Pokhara and back in Kathmandu

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I am again in Kathmandu, against my will 😊 I was supposed to fly to a town called Bhadrapur on Wednesday Dec 10th and then take a bus up to Ilam (where the hospital is) but due to "roadblocks" in the east my flight was postponed until Friday. Today is Friday and I am still here, my flight was again postponed until Monday. So fingers crossed I will get out of here soon. I'm ready to settle into Ilam and do some work and have some sort of semblance of a "home" at least for a month.
Back to what's been going on......
I left you last in Pokhara, when I had finished with my trekking and was searching for a relaxing yoga/meditation place to hang for a little bit before returning to hectic Kathmandu. I found a really nice place about a 30 minute walk from north Lakeside up in the hills below Sarangkot. It's called Sadhana yoga and it had a ten day yoga course starting in a couple days so I decided to do that. When I arrived I found out that there really wasn't any "set" program for the course. People just came and went from day to day and each day was pretty much the same schedule. The night I arrived there was a group of three Americans who were leaving the next morning (from Oregon and took turns convincing me I should live there) and Briony from Australia who also just arrived that day. The first day we had meditation at 6:15 (chanting which is new to me, it was primary hindu-based), then a morning "walk" which consisted of walking down to the road and along it, then back. Then was "yogic cleansing", using a neti pot (the nasal thing). Morning yoga (mostly breathing exercises). By the time breakfast came around I was starving, but we had this really amazing muesli with fruit and curd. The curd was spiced with cinnamon, cardamom, and cloves and was sooooo good. This became the highlight of my day for the next three days, sadly. The first day we had a "mud bath". Another girl from france showed up at this point so she joined Briony and I. Basically they put a big bucket of "cleansing mud" on top of the building, we slathered ourselves in it and let it dry x 3 then rinsed off in a cold shower. The funny part of this is that while we were sunbathing in mud on top of the building there were paragliders jumping from Sarangkot overhead and gliding over us waving. In the afternoon we had "karma yoga" which is work....but the job was clipping basil flowers from the plants for tea, not so bad. Then free time, more chanting, evening yoga (a series of sun salutations), more meditation, then dinner and bed. Although this was definitely a "relaxing" place, the instruction wasn't very good and I got a weird feeling that the teacher Asanga was basically in it for the money. He didn't seem all that interested, and by day 3 Briony and I had enough and conspired to escape during our karma yoga session. Another American, Jen had also come during this time and wasn't thrilled either. So we cut our time short and headed back into town. I can't say I got much out of it, except learning to trust my intution when something is for me or not. That place definitely was not for me. Also I used the neti pot for the first time which was actually pretty good. If you have sinus issues I think it's great. I'll use it again when I'm sick or something.
Upon escape I decided to try another "spiritual pursuit", a weekend Buddhism course at a small monastery there that was supposed to start the next day. So I checked into my room there (150 rupees a night which is about 2 dollars, the cheapest place I've stayed so far!) Generally I've paid around 450 rupees which is still just over 6 dollars. Briony and I did a little shopping and met Javiad, a pashmina shopowner who was about our age from Kashmir (India). We ended up hanging out in his shop for a couple of hours, swapping stories about Kashmir, the US and Australia, and our collective experiences being in Nepal (he hates it here and wants to go back to Kashmir). Over the next few days I sat and had tea in his shop with him and talked a few more times, and came away with a good deal on a pashmina and an invitation to visit him and his family in Kashmir (apparently there isn't fighting anymore where they live 😊, score!
The Buddhist course started the next day and in a nutshell was really great. If you ever come to Pokhara I highly recommend it, its called the Ganden Yiga Buddhist Centre, and is a beautiful place with an awesome teacher. I was a bit dismayed at first to find out that the Lama was from Pittsburgh, but I was able to learn so much more from him that I think I would have been able to from a Nepali or a Tibetan. There was a big group of us, a few from Argentina, one Israeli, one Syrian, me and Jen and another American (who happens to be good friends with my PA mentor from my rotation in Colorado!) a couple of Dutch girls, a Belgian, and a couple Brits. The weekend was amazing, we had meditation, hatha yoga and a LOT of teaching and discussion on Buddhist theory and practice. I feel really lucky to have had the experience and to have learned from a very talented teacher. When talking with the director/caretaker of the place I he told me that he has known Asanga (the guy from the other yoga place) for many years and although he started off very genuine he has become more about material wealth and making money from his place over the past several years. I was right!
The course ended and since I'd been in Pokhara for a while I was ready to move on to Ilam. I was supposed to have my flight from Kathmandu on Wednesday so I booked a bus ticket back from Pokhara for the next day.
The bus left at 7:30 the next morning. Its about a 7 hour bus ride from Pokhara to Kathmandu, along a pretty decent road, probably the best in Nepal. I ended up sitting next to a 26 year old nepali girl named Kanchan. She's working as a pharmaceutical rep and going to school for her master's in business. She was in Pokhara for a wedding. We had a great conversation about the "progress" in Nepal, she was very liberal and didn't wear traditional dress or the tikka (the dot on the forehead), about women's issues and the way village women are treated. She said that the women in the villages are considered slaves basically to her husband's family, and they are treated extremely poorly. She was from the Brahmin caste (the highest one) so was able to be educated and live pretty well in the city. Her mom and aunt were also on the bus, and she took the opportunity to point out to them that I was 29, not married and didn't have children as a point that it was okay that she hasn't had children yet. I entertained all sorts of questions from her mom and aunt about why I wasn't married, did I want to marry a Nepali man, etc. The ride was more or less smooth and I finished "The Snow Leopard" by Peter Mathiessen which was great, I highly recommend it.

Upon returning to Kathmandu I called Shashant from HHC, who informed me that there were roadblocks and I couldn't leave Kathmandu the next day. Ugh. I had stayed at a place in Thamel which is the ultra tourist district of Kathmandu before I left but was ready to get away from the noise and being hassled all the time in the streets by people selling things and begging so I moved down to a place in an area called Jhoche, or "Freak Street" by the foreigners. It was the original area that the hippies all stayed when they first let westerners into Nepal in the late 60's. It's older and less busy now but still has the amenities (guesthouses, restaurants, a few shops and internet). It's also right next to Durbur Square which is the central area with all the temples and historic places, and teems with locals going for their daily worship, selling their produce and wares in the streets, etc. So the past couple of days I've spent wandering the streets of Kathmandu more or less. I've decided that I like it best from 6-8am when its still fairly quiet and overcast. The women selling marigolds and candles for offerings are already set up in the street and people are going to the temples. The shopkeepers are just starting to open and people are busy setting up their stalls and blankets in the squares and streetcorners to sell whatever they have. After that it gets bright, crowded, dirtier as the day goes on, and so noisy with horns blaring and people constantly hassling you for a taxi, rickshaw, to buy something from them or begging, until nighttime. That night for the first time I was brave enough to try one of the local "restaurants" which is basically a little candlelit hole in the wall in an alley with a few tables and a curtain hanging over the doorway. I figured as long as I was going to be in Kathmandu for a couple days I could afford to be sick 😊 The guy spoke enough english to explain what the cuisine in the bowls on the counter were, but it was easy enough to see as well. I had my choice of some dried smashed rice, marinated buffalo chunks, buffalo brain, potato curry, fish head curry, fried sheep intestines/stomach, and chicken. I decided to go with the rice, buffalo meat, potato, and to be exotic the fried intestines. Eating parts of heads is just a bit much for me. The intestines were surprisingly good, and the rice and potatoes, but the buffalo made my stomach turn over a bit. I took some pepto bismol when I got back to the hotel and so far am doing okay, two days later.

The next day I went to a rooftop restaurant overlooking the Durbur Square for some lunchtime momo's (like dumplings, and really good), and after chatting with my waiter for a while I asked him how long it took to walk to Swayambhu, the big buddhist temple on the outskirts of town. He ended up being Buddhist and goes every morning (everyone goes to some sort of temple, hindu or buddhist EVERY day to give their offerings and pray) and asked if I wanted to come with him the next morning! The other nice thing that happened that day was walking through a really crowded street and someone grabbing my arm and saying "Jennifer!" It happened to me Kanchan's Mom and aunt from the bus ride. We chatted for a minute and I was introduced to the other sister, then parted ways. I thought it was pretty wonderful to run into someone that knows me on a crowded Kathmandu street, a city of 700,000 people.
Yesterday morning I headed up to Swayambhu with the waiter, Buddha Lama was his name. Turns out he used to be a monk and studied in Dharamsala with the Dalai Lama but he was a teenager an snuck out of the monastery and they kicked him out and sent him home. It was a really overcast and foggy/misty/chilly morning. You can usually see all of Kathmandu and some of the mountains because its set up on a pretty high hill but no views yesterday. It's also called the "monkey temple" because of all the monkeys running around, there's a ton of them there. It was nice to have a local guide, he explained what things were and some of the symbolism as we walked around the stupa and spun the prayer wheels.
I again called Shashant to confirm my flight for today, and found out that it was cancelled again. Utter despair! I'm so ready to get out of here! So now the plan is to leave on Monday, which means I have three more days to spend here. As lovely as temples and "sights" are I'm getting a bit tired of walking around and looking at things. I'm missing some of my creature comforts of home as well so this morning I walked up to the tourist area, had a nice REAL cup of coffee (most places just have instant "nescafe") and breakfast and a fancy little cafe and watched the BBC world news on their tv.....it was great. I haven't seen any news for a few weeks. Ironically, at this cafe I saw a poster for a talk on translating tibetan buddhist texts at the major local monastery and the visiting speakers were from Emory! I'm even toying with the idea of seeing an American film at the theater. Maybe if I take a day off from the "real" city and partake in my regular "American" indulgences I'll be ready to face the dirt and hassles of the city again tomorrow with a fresh face and perspective....I'll let you know 😊

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