Trekking the Kathmandu Valley

May 15, 16, 17

Warning: this will be an extremely long post because it is a lot easier for me to talk about my whole trekking experience as a whole than as the individual days. The conversations overlapped a lot and there's not a huge amount of things to talk about with the actual trekking, although I'm sure I will say a lot more than I think I will.
This blog is my journal as well. I am not keeping 2 separate ones because I just don't have enough free time to write in both. So yes, the blog is for everyone to read and see what I am doing, but it is also for me in the future when I want to remember my trip which is why it is so ridiculously detailed. Everyone has mentioned how detailed it is and i know its probably not as a bad thing but feel free to just skim parts that do not interest you :) I don't know if I'll have a chance to come back to these countries again or not.

Ha. Wow. I'm not really even sure how to describe the past few days. It was an amazing experience. Not only was it beautiful scenery, but I also had 4 full days with a local who could answer all my questions and explain the life of the Nepalese. Honestly, Sonam gave me so much information there is no way I can even start to pretend I can write it all down here. I will talk about as much as I can remember though. No guarantees that everything is 100% correct because of my memory and because its possible things could have gotten lost in translation.
First of all, Sonam was my guide as I mentioned before. I'm not sure how old he is but I would guess maybe in his 30s? He was married when he was 18 by an arranged marriage. Him and his wife have 4 children. 3 girls and 1 boy. The girls are 14, 12, and 8. The boy is 10. He and his family are Buddhist. He grew up in the countryside and he would always go trekking with his dad. I think he said his dad led treks as well but I can't remember. He lives in Kathmandu now but he hates the city which is why he loves his job so much. He really is a true believer in happiness, peace, nature, tradition, and religion. He leads over 15 or 20 different destination treks. He has been to Everest base camp over 50 times. He has never been past base camp because it costs a lot of money and the journey is 2 or 3 months to summit. It was easy to tell how much he wanted to show me and explain to me about Nepalese culture and the people and their way of life. He has been a guide for 7 years and it took him about 4 years to train. He was a porter for 2 years and then an assistant guide for 2 years. He said he never wants to be a porter again. Most porters are farmers for 7-8 months of the year and they are used to carrying heavy loads (35kilos) at high altitudes. He has been to Thailand and the UK before. Since he meets people from all over the world on his job, he has friends everywhere.
The Nepalese language contains 36 letters. It is written similarly to Hindu but some of the letters are different. Normally they can understand each other though. Even though Nepalese is the main language across the country, there are over 130 different dialects. Each area or group of people speaks their own language. I can't remember if he said he speaks tamag or if he can just understand tamag because it is similar to his dialect from the countryside. He said usually it just sounds like people have different accents. But he can't understand all 130 dialects or really even that many of them. He also said that tamag (im pretty sure that is what he speaks the more i think about it) uses the same letters as nepalese so other people could read it but the words are totally different so they wouldn't understand what it said. He said almost everyone speaks Nepalese though. When we were in Bhaktapur, he said the women with the traditional Newari dress (red and black) are older women who can't speak Nepalese very well.
The population of Nepal is about 30 million people. 10% of them live in Kathmandu. He said there aren't really too many areas of Nepal that aren't inhabited. He also said that 2/3rds of Nepal is water and 1/3rd is land.
The first day of the trek we spent what seemed like a long time talking about how people should be happy and the power of positive thought. He kept talking about how negativity and anger pulled people down and made them unhappy and that he just thought it was better to be happy. I agree with him. It takes too much energy to be angry haha.
Marriage is a 1 day or 1 and a half day celebration. There is drinking and story telling with family and friends as well as lots of dancing. There is no honey moon because it is not affordable. Plus in the countryside especially they need to work all the time, especially during monsoon. He said that arranged marriage isn't as common anymore but it still happens. He doesn't think he will arrange a marriage for his children because he thinks it is better for them to find someone they want to be with. Once you have an arranged marriage, your parents choose the person for you, you are bound and there is no way to divorce. It is possible for the man to take more than 1 wife. His father has 2 wives so he has a step mom or half mom or something like that. It is legal as long as the man can figure out a way to manage it. In their culture, sons are very important. Daughters are married away to men so the son is the one to take care of his parents when they are older. His dad got another wife because he wanted a son and his first wife only gave him 2 daughters. I think Sonam has 4 sisters. I can't remember for sure though. In their culture it is all about giving back. So if Sonam doesn't take care of his parents then his son will not take care of him when he is older.
Tradition is very important as well. In pretty much every aspect but especially with marriage. Both Hindu and Buddhist cultures have a cast system. They are not the same but they are similar. It is very important for people to marry within their same cast. He said that if a marriage between different casts occurs then the parents will take the children apart and the marriage will no longer exist. He thinks it is good that there is this rule because it helps keep tradition alive. Different people practice different traditions for death and marriage and life, etc. He gave the example of if a Newari woman married a Brahma man then it would be fine during her life because she could live as a Newari but then once she died the family would immediately go to Brahma traditions instead of Newari traditions for the death ceremony.
Death is very confusing to me in these religions. In both Buddhist and Hindu religion, the body is cremated. Hindus put the ashes directly into the water (Ganges) but Buddhists bring them in pots to the monestary and leave it there. I'm not sure what happens after that. But, depending on what part of the countryside you are from you will mourn in different ways and even take care of the body in different ways. He said sometimes the body will sit in the house for up to 2 days waiting for relatives to travel in. Other times it is taken to the cremation sight right away. I think in the Buddhist religion you are not supposed to cry and normally crying is saved for the household. However, for example, we saw some women walking through Bhaktapur this morning with an older woman who was crying loudly. Sonam said that in the Newari culture you are supposed to make it known that someone has died and pretend that you are sad even though you are not and basically put on a show. He said he doesn't understand why. There are no cemeteries. Some rich families will build white memorials though. We saw a few while trekking.
Divorce doesn't exist in Nepal. Once you're with someone, you are with them forever. Gay and lesbian does not exist here either. Marriage is only between men and women and he said he hasn't even seen a man with a man or a woman with a woman who are from Nepal. He hadn't even heard of homosexuality until a few years ago when he had some Trekkers who were gay and lesbian. He said when he first heard of it he didn't understand how it could be possible.
The Star of David is a swastika (I'm not sure if that is how it is spelled) for Hindus and Buddhists. It symbolizes education and learning. It is on all the school buildings. It is also in the courtyard of kumari the living goddess. It can be on other things as well. In Lumbini we saw it on a number of statues. The school year is about 10 months long. Kids are still in school right now. We saw them walking to school while on our trek. They are required to wear uniforms. They all have ties. They are dark blue bottoms and light blue tops. The girls had skirts with stockings and the boys had pants. Some of them have to walk over an hour to and from school everyday! It is also basically like trekking for some of them depending on where their home and school are. They were going along the steep uphill stairs we were climbing. Its good exercise to say the least! They go to school between 9am and 10am (they have that amount of time to arrive and it starts at 10) and they get out at 4pm. They go Friday through Sunday, they have Saturday off. They have normal subjects. It starts with 5 subjects and when you are in grade 8 you can add 3 more and have 8. They have music and art and karate but it sounds like they are electives for the older kids. One of the schools we saw he said probably about 400 children attended. They have class sizes of about 30 students. The school seemed small for that many kids but I think I could only see one part of it because it was on a hill.
In Kathmandu an apartment on a street will cost about $100,000. I think he said if there is no street (I'm not sure what that means) it is $30,000, but I can't remember. It also costs money for the people to rent a shop area in Thamel (the tourist area) which is why prices are so high on their products. I think he said its maybe $300 a month for a small room shop. These prices are all very expensive for Nepal. You can't just build on any land that you want in the countryside. He said it is all owned already and that to get land you have to get it from your grandparents. Otherwise, you can speak to the people who own it and see if they will share it with you so you can build on it.
Cricket is a big sport here, just like in India.
Sonam said there are over 30 political parties! Only 3 major ones though. Most people don't really like the government and preferred having a kingdom. King Pritavinarayan Shah was the first king in the 1700s to bring all of the kingdoms of Nepal together because each city had their own kingdom. Then in the 1970s, King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah ascended the thrown. In 2001, he was shot by his eldest son. The son was very drunk and had a gun and shot every person in his immediate family... no one else even though there were other people around. He then committed suicide. I'm not sure if he committed suicide right away or if it was a while after he killed everyone. I think it was a little after. Since he was the eldest son of the king (which is the rule for ascending the thrown) he was crowned king even though he murdered his family. They believe that the brother of king Birendra Bir Bikram Shah had convinced his son to shoot everyone and himself so that he could become king but that is just speculation. Sonam said the king would travel to the villages and countryside and make sure people were enjoying their life which is why they liked the kingdom better than the political parties now. I think he said they have been working on a constitution for Nepal for 3 years now and there is still nothing written which also makes people skeptical of the new government.
I can't remember what the dot is called they put on their foreheads after punja which is the morning prayer. If the dot is between their eyes it is from punja but if there is a powdered dot near their hairline then it means they are married and Hindu. The women put that on every morning as well as necklaces and bangles. If their husband passes away they stop doing it and they stop wearing all the jewelry as well. In Hindu culture, the man is very powerful and important. The woman sleeps with the man every night but in the morning she is required to bow her head 3 times to show respect in case she kicked him while asleep or something because that is bad in their culture. She also has to offer all food to him before she can eat. She can only go ahead and eat on her own if he has told her he will be late and she doesn't have to wait for him. Buddhist culture is not as strict as this and does not require the bowing or the man eating the first part of the meal.
Hindus do not eat or drink anything before punja unless they live at high altitudes, then tea is allowed to stay warm.
In Nepal, men and women are still pretty unequal. The man is supposed to go work and the female is supposed to take care of the house. Sonam thinks this will change soon enough. In the countryside the women do the laundry and watch the children and work in the field. They carry baskets with a strap that goes on their forehead with the basket around their back (instead of like on their head in India for example). Working in the field everyday in the countryside, Sonam said they will make about 200 rupees of money. A government job is about 10,000 to 15,000 rupees a year and it is a hard job. I think he said everyone mostly gets paid per day other than those jobs and I want to say he said they make 500-1,000 rupees a day but that may be wrong. I remember it being low I just don't know if it was that low. He said because people don't make that much in Nepal that a lot of men will get jobs in China or Korea or India where they make more money. They may be gone for 2 or 3 years though.
Buddhists believe in Lord Buddah and Hindus have a number of different gods they can choose to pray to such as Vishnu, Shiva, etc. Sonam said it doesn't matter what god you pray to and that it just depends on what they choose. You don't have to pray to specific gods about specific things and you can pray to all of them or just one of them. The elephant god is the god of poverty. If there is a bull facing the temple it means it is a temple of Shiva. There are different markers like that for different gods temples.
Instead of using the cup with the stick that makes noise that I saw outside of the monkey temple, Sonam said that Buddhist people usually use the turn prayer things that are around the temple.
I think they ring a bell after puja for both hindu and buddhist which signifies good luck.
If people are visited by a dead relative in their dreams, they can light a candle and put it on a designated platform or offer it to one of the god statues. It helps get rid of that person visiting you. We saw some men sitting around one of the temples as well with a little plate of different flowers and things. Sonam said you can go to them as well and they will deliver good messages to your deceased loved ones.
On the big white thing with the Buddhist eyes, the eyes are on all 4 sides. That means that Buddah is watching you everywhere and can always see you. There are 13 different levels above that in gold which signify concepts of understanding and then the top part is nirvana. Buddhists believe in nirvana and Hindus believe in heaven. I messed that up when I was talking about the Ganges in Varanasi. Once you reach nirvana the reincarnation process stops. Both religions believe in reincarnation. The religions are so different from ours and therefore complicated I am sure I didn't do them any justice.
Buddhists also are okay with punja being done anywhere. There are small paintings that can be taken to the home (thankas) and then Buddhists can do punja from there in the morning. They are all about happiness and comfort and they want you to be comfortable and be able to do punja wherever you want. I think for Hindus you have to go to a temple but I'm not sure on that.
Temples are not really like temple at home or even like a church. It's just a small stone statue or building that fits 1 person inside. People go up to it and touch it or light a candle and leave it and say a little prayer. Sometimes there are the bells to ring or the circle things to spin.
Sonam was telling me that when a girl gets her first period, she is separated from all the boys in the family for that week but then when she is done with it she comes out and there is a big party. I think he said that was for Hindus. He also said the men and women do not share the same bed when she is on her period. And the woman can't cook or do anything in the kitchen. She is allowed to work in the field but she cannot touch any fruit trees just wheat and rice and corn I think. They believe it is bad if the woman touches the fruit while on her period and it will be bad tasting and spoiled. It sounded like he believed this too so maybe that is for Buddhist as well? He said something like, "yeah I think it is true."
While we were walking through the countryside he had so much to show me and tell me about based on what we were seeing. I have so many pictures of country life but I still haven't figured out how to put them on my phone. I want to back them up somehow, especially incase my camera is stolen. The only thing i have other than the experience of being here is the photographs.

The first day we drove from Kathmandu to Sundarijal around 8:30am. The car we drove in was actually really nice and had seat belts in it. instinctually, i put my seat belt on and then sonam told me that it was unnecessary for anyone but the driver. We then began our trek at around 9am. It was uphill. All of it. And not just on an incline but also with stairs and foot holes and yeah. Ha. 5 hours of uphill climbing! Today is the most difficult day and Sonam and I had a lot to talk about so it wasn't too bad. Especially when I didn't think about it. I think it was good I was alone because that meant that I had no one to commiserate with which made the mental game a lot easier. He was very good about doing resting points and sometimes we would stop for a minute as well so he could explain something we were seeing.
I easily caught on to the fact that while going uphill, there was a rhythm to follow. Like a metronome. Maybe like quarter notes in 4/4 time but I haven't played music in so long maybe I'm making that up. He always said "slowly, slowly. Bistari, bistari." For the most part everything the way it is written in English for the Nepalese language is sounded out the way it seems like it would be in English.
When we first started, there was a water reservoir. I think he said that it supplies all of Kathmandu. It was pretty large. He also said that during monsoon there is more power during the day than when there isn't a bunch of water because it helps power the electricity. I think he said some days there is only 4 hours of electricity.
Around noon the first day we stopped for lunch at a little place in Mulakharka. The woman was doing laundry while we were there so it took a while before we could order. we had noodle soup or chau chau soup as they say in Nepali. Mine had egg in it and some vegetables but it was pretty much like ramen noodles. I didn't drink all the soup like Sonam did because even though it had been boiled I'm assuming it was not clean water. Luckily I didn't have any problems with diarrhea or being sick the whole time I was gone. He said he has a lot of Trekkers who end up having diarrhea and have to go in the bush all the time. At lunch I made sure to take some extra strength Tylenol so I wouldn't die later haha. That Tylenol was very important on my trek. :)
We continued on our way up hill. The path led us through villages so i had ample time to see the houses and the people working and all the animals. So many animals! Goats, Water buffalo, chickens, dogs, baby animals everywhere. There's a lot going on in the countryside villages!
Sonam said the farm animals are very important. Just as important as the crops. Where he is from the main crops are #1 corn, #2 rice, #3 wheat. In the south their main crop is wheat an most of the fish comes from the south as well. They use goat, chicken, and water buffalo for meat. They also use water buffalo for curd and milk. The goats milk is not used. (All the milk they serve here is warm. Even in cereal). Chickens are also used for their eggs. Sonam said a chicken will lay 2 eggs in 24 hours. In Bhaktapur in the evening there was a spot on the mountain that was all lite up. I asked about it and he said it is a chicken farm. Those chickens only live 48 days and after that they are killed and sold. They also have a lot of injections. After 24 of our days though because they need light all the time. He said chickens owned by families in the country side are different and sleep through the night. They have special calls to call all the animals for feeding time as well.
For wheat, they take the stalks and hit them on something and the wheat falls off the stalks. They then have to separate out the wheat from the dust which is done by the wind. The wheat falls to the ground from the basket and the dust floats away. With rice it is coated so they have to separate out the rice from the coating. I forget how he said they do this but they use the hard shells to feed the animals.
He also said a water buffalo might cost about $800 usd which is a lot of money and very expensive, especially for the countryside. If they only make 200 rupees a day that's about $2.30 which means they would have to work almost a full year to save to buy a buffalo. And none if that money would go to anything else. Crazy! And that is why breeding is so great haha. Rich families will also own cows. Cows are still sacred in Nepal because of the religions but I definitely didn't see them roaming around the streets as often.
Finally, we got to the point called Deurali which is the top of the hill and meant we only had to go down from there to get to Chisopani. At the hill, Trekkers will use walking sticks all the way (I think mostly if they are coming from the other trails that were longer but I'm not sure) and then leave them here. There is just a huge pile of sticks on either side when you walk through. We got to Chisopani around 3 I think which meant we had walked for 6 hours. He said the fastest is 5 and a half and we stopped for lunch for a while longer so it was pretty good time. He said sometimes it takes people 8 hours.
Chisopani is very small. There are many 15 or 20 buildings total. It may spread out more once you keep walking through to more countryside but I don't know. There is nothing to do there. Literally nothing. We had some tea and Sonam had a vegetable fried momo. Then we went for a walk and then we sat there again in the little table area at the guesthouse. Until like 8pm. Ha. There were some other Trekkers with their guides around but we mostly had conversations between the 2 of us. I wasn't sure if I would be able to go to sleep at 8pm but I passed out at about 9:30. I woke up every few hours. The tea house wasn't terrible. There was a bad and I had my own room. I used my sleeping bag though. It's just a basic accommodation house with 3 floors of rooms and a toilet as well as a hole toilet. I was sweaty and smelled but I didn't bother trying to shower there. Sonam didn't either. He said the hotel tomorrow was very very nice. Chiso means cold and pain means water so Chisopani means cold water. Tato is hot so tatopani is hot water. It was nice to have little language lessons along the way.
Around 5pm I had dal bhat. Sonam had his around 7pm. He said that normally in the countryside people get up at 4 or 5am and don't eat breakfast. Then they eat lunch which is dal bhat around 10am. Momos around 4pm for a snack and then dinner at around 7pm... Which guess what, is dal bhat again!!! Then they go to bed around 8pm. He said in the city he does the same but usually has chowmein for dinner instead of dal bhat. He ate his dal bhat with his hands. Well, hand. They use their right hand for eating and their left hand to go to the bathroom. He poured the dal bhat over the rice and mixed it in with his hands. He then took the chicken and also rolled that around in the rice and dal bhat with his hands. There was also chapati which is like a big tortilla chip but softer and its sometimes spicy and sometimes buttery. They literally have tea or coffee with every meal and like 2 other times during the day. It's so hot. Same with the soup. Which is good for me since then I know I probably won't get sick but I hate hot things haha. They burn your mouth and you can't taste any flavors.
We had breakfast in the morning around 7am I think. Maybe 6:30. I don't remember exactly. Sonam told me to try Tibetan bread with jam and hard boiled eggs. Tibetan bread is a thicker doughier bread kind of like a pastry but not really sweet. It's pretty large as well. Maybe the size of 2 or 2 and a half pieces of toast.
He said today would be mostly an easy walk. It was on the road and through forest roads. For the most part it was pretty easy. We didn't spend that much time walking through villages. The views were spectacular though. I don't know what the name of the village we stopped for lunch was but the noodle soup was so good. An old man made it and it had fresh basil in it and fresh cabbage. Yum.
We then walked another 3 or 4 hours Nagarkot. We didn't stop and rest very much on the way. Just once before we went down hill for a while and once before we went uphill.
Then I died. Ha. We went uphill for maybe 25 or 30 minutes. It wasn't 4 or 5 hours like the day before but it was terrible. It was really steep. They are "short cuts" and basically they sucked lol. There weren't stairs it was just climbing the dirt mountains. With my back pack it was the worst. The stairs the day before weren't even and some of them were literally half the size of myself but it seemed not as bad. I think it was also easier because there would be parts that were uphill and then a little break of walking level for a while. This was all up hill. It was also in the sun and not covered by shade from trees.
Going up sucks, but going down was really hard on my knee. Like it didn't hurt painfully but if felt really strange as in the normal it feels like there is air in my knee and its kind of uncomfortable. I think I would choose going up for 5 hours instead of going down for 2. Plus when you do stairs your butt muscles get larger and when you go down your anterior and lateral leg muscles just fatigue haha. Sonam and I kept joking about how I was going to be so strong because my bag was so heavy. Note to self: next trek, bring the smallest, lightest back pack you can find and put the least amount of things in it!
When we got to the top of the mountain there was literally sweat dripping down my forehead. Ewwwww. My body was aching at this point. Like I was surprised I was still moving. But alas, I was still putting one foot in front of the other. Bistari, bistari haha. Then we still had to walk up a steep hill for a while to get to the hotel. I'm sure I looked like a wet rat when we got to the country villa hotel in Nagarkot. It was a super nice hotel too. Like very clean, very modern, beautiful view of the mountains. We got there around 3. So we trekked about 7 hours total. I went to my room and took a 2 hour nap haha.
Then I met Sonam for dinner which was a buffet. Rice, dal bhat, chicken curry (bone in which I really hate over here haha), vegetable chowmein, and fried fish. I didn't really like the fried fish either. The bones were still in and I didn't know what I was eating and yeah haha. We went to sleep around 8pm again but I showered. It was the best hot shower of my life. It felt so good. I didn't use my sleeping bag tonight. The sheets were so clean.
In the morning we met at 5:15 am to watch the sunrise. That is what Nagarkot is famous for. Unfortunately, it was too foggy to see the Himalayas but you could still see the different elevations of mountains and it was still pretty cool.
Breakfast again was a buffet which was very good. There were pancakes with honey (so good. Should definitely do this at home more often), chicken sausage, salami, toast, and omelets. I got mushroom, basil, and cheese in mine. Their omelets are just a flat sheet of egg with little toppings in them. It's not folded in half or stuffed with cheese like it is at home.
I was really stiff but I had been stretching every chance I got since we arrived in Nagarkot.
We were off again at around 7:40am and we had about 4 hours of easy walking ahead of us. It was again through a lot of villages which I enjoyed a lot. In the countryside when you go to visit relatives who are older than you, you bring homemade wine. We saw a few families making wine in pots over fire. You have to change the water and the less times you change it the stronger it will be. The more times it is changed, the weaker it will be. Some may change it 3 times or 9 times or 11 times.
A lot of the houses had a bunch of wood and wheat stacked up as well. During the dry season they stock pile as much wood as possible so that during monsoon they have dry wood to use for cooking.
There were women coming back with the head baskets from the field and women working in the field or doing laundry or feeding the animals. It is almost monsoon so it is very important that from now through monsoon the families all wok very hard and all the time because it will be the most they can grow and profit from. They also grow all their own food because it costs a lot to go into Kathmandu to buy food. Sometimes they have to do this though if the crops are bad or if they don't have enough food on the off season.
Over some of the plants there are open bamboo structures. These structures allow the plants to be covered if there is too much rain. There are a lot of these over mushrooms because mushrooms don't need much water to grow. There was cucumber, tomatoes, pumpkin, coriander, marijuana (which is illegal in Kathmandu but is used for medical purposes), corn, mushrooms, banana trees, potato, so much. The mountains all have natural stairs basically in them, like I was talking about in pokhara. And you walk by and see green but then realize that on all the hills there is a bunch of corn stalks. It's pretty cool. I'm not even sure why. Maybe just the way they use the land impressed me?
When we went to stop and eat at the places we had lunch, there were always half used water bottles on the table that Sonam would drink from. In Nepal that is common and they just don't put their mouth on or near the opening so it is a communal water.
We made it to Telkom which was the half way point in a little less than 2 hours. We took a rest and he said we had about a 30 minute walk up hill. It was kind of similar to the day before on the way to Nagarkot with the steep climbing of the dirt but there weren't as many in a row so it didn't seem as bad. He turned around and said we were done and I was surprised because I had been expecting more and much worse haha.
We walked through more village areas for about 2 hours and arrived in Bhaktapur around 11:40am. Exactly 4 hours of trekking. We then had lunch (I had vegetable fried momos and Sonam let me try one of his steamed buffalo momos which I actually thought was pretty good. When we stood up I was really stiff still. My sides were really sore as well from supporting my bag around my waist with the buckles.
We left my bag at the restaurant and went to see a temple. Then we took a bus for maybe 40 minutes to the city of Bhaktapur. I had to pay $15 to enter because it is a UNESCO world heritage site. We went to the hotel to put our stuff down and take a nap because the hot bus ride had made both of us pretty sleepy. The hotel was nice enough that I didn't feel like I needed to use my sleeping bag but also not anywhere near as nice as the hotel in Nagarkot. I think I would literally go on a honey moon to the hotel in Nagarkot...I mean maybe. It was beautiful but there was nothing to do there either. And you can't flush toilet paper down the toilet. But there was a balcony haha.
I also took a nap when we got to the hotel in Bhaktapur. And I could barely move. And before we had gone up to Nagarkot I had employed the use of duct tape to prevent blisters. My shoes are fine but the wool socks don't fit the best and they always bunch up on my pinkie toe and give me blisters. I was literally hobbling around my hotel room.
I met Sonam downstairs at 5pm and we walked around Bhaktapur for an hour. He's not supposed to guide me because he doesn't have a license to do so at monuments from the government so if anyone asked I had to say he was my friend.
It's a really cool city. There are a number of different temples and local markets. Durbar (meaning palace) square in Bhaktapur and in Kathmandu are running together in my head right now though. I think the one in Kathmandu was cooler and bigger and had more going on.
After walking around Bhaktapur we had dinner at the hotel. I ordered a pizza and it wasn't very pizza like. It was okay though. No crust! :( We went to sleep and again, I showered.
For some reason the showers confuse me. The left is the warm water but it has to run for a while before it is warm. And then sometimes you need to turn the shower on before it will get warm but sometimes you can just let the spout run a little. I don't know. It always takes me forever to figure it out for some reason.
I think Sonam said that in Hindu culture the women really like wearing green and red. Some sarees for special occasions cost up to $300 or more. They also wear sarees like in India but those are for more special occasions and the traditional dress I described earlier which I can't remember what Sonam said the name was, is what they wear for everyday life. The men also have little patterned hats they wear. The hat is a Nepali thing though.
There are a few Nepali wide holidays. They have Mother's Day. There is a holiday for siblings. The females visit the males and bring wine. The color festival which I believe is Hindu. A holiday where you visit your oldest living relatives and bring wine. And their New Years which is different from ours. It is the year 2070 for them. They don't have A.D. I guess which is why they are ahead. They still have 12 months.
He thinks tourism is really good for the country and that it is important to teach others about Nepali culture. He doesn't understand the fact that people want money back if things don't go according to plan because he said in Nepal they are always trying to please the customer. No one would ever do anything to make them angry on purpose.
While we were walking through the mountains the last day, we saw he army in tents on a hill. He thought they were doing some type of first aid training. We started to compare first aid techniques. They're pretty much exactly the same which is good to know. He hasn't heard of an AED though. He started asking me questions from his advanced training classes. If there is a 10 year old and a 35 year old and they are both drowning but the 10 year old is at 3500m altitude so it is really cold and the man is at 1300m, like Kathmandu. Which one has a better chance of surviving? I don't really know anything about altitude other than its harder to breathe and it can make you really sick. I guessed the older man because if its really cold at the higher altitude then the child would get hypothermia. He said that the kid would have more of a chance to survive because since it is so cold the heart would stop and once rescued there would be a better chance of revival. He said hypothermia would not be an issue unless there were no warm clothes to give them after rescuing them. I still don't understand it and I feel like I should.
The army is well respected in Nepal and men an women can be in it. There are not too many women in it now though. It is really difficult to get into the army as well. You have to have good grades and a certain chest size and physical fitness level.
In Bhaktapur there is a famous peacock window I got to see. There is also a big fruit that is the size of a watermelon that is prickly looking called a jack fruit. And a little prickly fruit that I don't think has an English name but it is really bitter. I've never seen one before India or Nepal.
There is a pottery square as well. In the afternoon it is laid out with pottery all over the place. We didn't see that. But we did see the large wooden wheels they use to shape the clay pots.
I think that's pretty much it. I will write about the last day in a separate post.