, possibly, the scariest market on earth. I decided to call it Hades because I’m snobby, but really it’s pretty accurate because you descend under these blue tarps and enter an eternal clothing/fabric/shoes/cosmetics bazaar.

Quoting People!
As Mer so brilliantly said: “You can’t go a day without seeing someone carrying something giant and heavy.” The best thing that I've seen so far, in this vein, was a little man carrying a huge refrigerator. This yellow thing is pretty exciting though:

Festivals!
I decided that I really had to see the current festival called Indra Jatra. Mer had no interest and even Shusila who has been taking me to all the festivals didn’t care about Indra Jatra. I forced them both to come with me anyways. Apparently, it wasn’t even really happening the day I said we should go (though someone told me it was!). Luckily, Meredith is trying to buy a human skull for a friend so that spiced up the evening with a little black market fun. Here’s Mer sitting among some Nepali's, the human-skull dealer, and the human-skull dealer's bodyguard. There’s a $500 human skull in that black plastic bag:

All we saw concerning Indra Jatra were some chariots (for the next day), a sculpture that’s usually hidden, people getting tikas, and candles that made for an awesome picture:

The End!
I’d like to conclude this post with my least favorite part of Nepal. Unfortunately and sadly, there’s a lot of people begging and a lot of people aggressively and overwhelming hocking their goods at you. I came across this shirt that so succinctly summed everything up:

If you can't read it, it says: No Rickshaw, No Hashish, No Tiger Balm, No Change Money, No One Rupee, No Problem.

Story Time

2008-09-16T23:34:00.004-04:00

My friend Pia may have told me the best story in the world yesterday. You can be the judge (my words, her content):

Once upon a time Pia worked in an insurance company. Her boss was a woman, and she said this was a time when it was still rare for women to be in positions of power. One day her boss told her a story about a dream she had. In the middle of the night she had suddenly woken up because she had figured out the secret to World Peace. She knew that she would forget it in the morning if she didn't write anything down, so she quickly got a pen and paper and scribbled some words that had the power to create World Peace. In the morning she quickly remembered her epiphany. She scrambled for the paper and when she found it, she read this: Brooown.

Bandipur and Pokhara

2008-09-14T01:06:00.008-04:00

I’m back in Kathmandu and in my pretty little apartment! Yes, yes, yes. Mer and I got back from our mini trip to Bandipur and Pokhara yesterday afternoon. The trip was really awesome overall; beautiful landscapes and nice people. However, we had some major issues with Pokhara and came back early because of them.

We got up early in the morning last Saturday to take a bus from Kathmandu to Bandipur. I was psyched to be leaving the Kathmandu pollution and chaos for the natural beauty promised to me by my Lonely Planet guide. Here’s some of the first views I saw:

It’s pretty well known that the cheaper Nepali tourist buses are not the best in the world (New York – Boston Chinatown buses are luxury style comparatively). We had paid around $11 for a 6 hour trip on this bus. We got what we paid for: the engine on our bus had to be sporadically pumped when we were going uphill. I reassured myself by saying “better a faulty engine than faulty breaks.”

At the first rest-stop we got to see a new delicacy of Nepal: gross fish.

It’s really impossible to describe how ridiculously gorgeous Bandipur is. Definitely the most prettiest mountain landscape I’ve ever seen. Lonely Planet said Bandipur had “gob-smacking” views. I don’t know what that means, but I totally agree anyways. Here’s a picture that can’t even begin to infer the true beauty of this place:

Mer and I settled into our $5/night hotel room, which was in a classical Newari building. Bandipur is known for being preserved really well as an old Newari town and you can really tell how hard the townspeople have worked to keep it maintained and unmarred. Our room was bathroomless and small but had a gobsmacking view that I couldn’t take my eyes off of. Here’s me in a new $.60 shirt in the village:

After a short rest, we took a huge uphill hike to Thani Mai, which, not surprisingly, has a gorgeous view. From here we could see the village of Bandipur:

Mer has a new camera that I wanted to impress, so I got crazy and climbed a tree:

One of the highlights of the entire trip was holding baby goats. I think I might start a goat-baby-holding hobby because it was so fun. There were tons of farm animals in Bandipur that Mer and I took great advantage of: Buffalo, goats, chickens, pigs and of course cow and dogs roaming the streets like they owned them – because they do. We took a lot of pictures of the various animals but I will only subject you to two of them:

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We were planning on going to the largest cave in Nepal which is about a three hour (one way) hike, but due to the monsoons the water was about knee deep inside of them and you had to wade through it to see the caves. This wouldn’t be so bad, but there were leeches in the water and that’s one animal I did not want to pet. Instead, we went on a little hike to go see worms make clothes. There’s a silk-worm farm in Bandipur that we decided to check out. The man who ran it gave us the tourist explanation of the silk-making process.

We gave him 200 rupees and then walked home. Besides baby-goats, beautiful views, and silk worms, we encountered our favorite restaurant of all time. Not only was it one of the cheapest places we’ve been to, it had the most amazing food I’ve ever tasted. We got lucky and ordered this amazing thing called a Shaslik which is a grilled kabob of cheese, tomato, and onions on a plate of rice. It’s actually a little painful to write about it because it was so good and I’m afraid we may not be able to find it again in such good form. Here’s Mer eating two Shasliks on our last day – look how sad she is that we are leaving it:

We left Bandipur after two nights to go to Pokhara, which is a city on a lake about two hours away. This is where we planned to stay almost a week – it’s a big tourist destination in Nepal. Buses from Bandipur to Pokhara left every hour and as we arrived at the bus area we were virtually attacked by locals to get on the buses that were imminently leaving. Sadly, we weren’t ushered INTO the bus, but ON TOP of the bus. This is something that Meredith has been dying to do. She did it before and was looking forward to doing it on this trip. Although I don’t regret going on top of the bus, I won’t do it again because it’s so stupid and dangerous. It’s not like one of those red New York City tour buses with railings and seats, it has a rack to tie luggage onto and that’s it. We were up there with a few locals and two Sadhus (wandering holy men). Here’s a picture of me with one of the locals holding on for dear life:

And it’s not like we were up there for ten minutes on good roads, we were up there for two hours on crappy roads that overlooked cliffs. Never again, Meredith, never again.

Amazingly, we arrived saftely in Pokhara. Taxi drivers, merchandisers, and hotel staff jumped on us as we got off the bus. Bandipur had none of this tourist-jumping and the constant barrage of sellers overwhelmed us. This is one of two things that essentially ruined the Pokhara trip. Maybe I’m being privileged and snotty and stupid, but it was frustrating to be in a city where everyone you met was trying to sell you something. Anyhow, here’s Pokhara being pretty:

Want to know what the second thing is that killed Pokhara? The cockroaches in my hotel bed. We probably should’ve sucked it up and paid for a nicer hotel room, but various (boring) circumstances prevented this decision. By the time we realized the cockroach situation was ever-present, we were too sick of Pokhara to do anything about it. Shusila was supposed to come visit, but we called her and let her know our feelings about P-town. The two fun things we did in Pokhara was go to a temple in the middle of the lake and a temple on top of a hill.

On our way to the temple in the middle of the Phewa Tal (the Pokhara Lake), we passed by this dock with these Japanese kids sitting on it:

We shouted at them to jump in:

At the temple we got a small taste of drunk Nepali homophobia, fed some insanely large fish corn, and I got a tika (the colored Hindu smudges on the forehead).

The next day, on my urging, we took a boat across the lake to hike up to the World Peace Pagoda. There are several ways to get the Pagoda, one of which is a mild up hill 2 hour hike, the other a steep 45 minute hike. I convinced Mer to take the 45 minute hike straight up. The whole way up Meredith told me about how much she hated me for persuading her to go up this way. It was horribly steep and took us much longer than 45 minutes because we are not in shape. On the other hand, it was totally worth it to go up there:

A bunch of monks were coming there in the next few days, so there were some people cleaning the steps of the Pagoda. We conducted almost a full conversation in Nepali with one of the cleaners. Here’s a good picture I took:

We decided to take the long way back down and I promptly got a shin splint which made it take twice as long as it should’ve. We had planned on taking a full day hike the next day, but with cockroaches, sellers, and shin splint it was time to leave.

Teej

2008-09-05T02:54:00.003-04:00

As I mentioned in my previous blog, Teej, another Nepali festival was recently celebrated. Teej is a three day festival where women who are unmarried pray for a good husband to come along and women who are married to pray for their husbands. I, obviously, had to participate because I am husbandless. HAHA. Anyways, I did actually participate by going with Shusila to two huge temples: Pashupatinath and Swayambunath. Meredith stayed home to pretend to work.

It’s amazing how many people you meet when you are constantly getting lost and have no idea how to get places. On my way to meet Shusila at Pashupatinath I ended up chatting with a nerdy Nepali guy who helped lead me to my destination and called Shusila on his cell phone for me. The frustrating part is that I always have the same exact conversations with these people I meet: “I’m from America. California. I live in Sanepa. I volunteer at a theater called Aarohan. A theater, like Shakespeare. I am here for five months. I’ve been here for me one month. Yes, I look like a boy.” Then I ask them some questions: “You live in this area. You are from this caste. Your family is from this village. You have this job. You are/n’t married.” It’s hard to steer the conversation towards anything else but these topics. Probably because of their limited English and something sociological I don’t understand.

Anyhow, Teej. Everyone wears red Punjabi suits and red saris and red bracelets and red. I stupidly wore no red, so Shusila and I immediately went to go get some red jewelry.

We then wandered around Pashupatinath. This temple is famous because it’s where Hindu’s cremate their dead. It’s right along the river and at any given time you can see smoke stacks indicating a burning body. Walking around the various temples at Pashupatinath actually requires some small hiking and Shusila showed major skills by walking around in her heels. Here’s a aerial view of some human smoke:

Hundreds of women were waiting in an enormous line to get into the temple to pray. Shusila said that these lines are hours long and people wait all day. Also, everyone is fasting on this first day of Teej, so they are waiting in a long line in the sun while hungry. The not-so-dedicated fasters will eat fruit and ice cream and the super-dedicated fasters will spit so as not to swallow even their saliva. Women in red waiting in line and fasting:

Shusila and I then took a few buses over to the other side of town where the Buddhist stupa Swayambunath is. I’m not sure why she took me over there because Teej is a Hindu holiday, but nonetheless, I was excited to see this stupa. Here’s us on the bus:

Swayambunath is known as the monkey temple for obvious/awesome reasons. The monkeys rule the area and look adorable doing it. OH, NOOOOOO:

Below is a picture of a Buddha and me. I look tired and sweaty because Swayambunath is on a horribly vertical hill with thousands of steps up to the main stupa. Luckily, there are tons of souvenirs and monkeys lining the steps to pretend to stop and look at.

I enjoyed Teej and hopefully will get an awesome husband delivered to me soon.

Tomorrow, Meredith and I leave for Bandipur and Pokhara at 6:30am. I’m not sure how long we’ll be there, maybe for a week depending on how much fun it is. I’m also not sure what the internet access will be like there, so blogging may be on a temporary hold.

I salute the divine beings in you all, for now.

Apartment Search Complete

2008-09-04T02:36:00.003-04:00

Meredith and I have officially moved to a new apartment (see above – we’re on the top floor). It is a little south of Albert’s apartment in an area called Sanepa. It was actually a really random find: one day I was napping and Mer was working and this little man named Binod came in to Albert’s apartment to say hello. Turns out he delivers newspapers and is a realtor. So, we got on his motorbike and looked at five or six apartments. Two days later we got this lovely thing. It has a really awesome windowed room, an office, bathroom, kitchen, and good-sized bedroom. It had a huge layer of dust and grim on it that we spent the first day cleaning with Shusila. Meredith pretends to be a bandit while she cleans:

It’s really good to have our own place. The day before we left Albert’s, Meredith had resorted to throwing things at the next door neighbors dog to get it to shut up. She pegged it with a lemon first and then created a stock supply of tofu balls in case it started up again. Turns out Meredith is really sensitive to barking dog noise. A few times in the middle of the night a dog would be non-stop barking, and she would get up all disgruntled, run outside and shout: “Shut Up Dog!!” She did it so scarily, so I just pretended I was still sleeping. The sad part is the dog wouldn’t stop. Lemons and tofu balls were far more effective.

Yesterday we went swimming at the Hardic fitness center. We’ve gone there on a few occasions; the first time we got a massage, the second Meredith tried to do a sauna but they had lost the key to the sauna room. That gives you a good idea of their operations. This time, apparently, the four Nepali boys swimming had never seen Western women in bathing suits. We were pretty amusing to them. Let me just say, it’s creepy to have a 30 year old man in a donut floaty paddling two feet away from you in circles. Also, there was one cloud in the sky and it was right above the swimming pool. We left. Here’s Meredith, she’s psyched to be leaving Hardic.

That evening we went to Shusila’s apartment. She invited us for dinner and to see her place. Many of her family members were there because a. They live there b. it is the evening before a Hindu holiday called Teej. Shusila’s cousin and our Nepali language tutor, Sauroj, picked us up at our apartment. We took a bus to Ratna Park (the main bus drop-off and pick-up area) and then walked to Samecusi (sp?), Shusila’s part of town. Sauroj said our walk would take 20 minutes. This is funny because it took at least an hour. In our apartment search we learned that when Nepali people give you an estimate of how long it takes to walk somewhere, they leave out the words: “times three.” So, it’s good to know when someone says they live “ten minutes away”, they mean “ten minutes away times three. I live thirty minutes away.”
On our twenty minute times three walk:

I know irony is not cool anymore, but I got an ironic Christina Aguilara. This is one of three really popular shirts in Nepal, the other two have Avril Lavigne and Britney Spears on them. I will try and collect them all because they are seriously so ridiculously awesome. Here’s me so excited to have mine on (I even put on red underwear to match):

Shower Dance

2008-08-30T09:35:00.002-04:00

Last night Mer and I went out with Naba and Pia. Pia is one of Albert’s business partners. She is Finnish and is married to Nepali Naba. A while back we had asked Naba if there were any gay bars or clubs in Kathmandu and he said that there was one called Via Via in touristy Thamel. With this plan in mind we went to a Korean restaurant first where we roasted our own meat (I ate none because I am easily vegetarian here – and in a healthy way). Anyhow, while we ate our Korean food, the mosquitoes feasted on us. I’ve been super nauseous lately, and Pia suggested some local rum to kill whatever is making me pukey. Amazingly, I have not been nauseous since. Go alcohol.

We then went to Via Via which was only gay because Meredith and I were there. I had a milkshake like the 10 year old I am and then I convinced Naba to find me a "shower dance". There are advertisements in Thamel for “shower dances” and usually they’re accompanied by a picture of Angelina Jolie or Jessica Simpson. Pia said there was not likely to be any dancing in any showers of water, but probably girls dancing with poles. Naba argued that shower dances did exist and finally we went to go see for ourselves.

The first place we went into had a woman dancing with a pole. One point for Pia. The second place we went into had this scene: A woman dancing. No pole. Two large trees with green flashing lights on it and in the middle of the trees: two shower heads. SHOWER DANCE WHAT WHAT. They heads weren’t on and no one was showering, but they existed. As we walked there seemed to be a bunch of people enjoying themselves, but then everyone stood up because they all worked there and we were customers. Immediately someone grabbed hold of my wrist and lead me to a seat close to the large trees. SHOWER DANCE WHAT WHAT. We ordered some beer and sat down to watch. After about five dances of the scantily clad (no nudity) women dancing awkwardly we began to wonder if they were going to turn on the shower heads. Naba argued with one of the waitresses and it was pretty clear there was going to be no shower and no dance in the shower. We watched some skinny guy get up and dance in front of a confused girl and left.

I don't think that story could have been more anti-climactic if I had tried.

Anyhow, we put some money down on an apartment today. Tomorrow we will go clean it with Shusila and then we will live there. Here's the man who helped us find it next to Meredith and Shusila.

Birthday - Nepali Style

2008-08-28T14:16:00.003-04:00

I spent number 26 in Kathmandu.

Too bad I'm still recovering from my first Nepali sickness because supposedly Meredith was planning the biggest birthday bash ever for me. Since we were still sick, she did this second biggest birthday bash:

Cooked me french toast with fruit compote.
Gave me a ring. (How many parents had heart-attacks from that sentence?)
Promised me a trip to Pokhara.
Took me to dinner at our favorite nearby restaurant at the Hotel Himalaya.

I love the Hotel Himalaya. They serve awesome American/Nepali buffets. The waiter said I was "very handsome gentlemen" and my birthday was complete. Meredith and I love to play the game where we guess what kind of people stay at this hotel, because it's really inconvenient to get to and far from any touristy things to do. The last time we went there just for dessert, and this mid 20's American remarked that we looked too young to be able to afford "this place." I can think of so many responses to that statement now, all of which I did not say at the time.

I swear things will get more interesting on this blog once I am not stuck in my apartment pretending to live.

At least this guy knows what's up:

Sick and Breast Massage

2008-08-26T12:14:00.003-04:00

(Me checking my 103 temp with a cold pair of underwear on my head)

About five days ago I started getting the same awful cough that Meredith has had for a while. She was still pretty sick and was going crazy from the dog barking and metal grinding that surrounds our house 24/7. We decided that we would move to a hotel for a few days for some peace and quiet. We found a place called Kathmandu Peace Guest House which is just outside of Thamel (the really touristy part of Kathmandu). Then we went to do Meredith's favorite thing in the world: get a massage.

I've only gotten three professional massages in my life. One was free at a pole vault meet and the second two were from massage students in Alburquerque and Los Angeles, respectively. I had gotten a massage in Kathmandu at a resort near our apartment, so I knew that the Nepali massages included a "breast massage." Meredith enjoyed me squirm as my female masseuse tapped me and said: "breast massage?" Errrr...I struggled for an answer and then asked the masseuse if Meredith was getting one. Meredith shouted at me: "Yes, just get one!" So, I did and it was fine.

Anyhow, we went to a spa to get another massage and this time we were in separate rooms because I was getting a 90 minute massage so Meredith could get do 30 minutes of sauna. My male masseuse entered and gave me a damn good massage (including the infamous "breast massage" - not as fine this time but whatever). Near the end we started talking and he asked me if I was married. No, I wasn't I replied. He chatted some more and then he asked me for my phone number. Since, I was naked, I said "okay, but I'm naked - let me put some clothes on and then I'll come out and give it to you." As I was dressing I realized that he probably thought I was about to put on some girly clothes. Oh man, hope he dates dykes. Well, turns out he doesn't date dykes:

Him: Oh, I see you wear boys clothes.
Me: Yes, yes I do.
Him: Only today or everyday?
Me: Every day. Even Tuesday.

I didn't say the "Even Tuesday" part but that would have been funny if I did. He was totally heartbroken. He didn't even have the heart to just pretend he still wanted my number. No more breast massage for me.

So, anyways, and then I got really sick the next day. Had 102.5 degree temp and went to a hospital to get some antibiotics and not die. The first hospital checked my temperature under my arm and said my temp was 98.5. As I sat there bathed in sweat and roasting I was like: "Feel my head! You don't even need a thermometer to know I have temperature!!!" They sent me to the regular doctor because apparently I was totally imagining my high temp. We arrived at a room that had a bunch of people sitting in it like they had been waiting an eternity. I started crying and we went to another hospital.

I got antibiotics and suffered like the baby I am through the next five days. I almost went to the hospital again because my temperature flew up to 103.5, but then it went down pretty quickly again. Now we're back at the apartment and desperately searching for a new one.

Let me know if you know of anything in Kathmandu.

Sick

2008-08-23T05:07:00.002-04:00

I'm in a hotel.
Went to hospital.
Had a 103.5 degree temp.
Doing nothing but watching movies, taking meds, and trying to get better.

Talk to you soon.

American Friend and Gai Jatra

2008-08-19T11:41:00.006-04:00

American Friend

I made an American friend in Nepal, but now she is gone, so I’m not sure if she still counts. Her name is (was?) Olivia, and I met her at the Aarohan Theater. She goes to Drew University in New Jersey and has been staying at Aarohan for the past six weeks. She learned a surprising amount of Nepali and knew nearly everyone at the theater. I think I mentioned in my last post how much Aarohan is like a camp. Most of the staff lives there and when students come from the various villages, they reside there. They have a ping pong table and a game that resembles pool. Here’s the Artistic Director playing ping pong and kicking ass:

They eat at the “canteen,” a communal eating area where they serve tasty Nepali food. There are two indoor theaters; one is a black box and one a lot larger. I watched a group of students, from this remote village in the mountains called Mogu, rehearse a play they will be performing in a few days. It is in their native language, so most people at the show will not know what they are saying. Olivia said it is going to be a very visual show so it will be easy to understand, but I was very lost during the rehearsal. Maybe I’m missing the visual cues…? Here’s Olivia with two men from Mogu and a woman from a town I always forget the name of:

I really enjoy hanging out at Aarohan, but I have yet to assist them in any way beyond being an interesting foreigner and an audience member. I was supposed to help with the website yesterday but Jeebesh, my main contact there, was at exams all day despite the fact that he had invited me to work on the website yesterday. I was supposed to do my lecture today but my translator, Jeebesh, had exams today, too. So, I’ve had fun hanging out at this camp theater place and meeting all the artists that work there. They are very animated and friendly and one of my favorite people, Min, has invited Meredith and I to visit to Mogu. He also said he wants to go bungee jumping with me!!! AHHH. There is the world’s longest bungee jump in Nepal. Don’t worry, no one has died there, yet.

Gai Jatra

Last Sunday, Shusila our wonderful cook, took us to Bhaktapur a town inside Kathmandu Valley for this festival called Gai Jatra. This festival allows people to pay homage to family members who have passed away this year. Sorej, Shusila’s brother, said Nepali people also take this opportunity to make fun of political leaders. Shusila came to our apartment to pick us up and we took two buses to Bhaktapur. The first one had goats on top of it:

While on the bus, Shusila pointed to one of the men on the bus, and in her limited/awesome English said: Goat Man.

On the second bus, Meredith started to get some bad allergies so I gave her my handy dandy bandana. Look at the angry man behind her, maybe he thinks she is going to try and take his money:

After a two hour journey we arrived in Bhaktapur. We had to pay 750 rupees, almost $12.00 to get into the durbar (palace) squares. This, though it may seem like very little, is actually a lot of money to pay to get into somewhere. Relatively, it’s nearly five times an average Nepali daily salary. Well, luckily for the Nepali people, they only charge Foreigners.

The best part is the latthi nach or “stick dance” where men dance and bang sticks together. It’s beautiful and captivating and Shusila thought it was hilarious when I would move my head to the rhythm.

Meredith and Shusila also thought it was hilarious when Meredith poured scalding tea on my thigh. Stupid senses of humor. This happened while we were eating at a restaurant we had deemed “white restaurant” because we had seen it from afar and noticed there were only white people eating there. We decided not to eat there, but then Shusila suggested it and we didn’t want to be rude and also we are white. Here’s our view:

I will spend very little time on this, because I’m very embarrassed, but, we got mhendi. Shusila, Meredith, and I, all got mhendi (aka Henna) on our hands. We attracted a lot of attention as we were painted, though I’m not sure if it was because we were foreigners or because it’s so fun to watch the men create intricate little patterns on our hands.

Speaking of being gay, we saw a few men dressed as women. I read the next day that the only gay group in Nepal, The Blue Diamond Society, used the festival to raise awareness for “third sex” rights. As far as I can tell, third sex refers to men who dressed as women. Like Thailand, these transwomen (this term may be a misnomer for them), mainly work as prostitutes and while they are accepted to some extent, are marginalized and ostracized. I am planning on going to the Blue Diamond Society to check them out and see if I can volunteer.

Overall, it was a fun trip to Gai Jatra and Bhaktapur. Shusila is a great guide and friend. She is going to take us to one of the big (read: expensive) resorts in Nepal on Saturday where she takes cooking lessons.

Here’s the best picture I took at Gai Jatra (mostly it's impressive because my camera is a piece of shit):

Bouda, The Theater, and Meredith Gets a Staph Infection

2008-08-17T13:02:00.010-04:00

Meredith Gets a Staph Infection

staph·y·lo·coc·cus n (aka staph)
A bacterium that typically occurs in clusters resembling grapes, normally inhabits the skin and mucous membranes, and may cause disease. Genus: Staphylococcus

We didn’t want to tell you, but Meredith got a staph infection. Don’t worry, she’s better now. It all started as a weird bump on her back (maybe it was a bug bite or maybe acne…) that caused her whole back to ache. She took matters into her own hands and decided to treat it with hydrogen peroxide. Really that did nothing but sear her skin and make everything worse:

This “treatment” happened at night, so instead of a doctor we got to take our first trip to the emergency room! We’re so lucky. Actually, we are because it was my favorite experience at a hospital. We were there so short that our taxi waited for us.

The only weird part is that it’s a really small hospital and nothing is very private. Here’s Meredith getting examined. She loves it:

The doctor facetiously asked her if she was training to be a doctor since she had decided to treat herself. HAHA, no she wasn’t. He prescribed her some antibiotics, we paid about $20 in all and went home. She’s all better now:

The Theater
(This part is altered from an email I sent someone...)

I went to the theater I'm going to be working for. They are called Aarohan and are super political and socially conscious, but not in an annoying way that makes you want to never vote again. Here’s the welcome sign:

They seem excited to have me there, but I don't think they know how best to utilize me. For now, I’m going to do a lecture on arts management for some of their students and also help out with their website. Unfortunately, both of these duties are very short term, and I want to be more involved. I think the more I’m around there, the better they'll know how to use me. I’m most excited about their international theater festival in November. There are, tentatively, 10 different countries coming so far. Including two from the USA.

Also, they do this thing called Legislative Theater. It’s a kind of theater that helps the people create laws. A man named Augusto Boal created it and used it in Brazil. Look it up...it's ridiculously awesome.

Also, they idolize Henrik Ibsen...

Guess what I’m not excited about? That lecture. In fact, teaching is probably my least favorite kind of job. I will suck it up and do it anyways.

Bouda (aka Bodhinath)

Lastly, I went to a place called Bouda a few days ago. They have one of the biggest Buddhist stupas in Nepal here. Here’s me standing awkwardly in front of it:

Most importantly, I watched a cow pretend it was a pigeon:

And then I ate some Tibetan food and went home.

Top Five

2008-08-14T04:59:00.005-04:00

Top Five Things I Love About Nepal (in no particular order)

1. The Sweets
What I like about Meredith is that she's not me. A few days ago, after dinner, we went to a sweet shop a few minutes away from our house. They have a huge assortment of silver-and-gold-foil-topped sweet treats. We picked a few of our favorites: sponge cannoli thing, orange grain thing, bowl of watery rice pudding thing. And lastly, Meredith picked the one I would have never picked: dark brown ball thing. You can see it hiding in the back of the picture below. It was the best ever ever ever. It tasted like an American donut times ten in flavor and texture. Plus it had a yellow goopy thing inside.

2. Random Animals Wandering the Streets
There are many animals that roam the streets of Kathmandu. Mostly, it's mangy, depressed dogs that eat the trash and get kicked by shop owners. Let's not talk about that right now. There's no stray cats because Hindu's believe cats are evil and they shoot them. EXCEPT, a few days ago I caught this awesome picture:

Maybe the dog is protecting the cat?? Someone submit this picture to cuteoverload.com or something. Anyhow, I've also seen many cows (sacred Hindu animal) and yesterday came upon a huge goat! Some kids saw me and Meredith gaping and laughing at it and went over to prove their superiority over it:

My camera sucks so bad.

3. Avocados

Actually, I hate Nepali avocados, but compared to no avocado, I like them. They're watery and too sweet, but before yesterday, I thought they probably didn't exist in Nepal. We found them though!! Meredith is making her special guacamole with them right as I write this. I dunno if you've ever tasted her guac, but let's just say that's the only reason why I'm dating her.

4. Funny Spellings

5. Meredith's Impeccable "Sense of Direction" and The Sites We See On the Way

I admit that my sense of direction is at the bottom of the food chain, but Meredith believes that she is a god among gods when it comes to finding her way. Usually, she's preety good, too. However, she too is fallible and yesterday as she led us home, we got LOST. Yes, we eventually found our way, just as we would've if I was leading. As I questioned her guidance, she laughed and reminded me that she had a good sense of direction. On our journey we saw these guys playing ping pong on a concrete slab:

We also saw the ram I mentioned above. After a half hour, and what should've been 5 minutes, we found our way. As we approached the main road we saw a huge temple that we decided to go into. However, as we walked towards it we noticed it was encased in a weird compound type thing, there were armed guards, and everyone was looking at us funny. A guard asked us where we were going and we pointed at the temple. He shook his head and then Meredith asked where we were and he said: This is the central prison. Here's what we saw before the temple that should've tipped us off:

Ah.

So, clearly I chose those top five things based on what I had pictures of and what I am thinking about at the moment. But, I also like these things: the people, the business men, the Nepali language, the cost of things, the way it rains at night, when the dogs are quiet, being here with Meredith, our really wonderfully nice cook Susila, the pretty saris, the boys that run the buses, fresh vegatables after they're soaked in iodine and giardia-free, getting emails from my friends and family, writing this travelogue, being able to afford things, the himalayas as a backdrop to everything, the cute vests the Nepali boys wear, the hand-made goods, etc, etc.

Put Yourself in Their Place

2008-08-09T10:25:00.007-04:00

Yesterday, one of the kids from the orphanage named Madhu came to our apartment to hang out. We talked for a few hours over tea and Meredith's favorite new snack: sliced tomatoes, cucumbers, and red onions with lemon squeezed over them. Madhu is 17 years old and is extremely smart and friendly. He told us a story about how four years ago the orphanage (they call it The Foundation, so I will call it that, too) was run by a horrible guy named Delib. He stole money, didn't take care of the kids, and was a generally sucky owner. Apparently, this is common at Nepalese orphanages. The Foundation is run by this very wealthy German guy named Ludwig (I mentioned him in another post) who everyone has spoken very highly of. He is coming in October and Meredith and I are very eager to meet him. Anyhow, so one day Ludwig came to visit The Foundation (he visits about twice a year) and Madhu took him aside and told him about Delib. Ludwig didn't know about this and he immediately fired him and hired a board of directors who now run The Foundation. Madhu is very happy with the board of "uncles" and "aunts" who come from different parts of the community and help guarantee a corrupt-free organization. With many people overseeing The Foundation, there is less of a chance that someone can take advantage.

Madhu, Meredith, and I went on a long walk south on the main street. Here's a picture to prove it:

As you can see Meredith is wearing her new pants. I told her she could wear them as long as I can call her Aladdin. She agreed. I'm hoping she'll start calling me Jasmin and we can get a monkey.

Anyhow, we ended up at the local zoo. This is the scariest zoo I've ever been to because most of the cages were small and flimsy. Therefore, you could see all the animals and they were really, freakily close to you. Here is the most amazing warning sign ever in life:

Look at that blood!! Every other zoo you are lucky if there is animal visible at all. But at this zoo I had to pretend there were invisible electric fences keeping them in. I swear there was a two foot wooden fence around the rhinos. Here is the hippo that is only separated from us by a flimsy chain-link fence:

Many times I would look up from watching the animals and realize that people were looking at me and Meredith and not the animals. Pretty awesome that we are more interesting than the crocodiles and hippos.

A few other things. Instead of cockroaches, we have tiny, cut little lizards:

Also, as we walked to the zoo we passed by all these incredibly long lines of people with their motorcycles waiting to get petrol. The oil shortage means that people have to wait in hour long lines and pay twice as much.

It is true, there's much pollution here. Especially when you're walking down the main roads. So, I've taken to wearing a bandana around my neck and pulling it up around my nose when it gets especially disgusting. Hey, remember how a hipster fashion has turned into a useful accessory that saves my lungs? I remember. Thanks, hipsters.

American Life

2008-08-06T12:11:00.009-04:00

Yesterday, I may have been graced with one of the most awesome quotes in history:

“American Life
Japanese Wife
Chinese Food
Italian Shoes”

Meredith and I went to one of the three durbar (palace) squares in Kathmandu. We had yet to do anything tourtisty because we’ve mostly been hanging out with Nepali people. Foreigners have to pay 250 rupees to get into the square. Here’s me doing my best tourist impression:

Immediately, Nepalese people who wanted to give us a tour approached us. The first man that approached us told us that he loved Americans and hated French people. Then he said my favorite quote (above) and despite my affection for his clever rhyme, we said no to the tour. As we wandered around the square, I realized that we probably made a mistake by not agreeing to the tour. The next guy that came up to us spoke great English, so we agreed to pay him to show us around. Here’s Meredith eagerly learning something:

We saw a holy Brahmin talking on a cell phone as he received mourning women:

Sadhu’s are wandering holy men who give up all material possessions and travel around begging for alms. Meredith said that many people pretend to be Sadhus to get money. They are the kind of people that end up on the front of Lonely Planet guide books because of the dramatic make-up and garb. Our tour guide had a Sadhu came up to us and put a white dot on our foreheads and then pose for a picture. Clearly, all these “real” experiences are planned. It reminded me of when I went to New York for the first time and went to the tenements. Some actors re-enacted tenement life and although they interact with you, they never get out of character. This is how it was in the square, but everyone pretends that the Sadhu aren’t actors. Meredith and the zombie Sadhu:

Everytime I write on this travelogue, I’m reminded how my memory retains maybe 2% of what I learn. Anyhow, here’s the 2% I remember from this piece of information: Brahmins can’t eat off the same plate more than once because…of some reason. Therefore, they must use plates made of leaves so that after they eat they can give the food remainders and plate to animals and then nothing goes to waste. I’m bringing this all up because I took an awesome picture of a woman making these leave plates:

I’m sure every other human being alive has taken this picture and felt like they are Ansel Adams. I don’t care.

Here’s Meredith cheating on me with a mummified frog:

Here’s another choice photo of a man carrying birds around:

Here’s Meredith trying to fit in with her Punjabi suit:

Love.

Finally

2008-08-04T07:14:00.012-04:00

On Saturday afternoon we arrived in Kathmandu. We flew in a huge plane from Delhi to Kathmandu with only 15 other people. There was a man in a pink shirt that kept looking at us. When we got in the plane he was sitting far away at first, and then I looked around and he was right behind us. He never said anything he was just quietly menacing. I was wondering if we were to expect this kind of behavior in Kathmandu, but nothing else like this has happened.

In the Delhi airport, this clerk kept coming up to talk to Meredith and me. However, Meredith is a skilled airport sleeper and managed to put seats together to sleep almost 6 hours, so I got the majority of the attention.

I couldn’t go into a bathroom without five or six people telling me I was in the wrong place and “this is the women’s restroom”. Maybe I should expect this. I started to think that I should probably pick a gender and stick with it while in Nepal. Boo. Anyhow, the clerk kept saying that I was a “man/woman” and that it wasn’t wise to look like that. He wanted Meredith and I to accompany him to smoke cigarettes. Luckily, he left me alone after a while. Also, when I went through security, the smile-less guard kept telling me to go the "gents" line. I kept saying that I was a woman, but he insisted over and over again to go in the other line. I finally took off my jacket to convince him with my breasts. That did it. He covered his face with his hands, laughing and turning bright red. Ah well.

Albert, Meredith’s boss, sent his friend Khusbu to pick us up at the airport:

Khusbu has turned out to be an awesome guide and friend. He dropped us off at Albert’s apartment where we will be staying for a month until Albert returns from the States. I realized on the taxi ride from the airport that driving in Nepal would be ten times more scary than any scary trip I've ever taken in New York or Italy or France. There are no stop signs or traffic signals of any kind and yet somehow people are not killed every second.

So, how does Kathmandu look and feel? It's new and old at the same time. Like Europe, only more extreme. Everything is jumbled together. Cornfields and decrepit buildings, stray dogs and palaces, slums on the river and temples, cows on the street and huge houses. Our apartment is across the "street" from a field full of corn and marijuana:

Meredith has serious allergies and got really red and puffy and sneezy and snotty. She took some pills, but there was something in Albert's apartment that was affecting her. We decided it was the sheets that were making things so bad. So we cleaned them. Look at how ridiculously dirty the water is:

On Sunday we went to Khusbu's house about 20 minutes away from Alberts. It's a very nice house with a big backyard. AND a puppy!! Lord, the cutest golden lab pup.

We played with the puppy and with Khusbu's son. His son is a very clever and friendly kid. He taught me some Nepalese and we played Mastermind with him.

Since Meredith was so affected by her allergies, she decided to go take a sauna and massage. Khusbu invited me to go take a look at some of his property and then to an orphange he manages. His property is in an area called China Market where there are all these small shops that sell DVDs for like 20 cents.

Then we went to his orphanage. This has been the highlight of the trip so far. All these awesome kids live there. Very smart and they all speak english. They heard I played guitar and brought me one to play. I played them a short song and they clapped. Though, they also clapped before I began, so that's not really an indication that they liked my music. They were very confused about whether I was a boy or a girl. But, even children in the States are, so I don't think it's a Nepalese thing. One of the kids, Madhu, said he would show us around Kathmandu. The orphanage is paid for by a German billionaire named Ludwig. They all call him 'papa' in the orphanage and have great affection for him. They talked about him a lot. Khusbu said I could come teach a seminar (in what? I don't know...) every week to the kids. I would really like to do it...

After the orphanage we met Meredith in Thamel which is the most touristy part of Kathmandu. We saw some white people and ate some expensive food, which wasn't expensive.

Can't believe we're here. Probably should start believing it though.

3:27am – Los Angeles
6:27am – New York
4:13pm - Kathmandu

In Delhi, India

2008-08-01T22:18:00.002-04:00

Hey Rickard,

I got to visit India for an unexpected 12 hours. Actually it was just Delhi. Actually it was just the airport.

Don't have a 12 hour lay-over in Delhi. Or anywhere. But especially here because people keep you in the dark when your plane flight information mysteriously disappears from the departure screen.

We met a nice boy named jon who knows way too much about politcs and is going to Cambodia to teach English and Math and something else...history? Maybe we'll go stay with him.

I'm forcing Meredith to write something on this blog:

"I'm smelly."

Bye Rickard.

P.S. Maybe someday we'll get to Nepal....

It's time.

2008-07-31T01:26:00.005-04:00

The last few days have been pretty busy. My last day at work was on Friday and it was a surprisingly sad goodbye. But, time to move on. Here's how the moving on has been going:

Starting packing on Friday:

Had a goodbye party on Saturday:

There are more pics of the adios party. Click HERE.

Unfortunately, two of my favorite people (Shoshi and Ayla) were missing that evening. However, I got to see Shoshi on Wednesday night when Kyle, Meredith, and I waited in line for nearly 7 hours to see Hair (The Public/Shakespeare in the Park)

I saw Ayla tonight as I completed my packing. She made me FOUR awesome CD mixes. Want to judge her musical tastes? Email me: white.lauren@gmail.com

And we're off tomorrow at 7:45pm!! That's 19:45pm world time. We're on WORLD TIME NOW!!!!

Holy shit.

you'll have a roof and such

2008-07-25T12:55:00.003-04:00

My favorite conversations about this blog so far (all conducted on my most frequently used form of communication - gchat):

MICHELLE
Michelle: blog = awesome
Me: yeah???
Michelle: i liked it
now i can check in on you in nepal...or as long as you have internet access and power
:)
Me: yay!
i hsould have access to internet
there
Michelle: oh good
yeah i guess its not like your living in the mountains in a cave
you'll have a roof and such

GAELEN
Gaelen: i thought you said there was a new post
Me: there was going to be
but
i decided not to post it
because
Gaelen: geez- i'm like a blog stalker
Me: it feels really indulgent!!!
hah, yeah you are
Gaelen: the more indulgent the better i say. that is what is great about blogs

KAT
Kat: says the girl going to thailand
me: nepal, haha
Kat: same difference
(i know i know not at all;)
i'm reading your blog though
Me: yay!
is it ridiculsouly boring?
Kat: no
i really enjoyed the knife fight post
are you stoked?
Me: i'm so excited
except it really hasn't hit me yet
Kat: Also, don't break up while you're in Nepal
that could be awkward

accommodate your butch-ness

2008-07-23T11:37:00.007-04:00

Meredith Makes a Damn Good Packing List:
(I've bolded my favorite parts)

-------------------------------------------------
PANTS/SHORTS
1 pair sweatpants (or other warm, soft pants good for traveling/keeping warm at high altitudes
1 pair jeans
1 pair cargo pants with drawstrings on the legs to become like shorts (or other non-jeans pants. You can leave it out and buy hippie pants there if you prefer)
1 pair of nice shorts (khaki or whatever)
2 pair cotton/Lycra sport shorts (one of which will dry fast if wet, you can sub your swim shorts)

SHIRTS
1 hooded sweatshirt
1 thermal long sleeved shirt
5 or 6 t-shirts, one of which is loose and bigger than normal for putting over bathing suits or going places where you especially don't want your tits on display
1 light, nice collared shirt, long or short sleeves (mine has long ones that can be rolled up)

SHOES/SOCKS
1 pair sneakers
2 pair thong sandals (one is waterproof and good for grody conditions like the beach or walking around a campsite, the other is the gold pair - nicer for the city. More appropriate would be a good pair of leather sandals that are sturdy enough to walk around in but nice enough to wear at night or with a good outfit, I'm trying to find such a thing now)
5 pairs socks, one of which is thick and warm

OTHER
1 waterproof/resistant shell jacket, like a windbreaker
1 sarong - very important item, to be used as a towel/beach towel/wrap/dress
1 bathing suit
2-3 pairs of underwear (you should take 5-6 probably)
2-4 bras, one of which is a sports bra

Additional: I am bringing one very nice sari for dress-up and two Punjabi suits that I got in India - they're a casual thing people wear around, google and you'll see what they are. Also plan on filling out my wardrobe with some dresses and other Nepal-appropriate clothing that's easy to buy there. Obviously you're not interested in dresses, but you might plan to fill out your own wardrobe with some local stuff once we get there. Make sure you bring at least one outfit that's nice enough to meet your new employers in and/or go out at night.

Optional:
1 pair of long underwear - I almost brought it but decided there probably would be no occasion to use it, so if we end up going to high altitudes will just layer up, or buy some
Warm stuff like a scarf, gloves, hat, etc - definitely don't buy any of this since if we end up needing it it's all over the place there and cheap (and nice, will be a good souvenir). But, if you've got any laying around, you could bring it along and replace it if you feel like it.

NON-CLOTHING ITEMS
tickets
passport
2 color photocopies of your passport
4-6 passport photos
immunization record (I'm actually not bringing this because I lost it, but you should)
$4 - $500 emergency cash in USD
list of emergency phone numbers (parents, US embassy in Nepal, the insurance people, etc)
photocopies of all important papers relating to any business in NY you might need to take care of long distance (lease information, pay stubs from your last job, health insurance receipts, etc)
10ish copies of your resume/copy of portfolio/letter of recommendation from previous boss (optional)
computer (get a case if you can)
external hard drive
jump drive
camera + tripod
sketchbook
pens/pencils
travel watercolor set
day bag (a small backpack, best if it can fold up small, not one with a lot of foam in it or whatever)
compact umbrella
knife
small leatherman tool
sunglasses with 100percent uva/uvb
an empty artist's tube for transporting any posters or roll-able art I pick up
first aid kit
flashlight (mine turns into a little lantern! ha!)

toothbrush (NOT your electronic one, a normal one)
toothpaste
mouthwash (I got a big bottle for us both)
enough tampons to last 5 months
sunscreen
bug spray
deodorant (I like my brand so I'm bringing enough for 5 months, but they've got all this stuff in the local variety)
floss
razors
tweezers, nail file other Grooming Tools
generally any toiletries you like to use and cant live without. The best are things that you will use up and not have to bring back, that way the space you allotted for that stuff can be used for souvenirs on the way home! :)
a medium-sized Tupperware (its waterproof, u can pack stuff in it)

THINGS I HAVE THAT YOU DO NT HAVE TO BRING:
tent
sleeping pad (got an extra for you)
sleeping bag (buy it in Kathmandu if you need it)
bungee cords (got you some)
nylon water-resistant bag for laundry/all purpose (got you one)
safety pins
sewing kit
ziploc bags

MEDICINE
Advil/painkiller
anti-diarrhea
anti-nausea
anything else you think you might need for your various ailments

all of the things I'm bringing I'm ok with losing, replacing, or ruining....don't bring anything you really care about. Some of the stuff I'm deliberately planning on replacing with new stuff I buy in Kathmandu - good to buy there will be hippie pants and shirts, dresses, all types of hats/scarves/gloves/accessories, any camping gear, etc.

and note, a lot of the flashier stuff would be left out if we were actually going to be backpacking - but it's ok to bring some extra stuff since were going to be more or less in one spot for the next 5 months. I would be a lot tougher on you otherwise!!!!

obviously, you will have to adjust this list a little to accommodate your butch-ness - but anything you don't have that your thinking of buying check with me first, bc they probably have it there.

OK. love you!!!!
--------------------

SO ADORABLE IT KILLS ME

i don't want malaria

2008-07-21T21:41:00.007-04:00

I've never gone somewhere you have to get so many immunizations and shots to make sure you don't die. I remember when my dad went to Africa he had to get a zillion shots, too. So a few weeks ago I had to get these shots (or make sure I already had them):

Hepatitus A
Hepatitus B
Meningitus
Polio
Tetanus
Typhoid
Malaria

Below is a picture of my doctor getting all the medicines ready to stick them in my body:

He's a nice man, but anyone who comes at you with a needle that many times becomes something less than a friend. When he went to put the shots in my arm with the horse tattoo he said: "One in the butt and one in the head." Ha-ha, funny for you and not for me:

I'll Cut You

2008-07-14T17:39:00.001-04:00

I had a brilliant idea to learn how to knife fight. In retrospect, this was definitely a good idea, but maybe not in the way that I had originally thought. It all began because I'm nervous about going to another country that has this kind of warning attached to it. I decided I would carry a knife with me, both for safety and practical purposes. However, I knew that with my luck and (lack of) dexterity, I should probably be trained in knife fighting. I was psyched. I looked up "knife fighting" on Craigs List. I found this posting (condensed):

Learn at Home:

Sports Fighting – Boxing, Muay Thai, MMA
Kali – Staff, Stick Fighting, Knife Fighting, Empty Hand
Jeet Kune Do – Self Defense (client specific – Kids, Women, Men)
Fitness - Get Fit at Home or in a nearby park (with weights or using
environment)

Contact Info: Bonafide Warhawk

Yeah, so that was the deal. Bonafide will teach you to cut someone. Ayla said that it "sounds psychooooo" and she didn't mean in the "I can protect myself from death" way. Nonetheless, Meredith was down, it was $20 cheaper than I thought, and we could learn in a public park. Below is Meredith learning how to kick. She's so happy when she kicks.

The man in all black who could kill me with his pinky is Bonafide. He definitely was stabbed in the eye at some point and had the softest touch for a man who could BREAK ME. At one point it started raining so hard the whole park was deserted except for us learning how to knife fight. Bonafide said we were hardcore and that it was like "military training."

Meredith and I ended up hurting each other in the most pathetic way possible. I gave her a minor bruise that she complained about for WEEEEKS (haha, this is my blog). See below:

Besides some knife fighting techniques that I still don't completely understand, I learned how to do some really easy knife-less self-defense moves. Those ended up being the most useful. Bonafide said we should continue practicing the self-defense moves on each other and the knife moves with spatulas.

My mom made a good point the other day about how it is super dangerous and stupid to introduce a knife to what could've been a non-lethal attack.

Pepper-spray it is.

Nepal vs. Spain

2008-07-14T17:08:00.000-04:00

Guess what? If you choose where you want to go based on how easy it is to get a Visa and your only choices are Nepal and Spain, you should go to Nepal. My friends (wait, who am I writing this for that wouldn't know Rickard and Sarah...? I don't know), Rickard and Sarah are going to Spain and they had to do all this stuff to get their Visas. I went to the empty Nepalese consulate and gave them like the two documents they asked for. Here I am at the window:

Then, I waited for ten minutes:

And then I got my (albeit ugly and boring) Visa:

It took Meredith and I a combined two hours to get our Visa. So, there you go. Question answered. Therefore:

Nepal: 1

Spain: 0

And, now I'm off to a place with unsafe drinking water and sewage everywhere. DAMN.

Nepal: 1

Spain: 1,000,000

I decided to go...???

2008-07-14T16:43:00.000-04:00

So, I'm setting off to Nepal. This is what happened:

1. My girlfriend Meredith went to Nepal a while ago

2. She went to an "Eco Resort"

a. No, I don't know what an "Eco Resort" is

b. Maybe something like this: Eco Resort?

3. She met an "Eco Architect" named Albert

4. Albert told her she could work for him, but maybe he wouldn't pay her....

5. Albert came to town about a month ago and talked to Meredith about coming to Nepal to work for him and maybe he would pay her....

6. Meredith was very very excited.

7. Meredith invited me to come and I said "Yes, please."

So, that's basically what happened. There's more, but I'll stick to the basics so I can use up your time with more interesting aspects of this decision.