Everest, Moving, Cooking

So I got back from my trip to Everest Base Camp a few days ago but haven't had a chance to post on here. While I was gone we moved to a new apartment a couple blocks away from where we had been and the internet isn't quite hooked up yet. We have been using these nifty USB connection things put out by Ncell, but they get used up by the amount of data you download, so I've been rather sparing with it. Should have our internet connection back up and working today though, I think.

So the trip up to Everest went really well and I'll have photos and some more detailed posts soon. We walked from Jiri to Lukla in four days, had some pizza at Khumbu lodge, and then made our way to base camp after a rest day in Namche and a few shorter acclimatization days on the way up the track. The upside of this trip was crystal clear skies, the clearest weather I've had up that way. The downside was that it was quite cold, and on the day we planned on heading toward the Cho La we got hit with a decent snow storm that kept us from crossing the pass and even made the high trail to Phortse questionable so instead we just headed back to Kathmandu. Still, I got some of my best photos of Ama Dablam, Everest, Lhotse, Nuptse and others that I've ever been able to get. Donnie even got to drink his Everest Beer at Everest Base Camp.

While we were gone, as I mentioned, Kim got us moved into a new apartment. This ones a two bed, two bath, with a full living room dining room and a nice kitchen with a pantry. In an attempt to move to something that comes closer to resembling the first world we even bought a washing machine, so no more laundry by hand. This place is on another dead end street so it's still quiet for Kathmandu, which is a big bonus. Marble floors, moldings on the ceiling, and a bedroom almost as big as our last apartment has me feeling like we moved into a palace, but the electricity black outs sure enough remind you that we are indeed still in Kathmandu. Still we've been able to run the projector off the inverter and have been watching the first few seasons of Dexter at night while munching on whatever food I've been experimenting with. Hellfire wings a couple nights ago, various pasta sauces the night before and a blue cheese based yogurt dressing with a huge salad last night.

Which brings me to the final part of this update, new food and cooking. I'm planning on expanding what I sell at the market by a significant amount. The plan is to include the south west style pulled chicken, pulled pork, at least two different pasta sauces and a marinara sauce if I can get my hands on any red bell pepper, along with a hot sauce, some Greek style yogurt dip, and maybe a few other items. I'll also expand to pesto, chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, and possibly a Buffalo pulled chicken with blue cheese once I get some supplies from the states. The aim of all of this is to not only produce a bit more income, but to gage interest in a few items as I possibly start working toward putting a restaurant together. The big question mark is of course the up front financial investment, let alone figuring out how to get fresh beef in a Hindu country, how to keep prep refrigerated in a country that is without power more often than it has power, where to get things like fryolators, fountain drink machines and the gas that goes with them as well as syrup, and how you could motivate a staff of south Asians to run an American style restaurant. Starting the process of looking into all of it anyway, and in the meantime putting together some new recipes. 

Bryan Adams Can't Save Nepal

So there is a Bryan Adams concert in Nepal tonight. One would think that a concert by a man whose last song you can recall on the radio happened back when you were in middle school wouldn't be that big a deal. This case might gain further relevance when you consider that the song in question wasn't even that good and was attached to a very bad film featuring a very bad Kevin Costner playing Robin Hood. But I suppose if you happen to be a Bryan Adams fan it's your lucky day if you're in Nepal- good for you.

The problem is that the way this concert is being billed you'd think Kurt Cobain rose from the grave and Nirvana was having a reunion concert in Nepal. He's being touted as a legend of rock as if the Rolling Stones or someone with- you know immense talent that didn't sing cheesy soft rock love songs that people stopped listening to almost twenty years ago. This event has been watched with more enthusiasm and worry for national pride than the writing of the national constitution (I only wish this were hyperbole). People have deemed the day of his arrival D-Day, and the Nepali press has followed every development closely.

Newscaster: "This isn't the first bad thing to come out of Canada. Let us not forget about Bryan Adams!"

Canadian PM: "Now, now, the Canadian government has apologized for Bryan Adams on several occasions!"

-South Park

As the above quote indicates, to some extent, Bryan Adams was a bit of a joke back home even when the South Park movie came out back in 1999. That was 12 years ago. I'm not really writing this to rip on Bryan Adams, again if you like him or even just want to have fun at a concert than have at it. What is sad is listening to people in the press who equate this concert to economic growth or increased tourism. Look your country isn't going to head out of the gutter because Bryan Adams plays a concert there. Hell it doesn't improve even if someone who really was in demand played in Nepal, economic development isn't stimulated through music concerts.

The sadder comment I've heard is that this concert is the unofficial highlight to Nepal Tourism Year 2011. Look, to be honest, if Bryan Adams was playing at the next town over in most of the west, very few people would bother to drive over to see him, thus it seems a little crazy to suspect that people would come to Kathmandu in order to see him. It would be embarrassing for most people, even if it was true due to a questionable taste in music, to admit out loud that they traveled all the way to Nepal to see Bryan Adams. In short this is not an event for tourists, or one that will increase tourism. If people in Nepal love this guy and are excited to see him, then that's great, but it is also the limit of the impact. 

On another level I get it that Nepal wants to show that it can host an internationally known artist, can provide a venue where he can preform, and provide a high level experience without messing everything up. Yes even in the land of load shedding no electricity we can still hold a major concert event. Logistics, not being south Asia's strong point, has been a nightmare for India as of recent- see the Cricket World Cup or the even more botched Commonwealth Games. Everyone knows its difficult as hell to organize and do anything here, so props to Nepal for pulling this together, I do understand the difficulty. That said, nobody from outside of Asia that doesn't understand the inherent difficulties of doing anything here is going to be impressed. Putting on a concert for a "star" like Bryan Adams is something that even small towns or sea side parks do on a regular basis back home. 

In the end Bryan Adams won't save Nepal- and he sure as hell won't boost Nepal Tourism Year. The amount of national pride and interest that was focussed on this would be better focussed on other national endeavors. Maybe completing hydro power dams so that Kathmandu isn't the only capitol city on the planet that is regularly without power for half the day, or completing a constitution and creating an actual representative government. But maybe that's just me.

Tamang Heritage Trail: Part I

Ok, so we're back from hiking a little early, and short on anything to do with the Langtang valley, instead we did just the Tamang Heritage Trail. I'll explain why in this post (or the next) but the short of it is that Kim wasn't fond of steep down hills in the snow, something there was sure to be more of in Langtang proper. This part aside, we had a great time, saw some great stuff and met some fantastic people. I was able to map the whole trail with GPS and the results can be seen in the Google Earth image below. I've color coded each days hike a different color, and the places we spent a night are marked as the house with a flag.

I was really happy with how my Garmin performed, getting what looks like really good data almost the whole trip. The only day things got a little jumpy was on day 5 (purple) when we were walking at the bottom of the valley and had our worst satellite exposure. On close inspection you can see that there is a slight deviation between reality and where Google has their imaging, it's just under a 100' shift to the west. I've mapped all my photos and POI in one KML file, so if anyone is interested just leave a comment or e-mail me and I can send you the file.

So to get to this region you catch a 7 AM bus out of northern Kathmandu, with an estimated travel time of ten hours. Despite being under 80 miles as the crow flies, several ridges, rivers, and miles upon miles of switchbacks mark the actual route, making it a very long ride. To add to the comfort, the bus is made for Nepali people, meaning if you are over 5' tall your knees hit the seat in front of you. Our bus made numerous stops along the way, onloading and offloading various bags of grain, rice, potatoes, people what ever. At one point we came across a traffic back up due to a blocked road. Apparently there had been an accident, the guy who had hit someone on a motorcycle had fled on foot, and to prevent his car from going anywhere until police arrived the road had been blocked. Two hours later we continued on our way and reached our destination after only 11 hours and a few bruises. That night we stayed at the Hotel Peaceful and I awoke with the worst dehydration headache I have ever had, I felt like someone had kicked me in the back of the head with a steel toe boot. Only time in my life I have been nauseous from pain, apparently caused from some odd muscles I used to hold my pack on the bus and a lack of proper hydration. Lesson learned I guess.

So anyway on to the trail. By the time morning rolled around I was feeling much better. The day started with about 2,500' ascent up a bunch of switchbacks that would get us to Rongga Bhanjyang a pass at just about 7,500'. Along this section we got awesome views of Langtang Lirung and the adjacent mountains. Along the trails were numerous Buddhist Chortens (pictured above) and mani walls. These all added to the already picturesque landscape.
After topping the pass we continued down the "road" for another couple miles to the village of Godam, from where we took a trail gently leading down the hill toward the village of Gotlang. This is where we ended our first day, and the view from the community lodge there can be seen above (the mountain is Langtang Lirung). The lodge was run by a man named Dawa who was incredibly helpful and made our stay very comfortable. The village was extremely photogenic and Kim got some of her better pictures of people here. We also had the fortune of sharing the lodge with a Dutch couple, the kind of people that you are grateful to spend dinner with chatting over whatever. Really interesting people.
Above is a picture of Kim being mobbed by children who want their photo taken. They would all yell "One Photo?!?" and then after the shot they would run to see their faces in the preview screen, then run away again so they could get in another picture.

From Gotlang the trail descended gradually along the ridge down to the Bamdang Khola (a river) which we crossed then turned north along the Chilime Khola (another river) to the town of Chilime. We then crossed this river and began the long climb up to Gongoling, where we had lunch. While waiting for lunch some woman came through town singing and dancing which was kind of cool. The lodge owner was also very helpful and after lunch we made our way to Tatopani (meaning hot water) where we spent the next night. Here they also had hot springs and we were able to get a fairly nice bath.

I'll Continue the rest of the hike's details in the next post. My pictures can be viewed from the link on the side of the page "Tamang Heritage Trail" it's the mini slide show. Kim's much better and more numerous photos can be viewed HERE.

A Can of Gas, and some Electricity

So for the last few days we have been a little limited in our internet access due to only having internet when we have power. Power in Nepal is rationed this time of year, and thus we are at the whims of load shedding. A table entitled "Load Shading Ineffective from 28 Jan 2000 years and 10" (this makes me laugh every time) tells us when we do and don't have power. We've concluded after some observations that we are in zone 3. The good news is that we got a battery and inverter today that charges when the power is on and lets us continue to work when the power goes out. An electrician will be over tomorrow to hook it up.

We also made the jump to gas powered cooking yesterday when we got a gas canister for our stove. Our first meal was ginger fried rice, and todays lunch was mexican rice with refried beans and salsa. Not five star but it's nice to be able to cook again. The produce here is very cheap, and I was able to find some Nepali produced mozzarella that is quite good for only 150 NRS. As long as you stick to what is grown in season you can eat very good food on the cheap.

As usual both of these recent acquisitions owe thanks to Pradip for contacting the right people and getting them into our hands, especially the inverter and battery. My understanding is that all the inverters were draining the power supply so the government moved to ban their import. That combined with several recent holidays had made it a tricky matter to get our hands on one. Pradip always seems to know who to talk to.

Moving On

So this will be my second time writing this entry, and the first one had pictures and a movie! Unfortunately the internet and the power have been slightly unreliable, and despite the setbacks I'll get some pics and movies up someday...just not today it seems. So anyway on to the post.

No word on our bags yet, but I'm not going to dwell on it too much, you do what you can and the rest is out of your hands. With our small compensation amount given to us ($50/each) we set out yesterday to buy some clothes, since we had the same thing on for like 4 days. Buying clothes made for Asian people when you are of European descent is not always easy, and the selection was not things I would normally buy, but oh well. Much harder for woman I think, so I won't complain. The upside was that we got to drive around a bit of Kathmandu and see some of the larger shopping areas. Going through one of the grocery areas I was surprised and delighted to see many items I had thought I would have to give up; Tabasco (!!!!), Cheddar Cheese, feta cheese, Salsa, Olives, olive oil, Balsamic Vinegar, and plenty of other things that had been staples in my kitchen. Yay! We also spotted the rumored KFC and Pizza Hut, but I'm not in a hurry to go to either. I've read a place called Fire and Ice serves up really good New York style pizza if I get a hankering for it.

Between these stops and going to the Air India office we got to drive around quite a bit and get a feel for the driving. No way will I ever drive here. Traffic consists of motor bikes, bicycles, cars, pedestrians, dogs, rickshaws, tuk-tuks, vans and the odd cow chicken or goat. Traffic supposedly keeps to the left side of the road (Brit style) but really it just moves anywhere it can fit. Everything seems to come from all sides at all times and aside from constant signalling via horns and headlights I can't distinguish any real rules to the road, and also note that the roads are constrained, no wider than many people's drive ways in the US. Despite the apparent unorchestrated chaos they call traffic, it all does seem to flow (all be it at a slower pace) without any incidents. You would think after watching it for just an hour or so you would witness a fatality, but I haven't, nor have I seen an accident.

As mentioned I had video of the traffic, and a pic of KFC, but they are on my laptop, which is across town atm. Maybe I can get them loaded in an update. Another positive note is that I got my GPS device to finally lock on some satellites and figure out I was in a different hemisphere, it kept trying to acquire believing I was still in Westbrook. With this I plan on geo-referencing a lot of our pictures and mapping where we are staying and visiting. Those of you who don't have google earth, get it HERE!

UPDATE: Picture added, video is too big to upload on this connection,