22nd Birthday Present: A Trip to Nepal

March 23rd – I started the day at my mom’s house in Eatonville. I had just finished college at the University of Washington turning in my last paper on the 21st. I earned my degree in Economics and I was off to do a little bit of traveling. My cousin Alanna was teaching in Nepal, so I figured that coming to visit her would be a fantastic idea. My uncle was going over also, so I figured that going with him would be a good idea. So my mom drove me to his place in Silverdale, where we picked him up and got on the ferry. We were on our way to Seattle for our first set of flights. I had not spent much time with my uncle Jim, but I always liked being around him. We got off the ferry and he paid for a taxi to the airport. I would have taken the bus, so this was definitely a luxury. Everything went smoothly in the airport. Soon we were on a plane to San Francisco. We got to San Francisco with plenty of time to spare. We got some dinner, checked in with international, and hung out at the gate.

March 24th - I noticed it was midnight, which meant it was now my birthday. Uncle Jim wished me a happy birthday and fifteen minutes later we were on our giant flight. This had been a new experience for me completely with the passport and going to another country, so the huge plane was another interesting sight. We had fantastic seats with no one in front of us. This made sleeping easy as it was quiet and dark, so soon I was out.

March 25th – When I awoke we had crossed the international date line, so my birthday was now extinct. Our first plane stop was Taiwan. I remember looking down at the houses below and realizing how dramatically different the perspective of flying over this place was from just seeing it on a map. We got more fuel there and just had a short stop. Then we were flying to Bangkok. We arrived in Bangkok in the early morning. We had to switch planes there. I remember seeing CNN and thinking how strange that was to be in Thailand and see that. We had a bit of layover, but were soon on a flight to Kathmandu. “I think I’m going to Kathmandu. That’s really really what I want to do. If I ever get out of here. I’m going to Kathmandu.” “Kathmandu, I’ll soon be seeing you and you’re strange bewildering ways.” The flight was different as the stewardess just passed a bottle of brandy around. Things seemed more relaxed and finally we plopped down in the heart of the city. At the airport, we went through security which I did not understand, just went with the flow. We looked out to the beautiful day and there was my cousin Alanna to pick us up. She argued her way into as cheap a ride as possible in her best Nepali. I was glad she was handling the negotiations. She took us to the house of Mr. Pawdell who was one of the richest men in Nepal. He and his family had housed my cousin for a couple months and now he was letting us stay with him.  They had an incredible home, especially for Kathmandu. We had our own entire floor with two bathrooms, which made them a very wealthy family. They fed us dal bhat (rice and lentils) and shoved it on our plates until we could not hold any more. We had to eat with our right hand as utensils are not part of the culture and apparently toilet paper is not either which is why it is the right hand instead of the left. I’ll leave that one to you to figure out. That night all we did was go downtown to Kathmandu so we could use one of the internet cafes. Everything was overwhelming and exciting, but the plane flight was catching up to us, so bed seemed like a good option rather early.

March 26th – We awoke and had breakfast with a General in the Nepali Armed Forces. Okay. He paid basically no attention to me, but Uncle Jim got the run down. See the U.S. had just started one of those war things with Iraq, so they were a little curious about our opinion and honestly whether we thought the U.S. had any interest in Nepal. Well, Jim gave a rather straightforward opinion of I don’t like this war, but I was not quite sure yet. After that, we got our plans set for our mini-trek through the Annapurna region starting the next day which I was stoked for. Then we spent the day going around Kathmandu. Alanna brought along her friend Neelima who taught English with her at the school she was teaching at. We checked out Alanna’s school, then went downtown. There were so many interesting buildings, people, and culture to check out. We did a bit of shopping at the businesses as even though these were my first days in Nepal, it was winding down to be Alanna’s last. They were going back to Washington when I flew out to the Khumbu to go trekking. The city was such a combination of old world, new world, and sprawl. We wandered around and came upon temples in squares that were open to the public without any real purpose to them as far as we could see. We checked them out and also walked around the city where we were harassed constantly by people just because we definitely looked a bit different. We had lunch where I promptly ordered fried rice because I knew that I could get by eating that. I also had a gigantic beer which is served in huge bottles, so having one bottle of beer is like two and a half in the U.S. After lunch, we decided to go to Swyambunath, better known as the Monkey Temple. The weather was not very good as it was slightly drizzling and when we got there, we had a set of very steep stairs to climb. I was excited to do some climbing near mountains, but these stairs could be a good warmup. When we got to the top of the stairs there were tons of monkeys just chilling at the temple. Alanna told me not to look them in the eyes because they had been known to attack people, so I refrained. We wandered around the holy Buddhist site. Kathmandu was a mixture of Buddhism and Hinduism as both religions saw it as a holy city. The Nepali girl who came with us, Neelima, was Hindu and Alanna talked about how her religion had thousands of Gods. It was hard to fathom, not being exposed to it much. We also got ourselves a little follower who wanted to be our tour guide. Really he was just looking for a handout. Jim was nice to him but the rest of us ignored him as we checked out all the statues and buildings. The rain started to come down a little bit harder and eventually we had to retreat to the Pawdell’s for some more dal bhat. After dinner, we decided to take the evening out on the town. Uncle Jim was tired from the time change, so Alanna, Neelima, and I went to a Nepali Beatles cover band at the Holiday Inn where we were able to chat and have some beers. Actually we only had one beer, but that was enough to get Neelima rather blitzed where Alanna I had to sort of babysit her the rest of the night. Mostly, though, it was fun to sit back and enjoy being in a new and different culture, something that I had not experienced enough of in my lifetime.