To Pokhara

Although we were well taken care of in the village, I think we were all about ready to leave when the time came. We had been 4 days without showers, we worked hard on the project and all the tall people had very sore heads. The villagers were beyond impressed with the amount of work that the Waterfalls had done while in the village. There were ditches and deep holes that were dug, rocks that were moved at the “source” of their water supply, and the meals that were cooked along side of the village women. A hot shower, a nights sleep in a relatively soft bed, and walking upright indoors awaited us in Pokhara.

On a previous trip to Nepal I had done a trek with some friends. We randomly walked into one of the hundreds of trekking agencies in Pokhara and were assigned a guide and ended up with Dilip, who is without a doubt the best trekking guide in Nepal. I have referred several people to him, and I know all would agree that he is amazing. Not only does he know everything and everyone associated to trekking in Nepal, he is ever aware of everyone’s needs before, during and after the trek and is right there to meet them. He did not let us down when it came to selecting a hotel for us. Except for the occasional cold shower (sorry Megan) and getting our clean laundry back a little smellier than the dirty laundry we had sent for cleaning the day before…..it was…perfect. A twin bed never felt as good as that first night at the hotel in Pokhara.

The next two days was spent preparing for the trek. We had decided to trek the Annapurna conservation area also known as the Ghoripani-Ghandruk trek. This is the same trek I did years ago. It is an absolutely amazing trek that takes you up and through the Annapurna Mountains. I was as excited to do the trek the second time as I was the first time. As I remembered back to the trek all I could think of were the seemingly never-ending steps the first and second days. The worst being from a small village called Tikheadunga to another small village called Ulleri. One map says there are 3,280 steps between the villages. That doesn’t count the steps prior to, or after, the two villages.

Three hours into the trek we came upon a Maoist check point. It is there that all passing trekkers must pay “voluntary contribution” to their organization. They deceptively claim that the money goes to support the local villages and villagers. It is nothing short of extortion and paying it angered me. The Waterfalls were kind enough to pay the expenses of having me tag along with them through Nepal including this fee….which on many levels made paying the Maoists even worse.

There is much I could write pertaining to the trek…. including the amazing views, the not-so-amazing tuna fish pizza, and the great company. And maybe some time I will, but for now I will only talk about spending Christmas morning high atop Poon Hill watching the sunrise. I doubt that I am capable of coming up with the words to justly describe the scene, but I can say this…..it was one of the most breathtaking scenes I have witnessed in my life and it was made even better being there with such good friends. For a brief moment that Christmas morning I didn’t miss my family and friends back home as I was perfectly content to be right where I was.

The short of it all is that we made it. There were times that we struggled, there were times we were able to relax and take in the amazing scenery, there were great games of GOLF (thanks Ryan and Shannon), there were great conversations along the trail, and there was laughter….and of course we made fun of Mark as much as possible.

For the second time on the trip I think we were all happy to head to Pokhara to recover. We spent just about 24 hours there eating good food and sleeping in a soft bed.

We flew from Pokhara to Kathmandu which was a great thing. It is a 6 to 7 hour drive to get from Pokhara to Kathmandu and a 25 minute flight to travel the same distance. As always for me returning to Kathmandu was like going home. There continues to be something about this place that draws me to it….

The Waterfalls had two and a half days left in Nepal. The Waterfalls had brought quite a few wood trucks and cars and dolls. They handed many of them out in the village, but saved some to give away at an orphanage in Kathmandu. Ramesh and the Tophams had worked with one orphanage in particular so we went there to spend time with the kids and to give them the toys. In all of my travels and with the fair amount of humanitarian work that I have done, I have never been to an orphanage. It was with incredibly mixed emotions that I sat there talking and playing with the children. On one hand I felt horrible that these kids were without families but on the other hand they were lucky that they had this place to live and people to care for them. One of the things that you will notice right away in Thamel is the number of homeless street children. It is heartbreaking to see these homeless children. Most have become addicted to “huffing” a myriad of different substances....maybe to keep them warm, or maybe to get them through another day not having to think about their plight…. At least these kids in the orphanage had food to eat, a roof over their heads, access to a good educations.

At one point some of the kids were singing and dancing for us. It was then that I felt a tap on my shoulder. A young boy, who was maybe 9 or 10 years old, took me by the hand and led me downstairs to what I assumed was his bed. He sat down and indicated that he wanted me to do the same. So I sat….. and for maybe 15 minutes we sat together on the bed his small hand clutching two of my fingers. Nothing was said, nothing needed to be. He would occasionally glance over at me and smile, and then he would go back to looking out the window. Then as if some inherent need was suddenly filled he stood up and led me back upstairs to join the group. We played for a while longer and then left to head to a children’s library that the Tophams started. The Waterfalls had brought children’s books to donate.

For their last full day in Nepal we did a city tour of Kathmandu. We visited the “typical” tourist sights and overall it was an uneventful day. EXCEPT for one event that about made me wet myself from laughing so hard. Let me start by saying that Ben is one of the toughest guys I know. He is constantly doing all these million mile bike rides, marathons, triathlons etc…. But at this moment he was anything other than tough…..Here is what happened. There is a temple high atop a mountain here in Kathmandu called Swayabhunath also known as ‘monkey temple’ (because of all the monkeys that call it home). As I always do I told the Waterfalls to be careful of carrying anything in their hands, especially food, as the monkeys are notorious for running up and grabbing the items and stealing them. I still am not sure exactly how the whole thing went down, but this is what I do know. Ben was trying to discretely move a snickers bar from one pocket to another (or something like that). The next thing I knew I heard a scream that resembled that of a terrified 10 year old girl, and I looked over to see Ben with a monkey latched on to his chest. Ben was dancing in circles tripping over a small monument trying to get away from the Monkey. The Monkey then jumped off Ben and scampered high atop a monument with the snickers bar in hand, carefully peeled off the wrapper, and proceeded to eat the candy bar bite by bite. It was without a doubt one of the funniest things I have ever seen. I still laugh about it every time I think about it.