Hodgepoge of Thoughts

Hodgepodge of thoughts and occurrences: I have received many email responses to the blog. I am glad that friends and family are reading it. I was a bit surprised to find that some “unknowns” are following it as well. With that in mind I went back last night and read through some of the posts and decided that people must think I am nuts….both those that know me, and especially those who do not. That being the case, I will continue to write, trying to be as candid about this experience as possible. Some of the email responses are worth noting, so I will try to include some of them.

My laptop is not allowing me to post pictures or even email them. I am not sure what the problem is, but I will try to get it taken care of today as there have been many asking for pictures. A side note about pictures….I have not taken that many pictures since I have been here. On a previous trip I was here three weeks and took nearly 1500. I will try to get the problem resolved with the computer and get some uploaded.

Laundry?...NOT! After returning from Chitwan I decided it was high time to get my laundry done. Things were getting….well bad…if you know what I mean. So knowing that the festival was coming right up I decided to take all of my laundry to a three-hour guaranteed place and pay a little extra. I dropped it off, that part went well. When I went to pick it up, things did not go as well. Here was the conversation with the store owner.

Me: I am here to pick up my laundry, number 318.

Him: Oh it not ready.

Me: Hmmm when will it be ready?

Him: After Tihar(the festival)

Me: That’s three days.

Him: Yes, late in evening.

Me: But your sign says three-hours guaranteed.

Him: Guaranteed?

Me: Yes, What is the guarantee?

Him: What is guarantee?

Me: That is what I am asking. What is the guarantee?

Him: What mean guarantee?

Me: I walk out of the store dumbfounded wondering if I was just on candid camera.

Needless to say I have had very limited options pertaining to my clothing choices over the past 3 days. Tonight is the night and words cannot describe how happy I will be for a change of “clothes”.

Aussie Aussie Aussie Oi Oi Oi: One of the interesting things they do here at restaurants to maximize profits is to sit single people together whether previously acquainted or not. I was sat next to an Aussie guy last night. We had a great conversation and decided to do a little sight seeing together. We went out today and decided to take a rickshaw (the three wheeled bicycle). Unfortunately, KC was no where in sight so we ended just selecting some random guy out in front of the hotel. Ryan (the Aussie) is about my size so the two of us together in this rickshaw was quite the sight and likely an unfortunate load for this poor driver that could not have weighed more than 120 lbs. He was a trooper though, and we only had to jump off twice to get up steep hills. In the end we paid him about 1500 Rupees….a small price for the hard work the poor driver did.

On a positive note….I did get my laundry back, and what a great day it was.