So we arrived in Nepal!
a view over nepal along the walk to the monkey temple.The flights were pretty uneventful. I'm very impressed however with the efficiency of service in the Delhi and Kathmandu airports. There were no queues at immigration in either airport and check in at Delhi airport took about 5 minutes compared to almost one hour at heathrow, and a one hour delay in our flight departing! We experienced our first power cut when trying to reclaim our baggage in Kathmandu, the conveyor belt suddenly stopped and the hall went dark! It only lasted a few seconds though before it all restarted again. Rather amusing.
Kathmandu's power is apparently supplied by hydroelectricity. We were told by a resident brummie bloke that since there hasn't been much rain recently the power cuts out for three hours in the afternoon. During this time every little shop in Thamel (tourist central) turns on its own petrol powered generator, none of which have probably passed any safety checks and have been compiled from at least ten other broken down generators... The fumes are simply choking at this time of day! I feel like I'm going to have an asthma attack and I don't even have asthma!
a typical Thamel street.The streets of Thamel and nearby parts of Kathmandu are incredibly narrow and claustrophobic, some down to about 3-4m wide. The buildings and shops are really overcrowded, and they seem to close in over you at times. Everyone seems to have right of way on the streets; the cars, vans, motorbikes, bicycles, rickshaws, people, kids, etc. No one seems to get hurt though - its like an organised chaos, I don't know how they do it! The horns are also continually beeping from about 10am to 10pm at night. There's also live music blasting out from the surrounding bars from around 9pm, which can all be heard from your hotel room. Kathmandu is a really noisy place!
(the quality of video isn't that great. i cant seem to get google video to upload my video from here. but i'm sure you get the picture! ignore the little stupid convo at the end, we dont have any video editing here!)
The Guesthouse where we are staying is like a little sanctuary within the hubbub of Thamel. When we arrived we were disappointed that we couldn't get the $2 a night rooms, and after a little haggling and threatening to leave we managed to get the rooms for $3 a night! The room isn't too bad. Its a twin room, pretty dirty and damp, and could do with a good lick of paint, but its private, secure and there no bed bugs!! The thought of sharing my bed with any creature bigger than a full stop, that also happens to be a bloodsucking carnivore fills me with absolute dread! We've made looking for evidence of their presence one of our necessary checks for every place we decide to stay in.
check out the greasy head mark stain by Reena's bed!The shower is hot - lovely! After washing my hair yesterday we decided to have a lovely sweet pot of Marsala tea while sitting in the garden waiting for my hair to dry - this is the life! The garden is really beautiful, full of flowers and burning incense and is really well kept. It makes up for any of the low points of the bedroom and toilets - the smell of the disinfectant they use is worse than the smell of poo... its like a rancid lemon flavour. Thankfully though the toilets are still the stand up westernised ones. I'm really not looking forward to the hole in the floor!
the back garden.There is so much good food in Kathmandu! We've had Nepalese curries, Tibetan momo's (they're like the insides of an Indian samosa with the wrappings of a Chinese won ton - either steamed or fried, pretty good), pizzas and fries (yes we are ashamed of that), middle eastern couscous and curry, and this morning a french cheese croissant with a cup of tea on a sunny roof top terrace. We're going for a Tibetan-Mexican fusion tonight. They also have such a wide selections of teas here. They all tastes so fresh and well made.
couscous and curry in the Nargila Restaurant by candle light. Everywhere is so dark in Kathmandu (inside buildings), and all the light bulbs seem to be about 10 Watt!
having breakfast on a sunny roof top terrace.Well, we're off to do a bit of sight seeing now. Hoping to see the Durbar Square and the Swayambunath Stupa (The Monkey Temple). On Saturday we start the Everest Base Camp Trek. We're having to hire four season down sleeping bags and buy down jackets. We've found a really good shop for that sort of stuff. Its so easy to get ripped off here. Every other shop is an outdoors equipment shop selling fake North Face and Gore-tex Gear. We learnt a good lesson in haggling yesterday. With a bit of "in England (Primark) its half that price!" and "hmm... we
might come back later..." we paid less for two pairs of trousers than the initial price for one. They must just see us coming!
I'll post again after the Everest Trek - in about two weeks.
xxx
