Kathmandu

After a couple of buses (Mysore to Bangalore, Bangalore to the airport), a flight and a pickup from our hotel we had arrived in the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu. The pickup had driven through some small cobbled streets to our hotel (Hotel Tenki), people everywhere, locals wearing masks to limit exposure pollution, but this place was quaint and even though India was so close, the feel of it was so much further away. I think it’s safe to say the moment we stepped off the plane, we loved Nepal!

We checked in and dumped our bags to go and explore. It was fairly early in the morning so we had plenty of the day to get lost in the endless streets of tourist merchandise and miniature Buddhas. Even though the actual place felt remote, i.e. the building architecture and general feel, you couldn’t get away from the fact that this was a tourist and hikers city. Along with the nik-nak stalls there were countless North Face knock-offs and trekking gear at a fraction of the price. I played along asking how much for a North Face shirt when I was wearing the exact same one…!

Tired from the travel we decided to find some food and came across the Green Organic Cafe. A cool little place off the main street with a couple of levels. We headed straight for the top and open air. We got some soup and drinks, I decided to try some local beer while Heather opted for some green thing, ice with some mint and lemonade we think…. It was nice, then the rain came! Our first proper downpour since we left, everything was go, water overflowing in the gutters and flooding the kitchen! Luckily we’d placed ourselves just out of harms way under the tin roof and had a good view of the staff scurrying to fix leaks! The fun tired us out and we headed for bed.

The next day we decided to do what we’d come for, sightseeing! We wandered for a while in the general direction of the main attraction, Durbar Square and soon found it. It looked at bit like someone had taken some temples from a remote jungle and squished them into the centre of the city! It’s a brilliant difference from the hustle of the streets we’d just come from.

About 20 seconds from when we had paid entry (look out for a little hut on the way in, they aren’t obvious and we nearly got escorted to it…) we were approached by a rather persistent guide who insisted on taking us round the square (at a discounted price of course, Rs 1000 in our case), eventually after much hassle we decided it was probably the best way to actually get some ‘non guidebook advice’ and let him whisk us around the monuments for an hour or so. The last stop of the tour was an obligatory selling point, he took us to a Mandala painting school. Mandala are a form of picture to represent the universe, all are different designs and are painted by hand, usually taking a month or two. The styles vary greatly between artists and one artist usually dedicates his profession to one style, either modern or traditional. The modern paintings are very colourful with defined colour gradients ring/circle, while the traditional are usually more detailed, with many different layers of depiction.

Unsurprisingly, we were sat down and shown several artworks of which we were very taken by one of the traditional pieces, we show a little too much interest and we asked how we would like to pay. Very direct, but by now, expected! We said we’d come back later if we wanted it.

As we’d been shown round the square at lightening pace we decided to retrace our steps and look more in detail at what we’d been shown. It was at this point we decided we were a little lost and had a sit down…!

Mid chat regarding the candy floss selling boy approaching us with eyes locked on his next sale (not that we wanted any) we were found to be having a chat to a Nepali man who was describing treks and walks he had been on, he opened his book full of memoirs of treks he had guided on dating back to the 1980’s. One of the comments that we spotted went something along the lines of “Go on, have a drink [tea] with Tazbir, listen to what he has to say!”, So we decided to take him up on the offer and go have a chat.

We had been previously thinking about going on a trek while we were here, one idea was to trek to base camp but we soon realised we didn’t have the right gear let alone time so we quickly ditched it! However, during our conversation with Tazbir, we warmed to him and decided to let him take us on a slightly custom made easy trek around the foot hills of the Himalayas over three days. The tour would take us from Kathmandu to a little place called Sankhusuntol to Bhaktapur and back to Kathmandu. Everything was included except beer! We handed over a deposit (hard to see the cash go considering we had only just met the guy, we had a phone number though :S) but we said we’d meet up at the hotel the next day bright and early!

We finished off our day looking round the rest of the square and eventually ending up in the museum which we saw a parade of Gurkhas from the tower we were in. They we lining up for what looked like either some kind of parade or ceremony (full uniform, instruments playing, flags hoisted), however as we soon learned they we actually just getting on a small bus! They were good to see and made my day!

Time for food and we decided to head to one of the places I’d liked the look of, the Yak restaurant. The menu mainly filled with curries (and naan), we’d spotted the place a couple of times but we were either still full from lunch or it was so busy we couldn’t get a seat. This time however we were neither so we headed in…

Being honest I can’t remember what we ordered but one thing will stick with me for quite a while, the drink I ordered. It was called Tungba, apparently the local alcoholic beverage. At first we didn’t quite know what it was, it had arrived in a wooden cask topped with warm cloudy water, inside were seeds that we soon discovered were Millet seed (you know, the one you feed to birds…). Accompanying the cask was a jug of warm water, apparently to top up the cask when you have drunk all that is in it. Anyways, I’ll let the pictures below speak for themselves – it wasn’t very nice! Just thinking about it now makes my stomach turn. This said I tried quite a considerable amount, mainly because of two things, 1. the taste changed each time I topped up the cask with fresh water, 2. there were a few other people that had ordered it and seemed to be getting on with it so I thought I was missing something!

Anyhow, after the ordeal we paid up, and headed to the hotel a bit later than planned. Time for a trek!