The bus

I arrived in Kathmandu about a week and a half ago. Three days later Tiffany and I headed up to the Langtang region for a six day trek. It was about a nine and a half hour bus ride up to Syabrubesi from Kathmandu. (By the way, on Google Maps you can very clearly see the Langtang Valley that we hiked up east of Syabrubesi.) A bit of culture shock but not too bad. The trek was great--more on that later. It's the bus ride back down to Kathmandu yesterday that I'd like to write a bit about now...

The day yesterday started out normal enough. Tiffany and I woke up a little before six, got packed up and were down in the dining area / lobby of the hotel in Syabrubesi by 6:15. Our guide, Ganesh, and our porter, Rishi, met us down there for a simple breakfast. We opted to not have Nepali/milk tea before the bus ride. So we walked out onto the (unpaved) street, prayer flags all around, chickens, half built buildings, etc. We found our bus, put our bags on top, got on, and a bit later started the journey down towards Kathmandu. It's something like 170 km from Syabrubesi to Kathmandu, but it takes something like nine hours. How is that possible? Yes, we stop for lunch, and pick people up and drop them off pretty much anywhere along the way. And yes, the road is still under construction. And yes, the road is one, maybe one and a half lanes. But it is soooo windy. And the "hills" are sooo steep. It's kind of crazy, really.

So anyhow, we stared down from Syabrubesi. There were cases of beer and water on the floor in the middle of the bus, heading down to the next town for some reason. They were burning incense in the front of the bus. There was typical Bollywod music. There were posters inside the bus of Hindu gods and goddesses. The front of the bus said various things in Nepali that I couldn't read along with "Slow Drive, Long Life" or "Slow Control" or something like this. All of the busses are made by the Indian company Tata, and have slogans like this. Many of them also say "Wel Come" on the door. The English spelling and grammar--when there is English--is often pretty entertaining. There were children with their eyes painted with mascara--something about some god and better eyesight? There were many women in reds and oranges and all kinds of wild, beautiful colors.

More and more people got on as we headed down the hill, until it was sholder to sholder in the walkway in the middle of the bus. People would hand off their children to people sitting in the seats. People would just sit on the floor. Tiffany and I had a ten year old girl who looked like she was about to pass out in our laps. Children started vomitting (in Japanese tourists' laps). A woman sitting right across from Tiffany and me projectile vomitted a couple times. The roads are so windy, and the cliffs are so steep and so many. There are no lanes. Truks and busses slow down to a stop, get within inches of each other, and just work it out. We would see piles of rock in the road. Tracters, trucks, people walking down the road hearding goats, people sifting wheat in the middle of the road. The roof of the bus probably had 15 - 20 young men on top of it along with our luggage.

And then there were some Maoists throwing rocks at a minister who drove by. The Moaists had their black flags.

And then the bus ran out of fuel. We found some and started up again.

And then the bus had a short. They fixed it.

And finally--thirtteen hours later--we arrived in Kathmandu. Kind of in shock.

Just one piece of Nepal.

Photos soon. Loadshedding and such...