on the road again oohwoohoo

There are certain things that you absolutely must do. One of those things is nature stuff that involves sweating, hiking, biking....etc. So after a sad goodbye to Mel, who had to return to New York for her job training, Jack and I continued north to Pokhara. The town sits picturesque on a lake ringed with rice fields. I'm still curious about how they keep track of which rice field belongs to who because there are dozens of them separated only by thin, grass boundaries. They are so beautiful though the way they are even etched into the mountainsides. And people haul ass up there with their cows even in the pouring rain.

Pokhara is beautiful, but the center of town is quite the tourist ghetto. Even during the low-season, there were too many white people there for comfort! We had a nasty scene in our first hotel room because when we went to bed, we discovered there were dozens of cockroaches under our bed - we ran out of that room at 10pm with the hotel manager swatting at a roach the size of my middle finger. And, I have never been offered so many drugs in my life. While the penalty for drugs is way harsh in Nepal, people were pretty openly selling, buying, and smoking hash. Now, of course, there is nothing wrong with smoking hash. But I couldn't help but wonder what kind of affect this business could be having on the local community. If it is technically illegal, the trade is forced underground and surely dangerous to be involved in. And I can't imagine what kind of perception they must have of foreigners to offer a woman drugs so casually. They would literally yell what they were selling from down the street! When I walked out of a store once and a man as old as my grandfather offered me drugs I knew, rightly - no hash for me!

I did partake in some nature-business, although not without some trouble. We did a four hour hike up a mountain to the World Peace Pagoda, which was incredible! I am not all that into hiking, but the gratification that awaits the top of a mountain is undeniable! Less strenuous was a lot of nice biking around the lake. The rain was pretty on and off, so we got soaked. But that's all in good fun! Biking also gave us the chance to get away from the touristy areas in order to see some real-life. And as it turns out, people don't like tourists all that much! Ha, imagine that! One restaurant we went to actually denied us service. Not formally, of course. But we asked for food and while they were serving a bunch of other Nepali people, they told us that they didn't have any food. Hmmm. As frustrating as that is, sometimes I just have to accept that when I'm in someone else's country they have the right to do that kind of thing. Which, as an American, seems crazy-I don't think of my city or country belongs to anyone in particular. To each country, their own.

on the top of the bus?

Leaving Kathmandu was so fun!!! The city is really incredible, very cosmopolitan and affluent. But the nature in Nepal is something else. We took a short bus ride out to the mountains in Nagarkot and stayed in a grody, moldy hotel room. Three to a bed. And had a blast. The best part was coming back into town and riding on the roof of the bus through the twists and turns of the mountain. Ahhh. At first, I was holding on for dear life. But the fact is, riding those buses is no safe from the inside. There are no rails on the edge of the cliffs and the drivers speed up and down the mountains like hellfire. Well, if I am going to fear for my life, I am at least going to enjoy a nice view! And its cheaper.

I had the most unpleasant, but useful conversation with a Ukrainian girl on the top of the bus. Her first remark after hearing that I was from the U.S. was. "You know there are two kinds of people the world hates: Chinese and Americans" Now, now, now. I know that the world has a poor impression of my country. And honestly, I know better than most the failures of the American way. But I have never felt so defensive about it. I am now traveling with an Australian, so I am kind of own my own as far as defending America goes. My god. I am the worst candidate for that job. But what I really have a hard time with is this idea that people around the world, by and large, don't make a distinction between me and the actions of "my" government. On one hand, it's frustrating that these people can't see the humanity that exists behind every government. But what is even worse, is that that Americans do so little to redeem our country. You don't meet too many Americans out here. But those that I have met, have been by and large, rude and obnoxious. They define the stereotype of Americans. And make it even harder for me to dispel some of the misconceptions of that country that voted Bush in two times in a row.

Although it sounds damn cheesy, the only thing I can do with people who tell me to my face that my country sucks- that it is evil and ruining mankind- is be patient with them. To hear them out and attempt to have a real conversation about is to project an air of diplomacy that our country desperately needs. Because it makes a difference, if I am the only American the meet in the next year - they are going to remember how I carried myself. I had a man rip me on the Iraq War today and I just nodded my head and tried to be in agreement. In most cases, that's the best I can do. Trying to explain my own gripes with the American government is more than broken English can handle! Being in a situation where people are immediately judging you for your nationality is pretty humbling. I have something to prove here. So if you were wondering - I didn't throw that Ukrainian girl off the top of that bus.

kathmandu for beginners

After MUCH deliberation, we finally decided to make the trip over to Nepal. It was so close, we could almost touch it and so the risk of going at a somewhat turbulent time faded away in light of how incredible the idea of Nepal sounded. To make a long, drawn out conflict seem incredibly simple, the problem in Nepal right now is that Maoist activists have been calling state-wide strikes in order to pressure the new government into installing a Maoist leader as the head of the military. Otherwise known as a bandh, the strikes literally shut down all the stores, keep cars off the streets, and butcher any tourists hope of keeping a schedule. We booked our tickets to Nepal thinking that by the time we got there, the whole situation would have blown over - it didn't.

The day before we arrived there was a bandh that had the Youth Communist League rolling burning tires through the streets and beating up drivers and shop owners that failed to comply with their demonstration.

Well it is a good thing that the media does blow things out of proportion! We decided to go anyways and were totally blown away by how calm the vibes of Kathmandu were. What we realized pretty immediately was that strikes are just a very normal part of Nepali culture and politics. It's hard to understand that things are pretty much safe because they ask passengers to get off the bus before the burn it.

For a country that has been so fraught with violence and political turmoil, the country has a ton of tourist ghettos. The first night in Kathmandu, the taxi drivers nearly insisted that we stay in the tourist district of Thamel. Where he would be sure to get a commission and where everything is five times the price. During the low-tourist season this tourist ghetto is especially eerie because there are an overwhelming number of tour operators and curio shops, but hardly any tourists.

One of the biggest differences between my experience in Nepal and India is that while the Nepalis are absolutely welcoming and gracious - they do NOT stare at you. That must have something to do with the population difference. There are just so many people in India that the concept of privacy is very, very different. Staring or taking pictures without someone's permission is obviously not taboo in a country where people wash themselves in the street.



But there are similar tourist traps. On our first night, we were approached by a mother and her two daughters, who at first seemed like they really just wanted to practice their English. But then they started inviting us to their house. We agreed to go to their house in the morning...

So we go their house (a short walk from the city center brought us to the more outer-district of Kathmandu. Their house was incredible. It was made out of just metal sheets posted together. I can't even imagine how it stands up during the monsoon!! We had just gone to hang out, but they were all about impressing up. After the ritual cup of chai, they made sure to let us know that they had converted to Christianity and invited us to pray with them. Or sing with them really for about five minutes! It was so surreal to see these people so sincerely feeling Jesus in a land where I have really only seen Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism. They explained that they converted after they left their alcoholic father and a Christian church in Kathmandu took them under their wing.

Don't get me wrong, these people were not malicious at all. We were having a great time until we started walking around town and the kids started asking us to buy them things with an urgency that made us think they had ulterior motives. We left them pretty abruptly after we started to get uncomfortable. I feel pretty bad about it, actually. Inviting us into their home was so generous of them and I really wish that we had been able to leave with the impression that people could just be that nice with no strings attached. But that is so rarely the case, even in my own world.

mother ganga

They say that in India you will never get what you want. And while I have found this trekker’s wisdom to be infallibly true, we finally got something we wanted - sort of. Train ticket confirmation!! That seems so simple, but to get on a 15 hour train ride to the holy city of Varanasi was such a relief. Even though kind people will invariably make space for you to sit, being a stowaway really sucks. Varanasi sits right on the bank of the Ganges river and has an ancient, rusty feel to it. We are staying in the Old City where the streets are incredibly narrow and cows have priority over cars and pedestrians alike. The river sides is divided up into over a dozen ghats where specific rituals take place. Lucky for us - we are staying near the ghat that specializes in cremation….

So right on the banks closest to our guesthouse, there are platforms set up where bodies are burned and the ashes then spread in the river. It’s quite normal to see people walking through the streets carrying bodies covered in bright cloths and flower garlands up on slabs of wood. We were sitting down by this part of the river and actually had ashes falling on us - our signal to peace OUT! About ten years ago, people’s dead bodies were just thrown in the river without being cremated - this practice has been outlawed due to ‘obvious’ sanitation implications. They say that you used to be able to see bodies just washing up shore.

What is most incredible to me about this river is that despite its outrageous pollution, the people of the city still bath in it and even drink the holy water. But the water is literally septic beyond imagination. The Ganges river contains about 1.5 billion particles of fecal matter per liter, whereas normal water contains about 500. And considering that the water coming through most people’s pipes comes directly from the river, you can imagine the rampant disease and prevalence of birth defects that exist here. But the fact is that their faith tells them the spirit of the river cleanses itself of all impurities, so statistics don’t really matter.




Along this these observations, I think it would be important to comment on hygene/sanitation practices here in India. I know it’s a topic that has lead to numerous stereotypes about the country - I should be clear that I don’t intend to confirm or dispute any of them. I can only share my observations. Last night I went to the bathroom on the train and found a hole that only lead to the speeding tracks running underground. In other words, the urine and feces of every person riding an Indian train lands out in the open on tracks across the country. I can’t even imagine how a practice that is considered so incredibly unhygienic around the world would be institutionalized by the Indian Railways. SOmeone told me the other day that during this time right before the monsoon, things are the dirtiest because people rely on the heavy rains to wash away all the garbage and dirt.



And wash it right into the Ganga river! We took a boat ride on the Ganga the other day and as soon as we took off, we just saw giant piles of cow poop floating everywhere. And in such close proximity to the bathers! It was really apparant how grossed out the tourists where. I was trying my best to not show it on my face, because I would hate to be so condescending in the face of their faith. We did learn on the boat ride that the only people who are not burned traditionally are holy men, pregnant women, children, people who have been killed by snake bites, and lepers. So those people are still thrown into the river and further south, peices of flesh surface. Again, it was REALLY hard to hide my gross out!

can i take a snap?

At the Golden Temple in Amritsar, it felt like we were as much of an attracted as the holy temple itself. As the most holy sight of the Sikh religion, there were pilgrims from all over waiting in line to go into this beautiful gold dome on a lake where the original copy of the Sikh holy book is recited. Maybe it is because there aren’t so many tourists in India this time of year, but we were literally bombarded with Indians wanting to take our pictures. And they call pictures ‘snaps’, by the way. People were handing us their babies to take pictures! And to the extent that you really could not sit in one place for more than five minutes without drawing a crowd. After a while, it felt like they must have been viewing us as monuments or something. It is so funny because while this has happened a few times before, it definitely has not been the norm for Indians to do this. And especially upper-class Indian tourists. Why would they want to clutter family albums with some random white girls? Very odd.

The whole scene at the Golden Temple is really quite amazing and utopian. The pilgrims that come their sleep in an open courtyard for free. It actually looks quite like any train station, with all the people spread out on the ground. But everyone is barefoot and with head coverings. They even provide basic meals to all the pilgrims for free. You should see the kitchen, vats of Dhal the size of cars. People didn’t mind at all that we were visiting their holy sight as just a tourist attraction. Quite the opposite, they even have a free dorm for foreign visitors to stay in within the Temple complex. Of course we were subject to the same rules: no shoes, smoking, alcohol, etc. They seemed to almost be guided by a religious duty to welcome us into their spiritual place. One man even scolded me for sitting with my feet facing towards the Temple and then asked me to come sit with him while he explained the tenets of the Sikh religion and the history of the sight.

What did I learn? Well the lake surrounding the Temple has healing powers, which is why all the pilgrims and visitors are encouraged to ‘take the dip’. (No - I didn’t get in the water, there would have been too many snaps!) Also, they carry small swords or daggers around to symbolize the military struggles that defined the early period of the religion Also the turbans that they wear are covering years of uncut hair, cutting your hair or beard is strictly against the Sikh tradition. This was especially interesting to learn because I think people in America most commonly associate the turban with India but not with the Sikh religion in particular. Actually, the Sikhs are the only ones that wear turbans and I have even heard Hindus refer to the Sikhs as ‘Turbans’ - kind of a term of endearment.

The most wonderful thing about the Golden Temple might have to be the bathrooms. WOW! The first time in India I haven’t dreaded going to the bathroom. You would think that a place that sees over 40,000 would have scary bathrooms, but they really clean up constantly. It was not only pleasant for me, but really nice to see them taking such pride in the appearance of the place. It really sucks to see people litter so much in this land, and just generally not seem to care about keeping things nice or presentable. The other day I talking to a kid from Bombay trying to explain to him why he shouldn’t through his water bottle out the window. My argument was, “it’s PLASTIC!” His argument was, “it’s INDIA!” Stalemate.

hindustan zindabad!!! jeera Pakistan!!

Well, I have come closer to Pakistan than I had intended - twice now!! We are up in the state of Punjab where, the state of turbans, butter chicken, and bhangra music. The city of Amritsar is about 30km from the Pakistan border crossing where there is a daily border closing ceremony at sunset. The whole ceremony essentially gives the Indians and Pakistanis a chance to duke out their political rivalry by seeing who can be the most patriotic from their respective sides of the border. Lots of flag-waving and chanting. Because this is the Indian travel season, there were a ton of Indian tourists in Punjab, so there must have been at least 1,500 people on the Indian side of the border. Interestingly, the women and men were separated on both sides of the border, although perhaps for different reasons. I suspect that the women on the Indian side were separated for fear that women would be hurt in a crowd of rowdy, patriotic men. I have to be honest that I was worried about going, given the latest news in Pakistan. To be so close to a country that has become so stigmatized by own country was truly surreal. And ultimately, pretty sad. With so many Indians waving their flags and partying it up Bollywood style (literally, they were staging impromptu dance parties), there were, at most, 200 Pakistanis in attendance. This makes sense that such a frivolous event would be poorly attended considering the political situation going on there. I can imagine that Pakistanis would be trying to avoid large groups of people at all costs.

But it was pretty profound, to actually be able to see into this country and see the faces of people living there. It personalizes all the things I have been reading in the news a bit. I did notice that in the VIP section of the Paki side that all the people appeared to be very conservative in comparison to the people in general seating. All the ‘burkas’ were sitting in VIP….interesting that the upper-class would also be the most conservative.

tibet + dreadlocks / hashish = mcLeod ganj

Sangri La! Finally! After a pretty perilous drive up the lower Himalayas (in a crappy bus that felt tilted about 45 degrees) we reached the mountain town of Mcleod Ganj, which is very close to the better-known Dharamsala. This town is the official residence of the Tibetan refugee government and the Dalai Lama and you can feel the vibe change to something that is distinctly non-Indian as soon as you arrive. Mostly in the sense that things are so much less hectic. There is something about the intensity of the other places we have visited. Even where the weather is blistering hot, people are hustling, honking, yelling on their cell phones. Just really intense. So the polite vibe of the Tibetans was much needed and appreciated. (Not to mention the 10 degree weather drop!) It was pretty surreal actually, to go from being the only non-Indians around to this town where there are a ton of Asians, Indians, Europeans, Americans. Such diversity!!

Mcleod Ganj seems to be THE place for foreign tourists to go get their hippy dream on. There are a ton of yoga centers, ayurvedic massage courses, holistic bookshops. In fact, it reminds me of the West Village, with weed smoking as holy as sipping lattes. (The nearby Parvati Valley is rumored to be the number one marijuana exporter in Asia) And so naturally there are many, many tourists of the granola persuasion. Its funny to think of these foreigners with dreadlocks, tattoos, and facial piercings in other parts of India. If we have been getting stared at like animals in the zoo, I can’t imagine how the Indians must look at them. It was really wonderful to have the opportunity to make friends with other trekkers. And there was quite a social scene going on, especially because you are constantly seeing the same tourists in such a small town. Just to exchange stories of triumphs and frustrations reminds you that you are not the only person doing this!




Our very first day in the Ganj, we were lucky enough to see the Dalai Lama! What are the chances? Of course he constantly on the go, making appearances all over the world, but his residence is officially in Mcleod Ganj. So when he comes home, the whole town knows about it and waits outside his house to pay respects. They burn incense, hold pictures, and carry white shrouds. It is so interesting how accessible he is to his people. (although when he came through that day, he literally just waved from the car) When newly arrived refugees come to India, they get to have a meeting with him. Foreigners can even sign up to attend his public talks.




The Buddhist monks are equally human. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I was under the impression that the monks would be pretty much confined to their prayers most of the day. Not so! They go to restaurants, stay in hotels, and even go out at night! We met a monk in plain clothes out at a jam-session one night. He was having fun, but just not drinking or smoking, of course.



I had never seriously considered the plight of the Tibetans before my visit to this town. At a certain point, pop culture swallowed the whole “FREE TIBET” thing and reduced it to a bumper-sticker movement. But the Tibetans themselves are still hanging on to their struggle for independence, despite grim odds that China would ever give grant it. Tibetans STILL living in Tibet are actually paid a sum of money to stay there by the Chinese government and are exempt from China’s one-child policy. And yet, Tibetans are still making the dangerous trek over the Himalayas to seek refuge in Nepal and India. The Tibetans living there wear “FREE TIBET” t-shirts and hold rallies. Many of the local restaurants and coffee houses even screen daily documentaries on the struggle. It just makes me so sad to see them still hopefully engaged in a struggle that the rest of the world seems to have selectively forgotten. At this point it would be a suicide in international relations for any government to speak out against the Chinese government regarding the situation in Tibet. To think that when I went to Shanghai a few years ago, the national museum had a Tibetan art exhibit, as if they are sincerely trying to empower that community.

In all, Mcleod Ganj was a bit of peace. And now after a few cold nights and some yoga classes, I feel prepared to tackle India again!