2,860 meters: Ghorepani Day 4

My first morning waking up on the trek and even though it was cold, I woke up early, crawled out of my mountains of blankets and stood outside to see the sun swoop over the mountain. I ate the strangest breakfast of toast, an egg, popcorn and a few boiled potatoes and bundled up for another day. My guide told me this was the most intense day as it was all up the mountain.

Most of the time we were not trekking on dirt paths but rather large stone steps built by the Nepali people for ease of getting their mules up and down with their supplies. The steps were steep and forever winding upward. It was easily the most intense work out of my life. My lungs burned and my fingers swelled to the size of sausages. Luckily I’ve always had pretty damn strong legs that almost felt disembodied, carrying me up even when my lungs felt like they were going to give out.

The first time I saw a snow peak over the brown mountains I squeeled so loud my voice bounced down the side of the mountain. We began chasing the peak, watching it grow.

We stopped only for a herd of sheep to pass.

At 5pm, we made it to our lodge.

Now we could see a full view of the snowy Himalayas. The lodge was packed with trekkers. A large fire stove in the center warmed people and wet socks. The girls and I settled into a table and ordered tea and chocolate cake. CHOCOLATE CAKE. I sat eating chocolate cake and drinking ginger tea looking at the Himalayas.

Are you beyond jealous right now?

It was absolutely freezing (30 degrees Fahrenheit) and I forced myself into a little slimy dark shell of a shower because there promised to be hot water. There was, and I was happy, until I got cold, and then I was not happy.

I ate the best chicken soup of my life for dinner. Read a little of my book (Infinite Jest does not promise to be a good trekking book when your brain is heavy and tired but I keep at it), and fell asleep at 8pm.

I was so proud of myself for today. It was so hard and I made it up a mountain people train to do. I had no idea I should be training for this trek, so I didn’t. But I made it up just the same.

Namaste,

Chelsea

1,430 Meters: Hile Day 3

Again we got up at 5am. Ate breakfast in the shivery dark and piled into a car. We drove 2 hours to Nayapul (Alt. 1,070 meters), where we would finally start our trek. The car dipped between other cars dancing with the cliff edge. We drove in circles higher up the mountain. My training in public health filled me with statistics about Nepal’s car accident fatalities but there was nothing I could do. I relaxed and let go. Living in this continent has made me a lot less nervous because otherwise I would have no teeth or knuckles from gritting and squeezing.

We stopped at a tea stall, had our eighth cup for the morning, and the porters looped thick ropes around our bags, tying them expertly together. They made a head brace out of hemp to support the load and leaned into it. Unreal amount of weight. Before our guilt was too consuming we were explained that these men depended on our trips for their livelihood. They WANTED to carry our bags up the mountain…

Today would be a 5 hour trek ending in an overall altitude of 1,430 meters at Hile. Our walk started through Nepali villages. It was similar to Bangladesh except I swear the lifted air of repression was palpable. The smiles were bigger and the clothes were smaller.

The babies in Nepal are cuter than any babies I have seen anywhere. My new plan is to adopt one.

We passed so many waterfalls. The mountainside was green and divided into large steps for irrigation. Women and men bent over large areas of dried Millet beating them with sticks to remove the seeds.

It was a good group. Us three girls talked about our lives and difference and similarities in culture and Paul generally stayed quiet and led the pack.

No cars could go up the mountain so all loads were carried by Mules, Horses and Men.

Lunch was taken at a tea house on the side of the mountain and had an array of carb dishes we could choose from: veg noodles, momos, pizza, spaghetti, etc etc. Not to mention snickers. The girls and I craved chocolate so much on this trip that we tended to have a chocolate bar a day here.

We reached our hotel at 5pm. It was a series of rooms, insulated by unfinished pine boards, 3 small beds to a room. The shower was freezing and dark and damp and the toilet was a squat toilet in a shed. But the view.

Our little rooms looked out onto a mountain so green and clear.

It made our aching bodies relax at the sight. We ate dinner and drank tea and the girls

freaked me out for not packing a sleeping bag. The temperature was dropping at a scary rate. I asked for 4 blankets, piled on sweaters, hat and gloves and went to bed at 8pm.

Namaste,

Chelsea

1,700 Meters: Pohkra Day 2

With my backpack loaded onto my back, I made my way through the dark light streets of Thamel, Kathmandu at 5:30 am. Shop owners were starting up their breakfast fires, a smell I’m really going to miss and crave back in the states. At the Trek Nepal Office, I met our group. There were four of us: Rosalyn, a 33 year old scientist from Ireland, Robyn, a 24 year old traveler from South Africa and Paul, a 52 year old economist from Belgium. We also met our guide, Brahmo, and our porters. Porters are staff hired to help carry your bags up the mountains. Don’t get me started on the guilt on my back felt from the load on their back. But they were definitely needed.

Today there would be no trekking. We got into a bus and made our way to Pohkra, a city nestled between mountains. The bus ride was 8 hours. We stopped for lunch at a small restaurant and I ordered the traditional Nepalsese meal: Dhal Bhat which is almost identical to the meals I have grown to love in Bangladesh. I started to eat the meal with my hands as I am accustomed and realized all the tourists were looking at me. Keep in mind I had on a full Salwar Kamise from Bangladesh scarf and all. I felt like a total I’m-a-local-see-look-I’m-eating-with-my-hands and soon stopped.

In Pohkra we unloaded into this quaint and dirty little hotel right off the main strip. Rosalind and Robyn and I bonded as quickly and tightly as anyone about to embark on days of extreme physical intensity. We took this as our “last night” and walked down little shops for our last minute necessities. The girls thought I was crazy for going on a 5 day intense hike with just sneakers. They made me buy hiking shoes. THANK GOD.

It was pouring rain outside and we popped into a cozy restaurant lit with circle fires. Corey (the Canadian) had to leave for Madagascar that day but the South African, Denmarkian, and Norweigian joined us in Pohkra for dinner. We drank hot totties until we were hot and tottered back to our hotel in the rain. Tomorrow we would wake for our trek at 5am.

Namaste,

Chelsea

1,400 Meters: Kathmandu Day 1

It started in Kathmandu. I got off the plane at 3pm and was in a city that was teeming and pulsing with life. I could have been in Dhaka. But Dhaka high up in the mountains with a view that will take your breath away. Central Kathmandu, Thamel, is a mecca for expats of every flavor. You could feel the city’s release. Expats left their countries and NGOs to meet up in the city to share and sin. It was thrilling and intoxicating.

I head straight for my hotel. I had made reservations there a week ago but they had no record of it. I was so bummed, I had researched so much. Created excel sheets and price charts—this was the best hotel. Kathmandu was packed so the only hotel with an empty room I could find me was a gritty one in the center of the city. Up some dingy steps and I found my single bed. I didn’t care, I was just so excited to be here. I head immediately out to find supplies for my trek. I ate dinner in this place my guide told me about. Literally down an alley, Himali kitchen, was a local Nepali restaurant. It was brilliant. I was the only white person and felt so smug about it. I stuffed myself silly with momos. I think I prefer eating meals alone; more time to savor.

As I was leaving the restaurant I met four absolutely beautiful men from South Africa, Denmark, Norway and Canada respectively. I think they were the Adonis breed of their countries. I walked into their circle and asked where they got the marijuana they were smoking. (just a conversation starter, I don’t smoke.) They told me about the green heaven on the treks and invited me to join them for drinks and dinner. I like being alone, I really do. But I couldn’t deny their beauty. We ate together, then went to a bar. The Canadian (who currently works in Madagascar) and I split off and we drank and talked until 5am when I needed to leave to catch the bus for my trek.

Namaste,

Chelsea

An Update in Three Parts

Part I:

11/2/11

A staff member’s daughter died from drowning today. She was two years old. Can you fucking imagine? 2 years old. And my project is still wrapped up in a red tape nightmare. Tragic irony. I need to get away. I need a break.

Part II:

11/3/11

Heading to Nepal today. Can’t wait. It’s a break I really need. Between the gravity of death and the more petty boy relationship problems I just want to see a mountain and have it suck the perspective back into me.

I got to the airport 3 hours early. As I was going through immigration I was stopped. The man looked up. “Ma’am, you have expired your visa, please come with me.” Visions of left forgotten in a Bangladesh jail flooded. I was taken to the immigration police. I was told that I had expired my visa by 66 days. Bloody hell. Even though my visa was good for a year, it turns out it was a year “30 days at a time.” MEANING I have to leave Bangladesh every 30 days. I missed my plane and called my Jiva contact in Dhaka. “Please Saidul I’m at the airport and I need help. Please come get me.”

Saidiul came immediately and we drove the 2 hours (10 miles with Dhaka traffic) to the country immigration office. I’m on the phone with a travel agent trying to rebook my ticket to Kathmandu. But all the flights are booked because this is a big national holiday and everyone is trying to leave the country to vacation. We make it the office, cut past all sorts of people and have a guard open the back door for us. I don’t know, maybe they thought I was someone important and not some grungy little blue collar through and through?

We go straight up the Deputy Visa director. She is yelling at us with a mouth full of Dhal, “she is free to go if she pays us $550 in cash. But the banks close in 10 minutes for the holiday so run.” I run to an ATM, and, being the grad student I am do not have that much in my account. I have to borrow some from our driver. But no time to “oi” because now we’re running back to the office. Signing documents, hands filthy with money, collecting signatures and panting.

6 HOURS LATER, I have my passport signed and stamped. I have my exit visa. I am free to leave the country within 7 days and then return. Now we race over to the Bangladesh Airline headquarters to see if we can get me a ticket out of the country. Make it just in time. With a few tears and a pledge that it is my (13 year old) sister’s wedding in Nepal on Sunday and I got a ticket to Kathmandu Saturday, the day before I leave on my trek.

Giddy, starving and exhausted, we get back in the car for the 3 hour (11 mile) journey back.

Part III

Becky invited me to go to the American club with her to unwind and offered up her guest room for the night. The American club was dizzying. I was swept up by soft white hands, handed a glass of red wine, a plate of eggplant parmesan and placed in a soft chair on a rooftop deck overlooking a pool. I lost track of the Dhaka honking, and the heat and dust and death and stress of it all and let the wine make my head heavy. The scintillating conversation and parmesan cheese carried me away and I didn’t feel one bit guilty about it.

Where Do the Children Play?

I was leaving a restaurant in Dhaka and three little children started to follow me. Around 2, 4, and 6 years old respectively. The eldest kind of supported the youngest with her arm. Oh they were cute with big eyes and little tiny bodies. “Please ma’am please. Money please.” They developed a limp the farther they followed me. I gave one of the littlest girls a rose I had been carrying around with me. 5 steps later she threw it on the ground. “Please ma’am please some change.”

I had refused a beggar knocking his head against my taxi for money because he was limbless. I could refuse these big eyes. I started to cross the street and the little children followed me. Suddenly a huge truck comes careening down the dark street. I picked up one girl by the shirt and threw her in front of me and pushed the other two really hard with my remaining arm and leg. They were barely missed. I am still shaking.

They followed me for one more block, then turned around and head back into the dark street.

Sighs from a girl in Gaibandha

There should be an expatriot match.com. A matchpat.com

Location: South Asia

Interested in: expat health worker, tall, tan, and speaks English with an accent.

Not interested in: backpackers, Christian aid workers, anyone over 30.

Current expat American living in rural Bangladesh seeks male to join in eating curry, going on long dusty walks and being excruciatingly sober. Must like cow dung.