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  Kathmandu, Nepal
Sunday, December 9, 2007

I THOUGHT THE PREVIOUS POST WASN"T SAVED SO I ATTEMPTED TO REWRITE BELOW_ WILL COMBINE POSTS WHEN I HAVE TIME AS THERE IS SOME NEW STUFF IN THIS ONE. ENJOY!
# of purell bottles used: 2 (last trek had soap and water!)
# of times I used the phone in the last 7 weeks: 4
Most Expensive Call: 150 rupees a minute ($2.60) to call the parents on Thanksgiving from a village in Annapurna Sanctuary.
Length of Call: 2 minutes
# of vendors who tried to sell me a pashmina in Thamel: 257
# of tigerbalm vendors: 67
Thamel vendor I'll miss the least: the "violin"vendors..the sound is painful
# of maoists who asked for donation: 1
Favorite Him. Mountain: Ama Dablam
Most Shocking Event: Man dying in toilet in Gorak Shep (5200 meters) day before we arrived..stil trying to find out more info on that)
won't miss: the godamned horns; rickshaw, motorbike, van, car... and I won't miss wearing layers for a bit
Most Heard Songs: Om Mane Padme Hum and Jack Johnson
percentage of time Nepal spend driving on left side of road: 50%, they have to drive in middle and right side to avoid rickshaws, potholes, cows...
favorite book i read while in Nepal: Touching My Father's Soul by Jamling Tenzing Norgay
favorite non nepali meal: Spinach Mushroom Enchiladas at Chhetri Sisters in Pokhara
what i'll miss: incredibly kind people, being in the himalayas, tea, momo's, dal bhaat,
Best lesson learned: obvious, but eat local and yes, always have toilet paper with you
Best Airplane Moment: landing in Lukla- 8% grade, headed straight into a mountain. Fantastic!
# of times I was nearly stuck in a squat toilet due to leg seizing up from trekking exhaustion: 2
# of times my taxi driver used his horn in 3 minutes: 15
# of times he needed to honk: 3
Best buy: steripen for water. Drinkable in 90 seconds!
Thank god I brought: my down jacket, I've worn it almost every day.
simple pleasures: good signage. toilet paper in a bathroom
momo's consumed: I'm guessing over 200
cheapest momo's: 20 rupees for 10 momos total hole in wall in Thamel
Consistently worst meal: macaroni (i never ordered it but tasted fellow trekkers) still with the momo's!
favorite new nepali cuisine: yak cheese, momo's dal bhaat, nepali tea
# of dah bhaat consumed: 10, surprisingly low!
Favorite internet cafe: hotel room in chomrong- 2 computers, 1 email in 5 minutes
Most surprising find: Jacob's Creek Merlot in a village in Annapurna Sanctuary. 1000 rupees.
Interesting Nepal Tidbit: didn't open borders until early 1950's! so besides some foreigners that were given permission to enter nepal prior, tourism and foreigners are still a relatively new concept. 
other tidbit: there were cars in kathmandu before there were roads to kathmandu! The wheels were removed and the cars were put on a platform and carried by 50-70 porters!!! they had to go over 2 6000 foot passes to get to Kathmandu. If a car broke, they would carry it out and take it to India for repair.
Surprises: electricity in almost every lodge on Annapurna sanctuary. Could recharge ipod and camera batteries and they didn't charge.
Best Bargaining: Rosey on the Anna. trek- she negotiated, then gave the woman an extra 100.  Me paying tourist rate for bananas..don't ask.
new things I did: summit 5545 meter mountain, paragliding, rode an elephant, new food, new words, new people
# of Crocodiles seen in 1 day: 3
Nepali words I learned: namaste (i see the divine in you), putali (butterfly- the nepali women on the Annapurna trek called me this), pani (water) Danubhad (thank you) suva ratri (good night) aliali (little bit)
Nepali word I butchered: zopkio (mix of yak and cow that we saw on everest trek) I called it chorizo
Best cell phone ring I heard: Kumar, guide for kathmandu tour, Hotel California
most oft seen stores in Thamel: gear, bakery, money changer, trekking/tour, pashmina, internet cafe, photo, shipping, ATM, restaurants, jewelry,
Something I will never mock again: hot water bottles, they saved me while camping...not that I spent a great deal of time mocking them prior, but I will never say a bad word about them again.
# of full length mirrors in 7 weeks: 3
Amount of debris removed from Everest 2000-2003: 7 tons
best shower: buddha lodge, bamboo, Annapurna Sanctuary Trek it was hot!

Yesterday I was in a bus for 9 hours and starting thinking about what I was seeing that I would rarely, if ever, see on a major interstate in the states:
kids jumping rope
shop after shop selling the same thing (pringles, snickers, bagpiper whisky)
monkeys crossing the road
goats and cows on the road 
babies being bathed (weren't too happy about it)
Horse and Buggy
Rickshaw
Laundry drying on roof of homes
man beating down feathers with bamboo stick
woman carrying logs on her back
orange vendors everywhere
people retrieving rocks from river to fix potholes in road
potholes the size of a small pond
men walking with their arms around each other- very common in nepal
women in sari's walking with shopping bags
road repair peeps wearing flip flops
popcorn and nut vendors
piles and piles and piles of rubbish awaiting pick up
hundreds of buses, cars lined up waiting for road to reopen (it was closed for 18 hours due to fatal bus crash)
peeps washing cars (the springs come out of the mountain side)
buses passing by with 1/2 inch to spare
roadside "restaurants" making dal bhaat
everyone has black hair
dog sleeping in trash on side of road
lots of really tiny cars
bicycles, bicycles and more bicycles
motorbikes, motorbikes and more motorbikes

# of horn honks while typing this entry: 476

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