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Upon our return to Kathmandu we decided that since we survived the Rhino incident, we might as well continue to push our luck as much as possible: We decided that it was a good idea to take an hour long flight in a propeller plane that looked like it was older than both of us.
Packed in with a bus load of our fellow Japanese tourists, we held our breath as the plane took off and struggled to figure out the dinosaurs that were the seat belt mechanisms. Seriously, the thing had teeth and a few levers.
But hey! We got to see Mount Everest.
It made the terror totally worth it.
(Everest is the peak on the left)
Once our feet was firmly on the ground and after kissing the ground, we took off with our guide Isowar for a three town tour…but that’s a story for tomorrow.
So, it’s been awhile, but I, T, figure we need to bring everyone up to speed on our trip to the jungle. I love my wife with all my heart, but I do believe that she’s actively trying to find ways of making my life “interesting.” Last Tuesday morning I found myself muttering the following to myself while walking the jungle:
“Let’s go on safari…she says
It’ll be fun…she says
What could happen?…she says”
Understand that was the clean version.
It all started innocently enough with an early morning canoe ride down the river.
After a twenty minute canoe ride down river from our camp, we hopped ashore and were given the following instructions from our guide:
If you see a rhino: run zig zag and climb a tree
If you see a sloth bear: stand still and make a lot of noise
If you see a tiger: pray to God
I know what you’re thinking, but he wasn’t kidding. Often times tourists taking the jungle walk see nothing and go home disappointed thinking they would have been better off visiting the elephant birthing center.
Rest assured, we were not disappointed.
Within fifteen minutes of wandering we plunged under the canopy of trees and soon found ourselves taking cover as our guide spotted a rhino twenty meters ahead sleeping. To me it looked like two large rocks,
but as soon as it began to move my heart shot up into my throat as we tried to remain still. After a few more tense minutes of waiting, our guide asked if anyone had a lighter or matches. M & I don’t smoke, but fortunately the two stoners who accompanied us on our walk provided their lighter and soon our guide calmly started a small brush fire to ward off the beast with smoke.
From there on, the rest of the walk proved relatively tame as we encountered some elephants, monkeys, and birds before returning to camp.
Having survived I figured I could use a bath and decided to take one in the river with our next door neighbor by the camp, Puja the elephant.
Perhaps the heat had fried my brain, but I really didn’t hesitate to strip down to my underwear and give it a try. Surprisingly enough it was rather refreshing to get blasted with water coming from an elephant’s snout.
Following lunch we met up with a group heading off for elephant rides and once again bumped into Cheech & Chong. After reliving our adventure from earlier, Cheech turns and says, “I was really hoping the rhino would charge so I could get it on video!”
At this point I wanted to take the beer bottle in his hand and crack it over his head, but figured he was too baked to even feel it. Fortunately we soon arrived at the edge of the jungle and found Puja with her driver ready to give us a ride. Poor Puja had me and M up front relatively balanced; meanwhile Mama wanted no part of the stoners and decided to pair off with a small Chinese girl in the back. Needless to say our driver tried in vain to adjust the balance throughout our ride.
Puja held up beautifully for the better part of two hours as we saw deer, crocodiles, birds, and plenty of rhinos. From up high they look a lot smaller and significantly less threatening.
After a great day together, I made sure to reward Puja for her work.
Finally for the evening’s festivities we were entertained by the locals with a dance ceremony that combined rhythm, martial arts, and fire.
Now that we’re back and have ahad time to sift through the 500 or so photos I took on our trip, It’s show and tell time!
First up: Kathmandu’s Durbar Square. Situated about 20 minutes walk from our hotel, Durbar Square was a bustling area that may have won the award for more pigeons in per square foot on the planet earth.
(Yes, that’s a cow. There were quite a few of them hanging out in the area unattended. No, I don’t know why)
The architecture of the area was unlike anything we’ve seen in our travels and was quite interesting. As motorcycles, rickshaws and hashish peddlers crowded the area we wandered around taking in perhaps some of the most interesting structures, statues and people we’ve seen. Perhaps one of the larger differences to note between the temples of Kathmandu and the other places we have visited were the use of color and gold (well, gold plating at least).
A few minutes walk from Durbar Square we came across perhaps my favorite place in Kathmandu. It was down a small dusty alleyway and despite the school boys playing a pickup game of football/soccer, it was one of the most peaceful places I’ve found to date. With a stupa in the center of the courtyard and prayer flags connecting the surrounding buildings, this little square provided a calm place to sit and ponder amidst all of the craziness.
As we ventured outside Thamel, the infamous tourist district, we began to see a completely different side of the frenetic Kathmandu we had experienced.
About a half hour walk from Thamel was the temple referred to by most as the Monkey Temple. Overlooking the Kathmandu Valley, the Monkey Temple was a bit of a hike but it was certainly worth it.
The last photo is actually of the a few of the many prayer wheels. Spun only towards the right, the prayer wheels represent the prayers and wishes of the people that spun them. Simple but meaningful, the prayer wheels became a very common sight in our travels.
Tomorrow we head to the jungle.
We set off early this morning through the busy streets of Kathmandu to make our way to Durbar Square. A quick 20 minute walk from our hotel, Durbar Square is one of the best known places in Kathmandu. That said, the walk there was almost just as interesting as the rest of the square.
Dusty and crowded, the streets of Kathmandu’s Thamel neighborhood remind us of a strange cross between Hanoi and Siem Reap. With markets selling everything from prayer flags to tea to treks through the north of the country the streets of Thamel hold the potential to entertain for hours on end.
As we walked towards Durbar square we found ourselves in a small courtyard surrounded by Children playing soccer surrounded by Buddhas below a canopy of faded prayer flags. The square itself was probably the most peaceful place that we have found thus far in Kathmandu.
Durbar Square itself was interesting though a little disappointing as we found ourselves being followed by people offering us tours and ignoring our “no thanks.” That said, the architecture of Durbar square was incredible as were the appearances of the “Holy Men” who’s painted faces and dreadlocks would have been great to photograph had they had not been soliciting for tourists to photograph and pay them.
Oh well, I am still hoping to capture some shots of the actual Holy Men here as their appearances are quite eye catching.
In the afternoon we asked to go see another temple and found ourselves wandering the dusty streets of Kathmandu with a guide. To say the off the beaten path of Kathmandu is an experience is perhaps the understatement of the year. The desolate streets, lined with piles of rocks and abandoned streets provided a haunting reminder of the struggles of Nepal.
Once we arrived at the temple and hiked up the 365 stairs to get there, we found ourselves looking over the Kathmandu valley and quickly learning how to properly visit a Buddhist temple (always go to the right and be sure to go around the entire place in a circle). Our guide was awesome as he taught us all of the nuances of the temple, the stupas and the surrounding areas. He told us the meaning of prayer flags, the origins of each of the Buddhist and Hindu Gods and what each of the structures held and symbolized.
More to come on all of this as we’re off to see more!
Well, we made it to Kathmandu after quite an interesting trip here.
Following a night in the Singapore Airport transit hotel (would recommend it if you ever need a nap in the Singapore airport) we made our way to our silk airlines flight.
It was all good…until we tried to land.
You see, there is a minimum visibility rule that requires pilots to be able to see 1500 meters. Sadly, halfway through our landing, this rule came into effect and suddenly we found ourselves taking off again. You can imagine how much my husband, who LOVES to fly (note the sarcasm) enjoyed this.
Finally, after 20 minutes we made a fairly frightening landing into Kathmandu. It was fast, hard and there was a lot of breaking involved but we lived!
We’re now at our hotel and have already met some great people, made plans to go on a safari with a 64 year old Turkish woman who simply goes by “Mama” and may just end up visiting mount everest in a small plane.
So far, it’s been great and we can’t wait to see what happens next.
Happy Frickin 28th Birthday to me.
My gift?
Finding my first white hair.
……And discovering it has friends.
I did what most women in my situation might do. I immediately called my mother. Yes, there was screeching involved.
She was at least kind enough to tell me that my grandfather’s stripe was beautiful prior to telling me that I’m old and TICKTOCKTICKTOCK get on the grandkids!
My husband, however, upon hearing me on the phone with mum chirped up, “Ask her if she sent you some hair dye in your Birthday shipment.”
If you are fond of him, now would be a good time to say goodbye.
Thursday our company took the entire day to participate in an outreach project within the local community, as part of a regional effort within our network of sister companies to do something to improve the world around us for a day.
Our task was to clean up a beach down on the coast near Kamakura.
Ordinarily this would be a brilliant idea, except it’s still winter and the weather for most of the week consisted of rain, drizzle and biting wind along the coast. Knowing this, we put on our hiking boots, bundled up and took bets on which of our female co-workers would show up in the most inappropriate shoes (like open toed heels).
After a two hour bus ride, we were armed with surgical gloves, fabric glovels and two foot long tongs to make sure no one actually had to touch anything. I think this might be a good time to note that our CEO was questioning if there would even be litter to pick up as this is Japan and others were wondering if the Head of HR had spent the night at the beach ripping up papers for us to pick up…Japan is that clean.
Long story short we picked up quite a bit of trash with the majority being cigarette butts, bottle caps and even more cigarette butts.
After finishing our two hours of beachcombing M and I set out with a friend to check out the local aquarium with the free time the company provided. Initially the entry price of 2,000 JPY seemed a bit steep, yet the fish were actually pretty interesting, especially the dolphins.
As it turned out we missed their last show for the day, but what we saw instead proved just as entertaining as the trainers fed them, checked their vitals, and played with them. For the second time in the span of a week I found myself dumbstruck by animals that could be both smart and funny.
With the prospects weatherwise being just as dreary for Sunday, we decided we would check out the local aquarium with the hopes of having some repeat success.
Instead our results were mixed. M got some good shots, but the lighting inside made things a bit tricky.
Some of the fish were simply too fast to capture on film, but I’m thrilled that M got a picture of this little guy. (Editors note: I think it’s a type blowfish if you are curious. His smile was likely due to the fact his residence of the aquarium would keep him off of local restaurant tables as a delicacy. )
Finally on the way out after finishing with the fish we were hopeful in seeing the seals and penguins, but ultimately disappointed.
The seal was all alone and chasing his own tale for entertainment and Penguinland looked like one of the saddest places on earth. I think even the Beijing zoo penguins were better off.
All in all, we did see some cool fish but I’d have to say the Kamakura aquarium was quite a bit more cheerful than the Shinagawa aquarium.
After checking out on Sunday morning we headed out in search of the snow monkeys. To do so we purchased tickets for the “Monkey Bus” upon arriving the day before. From the ryokan it was a short walk to the station followed by a twenty minute bus-ride through a winding pass up the mountainside. It was a bit scary at points, but the driver managed to make it look easy as he kept plowing forward over the ice.
Once we arrived at the park entrance we set out on foot in search of the not so elusive monkeys (you’ll note that in all of our previous travels the promises of Monkeys had always been left unfulfilled). Within five minutes a few of the braver members of the troop made their way past us in search of a drink from the river.
As the signs at the lodge would tell us later, the monkeys don’t consider humans a threat and therefore make little attempt to engage us. Aside from this, the one other thing we picked up on was the smell. Anyone who has ventured near a natural hotspring knows the smell.
Sulfur stinks…like one endless fart or perhaps a cuddle with a wet dog.
Sorry, but I see no point in mincing words. It’s kind of funny to picture yourself in such majestic surroundings (snow topped mountains & beautiful trees soaring towards the sky) while trying to remember to breathe through your mouth the entire time. But I digress…
After another ten minutes walk we arrived at a rather humble lodge, handed our tickets in and within minutes entered another world.
Understand, this isn’t the zoo. There are no walls or fences, the ground is theirs and you are an observer. But what you see is nothing short of amazing. Carved into the side of a mountain is a small paradise for roughly 200 monkeys with the focal point being the onsen.
At times it can get a little chaotic, yet with the exception of one or two scuffles, everyone behaved. Better than some groups of people I’ve been a part of to be honest as most of the little guys played up for the cameras
To be honest, I think M took some of her best photos yet.
Overall we spent a little over two hours watching an average Sunday morning for the monkeys become an extraordinary one for us. The more time you spend with the monkeys, the greater kinship you feel to them. In their eyes you begin to see the characteristics we as humans display each and every day…
Pondering
Boredom
Mischief
Resignation
An OCD approach to grooming
What initially seemed like another goofy boondoggle M cooked up, turned out to be a window into the lives of some curious little creatures…
Go figure that the most awkward part of the weekend was having to share a bath with an old Japanese man. Though one of the Monkeys did get a little curious at one point…
