Hot tears sting my eyes as I make the 30 meter or so walk through "no man's land" on the border between India and Nepal. I am feeling my difference profoundly as I walk. The Nepalese army (?) police (?) guys are scrutinizing me - hard - so I bite my lip equally hard in effort to keep tears at bay. I have been more frightened in my life but have never felt so entirely alone....
When the bus driver dropped me at the border and helped me shoulder my pack, he told me to just keep walking - don't stop and don't take photos while walking into Nepal. So I turn away and try to ignore the worried look on his face. OhdeargoddessShiva I find myself praying that the Nepalese guide who is to meet me on the 'other side' is there. And then I'm there at the Nepal side, and no one waits for me. Stepping into the immigration shack, I begin to fill in the papers required for my Nepal visa, hand over the needed money and picture and submit to more scrutiny. my pack is opened, my stuff is rifled and my camera is extracted. on request I show the officer that I have no photos of the border, but he pops the memory card from my camera and tosses it into the garbage bin and now the tears do spill. Half of my treasured photographs from India are gone. Quietly palming the other memory card I get my passport and shiny new visa back and step back out and find "Jimmy" - my guide....his broad Tibet Sherpa looking face creased deeply into the leatheriest of smiles...and suddenly it's all up hill from here...
Literally....we hop into the group van and begin the long grind up into the "hills". For ease I have joined a trek group for the Nepal portion of my trip and there are nine of us collectively holding our breath as we navigate the crumbling narrow road...looking over the edge as our driver hurtles around blind corners I think that at least going over the edge would be done with some "Thelma and Louise" type panache. At the apex we stop for a meal of mo:mo's - water buffalo dumpling type things and plenty of welcome and icy beer. The villagers haven't seen a lot of travellers apparently so I spend a therapeutic half hour after lunch taking photographs of kids, and beautiful old folks and gaggles of giggling young women and dogs and....and....it is the perfect balm to my soul.
and hence begins my journey through Nepal. I came not knowing quite what to expect and have been entirely enchanted with this country every waking moment. Picture the scenery from "7 days in Tibet" overlaid with buddhist temples and shrines and villages straight out of the most surreal medieval movie set and then layer over all the friendliest most welcoming souls I have ever met. The Himalayas provide the visually stunning background to steeply terraced rice paddies and banana plantations, rambling wooden homes with metal pagoda roofs literally spill down cliff sides, spectacular glacier fed, aqua blue rivers slice through the gorges and everywhere children wave and run after us with broad smiles and calls of 'namaste' (hello in both Hindi and Nepalese). Their biggest joy is having their photo taken and then seeing it afterwards - usually followed with wild giggling and more 'posing'.
With ethnic backgrounds including Indian, Moghul, and Chinese the diversity of faces is amazing and the Nepalese, particularly the women are well, gorgeous and tiny and exquisite. Here in Kathmandu, they are also remarkably fashion forward and visible. This whole city vibrates with the energy and noise and calamitous joy of millions of souls...yet I feel entirely safe walking any of the streets alone, even after my self imposed curfew of being back in my room before dark (plug your ears, those of you that know my 'rules' while travelling....) For the streets come alive at night with families and singles and hawkers and shop keepers and those like me who simply stroll and marvel at the ancient temples and shrines nudging up against the vibrant nightlife.
Last night was the last spent with my group of hardy, jovial intrepid trekkers and we feted our success at the predawn hikes that Jimmy and Avi put us through with a visit to a place here frequented in the past by dear ol' Sir Edmund Hilary and his Everest team. Their doodles and signatures still grace an old paper tablecloth now protected by glass panel on the wall, along with other "Everest Summiteers"....The rest of the place is covered with cardboard "Yeti footprints" - all signed and doodled on by other trekking groups - some who've done the whole Everest basecamp thing - some like us who have simply conquered our own more modest hills. Our group gets it's own blank foot and spend a hilarious wine fuelled hour designing our own footprint to add to the others. As the smallest in our crew, I'm hauled up on the shoulders of the largest of our crew to nail our foot into the rafters. It's a ridiculously happy moment and I like to think that someone may read ours and laugh and what we've written and drawn on it, just as we have enjoyed the footprints of other trekking groups.
and now back out into the benign, glorious sunshine to enjoy my last afternoon in Nepal....tomorrow it's back to crazy-arse India, albeit with the goal of reaching the hippy-vibe paradise of Goa for a week of blissful bozo time on the beach. As always, thank you for walking along with me on the way. Even if I don't reply to your notes right away, I love getting them - they give me that delicious connection to home...Love and warm, thriving, happy hugs to you all, Deli.
