We leave tonight!
I'm going to miss this place. Looking back we have done so much! Mountains, jungle, flat lands, rivers, cities... We've seen traditional dances and weddings, we even saw a funeral procession walk by. We've climbed passes where the air was so thin we were gasping, we've swam with elephants! But it's time to come home.
It's getting so hot here, I really don't see why now is tourist season, I'm dripping.
tonight we fly to HK. We're home in 3 days.

Rafting!

8 days of rafting! We had a great time. 2 other people joined our group to make it just us 4. 2 guys in their mid 20s, lots of fun. 2 guides and a junior guide also came. We crammed all the gear and all but one person into the raft. There was a kayak for safety that came a long as well. The rapids were big! huge waves and holes. The water temperature was like a pool and the sun was hot so no one minded getting wet. When we did get too hot and we were in a calm spot in the river we'd jump off the side of the raft and float down. We camped on beaches, which is great minus sand getting everywhere! It was relaxing and a nice change from walking everywhere. Rafting is a fun sport but you aren't in control of anything, you're told when to paddle and when to stop. I like being able to do it myself. We flew back to Ktm. We had the option of taking a 12+ hour night bus with the other guys but i probably would be hurling out the window the whole time or knowing our luck there would a strike. So we settled for the 50 min plane ride. It was probably the best decision we made =)

Pics

Here are some pictures from our trek and Chitwan.

The first couple ones are of mountains and the pass we went over and the last ones are of the one rhino we saw! YAY! and we got to ride and swim elephants! The riding was really rough and bumpy but you got to see the jungle from up high which was sweet. It was so hot there! 30 degrees easily, ugh. But in the evening it really cooled down.

Now we're back in Kathmandu for a day. Tomorrow we leave for rafting.

Pokhara

We have finished our trek. We arrived safely yesterday in Pokhara. After 27 days of walking we are ready for a bit of civilization. Last time we wrote we were in Manang. So after that we spent a couple days ascending to the big pass, Thorung la. the weather got colder and snow started to fall. B got sick in the gut from food so it took us a lot longer then planned but we made it! The altitude didn't bother us because we took the time to acclimatize. But still it's a hard day of gasping for air to get to the other side. We had brilliant weather and got a lovely view from way up there. We were lucky because apparently it snowed knee deep a couple days later forcing some people to turn back. The week that straddled the pass was a cold one. We spent a few nights in pretty drafty stone buildings under dirty quilts. Our standard for comfort is quite low now and by the time we got down to Jomsom which has the first airport we were thrilled at the luxury or sit down toilets and warmish water to wash. We took our time descending. spending time in the beautiful medieval towns along the way. Some hadn't changed at all in the 15years, but some, with the road had completely transformed. Our trek ended at the perfect time because our knees were starting to get pretty sore. Tomorrow we take a bus down to Chitwan National Park where we'll enjoy a few days of nature and luxury!
B&P

Hello from the Annapurna Circuit Trek

We are in a valley north of Mt Annapurna, the 7th highest mtn in the world, halfway thru our trek. we did not write last week because we had to postpone our trip to chitwan park. this was due to a protest by the local inhabitants about a govt caste designation policy. hopefully we can go there after our trek. we have been trekking up a valley for the past week and a half. we have gone over 100 km and 1800 m vertical. we have to ascend another 2000m over the next 3 days!! to get over the big pass, which is 17,500 ft. we are at Manang, which is the last big town before the pass. we have been spending 2 days here to acclimatize to the high altitude, but we are feeling fine so far because we have been taking out time getting up here. the scenery here is fantastic with all of the huge mountains, which are about 22,000 ft tall !!. we will try to post some photos after the pass.
Hope everyone is well.
Bridget & Patrick

Good bye.

I am done volunteering now at the child centre and helping the teen ageers at the community centre with their english. I am emotionally exhausted from it all. But it was an amazing experience and I would do it again. The kids are beautiful and some have so much potential and I really hope they succeed in life. or else they will inherit the selling bananas on the street business. To see their smiling faces everyday and their little accomplishments made it worth while. when they all memorized 'may i go to toilet' and 'good morning miss' (that's what they call all their teachers)it made me so happy! And i wouldn't let then go to the bathroom if they didn't say it, we had a couple tense moments there! =)
I moved out of the Nepali families house and it was a bit of a tearful good bye. They are my Nepali family forever and i had to promise to come back very soon! I really loved living like a local. buying food at the market every morning, having tea all the time! Walking to work and saying 'namaste' to people i see every day. But there is so much more to see in Nepal. So this coming sunday we get on a bus and go to the jungle!
So good bye Kathmandu! Hello Chitwan!

Here is a bit of news from Pat:
I have had a couple of very interesting weeks. Hired a guide who took me bird watching in the hills south of Kathmandu. He was very good and very nice, so we had a great day. He picked me up on his motorcycle in the dark at 6am and we zoomed thru the city and countryside as it woke up - great fun (& freezing!). The day in the hills was very good. We identified over 30 birds; very few of which I had seen on our last trip here. It makes such a difference when you are with an expert! We also had a bonus of a huge view of the Himalayas. Even at such a distance, it was obvious that they were much higher than we were!
Spent a morning with the Tibetan family which runs 'our' hotel. They said I was like part of the family, and I felt very honoured to be invited (I stayed at their hotel for a month on our last trip here, and have been almost a month here this time!) It was Tibetan New Year, which has great religious significance to Tibetan buddhists. The Dalai Lama had asked Tibetans to NOT celebrate this year, in protest of all the Tibetan protesters who were killed last year by the Chinese govt. So it was a quiet affair, just following them around as they prayed in a couple of monasteries, and did the circuit of the 2 huge stupas in Kath. I was blessed by the head Lama of one of the monasteries. We also visited the Dalai Lama's representative in Nepal.
Spent about 4 days so far working with the local consultant which is doing an engineering and rehabilitation plan of the rivers in the Kath valley for the Nepal govt. Most rivers are very badly polluted and there is no planning control on new building along their banks. I have been on 2 field trips: one to a site inside the city which has a Hindu temple and cremation site, and the other to a rural area upstream of all the pollution. The villagers there showed me around and explained how they wanted to divert the river back to its earlier course and then relandscape it. I tried to convince them to leave it in its present alignment because it would cause less damage and take less work, but they were adamant. Their property lines do not move with the river like in Canada, so the land owners want 'their' land back!
B has already described the day we spent with one of her family's relatives, a little girl who went through a coming of age ceremony. The day ended with a party to which only their closest relatives were invited (about 300!!) We were the only foreigners, so again I felt very honoured.
I have also been busy arranging the rest of our trip: a lodge in the middle of Chitwan Park - a dryland jungle, permits for the 4-week trek around Annapurna, and a whitewater rafting & camping trip down the Sun Kosi River.
I am living the life of Riley here: sleeping in, having breakfast on the hotel roof, doing day trips to the valley's 7 world heritage sites (which can be an adventure in itself!), and trying to communicate with the locals with my very rudimentary Nepal!
I hope everyone is well back in Canada.
- Pat

Last Week.

On Tuesday this past week a cousin of the family who is 11 years old got married to the Sun. She emerged from her dark room after 12 days and came up onto the roof of their house. She was dressed in the splendor of an bride with a beautiful red and gold sari on. She sat down with her parents and a priest and they started this long and complicated ceremony. We are so lucky to be able to experience this. The rest of the extended family watched and drank tea and ate traditional Newar food. It was great! That night we went to the after party, so they lent me a sari!





I've gotten into the swing of things here. I get woken up at 6:15 by barking dogs, crying babies and just the bustle of the house. I have tea and breakfast, dal bat tacari. Which is rice, lentil soup and vegetables. The kids are still unruly, but I think I'm teaching them things on Monday I'm going to give them a bit of a test. By getting them to match words with pictures like the word red with the colour red. I work until 3 Then head home for some more tea. At 5 I walk down the street to their youth club which is the community centre. where I teach games and songs in English to teenage kids, they have pretty good English from being in an English immersion school so we have fun and I correct their grammar. I sit in the kitchen with the family while food is being made. I haven't convinced them to teach me how to make the food yet. I think it's a cultural thing for the guest to do nothing... We eat before bed so at 8:30. And I am so ready for sleep!

The culture is of course so different. They are so superstisious for example, you can;t whistle at night because the thiefs will come. They were so suprised when I didn't know that. You know how you can buy tanning lotion and stuff? well you can buy whitening cream here and its considered beautiful to be so fair. They rub flour on their skin. So they think i'm just the bees knees! they always comment on my skin and how dark and ugly they are. I tell them that people in canada would love tanned skin like theirs but they don't understand.

The Child Centre

I walk on my own to the centre, it takes about 15 minutes to wind my way down the busy street and through the markets. The school is one room and it houses about 20 kids. aged from 5 to 15. There is a huge range of ability and interest so it's hard to judge how to teach them. This centre prepares the children who have never gone to school to be able to enter close to their grade level. The centre provdides scholarships to allow them to go. I have taught them the months the days the colours and the ABCs. they know things like A is apple, a-p-p-l-e. And every friday we do crafts and drawing. I have taught them songs, because thats more fun than sitting. They are fun kids so full of life when their lives are so hard. they lack attention sklills and its hard to make them listen. espessially with the language barrier. There is no way I can disapline them because they find me speaking english pretty funny. which is frustrating but totally understandable. They call me miss and run down the street when i'm walking home. It's rewarding when they remember which colour crayon is which. But i am always so tired at the end of the day.

The Family

It's the end of my first week volunteering. I am living with a Nepali family. The extended family lives here so there's aunts, uncles, sisters, grandmothers... all in the same house. Only a few know english whichis good. When know one is around to speak english i try to communicate with them, we end up acting things out and using my pigeon nepali. I've been working on my Nepali, but it's not easy. I know words like spicy and hot. The family is very kind and they let me in on their lives. There is a coming of age cerimony that happening right now. A cousin of theirs is getting married to the Sun. Girls get married 3 times, once to their god, once to the Sun and once to the man of their choice, there's no arranged marrages. So next week is the big party, i'm not sure what to expect. Yesterday the ladies of the house tried teaching me the art of how to wrap a sari. It's harder then it looks! I'm going to have to practise a lot before next week. They only have electricity certain hours of the day and limited internet so it's hard to find a day where weget both at the same time.

Bridget hasn't made a post recently because she has not been able to get access to a computer since she has been staying with the local family. She has been phoning me regularly, tho, and says that she is enjoying the teaching work with the kids, and she is getting along well with her colleagues and with the family she is staying with. I went with her last Sunday to meet the family and found them to be very hospitable. They toured us around the neighbourhood, showed us the local service club's facilities, served us lunch, and took us over to the school where B was to work. B is hoping to make a post very soon, so she will be able to provide much more news.

Meanwhile, our Canadian contacts here have referred me to a local environmental engineer, who toured me around his local NGO's facilities. He may have a bit of work for me, suggesting some landscaping improvements to one of his micro-sewage treatment facilities. He also referred me in turn to an infrastructure engineer whose local consulting firm is doing a planning project for the Kathmandu govt of the local rivers in the valley. It's a very sophisticated review of water quality, riverbank improvements, etc. The firm is very computerized, with a classy powerpoint presentation of their findings, and a paperless CAD design process. I have spent a day so far working with one of their architects on a park proposal along the Bagmati R., where the water level has dropped permanently due to increased water consumption, and there is now land available for park development. I went on a field trip, which involved a mad rides on a motor cycle through chaotic traffic. The park would have to integrate in a Hindu cremation site and temple! This is not Canada! There is capital money available and the work could start this year, which would be very cool. I may also do some work with them on a rural riverbank park project nearby, which would also be very interesting. We shall see how it goes.
I hope everyone is well.
- Pat

Volunteering

Last night we met with two ladies that I'll be volunteering for. They are from Canada and they are the founders of the organization CORE. I will be helping another organization they work with. I will be teaching English and art to children between the age of 5 and 16. They are the kids of single woman who can't afford school. So for the next three weeks starting Sunday, I'll be living with a Nepali family and teaching with local volunteers who hopefully know a little English.

This is our roof top terrace of the hotel we stay in. It is our refuge from the streets bellow. We eat breakfast up there some days. Fiona and I used to play up there on our last trip here.


We had momos for lunch one day. they are tibetan dumplings, deep fried. We had chicken and vegetable ones. The picture of the buildings is in Thahiti Tole, a square where we got the momos. That's the same square where we used to eat at Nima's restaurant 14 years ago.


We went to Swayambhu, which is a buddhist temple. There is a picture of it lower down, with Buddha's eyes. Another name for it is the monkey temple. It got that name because of the wild monkeys that live there. They are sacred so no know can get rid of them no matter how many lunches they've stolen.

Pictures

This is a street market in HK near where Ryan lives. We bought a fruit called mangostina which tastes like raspberry crossed with mango.

Hong Kong

We spent the day exploring the So Ho area on the island. It's an old part with steep streets and banyan trees. Everything seems to be growing. There are trees coming out on the sides of buildings, it's pretty cool! We walked down one street that had a market going for blocks. It sold everything from luck charms to dried squid. Streets are really narrow and busy, they mostly have english names like, Hollywood and Peel. A lot is under construction and all the scaffolding is made out of bamboo, which seems kinda crazy but aparently it's stronger than steel by weight! On our way from the train station to our cousin Ryans apartment we took the longest outdoor escelator in the world, it was great because we were tired. It was in the air like a +15. Ryan is great and he is putting us up. We went for lunch with him to a place he knows and he ordered his favorites. Crispy duck and peanut soup that was so spicy I cried a little. We had a good time trying to explain to the waitress that dad couldn't have peanuts. Ryan lives just off of a street called Ladder, cars can't go on it because it's steep and only has stairs. Ryan has lived in HK for 6 and a half years, he's a broker and loves it here and I can really see why: this city is so full of life, you could explore around and never get bored. I've never seen a city like this. (or been old enough to remember) Signs hang onto the street and everything's so colourful. There such a huge contrast between run down building and the new, glass highrises. The mish mash of contrasts is so overwhelming, it's hard to take it all in.

Pat loves the urban area because it is so vibrant, he drooled over the parks and busy shopping areas. He took a couple pictures of park signs to show his colleagues. In a garden called Hollywood Park there is a small section with a rough pebbly pavement that you can walk on without shoes and it gives you sort of a shiatsu foot massage, (P: inovative landscape design!) we found it painful and a couple local seniors thought our reactions were pretty funny.

Tonight we fly to Kathmandu. We'll spend a couple days in HK on the way back.

Bridget has been kind enough to let me come along on her adventure in Nepal. I will be carrying her bags and making sure her wishes are attended to promptly! Seriously, it will be a joy to travel with her.

Here's a recent photo of us backpacking at Dolomite Pass.

We'll try to communicate mainly by posting stories occasionally on this blog, rather than by e-mails. This way we can post photos too!

- Pat

Nepal

We leave this Sunday at 10am. Our flight takes us to Vancouver, Hongkong,then on to Kathmandu. Where we begin our journey. Close to four weeks we will be spending doing some sight seeing and volunteering. We are really excited for our trip! The Himalayas here we come!!




If you wish to comment, click on the title of the entry (Nepal.) then a comment box will appear. Unfortunately you can't comment without a gmail account. But we will still be checking email and facebook as much as we can so don't feel obligated.




We hope everyone has a fun and safe couple months, we can't wait to see everyone and share our stories.

love bridget and pat =)