A month in

I've been in Kathmandu just over a month now and the last week has been a little rough. That's why I haven't posted in a while. I didn't want my brief stint of negativity to pour out onto the blog. Briefly, the problem was two-fold. Firstly, I started to miss my family and friends. I'm not homesick, per se, but I was missing people and frustrated at my inability to contact anyone (electricity, internet access and time differences weren't lining up in my favour). Secondly, a good deal of Kathmandu's dirt and pollution has lodged itself into my lungs resulting in a nasty, hacking cough, two days in bed and just a general despondency.

I've turned a courner now. My naturally postive outlook on things couldn't let me mope for more than a few days. I've been able to speak to the people I really wanted to. I've been reminding myself that I can't expect every moment of my six months away to be stumpedously awesome. And there's so much to look forward to, not least of which is the wedding party for Sapna's brother, Supreet, and his wife Sangita. The wedding ceremony was yesterday and that will get a full post of its own as soon as I'm able to upload the photos.

Since I'm very behind on writing, you can expect several new posts in the next few days (electricity permitting).

My piece-of-trash bike

It's now two weeks since I bought my bike and since then I've had to take it to be repaired TEN times. Six punctures, one broken pedal (seriously, how crappy does a pedal need to be to break?) and three times to get different repair guys to tune up the shoddy work done first time round. And not even that has diminished my enthusiasm for biking.

An unexpected benefit from the visit of the Sri Lankan President

There is a terrible problem with electricity in Nepal.  There is not enough of it to go around.  As a result it is rationed - a system known as 'load-shedding'.  At present, there are 16 hours of load-shedding in each district of Kathmandu a day, i.e. 8 hours of electricity.  There is, at least, a schedule so you can plan your day/work around it.  

At Sapna and Rabi's, the situation is not so bad.  Like most comfortably off people, they have an inverter so we can, at least, have lights on around the place.  The rest of the available power from the inverter usually goes towards a few hours of television, but the quality of the picture isn't great.  Laptops can be charged when electricity is available and used when not.  The only thing I really miss during load-shedding is internet access, which is why I often don't blog for a few days then put several posts up at once.  It's also why some e-mails go unanswered for a while.  Sapna and Rabi live down a side lane, and when there's load-shedding the street lights don't work, which makes it pretty creepy coming back at night.  In fact, being out on the roads after dark is substantially more terrifying and dangerous than being on the roads during the day, which, as I've previously pointed out, is already terrifying and dangerous enough.

Load-shedding has really made me realise just how much we take electricity for granted when we have it all the time.

But what's all this got to do with the Sri Lankan president, you must be wondering.  Well, Sapna and Rabi live in the same district as the Prime Minister of Nepal.  For a long while after load-shedding was first introduced, their district was exempt, until too many complaints surfaced from the rest of the city.  But the official visit of the president of Sri Lanka, who is staying with the Prime Minister, means we've had two full days of electricity, something so appreciated that it makes it worth a blog post.

My hiking boots

(This post goes out particularly to my parents, Kat and Thomas, who were all unlucky enough to get caught up in the saga that I am about to describe.)

Purchasing hiking boots and getting them ready for this trip involved the following:

• approximately twenty hours of shopping in Covent Garden over five days in the space of a week
  
• trying on so many pairs that I wore away the skin on my fingers tying up laces
  
• purchasing and then returning five pairs after getting them home and realising they were not comfortable enough
  
• one in-store almost panic attack 
  
• three exceedingly patient and sympathetic sales guys
  
• one knight-in-shining armour of a friend who stopped said almost panic attack becoming a full one
  
• one pair of volume reducers
  
• one pair of custom insoles 
  
• one pair of gel heel pads
  
• a sum of money off of which I could have lived comfortably in Nepal for a month
  

Strangely, at no point prior to heading of for six months did I feel consciously nervous about my travels, but it seems that I poured every bit of lurking anxiety into the search for the perfect hiking boots. 

So, after all that and a day hike to start breaking them in, the big question is 'are they actually comfortable?'  Well, almost.  On flat ground and ascents they are perfect.  They hardly rub at all, fit very well and there were more than a few times in Shivapuri National Park that I was grateful for their strong ankle support and solid, good-gripping soles.  The only problem, and one I couldn't have predicted, is that I was getting terrible cramping in my right foot on the way down.  I hope that this will resolve itself as I continue to wear the boots in.  Otherwise, I will just have to carry running shoes and change into those for such stretches.  If anyone has tips for avoiding such cramping, please let me know.  Overall, though, I'm pretty pleased with them and, of all the pairs I tried, reckon that I ended up with the right ones.

Musical Escapades

I've joined a choir!  This will strike as particularly amusing anyone who has ever heard me sing.

Sapna is on the organising committee of a group called 'Women in Concert'; its nature is probably self-evident from the name.  They've got a show coming up in about three weeks and there's a choir that's going to open and close the programme.  I'm now in it, having accompanied Sapna to rehearsal last Saturday.  We're singing 'Sisters are doing it for themselves' and 'I'm every woman'.  When I'm surrounded by other people singing in tune, I can actually keep pitch with them and my voice isn't too bad.  In consideration of the audience, however, I declined a solo.  The rehearsal was great fun.  One of my very few concerns before leaving for my travels was how I'd cope without playing music for six months (it will be the longest I've gone without picking up an instrument since I was about nine years old).  Singing in the choir will go a little way towards remedying that.

Shivapuri Hike

Although definitely a big city girl, I'm often at my happiest in complete wilderness.  I love being in nature and enjoy all kinds of outdoorsy, sporty activities.  Hiking definitely falls into that category and one of the parts of my gap year that I'm most looking forward to is a two week trek, the Annapurna circuit, that I will be undertaking in April.

Although I'm reasonably fit and am used to walking a good deal, trekking the Annapurna circuit is no mean feat.  It seems sensible to prepare myself for it by undertaking a few day or weekend hikes before I go (the difference between a hike and a trek is that the latter lasts at least a week).  And, of course, these day hikes are a pleasure in themselves.

On Sunday, I went on my first of these, a six and a half hour hike in Shivapuri National Park, on the edge of the Kathmandu Valley.  We (myself and my guide/friend Vivek) started a couple of km outside the park at Budhanilkantha, a place notable for its 5m long sculpture of a sleeping Vishnu, in his incarnation as Narayan.  It was made in the 7th or 8th century out of one piece of stone and is most impressive.  It's a site that is holy to both Hindus and Buddhists and, when we arrived, just before 9am, there were a number of young monks chanting and lovingly (it seemed to me) washing the statue.

From Budhanilkantha we walked to the park.  I slogged up the hill, sweating and panting and wondering what I'd got myself into then, looking at my watch, realised with dismay that we'd been walking about 10 minutes.

Once we got to the Shivapuri National Park, the situation improved dramatically.  The scenery consists of a variety of forest types, depending on altitude and aspect.  The park lies in the transition zone between subtropical and temperate climates.  We planned to hike from the entrance at Pani Muhan to the summit at Shivapuri Peak, via the holy site at Baaghdwar.  That's an ascent of about 2000m over a distance of 12km.  Believe me, that's pretty damn steep.  Four hours solid uphill hiking.  And then, of course, what goes up must come down. 

Despite the poor start, I felt I did rather well overall (Vivek may well have disagreed, but then he;s used to that kind of walking).  There were certainly brief moments of clambering up particularly steep sections when I wondered if I'd make it out alive, but then we'd get to a slightly less steep bit and suddenly I wouldn't feel tired at all and enthusiastically pushed on.  What's for sure is that it was beautiful, with the forest becoming denser and the path narrower the higher we got.  At times, were so isolated from any signs of human life or civilisation that I felt it wouldn't have been much different if we'd walked the same path hundreds of years ago.

Vivek made a good guide.  He's knowledgeable about birds and plants and would stop to identify trees, flowers and chirping.  Along the way, we passed a monastery, from which we would have had a lovely view if the air had been a bit clearer.  Two hours later we hit Baaghdwar, a pilgrimage site since it is the source of the holy Bagmati River, which pours out of the mouth of a beautiful tiger-face fountain.  The last 45 minutes from Baaghdwar to the summit was a total killer but worth it.  The views weren't exactly spectacular; although there was a clearing, there were still too many trees to get the full panoramic experience, but we could see the snow-covered peaks of the Langtang region which was magical.  There were also prayer flags to admire, which added to the fantastic sense of achievement.  The best part of being up there was the air; so pure and fresh.  We lay on our backs and I watched the clouds which seemed noticeably closer than when in the city (although that may well be my imagination).

The way down was a doddle in comparison with the ascent, taking just two and a half hours, and there were some pretty decent views to enjoy, allowing us to appreciate just how high we'd climbed.  Unfortunately the photos don't do it justice.

Seven and a half hours after we left Budhanilkantha we arrived back there tired but happy.  Vivek took me to a traditional Newari restaurant (the Newaris are the original people of Kathmandu Valley).  I would never have found the place myself, nor trusted it if I had.  We had to climb a ladder into a converted old house.  There were dozens of local men packed into the three tiny, crooked rooms, sitting on low benches along the wall, not a table to be seen.  We were brought plates of much appreciated but far too spicy (for my taste) food, resulting in my mouth being far more sore than my feet!

Overall, I enjoyed the hike terrifically, the best bit about it being that I did it.  I now know that I can handle walking that many hours and covering such a significant ascent and descent in the same day.  All that remains to be seen is whether I can do it for 14 consecutive days.

Boudha

Saturday afforded the opportunity for some more sightseeing and I seized on the chance to make a trip to Boudha (also known as Bodhnath).  Boudha is the home of Nepal's sizable Tibetan Buddhist exiles and its stupa is one of the largest in the world.  The bike ride there was a slog (it's not far from Kathmandu but it's mostly uphill and the roads are rough).  As soon as you pass through the gate to the stupa area, however, your whole mood changes.  The first sight of the stupa is magnificent:

Unfortunately, the photo fails to do justice to its size.  It's an imposing 100m in diameter and approximately 40m high.  Since it was Saturday morning it wasn't too crowded but there were enough Buddhists there to create an atmosphere and I joined them in their clockwise perambulation of the stupa, spinning the small prayer wheels along its circumference as I went, which had a slightly hypnotic effect on me.  I found out afterwards that if I'd walked around three times, my sins would be been absolved.  As it is, I'm still is possession of two thirds of them.

Once I'd walked around the outside of the stupa, I climbed up to the next level and walked around up there, looking across at the shops, street and people through the prayer flags.  I really like prayer flags.  For a start, I find the bright colours aesthetically pleasing.  But, more than that, I'm rather fond of the idea behind them; each flag has a prayer on it and as it flutters in the wind, the prayer is released into the world (for a non-believer, quite why I like this is a mystery to me).

I had read a newspaper article which described Boudha as a haven from the bustle of Kathmandu.  It wasn't nearly as peaceful as I'd expected from reading that.  Nevertheless, as I walked around on the stupa, under the blue, cloudless sky on a perfectly warm day, appreciating the architecture of the stupa and the surrounding houses and watching the prayer flags flutter in the gentle breeze, I became aware of a sense of calm inside myself and, moreover, realised it was the first time I'd felt that way since I'd arrived in Nepal.

After a very happy hour or so around the stupa, I went off to explore some of the surrounding gompas (Tibetan Buddhist monastries).  Unfortunately, most of them were shut at that time of day, but they're still impressive from the outside and I enjoyed wandering the backstreets to find them.  Unlike the austerity of so many of the churches I've visited in Europe, I was particularly struck by the bright colours with which they are painted.  The photo below is a detail on the wall of the Tsamchem gompa:

It was with some difficulty that I tore myself away from Boudha in order to make it back to town in time for lunch with a friend.  I do, however, hope to go again.  I hear that it's particularly lovely in the early evening, when the Buddhists come out in throngs to light butter candles, covering the stupa in a glowing light.

Banu's Total Fitness - Update

It's incredible the difference less than two weeks can make. I am now an almost daily regular at Banu's Total Fitness and am already noticably stronger and fitter. I'm even enjoying the aerobics classes, despite the somewhat mad instructor who keeps shouting 'last 4' before making us do at least another 20 reps. But I can do it!

Now excuse me whilst I go and eat more cheesecake.

Cheesecake

Who'd have thought it, but the best cheesecake I've ever had is to be found right here in Kathmandu. And I say that with plenty of experience of cheesecake. If you ever find yourself in this fine city, I strongly suggest that you make your way to the Imago-Dei restaurant, on the road along the east wall of the Royal Palace.

So here I am, halfway round the world, with the insight to point out beautiful temples and exciting neighbourhoods, yet my first recommendation is for cheesecake.  What's up with that?

Maha Shivaratri

This past Monday was the festival to celebrate Shiva's birthday.  I went to Pashupati, the most important Hindu temple in Nepal, to soak up the atmosphere.  But first I had to get in, and that meant an hour working my way through this crowd:

It was worth the trouble.  Once inside, there was plenty to see.  As a non-Hindu, I was not allowed inside the main temple.  Due to the crowds, I couldn't even get near it.  The following is a photo from across the banks of the Bagmati River.  Note the queue of people waiting to pray there.  I spoke to some who said it took them more than four hours to get in.  The main Pashupati temple is the tall one in the middle background. 
The Bagmati is a holy river and a very popular place for cremations.  One is hit immediately by the smokiness in the air, the smell of burning and the flames on the row of ghats (cremation platforms) along the bank.  It's not as unpleasant as it might sound; the only part that gave me the momentary shivers was the sight of a body bag waiting its turn.

On the bank of the river across from the main temple complex, the Sadhus gathered.  These wandering Hindu holy men, who renounce everything for a life of austerity, make pilgrimage in their thousands from all over Nepal and India to Pashupati for the festival, and equal numbers, if not more, turn up to look at them.  They are indeed quite a sight, with their floor-length hair, painted bodies and near (or sometimes actual) nakedness.  They also smoke and sell weed and many join them.  The aroma is quite overwhelming.

I had a guide, who I sensed was not as informative as he might have been, but was nevertheless good at navigating through crowds and was able to take me to a couple of places I wouldn't have made otherwise.  One of them, the only welfare centre in Nepal, was particularly sobering.  It is a place for the truly destitute local elderly.  Whilst we were there, the residents were being entertained by a group of local and foreign volunteers singing and dancing, but there was no mistaking the awfulness of ending up living there.  That said, Pashupati is considered a particularly holy place to die, so I guess that's a plus, if you believe it.

Back in the main temple complex and along the bank, the festivities were due to continue all night, with singing and dancing for many hours to come.  Apparently the place is also beautiful lit-up.  But by five, after nearly three hours, I'd had my fill.  Although it was a fascinating experience, as a non-Hindu it was impossible for me to really get into the vibe.  There was no escaping the feeling of being so obviously a tourist, particularly when a 'holy' man gave me a tika (a red spot on the forehead), despite my protestations, then demanded a donation and became quite hostile when I refused to give it.  That was the only actual unpleasant moment.  Overall, I'm very glad I went.  It was yet another chance to experience something so distant to my 'normal' life, and what's a gap year for if not that?