Kathmandu to Lukla to Phakding. Meet the yaks. (cont'd)

September 2, 2010 (continued)

And now the trek begins. Lukla lies at 9,380 feet. This is the lowest we will be for the next 2 weeks. We go into our first of many tea houses for lunch and to meet our guys and get everything packed up. A teahouse is a sort of lodge/hostel/restaurant that are all along the trail. They’ve got a main dining area with benches along the outside of the room and lots of little tables and the center of the room is usually an amazingly efficient wood stove (that unfortunately is rarely going). Rooms are usually on a side hall, and generally consist of small rooms with two single beds. Shared toilets. Shower only if you’re really really lucky. Like being back in camp.

So we have lunch and explore a little of Lukla and then meet our team. First and foremost—we have 3 yaks. Well, not yaks. Dzos. Which is a yak-cow cross. Yaks don’t live well at lower altitudes, so the dzo is more practical. Our dzos will be loaded with 130 lbs of gear and the usually beat us up the trail. Incredible animals.

Our team: Tsering, our guide. Dawa, his son and our assistant guide. Ang Nima, yak driver. Gara, chef and Tsering’s cousin. Tsonky, Ngawa, and Jitman, assistant chefs and porters.

Plus us, the other yaks, or as they will soon name us, the Azhi Melwa—Crazy sisters.

That’s the group.

We saddle up and head out on our way to our first stop, Phakding.

We move along the trail through small Sherpa towns (anything above Lukla is now Sherpa country), and gorgeous terrain. Welcome to Shangri-la. I can see why people call this place paradise. It is clean (we were expecting more trash from trekkers—maybe being off season is saving us here). Towns are beautiful. And the surrounding land is so green and lush. Looks like New Zealand. Water falls pour down every rock face and we’re walking through almost jungly vegetation.

We are on the main road, but I think that the most striking thing about Sherpa country is the fact that a main road is a dirt trail. There are no cars here. No motorcycles. In fact, no wheels of any kind. The terrain is so steep and rocky that even carts aren’t useful. Everything here is moved on dzos, yaks, donkeys or humans. Sherpas carry an average of 150 lbs in their baskets, all secured by a strap on their forehead. It’s truly astounding.

And it’s quiet.

And the air is unbelievably clean. Just gorgeous.

Along the trail, in most towns we pass prayer flags on poles, always passing them on the left, as that is lucky. And mani, or prayer stones, are usually nearby. Mani stones are intentionally placed along the roadsides and rivers or placed together to form mounds or sometimes long walls, as an offering to spirits of place. These can be tablets with characters carved in them or enormous boulders that have been carved into or any size inbetween. They all say the same thing, a mantra: Om Mani Padme Hum (although it took us a while with Dawa to get these syllables). Which means approximately ‘Hail to the jewel in the lotus’.

Which sounds like nonsense to me.

So I looked up what the current Dalai Lama says about it, since it’s clearly a large part of Buddhism. And this is what he said:

It is very good to recite the mantra Om mani padme hum, but while you are doing it, you should be thinking on its meaning, for the meaning of the six syllables is great and vast...

The first, Om, symbolizes the practitioner's impure body, speech, and mind; it also symbolizes the pure exalted body, speech, and mind of a Buddha.

The path is indicated by the next four syllables. Mani, meaning jewel, symbolizes the factors of method: (the) altruistic intention to become enlightened, compassion, and love.

The two syllables, padme, meaning lotus, symbolize wisdom.

Purity must be achieved by an indivisible unity of method and wisdom, symbolized by the final syllable hum, which indicates indivisibility.

Thus the six syllables, om mani padme hum, mean that in dependence on the practice of a path which is an indivisible union of method and wisdom, you can transform your impure body, speech, and mind into the pure exalted body, speech, and mind of a Buddha.

Still obscure. But he is the Dalai Lama and ultimate authority.

As we’re walking a woman comes out to speak to Tsering, not unsual as he seems to know everyone. But then he stops and says, this is my wife, Ami. It seems she visiting her sister. So we all stop for tea.

Then on our way to Phakding for dinner and wine and off to bed. A great start.

Pictures: Our dzos on the trail, fully loaded
Mani stones and prayer flags
Suspension bridge on the way into Phakding
Man carving mani stones

Kathmandu to Lukla to Phakding. Meet the yaks.

September 2, 2010

It’s 3 am. I am wide-awake. Of course I went to bed at 7 pm, so that’s not so strange. The rain is falling steadily outside my window. Not a good omen for our flight to Lukla this morning. I manage to get all my bags closed, and down a quick breakfast of mediocre coffee and toast before the bellman shows up promptly at 5.15. Tsering told us to be ready to go at 5.30 for a 6.15 flight. This seems like cutting we’re cutting it pretty close, but he’s the boss. So 5.30 am finds us ready and waiting in the lobby. No Tsering. 5.35. No Tsering. Must be running on Nepali time. He finally pulls in at 5.45, looking totally unconcerned about the half an hour we have left to be on a plane.


We head to the small domestic airport we’ll be flying out of. The rain is lightening up but not stopping. And the gray gloomy skies show no sign of clearing. We pull into the airport and get our bags out. As we’re heading into the terminal, we realize what a shit show this is going to be. A group of people is gathered around the door holding bags, food, eggs, cartons, you name it, all talking loudly. And we start to realize they are all maneuvering to shove there way in first. No order or logic, just get inside. Tsering grabs some bags, and a stack of a couple hundred eggs cradled in cardboard, and wades into the melee. We grab our bags and follow. He makes good progress through the mass of people and we follow in his wake, being left mostly unharassed as it’s clear we’re not in charge here and have no idea what’s happening.


We make it through the door and all of the bags are thrown on an ancient looking conveyor belt to be taken through what must be an x-ray. We’re then ushered into the next part of the hanger. Groups wait their turn to get checked in. What this means is that we’re issued tickets and then all bags for the group are thrown on a gigantic scale to be weighed. We’re supposed to stick to 30 lbs per person, presumably to keep the plane to a certain weight. We’re over the limit (of course, the wine alone probably weighs 30lbs), so fees are paid and we’re eventually ushered into the waiting room. It’s now 6.45. A half an hour after we were supposed to leave, yet Tsering still seems totally unconcerned. He gets us a cup of coffee, sees us settled in seats and heads off again.


We wait. And wait. By 7.30 I’ve asked Dawa if this is normal. ‘Oh, yeah. The weather is bad in Lukla, so we wait. But don’t worry, we’re on the first plane.’


We may not be going anywhere. Tsering checks in around 8. He’s sure the weather will clear and we’ll get out. So we just sit. A few other flights leave. Many are cancelled. We watch a monk using a laptop, a study in contradictions.


At 9.30 they announce our flight is leaving. Now. Everyone springs into action. Tsering runs over, everyone grabs bags, and the eggs, and within minutes we’re all on a bus being shuttled to the plane. We load on. It’s an old plane, from the 1960s maybe, seats maybe 25 or 30, two propellers. The two pilots run the checklist, and to our amusement, we have a flight attendant for the 40-minute flight. She passes out caramels (our in flight service), cotton for your ears and newspapers.


We take off smoothly and are moving through the clouds. We have yet to see a mountain of any sort. But the flight goes well, if loudly. All of a sudden a valley opens below us in the clouds, the pilots bank right and then we’re landing. On a tiny airstrip. The airstrip at Lukla is 1700 ft long and is on a 12% uphill grade and it ends in a mountain. It has been named by the History Channel (perfect authorities that they are) the most dangerous airport in the world. Welcome to Lukla—the airport where there is no room for error. Our landing is perfect. But we’re only one of two flights that make it in before the weather turns again. We find out later that we’re on the first flight out in 2 days and for 3 days after us no more flights are allowed in. So we are the lucky sisters once again—hitting a very narrow time window.


Pictures: Lisa with our eggs
Monk on laptop at the airport
In flight service
Airstrip
Plane leaving Lukla

Kathmandu. We are Indiana Jones.

September 1, 2010

The flight into Kathmandu is cloudy. We can see nothing, much less mountains. The rain causes such poor visibility that we enter a holding pattern for a half an hour until it clears enough to land. Not an auspicious beginning. We’re coming to Nepal at the end of monsoon season, off-season for trekking because of the unpredictability of the rain and weather, and that’s what has us most worried about this trip. So this is not a good beginning at all.

Narayan kindly gets us to where we need to be to get a Nepal Visa, $40 American cash, and helps us pick up our luggage and then says goodbye as we meet Tsering Sherpa.

Side note: The word Sherpa in the West denotes a job. In Nepal it is a race, language, job and name. Sherpas are of Tibetan descent. And if you are a Sherpa, your last name is Sherpa, and sometimes Sherpas are Sherpas in the Western meaning of a porter.

Tsering is a smiling man in his mid-40s, joined by his youngest son Dawa, a handsome young Sherpa who reminds us of Elvis. They drape us each with a white silk scarf, the kata, a traditional Tibetan prayer scarf that is a blessing for the start of any enterprise or relationship and indicates the good intentions of the person offering it. Then they manage to pack our overstuffed bags into a small SUV that we all pile into.

We head to the Yak and Yeti, the original five star hotel of Kathmandu. It was started by a Russian expat, Boris Lissanevitch, once a professional ballet dancer. For many years the Yak and Yeti was the main hub for trekkers, Everest expeditions, and most mountaineers. Lots of trekkers still start and stop here, though it’s now a bit on the seedy side and smells of mold, even in the new wing.

We drop off our bags and clean up a bit. Then Tsering picks us up for lunch. We head to a local place and get our first dose of the Nepali national cuisine, dal bhat. This really means rice and lentils, which is what a Nepali would traditionally eat twice a day pretty much every day. Our version is a little fancier, rice and lentils, but also varied curried veggies. Skeletal cats freely wander the rooftop restaurant begging for food.

We reload in the SUV and head out to visit a couple of temples. The first is the Boudhanath Stupa. It is the largest stupa in Nepal and the holiest Tibetan Buddhist temple outside Tibet. It is the center of Tibetan culture in Kathmandu. It was probably built in the 14th century. The temple is huge, and definitely in use. People walk around constantly spinning the prayer wheels. We see women practicing yoga, and monks are preparing for the evening service. Colorful prayer flags cover the temple, blowing in the breeze.

The stupa is topped by what we will see often, the benevolent eye of Buddha. It’s nice to know that the Buddha is benevolent, rather than vengeful or even mischievous, and we spin the prayer wheels too. I don’t know what Anita and Lisa pray for, but I ask Buddha for clear skies and safe journeys.

We pack back in the SUV to head to another temple.

Side note: Driving in Kathmandu is a sport. The streets are unmarked, more than half the vehicles are small motorcycles often carrying 3 people plus baggage. There seem to be no rules but honk and go, and motorcycles weave in and out of traffic freely. Chickens and dogs line the edges of the roads, which are filled with trash. It is a loud, busy, crazy dirty city. Meat sits uncovered and unrefridgerated for sale (no wonder Narayan warned us off meat) . Ni leans over and mentions that Indiana Jones would feel right at home. It’s true. The streets just beg to have Harrison Ford burst out of a dirty local pub, jump on a stolen motorcycle and evade capture by jumping into a pile of chickens. Or us. The streets are begging us. Indiana Jones indeed.

We pull up in front of Swayambhunath, or the monkey temple. As we pile out and a baboon tries to climb up Anita, we see that it is aptly named. Huge golden images of Buddha, Green Tara and Shiva (?) sit in front of us guarded by a male and female lion (we know the sex of the lions as they are graphically anatomically correct). But by this point the three of us are shutting down. 30 plus hours on planes and in airports are finally catching up. Ni has a headache and we’re all tired. So we beg off of the rest of the temple tour and head back on a bumpy, loud ride to the Yak and Yeti to repack our bags and fall into a much needed sleep before heading out for the real adventure in the morning.

Pics: Anatomically correct lion

Buddha at Monkey Temple

Spinning Prayer Wheels

Benevolent Eye of Buddha

Budanatha Stupa

Paris to New Delhi. India transit sucks.

August 31, 2010

The most important lesson of the day: When traveling in Asia, do not, I repeat do not, transit through India. We arrive in New Delhi and it’s as if we immediately enter a Kafka novel. We get off the plane and an official with our names on his official looking clipboard escorts us and one other gentleman to the transit lounge. This means a long long walk through empty corridors with pristine carpets but no discernible purposes. When we finally reach the transit lounge, we discover it is guarded by a man in fatigues with a gun. It’s full of chairs and only one counter packed with people doing apparently nothing.

Our escort tells us to sit and wait until we’re issued new boarding passes. We assume this will only take a few minutes so continue to stand. Our escort walks over and asks us again to sit. We don’t. He asks us again. We don’t. He’s quite insistent and we can’t make out why it's such a big deal. Then the other gentleman who was escorted from the plane with us comes over. He tells us that we’ll probably wait at least three hours for our boarding pass so we ought to get comfortable. He then takes us under his wing. His name is Narayan, and he’s a Nepali returning from the states where he dropped his oldest son off for his freshman year at Yale. He’s done this transfer before and knows that it’s a bureaucratic nightmare. So we settle in. He offers his trekking advice—avoid meat and milk. And we sit and chat.

After three hours of waiting, and just as Anita and I decide to lie down and try to get some sleep, we are given a boarding pass and then abruptly ordered to leave the holding room. We head upstairs and Narayan kindly offers to buy us dinner since we have no Indian rupee. He bargains with the counter boys for four plates of noodles and curry and Lisa buys a round of beer, and after a nap on the floor in our cozy, fuzzy socks (courtesy of Lisa), we are finally on our last plane to Kathmandu.

Photos: Our feet in the cozy socks Lisa brought for us all (these prove invaluable over the trip).
The Azhi Melwa at the Delhi airport in socks almost 30 hours into the trip.

NYC. It Begins.

August 30, 2010

The day to leave is at hand. The three stooges are at it again, god only knows how we've been let out of the country together—Anita (interior designer and architect), Lisa (wine distributor and blender extraordinaire) and me, Amy (actress and jack of all trades). This time we have decided to trek in Nepal.

After making this decision, Anita contacted an old friend and colleague, Caryl, who went trekking in Nepal 20 years ago and came back with a Sherpa. She fell in love on the trek with Nima Sherpa and he later moved to the states and they got married. They still are, and living happily in Seattle, and Anita figured they’d have a good idea of which trekking company to go with. Nima and Caryl’s answer—Nima’s brother Tsering. So Tsering will be our guide. He’s put together an itinerary and trip and will pick us up at the airport and take care of pretty much everything.

We’re also more prepared after doing Kilimanjaro (or at least we think so). We’re pretty confident that our packing has covered everything. We’re more prepared for cold and rain. And between the three of us we’re smuggling in at least 6 bottles of wine and two flasks of whiskey. Just like the Boy Scouts. RJ will be proud.

We arrive at JFK. First order of business is making sure our bags are checked all the way through to Kathmandu since we’ve heard that security in India is a beast and Anita was unable to secure her Indian Visa. So at the check-in counter for Air France we make friends with Jonathan and flirt shamelessly, making him blush a number of times. But he goes out of his way to get all our bags checked and boarding passes in order. So we’re off.