Auld Lang Syne

Happy 2068 everyone, yup I seem to of gong back in time 60 odd years since last months Tibeten new year. So last night it was Nepali new year at this rate I’ll be back in 2011 in about 4 weeks. I’ve been in Kathmandu for a few days now and spent last night seeing the new year in in a bar, unfortunately the bars shut at 11 (and many police roam the streets enforcing this) so we didn’t quite see it in.

I don’t really fit in Kathmandu. A lot of the buildings are medieval and even modern Nepali’s are quite short so most the ceilings are below my normal shoulder height. I’m staying in Freak Street at the moment, affectionately renamed when the first hippies arrived here in the 60’s. tho its quite a small area and most the tourists are now about 2km away in Thamel. Freak Street is right on the fantastic Durbar Square full of monuments.

I've visited Swayambhu the most opulent Buddhist stupa in Nepal. It’s on top of a one of the few hills in the Kathmandu basin which is about 25km across and surrounded by mountains you can’t see most the time due to the pollution.

I also visited the national museum, split into 3 buildings it’s a pretty run down place except the Buddhist art/history section that is funded by the Japanese. This seems pretty common that Buddhist interests here do well from overseas money and are well looked after where as the Hindu stuff (by far the majority religion) is left to look after it self. I suppose this is understandable as it is such a large and displaced religion.

I was struck by the more blood thirsty nature of Tantric Hinduism (I’ve walked passed a few animal sacrifices here) compared to the more life respecting practices in India. I guess this comes from the Hinduist skill of accepting and absorbing any other faith it comes across. Also the deity worship of the tantric Buddhists seems to go against what little I know of Buddhism, often incorporating Hindu gods. The Hindus see Buddha as an incarnation of Krishna, but everything seems to boil down to Brahma in the end. The two religions seem very intertwined here.

Today I went to Thamel, to find an English bookshop and a place to move too tomorrow. I meandered back randomly and came across a load of guys playing Bagh chal in a bandstand/roundabout, I guess from the blankets ect at least some for them were homeless. I watched for a few mins, then sat and got my converted chess/bagh chal set out. I ended up playing the winner of the previous game. I found my self in the rare position of speaking more Nepali than they did English. I splashed a few cigarettes around and eventually won a very long game. They were had already lined up a guy I had to play next but I decided to head back home as night was falling and I was hungry. I may go back tomorrow.*

Oh I also had a couple of good games of chess against a 2200 rated coach of the nepali youth team over breakfast, I even felt I was winning for a while in the first game. Astley, a Malaysian chess player I met in pokhara has been here a few weeks and found the good chess players, but there is not real café playing scene here in the same way as Varannassi and Pokhara.

Anyways my foods arrived, catch ya all soon.

-Dan
PS kathmandu can be pretty dirty but some times the half hearted attempts to do something about it seem ironic.

see writing on wall

Chitwan National Park

Hi Again

I spent 2 days in Chitwan national park. 900 sq Km of Rhino and Tiger sanctury. It’s quite expensive there so I didn’t stick around too long. On the first day we crossed the river into the park proper with a guide and did a 3 hour walk through the forest. One of the first things we found was some tiger prints we followed to the river and where there was some blood and obviously some thing had been dragged into the undergrowth. We went in to investigate and found a huge deer (the biggest I’ve ever seen) half eaten. The tiger will likely come back for more in the evening. We saw a few other small spotted deer (like Bambi*) and lots of insects and interesting plants, but not a lot else.

In the afternoon we did a 5 hour jeep ride when you get deep into the jungle where there are lots of vines and things you half expect to see Tarzan swing across the road. Sadly we saw nothing bigger than a kingfisher early on, but there are some really pretty birds there, over 500 species in total, including the wild jungle foul, or chicken to you and I. Was stopped at a Gharial crocodile conservation center. They’re pretty awesome beasts. On the way back we saw a few troops of monkeys, a peacock doing a dance and finally, with in site of the river to cross back a huge stag. It was much bigger than anything we have in the uk, it was almost as tall as me standing up in the jeep and not at all bothered by us being there.

We crossed back, it’d been a nice day in the park but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed not to see a Rhino (Tiger sightings are really rare). We sat outside a bar on some loungers on the river bank chatted about the day and watched the sun set, and then with no warning a rhino just trotted passed on the other side of the river. It was still a long way away but pretty cool to see one in wild. It had a stand off with a man riding an elephant for a minute and then ran along the beach/shore and into the long grass.

(the photos of the Rhino didn't really come out)

The next day I had a long overdue lie in and got up in time to join in with the park elephants bathing at the river, which basically turned into elephant rodeo.

All good fun. I spent the afternoon in the community forest or buffer zone around the park reading and watching the world go by. There’s been a few rhino sightings there but I just saw the locals at work with elephants collecting a few logs.

Also i'm not sure about the cocktails in Chitwan...

(see monkey gland and nightlife)

Yesterday I had the long bus ride to Kathmandu, where I’m beginning to find my bearings and am sat in the tom an jerry pub right now as recommended by Ms Wilkinson (cheers Charlie)

Let you all know how drunk I get soon.

*Indecently Bambi’s parents were two different species of deer, both found in the park, thanks Disney for confusing generations.

Rafting

Hi Again
A couple of days before I left pokhara I went and stayed up at the guest house Robbie is building with Druba and his family and finally saw a proper sarangkot sunrise over the Himalaya. As you can see its pretty spectacular.

Then yesterday morning we headed off rafting. There were 5 of us on the raft, the guide, a german girl, an ozzie couple and myself, plus a kiwi in a kayak and 2 safety kayakers.
Most of the rapids were pretty tame but there was the odd challenging moment and the ozzies fell out once, but there was not really enough water.

It was really nice floating past the scenery and tiny villages of 3 or 4 wooden dwellings high on the banks, often on stilts, all the kids shouting from the banks "Namaste", "hello", "goodbye" and even at one point "I love you" to Anna (the german girl). The river was really warm (and weather scorching) so we did a lot of swimming.

On the first day we came across another raft of mischievous French and Spaniards containing my neighbors from pokhara. This led to lots of splashing each other that continued all day when we were close.
At about 5 we joined up with a big group of kayakers on a 3 day trip and setup camp on the river beach. Was a really nice evening.

Today we rafted till about 3 then caught a bus to a small village outside Chitwan national park. We all found a nice guesthouse and I am now typing from a hammock and watching the sunset.
Tomorrow into the park to try to spot some rhinos and tigers and other dangerous animals (humm do ozzies count).
-Dan

More Pokhara

It’s been a couple of weeks since I got back from my trek and I’m still here.

Not really done much except playing chess and drinking.

But why go anywhere when you can get an all you can eat meal like this for less than £1.50

And have a balcony like this to enjoy on my £3.50 per night room

There has been a thunder storm almost every afternoon, but it has made for some amazing sunsets.

Went sailing on the lake one day and got caught out in a sudden storm. We managed to beach the boat and get the sails down just in time. Two other boats on the lake capsized. Was quite exciting.

I also have been to Davi’s falls. A very odd water falls where the river goes from ground level straight down through successive holes it has dug. Its done is such a small space you can’t even see the bottom. Although there is also a cave with a temple in that comes out bottom of the hole the falls have dug deep under ground. All pretty cool.

Two days ago 3 of us hired bikes and went on a mission to get to Panchase which is only about 10km from here as the crow flies.

We’d heard rumors that there was now a road that was passable on bikes. The problem was no one seemed to know where it was. We headed off on one guys advice and after an hour got to a dead end in a village. There we met a chap who was the English teacher at the local school. He told us that we could hike for about 5 hours from there or come all the way back through pokhara and out the other side to get there by bike. We stopped for a chai with him and his mother, tea grown them selves with there own buffalo milk two. twas really nice.

So off we headed back to Pokhara, out the other side the road got progressively worse, we forded a few rivers and then started going up on a loose stone and sand track. It was tricky to say the least. Luis, who has ridden dirt bikes his whole life, was amazed I managed to get up some bits. I was a bit slower than the other two guys so I kept going when they stopped for a smoke. I was in the village before panchase and within sight of it when I got a call from the other guys saying Luis bike had sprung a fuel leak. So I turned around and started heading down again. At this point it started to rain. Now this is where my biking inexperience showed, I was on a steep down, tight, gravely bend doing only about 5km/h and I used the front not rear brake and found my self on the ground a little bit broken, as was the bike. Luckily it was just a few scrapes so I carried on and caught the others up. (Luis had fixed his leak with a stone).

By now we were in a real thunder storm, it even hailed for a bit so the rest of the ride back wasn’t so nice, we barely dared go above 20km/h even when we found some tarmac.

To add a final piece of drama to the day Robbie’s brakes failed on a bend above a cliff. His only option was to bin it and luckily managed not to go over the edge, He’s hired his bike for 6 months and it really is a bit ropey.

In two days time I finally leave here and go to chitwan national park. Seeing as I am now even more scared of Nepal's roads my chosen method of transport is … two days white water rafting ☺

Catch you on the flip side

-Dan