BHUTAN/NEPAL 2 of 2
BHUTAN/NEPAL TRIP - April 4-26, 2009
SATURDAY, 4/18/09: 4:17AM: Pee and type dream, having slept VERY little, despite starting Actualism about three times; stomach still bloated: MUST buy Pepto-Bismol, Cipro, shoes, and long-sleeved white cotton shirts! Up at 5:45AM, worried I changed my watch, but it's OK. Machhu is pretty clear. Kesh is out with an Annapurna-area map that he lets me have for 150R, and then gives me 850R CHANGE! So I pay the bar bill to the guy I just tipped $2, as I had Santaman before, and Bill accepted my $20 in exchange for his $10 for OUR tip to Tapa, so now only to worry about the $5 for Kesh and $6 for the tip box. But now at 6:51AM I gotta get my SUITCASE out! 5:06PM: Just mistyped DREAMS:4/18/09 in this file that had to be transferred to file 8. The elf-faced helper is named Santaman, and Ram writes the handsome waiter's name as Narayan. Narayan changes my US$10 into a US$5 and five singles, a great favor. I put $6 into the tip box for the staff, having already slipped Santaman $2 and, waiting for him to be alone, $2 to Narayan, who looks at me with his loving brown eyes and smiles and nods his thanks. Catch a glimpse of the small Thai waiter, but decide it would be too complicated to take his picture, and it turns out that I take ONE picture of the two servers to make my "interests" less obvious. I buy a great map of the Annapurna region from Kesh's array of souvenirs for what he calls a good discount of 125R, which I firmly believe, since it's a great map for a small price. He also accepts my 1000R note, coming back later with my 875R change at 7:34AM. Shit good at 7:53, but note a large itchy LUMP inside my left elbow, which I take outside to show Ram, who gets Kesh to verify is "only" a gnat bite (over an inch in diameter, raised into a bolus of solid flesh that's red and slightly hot to the touch?!) and that I should put cortisone on it, which I say I have in my green bag, which is now one of many on the backs of the Sherpa girls toting our bags out of camp. We're off at 7:45, first detouring to see Simplicity Camp, slightly more elegantly laid out than Serenity Camp, but with rooms that are quite a bit smaller: all single beds and no space for much else. Join the end of the group walking south on the road, easy going downhill until he directs us upward onto a path through a raised village, and farther uphill at 8:33 to the Green View Lodge, perched above a wooden bridge across a clear river that's cascading in crystal waterfalls all along its length. Kesh takes off his backpack, directs some to the john, and says we'll be making a 15-minute detour toward a waterfall. Since I thought Ram said this would happen only 10 minutes from the bus, I'm highly encouraged. Up a rough trail for about 10 minutes to a VERY nice waterfall into an emerald pool, down to which Claude immediately gambols. Others go down, but I'm content to sit on a rock just below some others on the parapet and enjoy the scenery: nice for a vacation, but, even so, I wouldn't want a house here. Leave the falls at 9:04, and go back to Green View to pee at 9:15, get salt for our shoe sides at 9:24. The salt is beginning to build up and irritate my right ankle in my four-day-old socks, and I get told that it's "45 minutes to the bus." Drat! Off at 9:25, take a number of "last" views of Machhu at 10:15, startlingly clear in person but sadly hazy in photographs, then sit in a little village and drink water while Kesh and Claude order soft drinks from a local kiosk, and leave there at 10:28, wondering how far more it could be to the bus, since we seem to be nearing civilization; it rather looks like a road up a slope ahead, and the last few steps are agony, and I'm into the glorious bus at 10:36, taking the second window on the left, which turns out be the only unpaired seat on the bus: Kesh and his son in the rear, along with a Nepali woman who's dropped at the outskirts of Pokhara [for a hospital, we're told later], and Ram sits next to David in front of me. ENORMOUS feeling of contentment as the bus goes at 10:45: I actually SURVIVED the trek-part of the trip, only the hopefully easier white-watering and Chitwan elephant-riding left, conscious that today's Saturday and I'll be back home next SUNDAY!! 11:18: 30 km to Pokhara, but we stop for Mary's "comfort" and photos of the range, which includes more and more peaks. Stop at 11:45 for many photos, still 40 minutes from Pokhara. 12:08 Pokhara 15 km milestone passed. #409 Annapurna III in the shape of a convincing elephant, which may not even show up in the mostly white photo. Get into the bustling town, very poor, very built up, with roads being reconstructed and lined with shops. Ram said that Saturday was their day of dressing up and going to temple, so that explained some of the elegantly dressed women on the trails and roads. Stop in front of the restaurant to be told we're so late we're not going to the hotel first, but to lunch, and we enter the Bistro Caroline at 12:50PM for an elevated view over the lake, of which I take a picture, and I order an Everest beer for 220R, hoping my increasingly tense stomach doesn't mean I'm getting sick again. We order fish (for me and most others) and a good-looking vegetable quiche for the rest, with mashed potatoes mixed with cheese, mixed vegetables, and a few other items, most of which I don't finish. Bob of Bob and Berta quizzes me about the number of my destinations, who counts them, how I got there, and I love talking about it, and later on the sidewalk he thanks me for a great lunch conversation. We end with a choice of a fudgy chocolate mousse or scoops of vanilla, strawberry, and chocolate ice cream, which I choose. Out at 2:15 to walk to something like the "Out of this World" restaurant, which distinguishes our alley from many other alleys like it, and walk down a GREAT distance, sadly, to the Hotel Gorkha Temple at 2:27, beautiful in a Nepali Newar red-brick and black-window-frame style, and wait quite a while in the lobby while Ram sorts out keys. I find my green bag and take it to room 203 at 2:40, first to go up, so Gloria has to knock on our door to say that Ram announced we'll be meeting in the lobby to go out to dinner at 6:30PM. Bill's bag arrives while I'm undressing, and shortly after, the cute little porter delivers my bag. I'm in to the john after Bill pees and drops into bed to rest from the walk, and I find there's no shampoo. Tear my bags apart to finally find some, and take a WONDERFUL warm shower to 3:17, and lie down at 3:21 without even bothering to comb my hair, my black earplugs squishy in my still-wet ears. Lie for a bit, thinking I won't sleep, but then wake at 4:55PM with the memory of a dream to find Bill in the bathroom after HIS shower, and he quickly leaves to look for money exchange. I type the dream (in the wrong file, but I'm pleased to find that file 2 wasn't corrupted during the move when I forgot to switch the file to file 3), and then catch up on my notes and my day by 5:44PM, ready to search for something like cortisone (which I think I have somewhere) for my enormous gnat bite, and sort things out before leaving for dinner. There's just NO ROOM in the bathroom for ANYTHING, and very little storage space outside a tall cabinet with three spindly hangers. Stop now at 5:45PM. Get out the night pills, hang some stuff in the closet to dry, decide to wear my khaki pants tonight, retrieve the stray omega-3 capsules from the bottom of the green bag, and clean the salt out of my shoes to 6:08PM. Count and organize US$75 and 9045R in my wallet. Figure I'm running late, because clock downstairs is more like Ram's watch than mine, so I start dressing as Bill comes up, and finish as he's ready to go, and leave the hotel as the clock in the lobby says 6:40PM. Ann and Bob aren't joining us; the rest of us walk down the street, where Ram recommends the Monsoon Grill across the main street for our "on your own dinner" tomorrow, and we enter the Sundance Grill, where I have a Tequila Sunrise and a Nepali Ice for 650R, getting change for another 1000R bill. The beef Stroganoff is quite good, others like their food, and a gorgeous guy in a green T-shirt sits on a dais in front of me, and then Scott (one of the managers of the Bird Restaurant we're going to for lunch tomorrow) comes in with a very beautiful blonde girlfriend, and talks about their falcon Bob, named after Scott's father, and we shake hands cordially at the end. [Tomorrow: wake-up at 7AM, 7:30 breakfast, 8:15 assemble for rafting orientation, then to a boat ride on the lake, the Mountain Museum, and lunch at the Bird Restaurant, the rest of the day free.] We're done by 8:35, walking down the alley in total darkness, even ahead of others' flashlights, and I get back to the room at 8:45 to start searching for cortisone, but the closest I can find is gentamicin, [start file 4 at 9:47PM 4/18/09, leaving file 3 for "handling errors"] which I apply, then continue sorting out empty bags, bags of clothes, bags of souvenir papers, bags of continuing papers, and bags of STUFF, and then apportion the pills, still not enough room in the pillbox for the remaining omega-3 capsules, and then catch up with this by 9:49PM, ready for the lights to go out any minute. Bill, for whatever jokey reason, says, "Goodnight, Mr. David," and rolls over to sleep. I have an old newspaper out to read, and even though dinner was over an hour and 15 minutes ago, I still feel pretty full. Bill's left the curtains open so some small breeze can come through, and someone upstairs starts moving furniture around. I finish this at 9:51PM and get ready for bed. 9:55: Wash hands and face, and pee, and find the little light above the bed is on a dimmer switch. Catch up with this, undress, and get to bed at 10PM. Quite quickly to sleep, lights staying on into the night.
SUNDAY, 4/19/09: Pee at 2:02AM and 4:10AM, and put gentamicin on my elbow and ankle. Bill's up at 5:50AM, and I get up at 6:45, type this, shit very well, lights still on, and get downstairs for breakfast at 7AM. But that's only for tea and coffee, and Ram teaches us the board game Tiger Move, with four tigers and 20 goats, and he says I play a very good tiger for the first time, even though I lose. Breakfast at 7:30 of muesli, one-egg omelet, toast and butter and jelly, mango, banana, GOOD wiener sausages, potatoes, cooked tomato, and juice. Chat to 7:55, Bill has to change his sheets, and get ready to go down for 8:15 rafting orientation and then departure for the day, finishing this at 8:03AM. 8:17AM: Orientation: Tomorrow: wake-up 6:30, breakfast and luggage out at 7AM, leave at 7:45AM. Drive 50 km, 1.5 hours, NO washroom at river, change behind rocks. Trek guide: Harry, "one of the best." EITHER 8-9 people in two boats, or three sets of fives, with a guide, each with two volunteers for the front to do the paddling at the direction of the guide steering from the back of the raft. Pack GREEN bag for TWO nights, put it at the bottom of the BLUE bag, remembering the number (15), trek boots next [tomorrow 3-4 hours rafting, into camp by 3-4PM; then trek to village!] and water shoes, we CAN swim, they'll provide towels, carry plastic bag with camera and wallet and passport, OUT of green bag, which goes to waterproof drum on the raft. Bus goes with BLACK bags to the end-stop. To Chitwan later, a two-hour drive. Carry sunscreen and bathing suit, sunglasses, hat. 6PM meeting, 7PM dinner. Start at Tamouli, to Seti River Camp. Day 1 raft ten miles, day 2 20 miles, and day 3 12 miles to Dienot, at the Trisuli River. Orientation is over at 8:47. Leave hotel 8:54, and at 9:05 THREE get into the first boat on the Pokhara Lake: I, Bill, and David. OTHERS are all four to a boat, two on the middle seat, rowers in back. To island at 9:39, lots of tourists, a shrine, some cute foreigners, lots of doves, and off island 9:49. Off boat 10:08, passing the guards of the Royal Palace, though no one is in residence there now. Lots of egrets flying across the lake, and a water-strider ballet occurs as we push toward the dock. 10:26 to Mountain Museum, told we're leaving at 12, passing an enormous climbing wall that no one can climb without a guide, so no one is climbing it, though Claude looks at it appraisingly. Then a ludicrous model of Machhu with stairs up so you can be photographed at the "top" of the mountain, about 25 feet off the ground. Then into the stadium-like building for an enormous expanse of wonderful photographs of all the major mountains, many of which I, in turn, take photographs of, and lots of OTHER countries are represented: Taiwan, China, Japan, Germany, France, and many others. Great series of the 14 (?) peaks over 8000 meters, with data of the first ascent, including quotes from the first ascenders AS they make the summit. Then hosts of apparatus from previous climbs, maps of mountains around the world, geological surveys, rock samples, stamps with mountains on them, models of clothing from various countries that have high mountains, cities of departure to climb them, including Salt Lake City and a few others in the United States, and more exhibits on minerals, yetis (including a hideous mockup), and a photograph of a "skull" from some Chinese museum. A 15-foot-wide model of Annapurna and surrounding peaks is woefully maintained, despite signs admonishing "Do Not Climb." Photographs of festivals at various mountains (oh, forgot the 15-minute-or-so DVD of preparing to climb and aerial shots of Namche Bazar and Base Camp from both Everest and Annapurna). Histories of naming the mountains, including a photo of Mr. Everest, and LOTS of other things. I climb the stairs to take a photo showing the SCOPE of the building, and one of the included temple, and a close-up of a glass-covered Kalachakra Mandala made out of actual colored sand. No real shop, but outside at 11:30 to the "Village," which isn't finished, but the Bamboo House has a nice set of tanka postcards for 300R. Sit and gaze into the distance at 11:42. Bus goes off at 12:08, me taking the window, forcing Bill to his favorite seat: the single on the left in front, so he can stretch his legs, still sore from yesterday, AND his stomach is causing him problems, too. Get to Bird Maya Inn for gorgeous Scott and Anita and a "meal on a bun" lunch with a 205R Everest, a 500R donation for many pictures with the African Vulture, Bob, and Scott, and lots of other pictures. Ready to leave at 2PM, watching some hang gliders landing without taking pictures of them. They're noted for the hawks flying with the parasailors. Papadum is the bread served with the Indian meal, as I forget the name for the THIRD time. Off bus at 2:15 to shop. Buy Purel hand lotion for 100R and two North Fork, long-sleeved (unfortunately NOT cotton, from the way they don't breathe when I wear one this evening) shirts for sun protection on the river, for 1850R, which comes out very closely to $12/shirt, and they're said to be good even if they ARE locally made rip-offs. Finally find water shoes in size 8, snugly fitting, for only 400R, which I hope last two days, but Claude says they'll last for years. Finish at 2:40, exhausted from shopping. To hotel 2:50, Bill in 3PM, start shower 3:10-3:25, feeling good. Lie down 3:35-5:14, feeling slightly stupefied on getting up, but it's useless staying in bed, so I start sudoku while Bill goes down to socialize. Move to the window as it gets darker and no lights come on inside. Sudoku 5:22-6:41, when I dress and leave for dinner at 7:10PM. Bill finds he put the card in wrong, now getting the lights, which were there all the time, to charge his camera battery. How happy I am my camera doesn't need that! Bill rather insists on Everest Steak House, and we find it has other food, so we go up for an AWFUL "American hamburger" that is HUGE and sawdust-tasting, with a salad I don't touch and lots of French fries I eat few of, and a VERY tart lemon soda that David has THREE of. Bill has only a beer to "protect" his stomach, Carolyn chow mein, and David a half-steak that actually tastes the best of the lot, aside from my giant piece of sweet pineapple. We leave restaurant at 8:34. Shit a bit to 8:56 and start the task of packing the black bag and the green bag and the blue bag until 9:27, and then type 9:28-10PM, waiting for the lights to go out any second, Bill having gone to bed about a half-hour ago. I still have lots of stuff to pack into my green bag, including this, in the morning. Pile stuff on the chair and the floor to dress in the morning, and stop this at 10:01PM, sweating in the humid evening. Hope I'm not sorry I only packed a flannel shirt for the rafting, and NOT the too-hot OAT jacket. Drink water, stomach still feeling uncomfortably full. Wash face and hands, and pee, lights not off yet, and bed at 10:08PM.
MONDAY, 4/20/09: 12:34:56AM: Start to type DREAMS:4/20/09, after peeing, the most incredible dream EVER. 12:48AM: At least manage to get the rough outline down, warm in the humid evening, which might be a contributing factor. AND I vaguely hope the lights might still be on, seeing the luminescent strips on the light switches glowing in the dark, but I have to get my flashlight, to which I had thankfully just added fresh batteries. Just a mind-bending dream! Drool over the end of the flashlight in my teeth at 12:50AM. 5:06AM: Wake with a DISTINCT memory of a dream, but in SECONDS it's gone. Try to get it back, but decide I must just get up and TRY to type it. Notice the red light on the TV, and figure the lights are on, which they are. 6:14AM: Bill gets up about 5:30AM and fusses ENDLESSLY in the bathroom, leaving the room light on, and with his blue bag, banging it on the floor trying to get more into it, and just sitting on his bed, doing heaven knows what beyond his shaving and contacts. Then about 6:10 he leaves the room, though the wake-up call isn't even until 6:30. Is that HIM I hear coughing from the window? I haven't even BEEN in the "yard" yet! Write a list of things to DO when I get up: 1) Short-sleeved shirt into green bag to be done as LAUNDRY on the trip; 2) More plastic bags a) for camera (HOW can it be in the same small plastic bag, in a drum, with my WATER?) and b) for wet clothes; 3) BUY sunscreen, since I have no idea what that clear golden liquid is at the top of the transformed DEET/sunscreen and I DON'T want the tops of my legs burned in the raft; 4) Valium and Ambien into GREEN bag: I may NEED them; 5) change earplugs from the black globs that are beginning to make my inner ears sore. Type this to 6:19, ready to put on bathing suit and get into the day, appalled by my appearance in the slightly distorting mirror at the foot of my bed. Cute little guy knocks on all doors at 6:30AM. There's a light switch for the bathroom IN the bathroom! Put on bathing suit and start REpacking. Reshuffle shirt and earplugs and plastic bags and Valium and Ambien and relock again. 6:43AM: Plastic bag around camera and batteries, money-stash BACK into shoulder bag into black bag; T-shirt into white bag in case North Face becomes intolerable on raft. ENDLESS. Pack Neo at 6:44 just to put it AWAY, remembering at the last second to switch to file 3. This white bag and black bag and green bag and blue bag is an obsessive-compulsive's NIGHTMARE! Breakfast 7-7:30, French toast with butter and honey, sausages, roast tomatoes, good potato gnoccus, juice (2 glasses) and tea, with later-distributed scrambled eggs with toast, and muesli and fruit at the end, going back up at 7:32 for a GOOD last shit, getting the key from the cute doorman who had it in his pocket when Bill didn't answer the locked door and there was no 203 key at the desk, and down to identify my two bags as they're all being loaded as we all stand in the roadway looking on, near the empty bus, so I decide to get on and steal the front-left single seat at 7:38. Off to take the last shots up and down the road at 7:42. People file aboard while the roof echoes with bags being thrown up and secured on top, and as we pull out at 7:50 no one's occupied the front-left seat, ahead of even the driver, and I ask Ram whose backpack that is that appears to be reserving the seat, and he says NO one is sitting there, and the driver considerately stops while I climb over the center obstacle for a GREAT view. Decide to go by my camera: my WATCH says 2:57 and the CAMERA says 3:07, so SUBTRACT ten minutes from the camera times for the "real" time to be reflected in my notes. Take pictures of downtown Pokhara from my great seat, taking a picture of the town gate as we leave at 8:08AM. Try to capture the week-old rice plantings in the flooded fields (which will take about two months to mature and harvest) as late as 9:02AM through the trees. Stop at Gunadi Highway Restaurant at 9:15, seeing whom I take to be the SAME sexy guys I've been seeing in Moondance and later in Pokhara. To Tamouli for the entrance to the river at 9:30, getting Bob to take pictures of me in my river-drag at 9:53. Instructions by Birbal, our leader, also OUR navigator, with SIX of us aboard: Phil and Karen in front, then Carolyn and Bill, then David and I, then Birbal. Camera goes into white bag into VERY secure blue drum and we start on river at 10:11AM. We go through some mild rapids, then two rather big ones, getting us wet, at which point Birbal asks if any of us want our cameras. I do, and where once we'd led, now we're bringing up the rear, but I start taking pictures from 10:46 of the impressive canyon, people along the shores, kids swimming, and boats before and behind going over rapids, even a few motion pictures of rapids. Stop for lunch before 11:19 (maybe we're early?) and get a box lunch the same as we had before: cheese sandwich, hard-boiled egg, mango juice, piece of fried chicken breast, cookie (which I can't help comparing with the one I was too MISERABLE to eat on the way in to Birukanti). Sit on a hard rock, and later pick up my larger eggshell pieces so as not to litter, but can't finish it all, leaving my blue-topped box identified by only two of the tapes closing the lid. Back on the river before 11:53, same positions, but we can leave off our helmets and take our cameras, Bill using his waterproof camera throughout. Stronger rapid at 12:18 I take movie of, using MUCH too much film, and later he tells me to put camera into HIS waterproof canister, and tells us to put on our helmets, and we go, in about half an hour, down two BEST rapids, though Karen says they're STILL not Level 3, which should be tomorrow, but we all get QUITE wet, and in the second one I'm thrown forward against David, and I'm not sure what might have happened to my glasses had he not been there to stop my trajectory. Film tramway and fishermen at 12:40 while Bill continues to make a fool of himself by shouting "YEEE-HAAA" and other inanities as we get wet. Film controlled fires and some cuties crossing the river and watching from above, and look BACK on the rapids that REALLY WASHED my whole right side just before 2:06PM. Dock at camp 2:11PM, get assigned cabin 7, right next to the central area, and pee in the most rudimentary bathroom yet; unpack, fill laundry bag with short-sleeved shirt and the smellier of the two T-shirts, and will add socks and shorts tomorrow morning before leaving bag 7B to be picked up for laundering and hanging to dry on the barbed-wire fence. Keep bathing suit on, put clothes on drying rack, don sandy house slippers, and push green bag under bed at 2:46, at which time I go out to start typing, getting my camera and taking #516 at 2:57 to establish the time, and finish this to date at 3:31, everyone seemingly vanished, kids gathering to filch empty water bottles from beached rafts. I have 1090 pictures left: figuring 200/day, they'll last 5.5 days: Tu,We,Th,Fr,St, and rest of Sunday, so I should be OK. OR else I can start deleting. We'll see. Let's go find who's drinking what where now at 3:33, ready for tea at 4, communication at 6, and dinner at 7. Start typing [tell Mary about Carolyn's two-Cipro solution working for her AND me, and she says she'll tell Claude, who ends up using it, too.] at 3:54, waiting for tea. Ram lets others talk here, and at 5:18 tells about the movie Samsara, which was shot in Ladakh. Back to the tent at 5:27. Lie down wearing only swimsuit, but feel like doing SOMETHING, so I shower from 5:55 to 6:15 and decide, reluctantly, to join the communication meeting, where he talks about marijuana being legal in Nepal because their gods smoke it all the time, and there's even a Marijuana [ganga, here, though he says it is NOT related in name to Mother Ganges] Day once a year. This goes to 7PM, then dinner 7-7:55: good curries, vegetables, potatoes, and gin and tonic with LITTLE tonic, and Tuborg beer, not that great for 300R. Banana custard dessert. NO lights after dark, so just NEW earplugs in at 8:11PM, and, lacking anything else, BED!
TUESDAY, 4/21/09: Dream at 11:25, just noted, then typed as DREAMS:4/21/09 at 4:20AM. UP at 6:15, have a BIG shit, wash hands and face, put on jeans at 6:25. Type and talk (David sits with us) until breakfast 7-7:30: cereal, oatmeal, egg, pancake with honey, mango juice, tea. Back to type this to 7:44, ready for walk, PORTER carrying water, GREAT! Leave on walk 7:55. Up rocky riverbank to raft, and are ferried across to other side to steep climb up to suspension bridge. Cross that and get to the ROAD, which is mostly level enough all the way to Khare Village at 9:30, after taking a "twin" (pronounced "tween") ride: a wire carriage is gravity powered to mid-river, then Birbal and fellow raftsman laboriously pull us back. Gloria and Ed first, then I and Bill, then Bertie, conquering her fear of heights, and husband Bob. Then watch single villager propel himself across. Children's faces show how infrequently they get tourists through here. Look at 9:49 at a millet still that brews 60-proof liquor, but Ram doesn't suggest we drink it. Photos of frizzled rooster. Bill suggests that I MAKE SURE to get a U/V filter for my lens, for protection and for picture quality. #990 drying rice at 9:53. 86-year-old man given glasses; with 76-year-old wife. Start back at 10:06, feeling GREAT from a mostly level walk with butterflies, bumblebees, acacia trunks used for betel chewing when they're ground to dust. Back over bridge at 10:45, tiring, but I'd seen the raft waiting for us below the bridge: the worst part was walking over the rocks to get to the raft. Down the river to get off raft at 11AM, pick up my nearly dry clothes from the barbed wire, and get back to room at 11:11 to pee, take everything off and put on bathing suit, still-wet T-shirt for its slight cooling quality, and Kempinski slippers, then brush two dozen ants off my lemon-juice glass that I stupidly left on the GROUND while I changed, then move the shirt outside alongside Bill's on our own private drying line. Grab this to get up-to-date at 11:41, expecting call to lunch at any minute. Don't think I'll swim: it's ALL in the sun, mostly rocks below, no one in particular to look at, and I'd have to negotiate the rocky shingle twice. GREAT pair of light-red-in-front, light-green-in-back beetles bumble out into the sun and quickly return to the shade of the porch. Ground is VERY dry, but butterflies are constantly flying past, the large (bread-plate-size) marijuana leaves are drying on the edge of the dry well at the center of our gathering area, and birds call in the distance while Mary ferries drinks up to Claude in their tent. Hammocks strung back up, having been taken down for the night. REALLY should zip my bag under my bed; no telling WHAT may have crept inside ALREADY! Sit until crowd FORCES lunch to start about 12:05PM. No soup; fried rice, tiny chicken legs, awful tuna "soup," momo of indefinite meat, mango juice and lots of water, finishing with lots of cucumber, the coolest thing on the list. Back at 12:35 to type this, and will get out puzzles. Puzzles (and wasp-nest-digging photos) to 4PM, when Ram talks about Chitwan and tipping tomorrow. Then at 4:42 many go into the kitchen to watch momo-making. I come back to puzzles. Continue to 6PM, when I go to the communication meeting, which so turns me off that I order an Everest beer just to get through it. It lasts till 7:05, when dinner isn't ready yet, and I go back to my room for my pills, but my flashlight doesn't work, so I'm glad Bill asked me to bring his. We have good mushroom soup, then lots of Chinese noodles and fried mushrooms, and other items, with lots of water, and finally we wait for dessert and they come out with a chocolate cake decorated with colored frosting that says "Namaste, OAT travelers." We have that, and I'm back to the room to find that my flashlight works enough for me to get my eyemask and earplugs out of my bag, write a few notes, and get to bed about 8:15PM. Then wake at 10:15 with a dream that takes until 10:24PM to transcribe, along with this for the rest of the day, only from memory, so I may have notes to copy. Remember to note the dust storm outside at one point, but I didn't get to video the kapok "blossoms" flying in the air. Also lots of video of a wasp digging a hole, but missed the crucial part, where I saw her dragging a corpse into it to feed her hatched egg, covering up the ground as well as she could to disguise her offspring's location. Bill saw another life-and-death struggle in the bathroom just before dinner. We're all looking forward to our last major stop, and fantasizing having ice and iced beverages when we finally get home. Pee, thanking goodness that my flashlight worked through all of that, and there were few bugs flying around it in the john.
WEDNESDAY, 4/22/09: 2:48AM: LONG time to get sleep, thinking about this and other trips, but start Actualism and doze off at last. Then wake with another dream, and pee and type DREAMS:4/22/09. Finish typing at 2:54AM. Type another dream at 4:18AM and another at 5:19AM, each time being "flashed" by the watchman, thinking I might be stealing something from a stranger's cabin. Then wake about 5:40 to find Bill up and dressed and moving about, and I can't decide what to do, but have LOTS to do before breakfast, so get up at 5:45AM and start typing into file 4 until 5:50 and into file 8 until 5:57AM, ready for what I hope is a good shit before 3-4 hours in the raft. 6:09AM: Indeed had a satisfactory shit, washed my face and hands, used Bill's towel, and started packing. 6:24AM: Reluctantly put my Neo into my green bag, which goes into the bottom of my blue bag, not to be accessible until Chitwan. Blue bag out at 6:40, wallet conveniently into SECOND North Face (NF) pocket. Drink tea that the porter left outside for me. 7AM put notepad in POCKET, no need for it until we're on the river itself. 925R bar bill: 2 beers @ 300R, tonic 150R, gin 175R. Give bar-boy the rest of my 1000R note for HIS tip. Scrambled eggs are gone by the time I get into the breakfast room, but Bill doesn't care for the taste of his and he's about to give them away, when I scrape them from his plate onto mine, and dig the last remnants out of the serving bowl. Also take a crepe-like pancake with honey, and Bill gives me a second Mango Nectar, both of which I put into my white bag to have later on the bus, making sure he doesn't want his back. Also intermix it with hot oatmeal sprinkled with muesli, to which I add honey for a heady mixture. Lots of water for my pills, a slice of toast with jam, and quite acceptable hash browns when enough salt and pepper are added. Feel full at 7:30. Go to pee and my cock-edge SMELLS: have to do something about it after my next shower; dust it at Chitwan. Last pee at 7:34, Karen's sunscreen on face and hand-backs and knees by 7:42, others benefiting from her largesse. Life jacket and helmet on, my watch into white bag at 7:45, and down to the rafts to get into the back of Birbal's boat with David, while Bill insists on sitting on the other side, putting Carolyn in front of me, who keeps moving back into my space, so I have to move in order to keep clear of the sweep of the oars in the rapids. Leave at 7:55, Birbal in the lead, saying I can leave my camera out for a bit before the first rapids. Cool at the start, but it quickly warms up. Pass lots of fishermen on the shores, with some kids watching from rocks where the rapids are, just to see us bob up and down and scream. Birbal tells us not to open our mouths going over the rapids, since the water's not good to swallow. Pass lots of eroded rocks, landslides that he says take place each year at monsoon season, keeping that particular hillside permanently eroded. Lots of terracing, lots of kids along the road, and we pass the area where the other rafts set up their own camping last night, with single Caucasians with dugout canoes nearby. Butterflies galore, but when I try to find a little frog for Karen to look at, I can't. The wasp's original hole seems filled in with rain, but they say it hadn't rained last night. The lesser rapids seem easy because Birbal just glides us through them. At one point he lets Phil come back to paddle, and before we quite realize it there's a splash and Birbal's in the water! The other two captains join him as Claude and someone else take over the tillers for the calm spaces, while only Phil is allowed to take us through a rapids, where he confesses to having lost control in the middle, where my shoulder got in the way of some of his grabbing for the loose oars secured by the locks. Bill insists on taking pictures, and Birbal requests, "Forward, please," and I say that he should PADDLE, not photo, and Karen asks him if I often get after him. "Yeah, he gives me a lot of shit, but I just let it go over my head," he says unendearingly. But later he takes the hint and paddles, except when he ASKS if he can photo, and Birbal says he can. Pass under more bridges, past more kids, until he announces the final four rapids, of which the fourth is Level 3. The first three are quite ordinary, and I'm prepared for something special, but frankly the one from the first day when David prevented me from pitching farther forward was the worst in my experience. Carolyn simply says she'd like to do the whole thing again. Join the Trisuli River at a distinct demarcation between the white of the Seti and the brown of the Trisuli, and then continue for about fifteen minutes until we see rafts docking ahead, a blue one along with our three orange ones. Ashore at 9:50, conveniently given a towel around a plastic bag for our wet items, and the women get a tent in which to change, while the men go behind trees just above the shingle. I find some dry rocks to prop my blue bag on, take out my shoes and socks and trousers, go behind a tree to take off my bathing suit and wipe off a bit before putting on my shorts and jeans. Then the water shoes come off, rather sandy; the towel wipes the feet that go into the socks and shoes, and then I pee before finishing up. I'm last up the slope, Birbal (to whom I'd given $2 for his help the previous days) waits while I finish with my blue bag and my green bag, both of which he takes up the road to the bus station. I get slightly breathless even going up that slight hill, but see that there's no one on the bus at 10:12, so I nab the front left seat again, driver welcoming me, helper smiling at me. I'd given Bill my $20 for his $10 for the driver, and given the helper $2 on my own. Bill drinks some of our water to lighten my load. Keep NF shirt on to sun-protect my arms, the water-coolness still welcome in the hot sun. Put my wallet back into my pocket, bathing suit and shoes into the wet bag at the top of my green bag. ANOTHER phase of the trip completed! I'm down to 739 photos, just under 200/day for the remaining four days, still counting: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, home. Take notes as I sit in hot sun in front of bus at 10:21. Go at 10:24, getting photos of the sudden-green of the landscape, where we appear to have instantly entered spring after a brownish autumn. Village transportation is almost exclusively bicycles and bicycle-taxis (some with large canopies, some open to the sun), a few mopeds, lots of supply trucks (since this is the main road between India and Kathmandu). BECAUSE of that, the locals want to make some kind of protest, so we encounter 4-5 roadblocks, where Ram is obliged to say that we're just tourists and really on their side. Some we have to drive around, some are pulled aside so we can pass on the road. People seem quite happy, even old women with sheaves of greenery on their backs for their cattle. Make much better time than expected: at 11:45AM we transfer from the bus to an open truck---where we pay off the driver and his assistant---the only transportation into the Machan Reserve of Chitwan. Truck goes at 11:55 after I take a few photos of the shy but beautiful children who surround us as we sit in the shade. Bumpy dry-river crossing, sometimes over side streams, hot and dusty, to 12:10. Walk to hotel lobby at 12:14 for a cold towel and a glass of what might even be Tang with a slice of lime. Told the schedule: 4PM two-hour elephant ride in long trousers for rhinos (with very little hope for tigers), then 7:15 slide program. Lock valuables in safe and take the key: things may fall from pockets from elephants' backs and be irretrievable. Turn on the left shower knob for 3-4 minutes to get hot water. We of course have noticed the fish-shaped green-tinted pool. Room sprayed against mosquitoes in evening, but we can also use the punk-spiral if we want. We get two lanterns, one for the living room, one for the bathroom, both of which are said to last all night. Cabins are named after birds: we're in Minivet 1 (a minivet being described as NOT being here, but a bright-scarlet little bird with a yellow companion). We have bulbuls and bee-eaters aplenty. Ram is in Hornbill 2. Also poor couples who have to put up with the fifteen of us yowling from a single table. Unpack a bit, using the space under the stairs, a few hangers, and the toilet top for my stuff. Out just after 12:45 to be last for lunch, sharing wonderful bread and soft butter with Phil, having a tasty onion soup to start, and then a water-buffalo cutlet with Chinese noodles onto which I pour some of my requested soy sauce, and the ever-fresh daikon and cucumber, and good creamy apple-banana dessert. The beer is COLD, so I get an Everest along with most others, and thus feel mildly plotzed by the end of the meal (in fact leaving my hat on the table, which I found tied to the chair when I went to retrieve it after my dip in the pool). When I leave the dining room at 2:13 I simply can't resist taking off my T-shirt, glasses, watch, and slippers, and stepping gingerly into the four-inch shallows, water just cool enough to be refreshing, but not so cold as to need getting used to. Put my feet over the edge and then just lie back in the water, submerged to my nostrils, ears muffled to all outside sounds until others join me in the water: Phil, Karen, David, Carolyn, and finally Ram and Claude, by which time I'm starting to wrinkle, and Bill wanders past to say he left the room unlocked. Back about 2:40 to pee, and just decide to put BACK T-shirt and take Neo out to the terrace to type, being introduced to bee-eaters by one of the guides, and Bertie sits with her binoculars looking for rhinos, but then leaves. I finish with this at 3:09, feeling somewhat tired, birdsong all around, and decide to go back to room to clear off bed and lie down until 4-ish. The truck is again bumbling dustily across the river-basin toward us. Up at 3:45 and out at 3:52, to get on right front of first elephant, Trinakali, and see two deer running across a path, then hog deer very close, getting good shots of the spotted female sambar, larger and at a distance, and then men get OFF elephants and rustle up a RHINO that stands in a clearing as if posing for us, a great picture, but one questions its "spontaneity." Take a motion picture, but sadly don't capture any of the tiny men standing perilously close. Then a good owl high in a tree, sleek brown barking deer running, whole herds of spotted deer with great horns, but not all male as the driver would have it. Much more SEEN than photographed, of course, and it's a kick to see a whole herd cross the road. Mahout gets into David's space and David "crucifies" himself against the howdah as the elephant makes its own way down a steep decline. Upper-arm weakness helps dismounts not at all. It may have rained when things poured off trees toward the end, and the orange-setting sun was dramatized by huge dust swirls, rather analogous to the dust storm on the river at about the same twilight-time last night. Leaves swirl, trees bend, raindrops splat down: I try to movie it, but it's nothing like reality. Take tea with a few stale squares of cake, then it really rains for a few moments at 6:19. I decide to take a shower to get rid of the chlorine stickiness from the pool, and share the shower with an enormous black spider that favors its position just below the faucets that obligingly give out hot and cold water to order. Powder crotch and cock-head after Bill "picks the wrong time," as he puts it, to be let into the locked door when I'm right in the middle of soaping up. Dry off and get out to slides at 7PM, which haven't started yet, so I order a gin and tonic, but they have no tonic, so I settle for a lemon soda, with a whole lemon and a tiny bottle of soda for 45R. Slides start about 7:10, not that great, lots of history of "ranas" ruling the royal roosts. Then dinner 7:50-8:40, another Everest to join the one from lunch, and curried chicken legs not very good, daikon again the best, ending with a warm semolina pudding that David hates, and then Bill considerately brings over HIS semolina for David to finish. David's brought his flashlight, so I follow him home, get to the room at 8:46, and get to bed at 8:50.
THURSDAY, 4/23/09: 1:37AM: Up to pee and type DREAMS:4/23/09. 4:26AM: Finish typing a second dream and peeing, glad to have an hour and a half more to sleep. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday: four days left, only 12 meals left---then HOME!!! Wake at 5:35, up at 5:50, shit, wash, dress, get pills, and get to verandah to talk with Phil and Superintendent until 6:05, when we go off for the same elephant, this time with me and David in back, and see lots of spotted deer---elephant steps into a hole for a bit of drama---and an Indian Roller of spectacular blue. Mary's lifted onto the head of our elephant. Off at 7:55, wait for Bill to unlock door, and finish this to date at 8:28 before going to breakfast. Breakfast 8:35-9, farina and honey, two fried eggs with toast and jelly, tea, and some kind of onion-mushroom side. Sit on the verandah and look out over the nothingness of the southern Nepali terai. Claude sits beside me and we talk about restaurants: his father knew Giraudet, and Crissier is still a three-star with the name Aureon, or something. Talk to 10:05, change to swim things, and go at 10:30 for long, slow, boring elephant talk to 11:42: all the time I'm wishing I weren't there. Starting seriously to concentrate on returning to NYC. Then long, hot walk down to the river where Carolyn, Bill, Gloria, and others get elephant-sprayed, while my paranoia keeps me out of the river except for wading. Start back 12:10PM, through same hot landscape, to feed the elephant his green chomp while Phil messes up his photo of me. Claude's photo of me washing the elephant is too far away, but maybe I can edit it. Lots of dud photos, but I have about 375 left for only two days of trip, essentially, except for whatever Taro dancing may be this evening at the barbecue. Back up to the lodge at 12:18 and order a gin and tonic to feel better. Full can of tonic but the gin seems quite weak. Give the key to Bill, who says he's going up soon, and after the gin and tonic go up at 12:30 to find room locked. Down to holler at Bill, get key, and lie down until he comes back and "apologizes," and then at 12:55 we're back for lunch. I still feel like treating myself, so after adding butter and salt and pepper to the already-good mushroom soup, I order a Sprite to go with the pork, potatoes with lots of butter and salt and pepper, and stewed vegetables and daikon and good banana custard for dessert, with another glass of water. To room and lie down at 1:35, after taking a Valium: I just don't want to hassle this anymore. Lie for a bit, then feel better and get up at 2:16, deciding to catch up with this at [oh, this is MACHAN camp] 2:27, before putting last of omega-3 pills into pillbox to get rid of THAT bottle at 2:35, putting in about a dozen fillers of five pills each and leaving about six pockets empty. Now to puzzles. Puzzles to 3:55, doing one, then to gathering place for Lok to tell me that the elephants were gathering at the boarding place for the next group of tourists at 4PM, so I walked quickly down to find a lineup of five elephants, my mahout in the center, who recognizes me and commands his elephant slightly farther forward, where he leans down to shake hands with me as I hand him his $2 tip, which he likes a lot, maybe even proving his superiority to the other mahouts. We encounter the Jeeps after a walk into the interior, going first and getting the front-left standing position in what WAS (but then wasn't) the lead Jeep, positions switched when the narrow road was blocked by a fallen tree and a way around had to be crashed through. Not since Londolozi have so many trees and bushes been sacrificed so that tourists could get better views of the local fauna. We see sambar deer, barking deer, and a langur monkey shouting above where a leopard had almost killed a calf but had run off across the road in a yellow streak, according to David. Our guide, Bishal Bhattarai, gets down from the truck with Lok, trying to find where the leopard might have gone into hiding, and we wait for long minutes; I sit up on the corner of the truck-roof support, possibly blocking the views of people behind me, but everyone seems content to shoot around me. Was somewhat mollified by the fact that no one from the other truck managed to get a picture of the leopard (estimated at 150 kg), and they thought the prey had been killed until it got up and staggered away. We all got out of the truck, feeling very adventurous following Bishal and Lok and Ram through the undergrowth to a narrow bush-filled canyon, into which Bishal descended. The other truck went back to camp, but we didn't get back until much later (I was tempted to ask for a stop for another bright-orange sunset shot through the thick green trees, but figured we were late enough, and the driver was kind enough to stop before a particularly picturesque termite mound that everyone joined me in photographing). Back to camp at 6:27 for tea, being told that the Tharu Dance had to be cancelled because they had to come from distant villages and couldn't cross the highway picket lines, said to be erected to request better human rights for the people who lived along the major India-Kathmandu Highway. Ram didn't know if the strike extended to any of the more-distant north-south highways, nor have any idea how long it would last, since it was still in effect the day we left, I taking a picture from the window that one of the locals sort of tsk-tsked about and waggled one finger: "No photos." My hands were almost rubbed raw from clinging to the railings, my pubic area was pummeled by being thrust into the support bars on turns, and my hips were hit when we went up and down steep hills. I took a shower, despite the rumor that something might be happening at 7:05, and dressed to get down to find the slide program going on for the new group. Into the bar to order a can of lukewarm tonic (WHY can't they keep it COLD?), and watch as they mix an array of rum punches, which I assume are for the new group watching the slides (annoyed by our howls of laughter when I mention the "cat" meowing outside my bathroom window; I asked David if he played a trick on me, but he said no, as did Bill, but Phil laughed rather too boisterously after I told the tale, so I suspected HE'D done it, "verified" afterward by David, who SAID that Phil ADMITTED to having done it, but when I confronted the two of them later, David backed down, saying he must have misinterpreted something Phil said; Carolyn thought it was a GREAT practical joke, and we should play one back in return on Phil, but I said I was "too nice" to think of something nasty, to which Carolyn replied that she could THINK of something nasty, but would never DO it, so I suggested she and Bill get together, because Bill would not only come up with evil ideas but put them into ACTION) but turned out to be for US. We THINK Ram treated us to the VERY potent rum, orange, lemon, water punch that I actually added WATER to to make more palatable. The party livens up considerably after those, but I STILL order a beer for dinner, bringing my total to FOUR, with the soda and the tonic and the gin and tonic bringing my bar bill up to 1146R, for which I give 1250 and he gives me back 100R, which, with the 300R Bill owes me, leaves me with about 1900R for the rest of the trip, including the 1356R exit-fee from Nepal. Order Everest with barbecue of good chicken white-meat, multi-lobed pork, noodles, vegetables, potatoes, naan, rice (most of which I don't take), with good rice pudding at the end. Talk long with David on LOMBOK, where he went with Inga, and HATED the place because the beaches were FOUL and there was NOTHING to do, although hotel wasn't bad, about six years ago. Up to room to brush teeth with diminishing water, pack a bit, totally unorganized, and take notes to 9:10PM. Bill gets into bed early, having packed, and I get to bed at 9:16, falling asleep fairly quickly, nicely comfortable in cooling evening under the ceiling fan.
FRIDAY, 4/24/09: Dream and wake to pee and type DREAMS:4/24/09 at 3:48AM, and then take a Valium "to be sure." Shit a bit, too. Back to sleep and wake at 5:45 to Bill moving around, and I get up at 5:55 and start washing and packing. Fill water bottle only a quarter full for the airport and flight, search under the bed for the last of my socks and shoes, and everything fits into the two bags easily, both out by 6:35, to be picked up as they're put out. Down to verandah for two cups of very white tea, ask Ram for a photo of the Tharu dancers (and Lok at the end comes up with a GREAT brochure for the place, which included the not-very-sexy male dancers). Isolate Bishal Bhattarai and give him an extra $2 tip, which he appreciates, and then wash my fingers from the sugared tea in the local men's room. Back to pick up shoulder bag, Bill completely moved out, and photo the "loft" and see the water pitcher up there and almost fill my water bottle from IT at 6:55. Leave lock and key in room, and down to breakfast, Ed calling the long-white-tailed bird a Paradise Flycatcher, but I don't think I have a photo of it at all. Order a mushroom omelet, more tea, take my pills, have HOT milk on corn flakes, baked beans with the omelet and toast and butter and jelly, a banana before and a banana with my corn flakes. Take my third cup of tea at 7:30, mid-breakfast. Also take a picture of the painted wall and the group at table, as I did last night in the bar. Gratified to see that I have 530 pictures left, nothing to worry about. Ram says I can find information about the Tharu Dance from Google, just before Lok gives me the color brochure with their picture. Identify our luggage on the stack and walk down for eight in the open-top truck we came in, and seven in a closed Land Rover that will NOT have to switch vehicles at the main gate. I get in next to Claude, crowding him a bit as we leave at 7:51, but then Ram moves to the van at the gate, Bill to the back, giving Claude the rest of the middle seat, with Mary in front with "H", to which Claude adds "Preparation H." Oh. Cross the Rapti River; the Siwalik Hills are to the south, something like the Bharatnagar range hazily visible to the north, over which we fly, I guess, on our twenty-minute flight to Kathmandu. Karen tells about knee-gel injections called Synvest or Orthovest that can delay the need for knee SURGERY or REPLACEMENT for up to ten years! Ask Chin about them, since my knees are starting to hurt when I climb stairs now, and my BACK hurts from the pummeling on the truck yesterday, though my upper-body muscles seem none the worse for their strenuous workout. To the airport at 9:11, Buddha Air flying to Bharatpur and Kathmandu only. Ram hands out "free-seating" passes, saying plane has only 18 seats, so I guess it's all windows, as on the Everest flight. Since we leave at 11, I want to face WEST, so I want a LEFT window away from the landing gear. Pee and drink water, envying Phil, who, with his pilot's license, gets to see the control tower. Finish typing to date at 10:10AM, Ram having warned that MANY times the plane is VERY late and we should have reading material to take up the time. Valium is working VERY well: morning packing, breakfast, and ride to airport went well, as does the wait so far. Today to Kathmandu, tomorrow to Delhi, day after tomorrow to NYC!!! Now to puzzles at 10:12AM. Oh, yes, file 3 is now FULL with junk keystrokes! GOT to remember to USE it for the rest of the trip! Ed: Bug is red-curtain bug. Woolly-headed storks. 10:43: on line for male/female security check, opening bags and checking pockets. Through at 10:56. Stand for plane (wrong one) at 11:17. ON our plane at 11:27 and it MOVES at 11:28 as I take last seat on left, and off at 11:31, absolutely perfect, except camera can't focus on the distant clear snow-topped mountains, only on the dusty villages below. Lots of shots, but I have lots of shots left. Land at 11:48, to luggage at 12:02PM. To lot (no bus because of traffic jams due to the fact that today is Democracy Day, celebrating third year of new democracy) at 12:08. Onto air-conditioned bus 12:11, and to Hotel Everest at 12:24. He announces 12:45 first-floor restaurant for soup and sandwich lunch, and that's where we gather at 6:30 for farewell dinner outside. To room 427 at 12:35 and wait for bags until 12:46, when I finish this. They're outside! Lunch to 1:30, good sandwich, soup, and beer, not much but I'm still full. Continue 3/1 top puzzle 1:42-2:07. 2:34 finish 3/1 bottom. Pack to 3:15, just to prove it will all fit. 4:18: Finish 3/29 bottom. 4:58 finish 4/5 top. Shit and wash face to 5:06, and type this to 5:08, caught up, room STILL cold. Turn OFF cooling altogether. 6:15: 3/8 top undone [but finished by 9:07PM], dress for dinner. Biatakh Restaurant, which means living room, the former stables of a rana palace. My camera DIES for the group photo by the pool outside Everest Hotel. Get recharged batteries and leave hotel 6:42. Take pictures in restaurant, and we're there to 8:20. Many give Ram his envelope, so I give him his $120. Take Valium at 8:52PM. Tomorrow: 12:30 luggage out, eat something before meeting for airport at 1PM for 3:45PM flight to Brussels. Essentially Saturday and Sunday, six more meals, left on trip. Tired enough for bed NOW at 8:57PM, comfortable in room. TEN puzzles still undone. Bed at 9:20. Sleep very quickly.
SATURDAY, 4/25/09: 3:57AM: Pee and type DREAMS:4/25/09. Knees sore from the truck ride. Two days to go. Note dream from 5:24AM. Bill's moving around early, and I finally take out an earplug and ask what time it is, and it's just before 6AM, so that's way over eight hours' sleep. Up at 6:10AM and shit adequately and wash face and prepare to tear black bag apart for AA card at 6:25, after I type this. 7:01AM: Tore apart all bags, consolidating note-pages, putting flight stuff into shoulder bag, finding AA card and spare photos, putting all dirty clothes into vaguely one bag, souvenirs into another. Two newspapers to scan. Clip a few articles. Breakfast 7:18-7:55, goodbye to Carolyn and David who are going to Tibet. Sudoku to 8:30. Brush teeth to TV to 9:28. Last newspaper sudoku to 9:39. At 10:48 finish 3/15 top puzzle. Work on others, but bored by 11AM. Shit a bit and Bill comes back at 11:11, entranced with his Lonely Planet walk through Kathmandu. I'm about to go downstairs to pick up a sandwich "just in case." NOTHING there! Back to watch more inane TV, Bill leaves to "join the group downstairs" at 12:08PM. I decide to put my jacket into my black bag, really stuffing it, but leaving the shoulder bag relatively light. Might as well go downstairs, too. Leave room at 12:15. Take Valium at 12:15: "24 hours to go." At 12:32 finish 4/6 New York magazine. I realize I don't have my KEY in my pocket, so have to go to Ram, who directs me to the luggage truck, and thank goodness my bag is RIGHT at the front, and I can lock the bag and take the key and pin it into my right-front pants' pocket. Leave hotel 1:03PM. To airport 1:12. CHAOS! Tax to pay? First yes, then no, then at the end YES, having to go to bank, and they DO accept my US$20 and give me $2 back with four squares of taxation forms, which do add up to the 1356R, or whatever, that we were told. We aren't even sure which line we should be in, and people keep pushing in ahead of us, though we try to keep together as a group, but we're more or less the blind leading the blind (even if Ed DID put in his eyeball!). 1:32: Claude: tax included in our e-ticket. Ed and Gloria paid, nonetheless. Then WE pay, and I buy a 260R (which I was SURE was marked 240R) chocolate bar for 250R when I convinced the poor clerk that I had no more rupees. It's still over $3, but less than the 400R for OTHER chocolate bars. Still on line at 2:02. Get WINDOW 22A at 2:22! To immigration at 2:30. Through immigration at 2:38. Security check AGAIN to 3PM, and then to waiting room. Then to INNER waiting room at 3:06. On bus 3:22, either having to stand or squeezing into a small space to sit. Board 3:30, peeing before I sit down at window. Bill on aisle, and a big guy who might be speaking Dutch sits between us. 1:20 flight announced. Do newspaper sudokus; no real news. Off at 4:20, quickly into smog that makes details blurry below. Then magnificent Himalayan profiles appear out the right windows, though most passengers simply ignore them. Below are only hazy fields, winding rivers with large sandy banks, and little sign of squared-off fields of any kind. Patches of trees alternate with bare patches, and toward Delhi the brown square fields tend to have yellow "pimples" in their middles, as if they'd stacked all their hay in the center and the wind had blown it slightly to one side. Small villages appear as incongruous clusters of haphazard taller buildings. Roads are narrow and dusty, but many might be canals, since some roads seem to END in them. We get served cans of Tiger beer, rather odd, and then at 4:50 hot trays come around with the choice of chicken or vegetarian, and the chicken has VERY little meat mixed in with corrugated short hollow pasta, though the tomato-based sauce isn't bad, and the salad-filled bread sandwich is certainly different. A 200 ml bottle of lime juice is strange, also, but later we get tea to go with the sugar and "coffee lightener" on our trays. A fluffy white carbohydrate mousse acts as a dessert. Take a photo of Chatrapur (identified by Chassim from my photo) on the way down, but miss a shot at the enormous purple bronze Shiva. Lots of clusters of villages on the outskirts of Delhi, and then slums around the airport, where we land, quite hard, at 5:43. Get told to change watch from 5:45 to 5:35! Onto bus, having to stand in jam with everyone else, and to immigration line at 5:42. To wait for the luggage at 6:01, long wait while many bags circulate past, but then our final ones come in a group. Out the green gate to find a yellow sign poking out at us, join Chassim at 6:12, and walk out the familiar exit, stopping for a pee, to the bus in the same place as before at 6:20, loading luggage into the back without ANYONE thinking that maybe we'd want to LEAVE it there [Start file 5 at 12:53AM 4/26/09, the LAST ENDLESS DAY of the trip] while we stay our few hours at the Ibis Hotel. We're told we'll get a wake-up call at 10:30PM and have to leave the hotel at 11PM in order to get to the airport on time for our 2:35AM flight. I complain bitterly about having to ride for an HOUR from the airport for a VERY few hours of rest between flights, when there are DOZENS of hotels closer, including a Radisson RIGHT AT the airport. Phil says that he'd gladly pay an extra $100 to get two more hours' rest between flights; I certainly agree: make it an option, if they want, but REALLY complain about it, sure to NOT tip either the hapless guide or the poor bus driver. Bus goes at 6:20 and arrives at 7:07 at the hotel (past constructions, stops for photos of the Shiva and the consorts on either side, enormous traffic jams, TWO tolls: one for the road, the other to enter the next STATE, Haryana---just to get to our REST hotel!). Traffic truly horrendous, though he uses the excuse that Saturday is only a half-day of working, so many people are on the road "enjoying" themselves. He collects our passports and I sit doing sudoku next to a solitary Indian woman while they go through their usual fuss trying to get us rooms, always seeming to take an unusually long time even though they KNOW we're coming and will be exhausted and wanting the rooms NOW! Get key to room 520 at 7:22, telling Bill that I'm going DIRECTLY to the room and DIRECTLY to bed, so the guide gets him an additional key. Even if I got to bed INSTANTLY, it would only be from 7:22 to 10:30, or 3:08 hours, too short a time to even try Ambien, though I tell everyone I'm psyched to go to sleep. Extract dop kit to take evening pills for the "late lunch or early dinner" on the plane, wash my face and hands, get out my earplugs and eyemask, undress totally, pull the duvet off the bed and get the bath towel to cover myself with, leaving IN my toilet-paper tampon---not CARING what Bill might think. Get into bed at 7:34PM, start Actualism, vaguely hear Bill come in (having left the lights on for him), and get to sleep gratifyingly quickly. At 10:15PM he pokes me awake, saying the call came early, and I groggily get up, wash my face and hands again; he leaves to join the people downstairs, I fill up my pill cases with my morning pills, which I'll take who knows when, adding a Valium to take at some point. Pee three times, lastly with a small shit by 10:40, my system not quite knowing what to do with reality. Pack everything up, take my card from the light socket, and get downstairs at 10:45 to find most of us already down! I ask Bill if he had dinner, and he says no, while Karen and Phil describe their three-course dinner. Everyone seems vaguely competent, which I'm not. Bus goes into the dark with the lights blaring at 10:51, while he makes some kind of announcement, and then turns the lights off. Nightmare ride through masses of traffic in the muggy, smoggy, disgustingly dusty air---horns blowing, mopeds and bicycles taking their lives in their hands in the lanes of traffic for cars, trucks, and busses. We only have to pass through ONE toll booth on the way back, finding signs for the airport long before we seem to be anywhere near it. People sit on the roadsides breathing in the cancerous air, while dogs scavenge and trucks stop for no apparent reason; lots of people walking determinedly at this late hour, and we start and stop in terminal (in both senses) traffic until we get to the airport at 11:33PM. Guide describes our needing to get to counter D, which might be on the right of gate 2 or the left of gate 3. But he doesn't mention the steps that we subsequently have to go through! Off to pick up our bags in a CRUSH of people: he says that for every person who goes on a flight, fifteen relatives and friends come to see them off. It's so jammed I can't even tell if we're INSIDE the terminal or only under an overhang AROUND the terminal. Push through many people pushing through with carts, luggage, and screaming babies, and finally seem to be on a passenger line entering the terminal proper. Follow who I hope is Bob down a long way to the left of the entrance, everyone separating, and then someone waves us to a farther counter, where the line seems to be shorter, and seems to belong to our flight. Get to the desk at 11:46 and am told that we have to have our passports "somethinged." "Our passports WHAT?" I demand. "Your passports SCANNED." Why don't they do that at the same counter that checks us in, for heaven's sake, and why didn't someone TELL us about this? Leave my bag leaning against Phil's truck and go back to wait for all of us to, yes, get our passports scanned and yet ANOTHER tag added to the front with the scribbled signature of someone looking after our security---admittedly always very kind, thanking us and wishing us a good trip, no matter how surly we are with them. At 11:55 we're given a departure form that, at first, we're told has to be filled out NOW, as we check in, but then told it's for LATER, when we go through CUSTOMS. Get to the desk just in time for the last day of the trip.
SUNDAY, 4/26/09: 12:04AM: The clerk works and works over her computer after she gets me a window seat for the Brussels-JFK flight, and I go into my ludicrous "Oh, I have terrible claustrophobia and MUST have a window seat," and she finally rustles up 37K for Delhi-Brussels, the last row of the plane (maybe taking it away from some stewardess or other flight usage), and I thank her VERY much: at least there won't be anyone BEHIND me with a screaming baby, and MAYBE I'll actually have a WINDOW and a TV to look at when I can't look out the window. Not to mention that most of the START of the flight will be in the dark. 12:15 to security, now amazingly CLEAR of crowds: "You can even see the FLOOR," I say to Gloria with astonishment. Many short lines, but when I get to the front the guard holds me up until about a half-dozen people backed up at the x-ray machines get through. At 12:25 I go through, having to take out my laptop, and a Sikh goes through my shoulder bag while I'm being body-scanned, beeping at my belt, my luggage key, my wallet edge, and even the zipper on my right NF pocket! Ed says that, being in India, we'll probably have 3-4 more body searches. Grab my bag and mention that Bob's being the traffic cop, and pass him and get to gate 5 and see only an enormous line waiting to board the previous flight at gate 6. Pass a "playground" with kids absolutely, no-doubt-about-it, SCREAMING at various intervals. How AWFUL! Into the gate 6 area and just decide to sit and type from 12:30. Lots to talk about, having to switch to file 5, and AGAIN surrounded with kids who appear to be either hyperactive or just plain CRAZED: laughing hysterically, screaming for attention, eyes wild with excitement or closed in sleep. At 1:13 Ann comes up to me with my e-ticket: "You left this at the desk!" Lots of VERY loud announcements for distant destinations for final boarding, individual passengers, and other unclear messages. Debate getting something to eat, but just don't have the energy to leave my seat and GET it. Still have my chocolate bar, and have the fantasy that we'll have SOME kind of snack just after we take off. Very content to sit apart from the rest of the group, whom I can see chatting in the distance. At 1:30AM I see that our board time is 1:35AM---fat chance. The gate 6 board merely announces "Bon voyage." Kids CONSTANTLY talking, jabbering, jumping around, making a nuisance. But I AM starting to get HUNGRY! Haven't had anything since that 5PM "linner" on the previous flight. But pleased with seat 24A (checking that 22A was well behind wing on PRIOR flight) Delhi-Brussels, and seat 37K Brussels-JFK, boarding at 9:10AM. Earplugs in? Put Neo away now at 1:33AM---home in HOW many hours? After HOW many meals? Remember to switch to file 3, now full of junk! Everyone getting up at gate 6 now at 1:37AM!! Oh, also had to fill out an ID tag for the CARRY-ON bag! Stand at 1:44 at changed gate 4, still scheduled to be off at 2:35. 2:20 up to stand in line. Board 2:28, JUST at wing's rear edge. 3:47 have "early breakfast" of chicken wraps with onions and a dessert, and EVEN have a gin and tonic! Watch Yes Man (with Jim Carrey) when the lights of Delhi have fallen completely behind (which took a while) to 4:57. Revolutionary Road 5:07-6:58, depressing, particularly when she drips blood on the floor and dies. Deserts of Turkmenistan at dawn, Caspian Sea [Afghanistan totally dark], at 35,000 feet. Caucasus Mountains will be on the left, get to Caspian west shore at Makhachkala. Only 4:40 left to Brussels at 7:02, so we'll be in at 11:42AM, almost halfway. Passed WAY south of Lahore, Islamabad, and Kabul, and at night. Mostly cloudy below now, sunlight on wingtip. Way NORTH of Tbilisi and Yerevan, at 4:22 to now, JUST halfway at 7:20. Actually SEE snowy Caucasus peaks! Playing Beethoven's 5th and 6th while watching the map for place-names and out the window for many pictures, many failures. Picture-taking futile. 8:01 clouds clearing over Georgian farmlands. 8:11: Sea of Azov with plain sandy shores. #828 Stavropol at 8:07. #829 huge Georgian farms. 8:36 pee. Sadly cloudy over Ukraine River north of Odessa. #831 PART of river bend at 8:52? What is all this HAZE doing to the CROPS? Neat fields of Poland at 9:41. LAST row (24A) before john PERFECT for raised shade being accepted, as will be LAST row from Brussels-JFK. Change watch from 10AM Delhi time to 6:30AM Brussels time, and think to ask Phil and Karen over for 4-5 hours! We have good breakfast: quiche, sausage, potatoes, fruit, yogurt, roll and butter and jelly and tea to 7AM, REAL breakfast time---for Brussels! Baby in front of me goes BAT-SHIT on cloudy landing at 8:08, actually FOGGY on ground, and windows fog up. Taxi to exit. Onto SECURITY line (again) 8:26. Through at 8:46, following guy to second-floor faster line, taking my drinking water, which I open and drink though she shouts, "Don't drink that here!" Well, I did. Onto liquor line for Amaretto for 15€ 8:55-9:06. Then to gate B37 with Phil and Karen at 9:10 to be told they already are boarding rows beyond 30, so I jump in front of everyone and get to seat before plane starts filling at 9:13. Sit at drippy window, guy sits next to me making cell-phone calls, and place fills up, guy in front of me bouncing back at my laptop with each move. Finish this to date at 9:42, passes being given out. 9:43: Get handed cold 200 ml water, which I drink instantly. Lots of babies screaming WAY forward in plane. 10:02: 7:30 flight announced. I'm now tired of reading New Yorker by 10:25. Off at 10:38. England lovely: clear and green and yellow and flat and dull. Ireland entirely under clouds at 11:44. I'm TIRED waiting for a drink at 11:56AM. Gin and tonic finally gotten at 12:07PM. Watch Jodhaa Akbar starting at 1:03, shit a bit at 1:30 when my aisle-blocker gets up, and love Hrithik Roshan's body in the movie, which goes off about 15 minutes before the end: I get it back and speed it forward until I get to about the two-and-a-half hour mark, when I guess I inadvertently hit the "off" button and I had to start all over! DAMN! Finally get to the end---glorious dancing---of the 213-minute film at 5:02, still cloudy below. Change watch from 5:09 to 11:09, only one hour to go. CLEAR in Canada but CLOUDY over the East Coast at 11:22. Land at 12:06PM for 7:28 flight, quite bumpy in the middle and VERY bumpy at the end. Plane docks at 12:17. Off plane 12:28. To immigration 12:34, tired. Through at 12:37, glad there were many more foreigners than US citizens on this flight. Get to the baggage carousel to find bags on the move already, and spot mine at the top and get around to the end to grab it off at 12:38 and breeze past customs to get to the surprisingly hot curb and get a taxi quickly at 12:52, driven by a turbaned Sikh. Traffic moves fast; I'm numb with relief and pay him $40 for a $34.90 meter reading, get a carrier to take a stack of mail up, and take the carrier back down by 1:43. Pee, water the plants, make a phone list of the six calls: 1) Carolyn needing a PACEMAKER!, 2) Anthony Gray will call back AGAIN, 3) and 4) from the Ball Corporation about some proxy, 5) a no-answer, and 6) from Ken, who had to cancel his Spain trip because of back pain and wants to talk about taking a more expensive plane so he can recoup his Spanish flight credits. Um. Talk to Ken at his office from 2-2:30, leave word with Carolyn and Spartacus, Mildred's machine isn't working, and gab with Marj 2:32-2:57, just to try to pass time without going to sleep. Quickly sort the mail into piles of 1) junk, 2) look at later, 3) handle now, and 4) magazines. Something turns me on and I jerk off to 4:10, playing nicely for a time, but with a damaged cock that I aloe before dropping into bed: I just don't have ANY more energy to DO anything. Up at 9:10PM to shit, then pee, feet feeling very swollen, just plain feeling TIRED. Weigh bags to take out magazine to read while eating an unfrozen HH dinner just to have something before the evening pills, eat to 10:20, wash face and hands, pee again, and rinse with peroxide to help teeth along. At 10:30 do New York magazine puzzles to 10:50, then try to j/o again to 11:55, but it really doesn't work: I'm just too sore and tired. Pee and get to bed.
SUMMARY OF BUTAN/NEPAL
SAT,4/4: Leave JFK 7:20PM. Watch "Curious Case of Benjamin Button."
SUN,4/5: Land 8:07AM [6:47 flight]. Fly Brussels-Delhi 10:25AM-9:47PM [7:22 flight]. Watch Australia, Changeling, and Slumdog Millionaire. Bed at 12!
MON,4/6: Wake at 2:35AM! Ibis Hotel breakfast. Fly Delhi-Kolkotta 6:54-8:53AM [1:59 flight]. Fly Kolkotta-Paro, Bhutan 9:53-10:43 [:50 flight]. Take movie of landing in Bhutan. Jigmi Ling lunch. Olathang Hotel dinner. Bed at 8:45PM.
TUE,4/7: Up 5:55AM. Climb 7:17-10:50 to Tiger's Nest Viewpoint, exhausting. Kichu Lakam 659AD temple. Samten Norzim lunch. GREAT Tshechu Dance Festival 12:42-2:40. Fortress and temple. Olathang Hotel dinner and bed at 8:36PM.
WED,4/8: To Thimpu via Siman Simtokha 1629 fortress. Dochula Cafeteria lunch at 10,000-foot pass. To Punakha 1639 fortress in Wangdue, on cliff. Dragon Nest Resort for Carolyn's birthday-cake dinner. Characteristics reading. Bed 9PM.
THU,4/9: Shower, breakfast, Bird Sanctuary, Punakha Fortress. Country Restaurant lunch upstairs. Mad Monk Temple and local Farmhouse. Dinner; bed 9:10PM.
FRI,4/10: Dochula Pass, Queen's Temple, Stupas. Thimpu Post Office for stamps. Bhutan Kitchen lunch. Archery, Arts School, Library, Kisa Hotel dinner; 10:19PM bed.
SAT,4/11: Memorial Chorten, Textile Museum, Viewpoint, Takin Reserve, Handicrafts Exhibition Hall, Paper Factory, Farmer's Market, Bhutan Orchid Restaurant for farewell dinner with cimbalom and guitar and dancers. 8:28PM bed.
SUN,4/12: Wake 4:34AM. Hour drive to Paro Airport to fly to Kathmandu 8:02-8:52 [:46 flight]. Hotel Everest Himalayan Tavern poor lunch. Bill Lentini appears. Traffic jam to Rum Doodle dinner with drink and beer. Bed at 10:24PM, tired.
MON,4/13: Shower, no hot chocolate in Everest Hotel. Bus to Durbar Square Kali Temple, Temple of Justice, Krishna Temple, Kumari Temple, moviemaking seen from Festive Fare terrace. Rickshaw ride. Patan Palace lunch. Tuk-tuk ride. Swayambunath Temple monkeys. Chinese package dinner at Mandarin Restaurant for New Year's Eve with Bill and David from 7-9:34PM. Bed exhausted at 9:45PM.
TUE,4/14: Replace camera card for Mount Everest $100 flight 7:27-8:29AM [1:02]. Lots of pictures of Himalayas and Everest. Bus to Bodunath, overgrown. Bus to Pashupatinath for cremations. Bhaktapur "Biscuit" Festival from Cafe Nyatpola lunch terrace. Dattatraya Square film in Baktapur. The Bakery dinner; bed 10PM.
WED,4/15: Shower. Fly Kathmandu-Pokhara 9:55-10:20 [:25]. Bus to Pokhara Cottage Restaurant lunch that I have little of. Walk 1:35-3:35 and get heat prostration. Lie prostrate to 7:18, chills, bit of soup, 2 Cipro, bed 8:20PM.
THU,4/16: Up at 6:40AM to breakfast in Serenity Lodge. Walk 10:20-12:12PM to suspension bridge alone. Lunch. Photo Annapurna. Communication Meeting and dinner in Lodge, apple pie with fresh cream for dessert. Bed at 9:30 lights-out.
FRI,4/17: Wake 6AM, take 2 more Cipro, early tea, photo Fish-tail. Walk 7:55-9:40 to school and "bee village" for homes, lunch, and dance. Walk down 1:10-2:20, drink gin and tonic, talk, tea and Communications and dinner. Tip talks.
SAT,4/18: Walk to bus 7:45-10:36 via waterfall and Green View. Bistro Caroline lunch in Pokhara. Hotel Gorkha Temple. Sundance Grill dinner with Tequila Sunrise and Nepali Ice beer with beef Stroganoff. Bed, caught up, at 10PM.
SUN,4/19: Up at 6:45, play Tiger Move game, good breakfast. Pokhara Lake boat ride. Mountain Museum and Bird Maya Inn lunch with gorgeous Scott and Anita. Back to Pokhara to buy Purel, North Fork shirts, and water shoes. Shower, nap, sudoku, dinner at awful Everest Steak House, packing all bags, and bed at 10:08.
MON,4/20: Pack, good breakfast. Bus 7:50AM to river rafts at 10:11AM. Box-lunch stop on Seti River. Dock at camp 2:11PM. Shower, Communication Meeting, dinner, bed.
TUE,4/21: Breakfast, walk 7:55 to Khare Village at 9:30, river-ferry ride, back at 11:11. Lunch, puzzles and wasp-nest photos, Communication Meeting, dust storm, chocolate cake for celebratory last dinner, and bed at 8:15PM, dream at 10:15.
WED,4/22: Skimpy breakfast, rapids 7:55-9:50, Level 3 rapid not bad, Level 2 worse. Change clothes in open. Bus 10:24, road blocks, 11:45 transfer to open truck to cross Rapti River to 12:10. Machan Reserve lunch, lovely pool, lie down, elephants 4-6PM: hog deer, sambar, rhino, owl, barking deer, spotted deer. Windstorm and rain. Shower in darkness, slides of ranas, dinner, 8:50 bed.
THU,4/23: Ride elephant 6:05-7:55: spotted deer, Indian Roller. Breakfast and SIT! Boring elephant talk and wash and feeding. Gin and tonic. Puzzles. Jeeps for sambar, barking deer, a langur monkey where others see a leopard. We don't. Tharu Dance cancelled because of picket lines. Free rum punches, dinner, beer.
FRI,4/24: Pack, good breakfast, Land Rover back to bus to airport 9:11AM. Fly Chitwan-Kathmandu 11:31-11:48 [:17]. Hotel Everest lunch. Puzzles. Biatakh Restaurant in former Rana palace for final Indian dinner. Bed at 9:20PM.
SAT,4/25: Up at 6:10AM. Breakfast, sudoku, puzzles. Chaos at airport. Fly Kathmandu-Delhi 4:20-5:43 [1:23], lunch on plane. Bus 6:20-7:07 to Ibis Hotel. Bed 7:34-10:15PM [2:41 sleep!]. Bus goes 10:51-11:33PM. Airport chaos again.
SUN,4/26: Get two window seats! Type lots. Fly Delhi-Brussels 2:40-?????. Watch Yes Man, with Jim Carrey. Revolutionary Road, thinking it had won Kate Winslet an Oscar, but it hadn't. See Turkmenistan, Caspian Sea, Caucasus Mountains, Georgia, Sea of Azov, Ukraine River misty, Poland neat. Good breakfast to 7AM, landing at 8:08AM. Buy Amaretto for 15€. Leave Brussels 10:38. England clear, Ireland cloudy. Gin and tonic at 12:07PM. Watch Jodhaa Akbar with beautiful Hrithik Roshan. Land at 12:06PM from 7:28 flight. Bumpy. Get into taxi at 12:52 and home 1:35. Get six calls, talk with Marj, sort through mail, jerk off, bed at 4:10, and up at 9:10PM, have dinner, do puzzles to 10:50, try to jerk off again to 11:55, but it doesn't work. Pee, and get to bed.