1/3/02

1/3/02

[Repost from my time in Varanassi, circa 12/14 ]

Greetings from the Holy city of Varanassi. Just rolled in this morning after a day of travel.

Spent a few days in Kathmandu and then left for Royal Chitwan National Park. Seems like I've been pretty busy lately

Spent a day white water rafting on the somethingorother river near the border with Tibet(China). Awesome time. Woke up early to make the three hour bus ride up there, with gorgeous views as the sun came up. We were on the ridge on top of the Kathmandu valley and got to see the mountains as they came into daylight, as well as the fog shrouded valley below and the little villages and their terrace farms hanging on the side of the cliff. Gorgeous. Had my head out the window taking pictures until my batteries died...

Well then we dropped below the fog into the valley and got to this beautiful resort on the banks of the river. The river didn't look too high, but my previous rafting trip was on the huge massive Nile so I guess anything would look small fry.

We spent an hour having lunch on the lawn in the sun, got our 45 minute safety lecture and orientation ("Get DOWN!" means hold on and get down in the raft, etc....). Since I had previous experience rafting, I got to be in front, which is the most wet-your-pants exciting place you can sit. You're the one who sees these huge rocks coming at you and the hole where there should be water and before he yells GET DOWN you've already GOT DOWN. Managed to get pretty wet up there. COOOLD water. But the views inside the river valley, with the mountains all around, were gorgeous, when I wasn't gettting soaked. I felt bad for our poor guide because our group was, um, not too good at this rafting thing. You're supposed to paddle in unison, listen to insructions, and they couldn't figure it out, and it was fully to look back at the guide and see the look of resignation on his face. So the group was pretty funny. I haven't seen before such a non-team'ish group in these rafting situations. Good for some laughs.

So that was a blast. Had a nice look around at Kathmandu but not too great since I am planning to fly out of there later, and will return. Then headed to Royal Chitwan National Park. Got in and signed up for a two day Jungle Hiking Safari. Walking through the jungle. Oh, and the jungle has tigers and elephants and 500 rhinos. Probably aren't 500 rhinos in all of Africa. So each group has two guides and so did we and off we went and take a cool canoe ride in the morning mist as elephants are crossing the river and get to the jungle on the other side. We get our lecture that says pretty much:

-Good chance we see rhinos
-Rhinos dangerous
-If we see Rhino do as we say.
-Climbing trees is the best way to escape rhinos.

Well, Karen, who I'm traveling with, doesn't think she can climb trees so she's a bit apprehensive. Me? I'm just apprehensive. Rhinos. And we're on foot. And they're fast. And very aggressive. Cool time, right?

So we're walking through the jungle and we come across the biggest pile of shit I've ever seen, and our guide says, "Fresh Rhino Toilet" so after laughing histerically, we're off into the bush tracking this Rhino. It occured to me a few times that perhaps trying to find a rhino isn't the greatest idea ever, since what happens if we find him....I wonder....

Well we run around in the bush for awhile and no rhino and then see some monkeys and have some lunch and we're walking down this path after lunch and the tall grass rustles and the guides freeze. "Rhino" and after a minute or two, sure enough you can kinda make out this rhino that really isn't far enough away from me to make me comfortable!

And then it gets closer and its camera shot time and the guides are telling us to get low and crouch and walk this way and that and we're behind some trees and then the rhino comes out of the grass and one guide says Run This Way and I run and then the rhino is looking at us and I'm scared pretty much and you know these things weigh 3 tons and are a lot faster than me in my running shoes and I'm wearing my boots and looking for a tree to climb. Then my one guide says Come Here and the other one says Come Here and I move towards the one farther away from the Rhino. Well, as I move, he makes a charge motion. Kinda like holding a gun in someone's face and saying BOO! So we've got this rhino 100 ft from us, staring at us and its no good to remember at this moment that Rhino's have good senses of smell but can't see worth a darn, because I was unable to think that. The other guide says PicturePicture. Me? Nah, I'll keep my eye on that Rhino. Karen, brave soul, pulls out her camera. Opens it up, looks through the zoom lens, while the Rhino is right in front of her, and then casually presses the zoom button, waits while it the motor slowly zooms in, then aims in the viewfinder, and I'm sitting here watching this ready to dart into a tree, and then she decides, I guess, the picture wasn't right, and flips the camera 90 degrees for a profile shot. AIE!

Well, after that the rhino kinda heads back into the tall grass and wanders off and was seen by the other folk on safari. But that was pretty damn cool and i won't soon forget how freaked out I was by these monster animals.

The next day wasn't so eventful, although as we were rounding a corner, I was in the back deep in thought or something and all of a sudden the guides are running right at me, saying Rhino! Apparently it was just standing there on the other side of the bend but I never saw it. Seeing the guides scared and running was pretty funny tho.

THEN, to top it off, the town at the end of the trek was hosting the World Elephant Polo Championships. So we got to see all manner of rich Brits and a token (although quite good) Nepali team play polo on top of elephants. It was like taking a step back in time - to the hayday of the British Empire and "The Sun Doesn't Set" and "God Save The Queen" and "Queen's Jubilee" and all that jazz that was almost enough to make you puke although they did have bloody mary's and I thought I'd go for one until they cost over $5 which is outrageous. But watching elephant polo was a treat. Unfortunately, it took all day and we weren't able to take an elephant safari the following day, which I'd wanted to do. Park permit fees too high. Alas.

So spent the next day relaxing on the "beach" of the river and got a treat watching 20 of the elephants (domesticated) getting bathed by their keepers and loads of tourists climbing all over them in the river and falling in and the elephants spraying everyone. Great fun! Should've hopped on myself but the sight of floating elephant shit in the river by them turned me off a bit.

I'm off in a few minutes to wander up to the cremation sites and get a shave while I'm at it - as long as they use new blades. Wonderful thing, getting shaves in Nepal and I hope they're better here!

1/3/02 Arambol, India

[This is a repost of my journal - my first experience in India circa November 1st]


India. Whoa.

So the four hour flight arrived around midnight and I get the cab into town, 17km away. Even changed money at a good exchange rate. Cool. Things going smooth. Hotel has places. Great room, has a balcony looking over a mosque (more on that later) and two wicker chairs and a desk and a little table. Fabulous. Got a beer, Kingfisher, pretty good stuff, and unwound at 2am on the balcony. Pretty edgy. Edgy because I just arrived in this new, wild, super place and want to check it out. As it was, I just saw it from the back seat of the taxi, closed shops. Dirty roads. Signs in English and Hindi. Dark. Lights. Looked like Mexico at night. Hell, any place looks good at night. The darkness hides a lot. And just makes me more curious. But it was deserted too, no one was out. Lots of puddles - I guess Monsoon had just hit with a vengance. Two days before - it was really difficult to get from the airport to town. So all the delay in Malaysia....maybe a blessing in disguise (hmm....I'd have prefered to have avoided).

Ok, so I finish my beer and turn off the little portable speakers that were playing music, and shut the windows and its bed time and my mind is still flying. But I finally fall asleep.

Only to awaken to HOOO-HUMMM-MAH-HUM-MAAAAAAH-HUM. Over and over. The mosque. Yeah, its the Morning Call To Prayer from your friendly neighborhood extrovered religious establishment. Whew. Scared the hell out of me. And dawn is quite early in India, don;t know how early but its early.

So back to sleep and then I wake up and open the doors and look outside and the little boy pops in and I get a thermos of tea and relax and read and drink tea. Finally I get dressed and get ready to venture outside. And I leave the hotel.

And that's when culture shock hit. I don't know what was more of a shock - the culture shock or having a culture shock. Because I haven't really had one before. I've had reverse culture shock. And maybe I had culture shock in Mexico but it was a gradual thing. And Egypt was amazing but more stimulating than shocking. And Africa was cool but after Egypt and all that it wasn't shocking, although still quite insane. And blah blah.

I walked out of the hotel, into the street that eight hours before had been totally void of any people. Last night. No one. The only soul - me. Taxi driver. Hotel dude.

Now, different story.

It was a side street.

And it was totally full of people. Madness. Take the mall at Christmas. Like that. People everywhere.

I'd scoped the map - the goal was to buy a train ticket. Off I went. Down to the main street where anarchy reigned. If I thought the street in front of the hotel was packed, well, here was some real chaos. Picture a sold out stadium emptying. People everywhere. Cars. Not many cars. But bikes. And auto-rickshaws, a cross between a motorcycle and a subcompact car. And motorcycles and scooters and PEOPLE. The road was mad. Madness. As I looked at the road and where I had to go, I was scared. My first thought was, "Ok, enough of this, lets get the next plane ticket out of here." My second thought was, "Oh, that's nonsense," and my third thought was, "Hm, maybe nonsense, but a damn good idea."

Anyway, it was mad. Traffic like I've never seen. How I didn't get run over, well, I don't know. And it won't be a car or a rickshaw that kills me. It'll be a bicycle. I swear. Silent but deadly. Vroom. There they are, there they go. No noise.

So that was the culture shock. I don't know where it came from - and I'm still trying to decide if this is worse than Mexico or Guatemala or Kenya, or is it the same and I'm just not used to it after being in calm places. It was also a pre-holiday, shoppers going mad and the like before the big festival two days hence, so the Mall At Xmas analogy wasn't too bad. And i came to grips with India over the next day and have decided its mad. Insane. Crazy. Wild. Nutty. But its great and I like it. The two days I spent in it.

Because I had Saturday and Sunday and half of Monday before the BIG TRAIN. 39 hours. Chennai-Varanasi. Quite the experience. Stuck in a compartment with some crazy Sri Lankan woman who sounded, and this is no lie, like a drunk incomprehensible Yoda. "Yes, you must come Sreee LAaanka. Yes. Visit me you must." At first she was just irritating. Curious in me. Hard to understand her because the train was loud. But over the next 39 hours I came to understand that she was one of those annoying people you don't want to have to spend much time talking to. One of those people that seem to not leave you alone. She was disappointed that I was not travelling to Varanasi and then on to Delhi and to Agra like her so, I presume, I could travel with her. Ha! And she wants me to visit Sri Lanka. I think she wants to marry me. Ha! Marry Yoda? Her teeth, well, actually now that I think about it, not much different than Yoda. So the second day, I read with my headphones on. On the top bunk. After a time I tried talking to her again, not try really, but sitting near her entailed conversation and Yoda was back.

Also had a Muslim woman, young, age unknown with quite small baby. Actualy pretty quiet for a quite small baby. With who I hope was her father. Muslim guy, beard like Osama. Grey. Old. Her father meaning the mother's father. But who knows. She didn't speak much english so I don't know her story. But the baby would cry sometimes, at night sometimes, and the 4-5 other kids in the car with us, naturally, would cry as well. Typical. Kids.

The train was pretty nice. Sleeper. Three bunks. Middle bunk folds down to make chair with first bunk. Sleeping was good. Top bunk good for escaping and reading. Finished a strange book. Going Native. Got good reviews on the cover, but I think it was riding a Pulp Fiction'ish popular tide, which has ebbed, leaving a weird book.

Also met some engineering students and struggled with Indian English. Very hard to understand. Irritating so. Like, I know I speak good english and they seemed to understand me better than I them. I wanted to get paper and pens and just "chat". Like internet chat, but just pass the paper.

Maybe I'll be a pro with it soon.

So hit Varanasi and got on a bus to Nepal straightaway. Supposed to be 9-10 hours. Well, sure. No way. Some festival was up Wednesday. And we had to pass all these parades. Slowed us down until Gorkapur. Where it stopped us. it was about 4pm and they just shut down the road, until 9pm or something. Took me an hour to figure this out, so at 5pm, emboldened by words in the book that buses to the border leave from the north part of town, I strapped on the pack and headed off to walk the 1.5km's from the bus station to the train station where said buses left.

Hm.

Turns out we weren't at the bus station. But right after where we were - a bridge, packed with cars fiull of these floats with these hindu statues that they throw in the river and managed to get across the bridge and some guy was also hiking iwth his suitcase to catch a train, so I tagged with him and we walked and walked and walked and finally caught a cycle-rickshaw (think threewheeledbiketaxithing) and bikd and biked and biked and paid this guy 12 rupees, 25 cents for what was a lifesaving 3-4km ride (I was quite far from this station apparently - the town was bigger than I thought) and got the bus at 6:15 to the border which was supposed to be 2 hrs and I thought I had an off chance of catching the 8:30 bus on the other side of the border to Pokhara so saving me finding a hotel by sleeping on the bus and arriving where I wanted to be in record time. And it looked good - we passed all manner of parades again and cruised and we hit a big town and I though it was it and it wsan't and this repeated over and over and how this ride could ever be 2 hours is beyond me, because while we did not go the fastest ever, it didn't seem like we stopped a whole lot and arrived, oh, four hours later. Grabbed a grimy hotel in the typically dirty and seedy border town and called it a night.

Got the bus in the morning to Pokhara and 10 painful hours of bouncing around on awful Nepalese roads and honking horns and adrenaline instilling passing and gorgeous views and more honking and bouncing around, finally got to Pokhara at 6pm. Thursday. Almost exactly 72 hours of travel. To Nepal. And, frankly, I did a pretty damn good job of it. I'm proud. Lot of distance to cover.

So I'm here to trek. Pokhara is on a gorgeous lake, a great place, the Annapurna mountains standing quite proud in the background, tall. The 4th tallest mountain in the world or something. And I'm heading towards it.

The trek is 16-21 days. Hike from little town to little town and stay in little hotels called tea houses and eat and hike all day and see gorgeous scenery. Today's friday and I will leave Sunday because there is some general strike Mon/T/Wed and no transport to the mountains and everyone seems to agree that the best place to be during this strike is trekking. Which means lots of people trekking, but tourism here has been hit pretty hard by domestic problems.

So ya won't hear from me for awhile. They have internet along the way, I hear, at prices that I certainly can't affford.