I had one last day in Kathmandu before my morning flight out to the Khumbu. I was sad because I was going to be leaving behind my cousin and Uncle Jim. I was having such a fun time with them just hanging out. After today, it was going to be just me on my own and I could feel the loneliness of that affair starting to weigh down on me. We had one more day to hang around the city, though. On this day, Mr. Paudell was taking us to Bouddha, a very famous spot for Buddhism in Kathmandu.
We awoke to find a wonderful breakfast prepared for us and we had another guest also. This was a general in the Nepali military. You see, Mr. Paudell was a very influential man and this was a common occurrence. They seemed to want to talk about the Iraq war and the common theme seemed to be, why wouldn't Nepal be the next target? My uncle Jim was staunchly against the war and seemed to have to apologize for the conflict throughout breakfast. I was still making up my mind as I had not been around war like other people. It just had not been a large part of my generation.
We then walked down to visit Alanna's school. She was teaching English at this school and we met the kids and some of the teachers. Afterwards, we took a taxi out to Bouddhanath referred to locally as Boudhha. This was a large spherical Buddhist temple with many different sites around. There were Tibetan prayer flags strung throughout and also the prayer wheels that you could spin. It was a similar site to the Swayambunath, except that there were not a bunch of monkeys throughout. We wandered around to find large statues, shrines, worshipers, and homeless sick people lying about.
Mr. Paudell, who was Hindu rather than Buddhist, stayed with us through this part of the trip, but left us as we went to some shops and a restaurant for lunch. I was doing okay with the food in Nepal so far, but I already knew that I could not stand butter tea. This seemed to be the thing to drink as every meal. I was excited because beer prices were affordable and having a beer with lunch wasn't anymore expensive than having a coke. We were in Durbar Marg which was the old palace for the king. It was now kind of a tourist spot where we could wander around and look at the buildings and statues. At this time in my life, I found it tough to get into the history of these cultures, but I did find it intriguing just because of how other worldly it was.
We did explore the shopping experience. Alanna did most of the negotiating. It was tricky. You had to be almost rude to people or else they would rip you off big time. We bought some pillow cases for family and I got a t-shirt because I was running low. Then it was back to the Paudell's home to prepare for the upcoming trip. I could feel the nerves building in me. I was going by myself to trek to Everest Base Camp. Crazy!
I had one last day in Kathmandu before my morning flight out to the Khumbu. I was sad because I was going to be leaving behind my cousin and Uncle Jim. I was having such a fun time with them just hanging out. After today, it was going to be just me on my own and I could feel the loneliness of that affair starting to weigh down on me. We had one more day to hang around the city, though. On this day, Mr. Paudell was taking us to Bouddha, a very famous spot for Buddhism in Kathmandu.
We awoke to find a wonderful breakfast prepared for us and we had another guest also. This was a general in the Nepali military. You see, Mr. Paudell was a very influential man and this was a common occurrence. They seemed to want to talk about the Iraq war and the common theme seemed to be, why wouldn't Nepal be the next target? My uncle Jim was staunchly against the war and seemed to have to apologize for the conflict throughout breakfast. I was still making up my mind as I had not been around war like other people. It just had not been a large part of my generation.
We then walked down to visit Alanna's school. She was teaching English at this school and we met the kids and some of the teachers. Afterwards, we took a taxi out to Bouddhanath referred to locally as Boudhha. This was a large spherical Buddhist temple with many different sites around. There were Tibetan prayer flags strung throughout and also the prayer wheels that you could spin. It was a similar site to the Swayambunath, except that there were not a bunch of monkeys throughout. We wandered around to find large statues, shrines, worshipers, and homeless sick people lying about.
Mr. Paudell, who was Hindu rather than Buddhist, stayed with us through this part of the trip, but left us as we went to some shops and a restaurant for lunch. I was doing okay with the food in Nepal so far, but I already knew that I could not stand butter tea. This seemed to be the thing to drink as every meal. I was excited because beer prices were affordable and having a beer with lunch wasn't anymore expensive than having a coke. We were in Durbar Marg which was the old palace for the king. It was now kind of a tourist spot where we could wander around and look at the buildings and statues. At this time in my life, I found it tough to get into the history of these cultures, but I did find it intriguing just because of how other worldly it was.
We did explore the shopping experience. Alanna did most of the negotiating. It was tricky. You had to be almost rude to people or else they would rip you off big time. We bought some pillow cases for family and I got a t-shirt because I was running low. Then it was back to the Paudell's home to prepare for the upcoming trip. I could feel the nerves building in me. I was going by myself to trek to Everest Base Camp. Crazy!
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