arnika round the world

It was so good to see Jess and Andy again after almost 2 years of them living in the Philippines teaching at an international school just outside Manila. Seeing the school they teach at and staying at their house, which is all included, has made me seriously becoming a teacher. Its such a sweet deal! The school and where they live is in the area called Brentville that is like this cheesy American style gated community. Normally not what I’d go for but its pretty nice, 2 mins walk from an amazing school, lovely house with a ‘helper’, who is lovely and cooks and cleans for them a couple of days a week. Everyone is friends with the neighbors there’s 2 pools to choose from and pretty much everything is included in their job and they get paid more than at home and work less. I don’t understand why teachers would even stay in NZ. Plus they have weekends and holidays to travel around the Philippines, which is an amazing country with practically no tourists. So we spent out week living it up in luxury which was well needed after India. Spent quite a bit of time just chilling out, swimming in the pool and visiting people for mega settlers of Catan games.
The Philippines is really cool, very westernized, heaps of malls around, billboards for Gap and massive highways where people are actually driving in lanes and there’s not cows wandering around everywhere. Lots of imported stuff means Starbucks are everywhere, as well as French restaurants and Jess and Andy’s cupboards are filled with Balsamic vinegar, pita breads, pesto and topped off with fresh mangos and pineapples, so pretty much perfect place to live.
What was really cool when we arrived was that a group of the teachers were organizing a whole lot of Christmas presents for the little village that lived literally on the other side of the fence that surrounded Brentville. Lots of the guards and workers live there so it was like a thank you present. So first day Tash and me were bagging up presents that had all been donated by teachers. Everyone family got a food bucket and every person got a massive bag filled with gender and age appropriate presents. We just came in at the end to help for a few hours but would have been a massive job.
Our second day we went out with a bunch of Canadians, first to Starbucks then up to the ridge of a big volcano that has a lake in the middle with another volcano in the middle of that with a lake in the middle of that one as well. We headed to the edge of the water and hired a couple of boats and speed out for about 30 mins to the second volcano where we hiked up the top. The Canadians, like Andy, were P.E teachers so they all charged up while me and Tash slowly followed sweating in the humidity we were not yet used to. Every so often there was holes in the ground with hot steam coming out because as we realized it was still an active volcano, and all the rocks up the top were too hot to sit on, a bit freaky! Amazing views from the top across the water and down in to the lake in the middle. Had a few team photos and a fresh coconut, which I was hanging out for. Back down the dusty track and into the boat that got to about half way in the middle of the lake and…stopped. For a few long minutes we were bobbing about with land looking very far away and the already dodgy sounding wooden boat struggling to get the motor going again. Luckily, it spluttered back into life and we were off again, with the wind picking up by the time we got back we were all pretty much soaked.
Day 3 was off into Manila to do some Christmas shopping. One thing the Philippines do well is Christmas, being a catholic country it is huge and everywhere is decked out with lights, nativity scenes. We went to a few massive malls that are super flash, far nicer than anything at home and because of the heat (we were there in winter and it was hard to handle) air con malls are they way to go. The afternoon we headed into Intramuras the old Spanish area of the town for a walking tour to get a bit of Pinoy history. The guy who takes the tour is a fast talking, hilariously funny and very knowledgeable Pilipino, with a bag full of props this tour was for those ‘with short attention spans’, good for us as the afternoon sun and a morning of shopping were taking its toll. The 3 hours went surprisingly fast and we learnt heaps mostly about how the country had been screwed over by the Spanish, the Japanese and the Americans. And particularly how Manila had been destroyed in WW2 and never really recovered. We learnt about local food (pig stomachs in bile), interesting house designs, dodgy Spanish friars and how Pinoy culture is a sort of mix between so many different things. It was really really good and really interesting. The area we walked around was what was left of the Manila before it was bombed, beautiful Spanish architecture and cathedrals. Really worthwhile tour and increased my knowledge from about zero to at least a little. Very interesting history with colonialization and the war etc.
After that we were pretty tired but still more shopping to do! And know we had a little secret santa going on. We headed to this mall that had been attached to a covered market. I would have brought a lot but know I can get all rip off labels in Thailand so had to wait. After fighting our way around and dinner at a yummy Chinese restaurant (so nice and reasonably cheap) we went to stay at one of Jess and Andy’s friends who live in an apartment in central Manila. He’s away for the holiday and just gave us they keys to stay there as much as we liked. This definitely set my mind on being an international school teacher, the apartment was amazing! Like a big house inside a building, beautiful views, 2 floors with swimming pools and one more outside, a masseuse came at 10.30pm to give Andy an hour massage for $10, cable TV, huge rooms with massive on suits and walk in wardrobes. Great place to just hang out after a pretty busy day!

Well when I get around to it I will write a proper blog about my last week of luxuary in Brentville, Philipines. But for now here is a little video of our firework we made from all the crazy and would be illegal in NZ, firework shops here. Always a good way to celebrate chrstmas! Off to Thailand tonight…enjoy

this is a little video from base camp in Nepal

Compared to India, HK was so clean, and shiny, and organised. The airport was big, travelators along the floor, toilets with toilet paper…I got confused and overwhelmed and filled in a departure card instead of an arrival card. So back to the end of the line.
I did eventually make it out, the airport was pretty massive and I grabbed some yummy cheap sandwhiches before getting on the bus into town (so easy and organised). 40 minutes later we were in downtown Kowloon surrounded by more shops than I’d ever seen, billboards sand neon signs almost blocked the sky and people everywhere. I found my hostel inside this massive building on the man road which probably had more people inside than the whole of Christchurch. The hostel was more of a corridor with beds in it, just seemed like a whole lot of different rooms called different hotels and hostels. All a bit strange, but a whole lot of cool people in their. I went down to the water with a German guy to check out the skyline and watch a lightshow they have there every night. One thing that I did notice was the incredible amount of christmas decorations, in India I’d almost forgoten it was christmas but here they’d gone all out and down on the water the massive syscrapers across from us had the entire sided of them covered in neon santas. All pretty crazy, but the view was pretty incredible, I’d never seen so many massive building and the lightshow was interesting, a speaker behind us blasted out some cheesy music and all the buildings flashed along in time with massive lazers. We went had some chinese for dinner then went back to bed as I was shattered by then because of my early start that morning. Wasn’t flying out until late that night so I spent the day checking out a bit of the city. Went and dropped a big bag of stuff I don’t need for the last bit of the trip at the hotel me and tash are staying at on the way home. Tash organised it and its a super flash, 5 star hotel. Wll be cool to stay there on the way home and great to get rid of things I don’t need as it made my bag about half empty. I caught the ferry over to the island where it seems there are more banks than people. Everything is all super flash, there a shopping malls everywhere and people shopping everywhere, kind of crazy.

Stocked up on a few supplys then it was time to head to the airport. The bus was bit late so was already running late, after waiting for ages to check in I found out that to get into the Philippines I needed proof of onwards travel, so had to wait for ages to find details of my onwards flight which luckily I had booked. Then immigration took forever finally made it though and i rushed off to try find Tash who was flying from Christchurch to meet me in the Philippines, she had a little bit of time in Hong Kong where we were planning to meet up beofre our seperate flights to Manila, just got there before she was going to leave. So great to see her if only briefly. Flight to Manila was only 2 hours apart from getting weird headaches from cabin pressure it was pretty average. Touched down in Manila around midnight after getting baggage finding Tash again we went out to met Jess and Andy, friends from home who are teachers at an international school here.

Rickshaw madam? Yes madam? Excuse me. Come into my shop, where are you from? Madam, madam! Rickshaw yes? You like silk, pashmina, sari? Yes madam? You smoke something? You like hotel, good hotel madam. Rickshaw?
Welcome back to India, it hits you in the face like a ton of bricks, but it was good to be back! The process of actually getting back to Delhi, however, was in no way fun or good at all.
Imagine the worst bus you’ve ever been on, the oldest, crappiest, most dangerous one (travels in developing countries will help) then imagine sitting on it for 25 hours. That’s right 25 hours straight, on India roads. But not only that before getting on this bus imagine first taking a 6 hour bus, crossing a border (always enjoyable) then another 2 hour bus. Are you imagining? Does it sound fun? Well I gather you get it. The longest 36 hours ever, only 3 of them not sitting on a bus! The plan was to catch a train after the first 2 bus rides but of course on arrival to the station in the random town I was in with an older German couple the trains were all booked out. So started our interesting bus journey. No tourist buses wherever we were but a big metal shell with a few seats chucked in. 2 drivers that must have been drinking and a long day/night ahead of us. Luckily we got the front row so we got to stretch out a bit and make sort of beds with our backpacks, unfortunately we also got to see the traffic coming head on and feel the vibrations of the constant horn. Up there with the most life threatening bus rides of the trip, sometimes in the middle of the night the fog was so thick you could only see about 1 meter ahead which didn’t stop the driver going full speed ahead into what I could only hope was open road. Towards the end (when there was considerably more traffic) he started just driving directly down the centre of the road with his finger on the horn while all the other cars/buses/livestock/people swevered out of the way at the last minute. The train would have taken 10 hours and the bus took 25, with numerous chai and toilet breaks of course. I passed the time by thinking of what could possibly be worse than this bus ride (answer: the people in the back with no leg room or packs to lie on) and buying every sort of food that made its way on to the bus. So survived on Samosa’s, Chappati, chai and yummy mixes of chickpeas and tomatoes on newspaper plates. I guess it was at least a very Indian way to end the trip and luckily the extremely lovely and full of good travel story Germans kept me from going completely mental!
The most frustrating thing was seeing signs that Delhi was 300 km’s away which would take only 3-4 hours at home and it taking more like 9 hours, streets are too packed and bus is too crap for proper driving. Anyway after an eternity we arrived late evening in a dusty smelly bus park on the edge of Delhi, we squished into a rickshaw and headed to a hotel for a much needed shower.

So I had one full day left in Delhi before getting up super early for my flight out the next day. Did a bit of last minute shopping, can leave a bag in Hong Kong at the hotel so able to buy a few extra things. Also went into Old Delhi to have a look around the markets and check out the Jama Masjid, the main mosque in town. Can hold around 25000 people so was pretty big. Lots of people around praying and chilling out. Nice place, although they charge tourists this ridiculous camera charge, which I had to pay even if I wasn’t going to use my camera. The area around the mosque has a definite Muslim influence; you are more likely to see cows on the menus than wandering the streets. I happened to walk past the meat market with bowls of goats feet and heads….pretty freaky.

Went back to visit the tourist information guys that I met when I first arrived. So began a crazy and confusing night. I was with a Bulgarian girl who I met at the office and originally we were all going out, I checked out from the hotel and took my bags there, they would take me to the airport at 3.30am and till then we would eat and party. But someone’s brother was in hospital, blah blah blah, me and Liliana went and had a great dinner and were supposed to meet up with them later but it all was a bit confusing so at 11.30pm I grabbed my bags and headed back to a hotel for 3 hours sleep and just caught a taxi, so much easier. But did have a nice night with Liliana and as usual they paid for lunch/dinner and drove us around which is always good.

So early start at the airport, feeling the effects of a few days with out decent sleep. Checked in then ended up chatting to a really nice Indian guy on his way back home for the holidays because he’s living in the U.S, Talking to nice people is always a good way to pass the time that is inevitably involved with catching planes, and kept me from falling asleep and missing the flight. The Delhi airport has to be the most useless airport ever, one money changer that wouldn’t change my rupees, because he said it was not enough.
“well what whould I do with them?”
“I don’t know, spend then, go away!”
So helpful, another lady came up and he wouldn’t change her $50USD into rupees, so I’m not sure what he would actually do, very odd and the selection of food is about zero, ended up with a bread roll with potatoes in it (?).

Anyway flight was only 5 hours, sat with a kiwi family on the last leg of their Round the World which was cool, watched “The inconvenient truth” which was good and disturbing at the same time and made it to Hong Kong!
Welcome back!

India photos are here:

India&Nepal

So ended up staying 4 nights at Chitwan because the less time here the more time in Delhi, and here was much nicer. Spent a lot of time just hanging out and spent the evenings having dinner by the campfire and talking with everyone else. It was really nice, the guy from the hotel even taught us how to make mo-mo’s which are yummy dumpling style Nepali food.

So my 3rd day was still part of my activity programme and I had bird-watching. My favourite. So back into the park on foot, but thought we’d be safe from dangerous animals because we stayed close to the edge and didn’t cross the river. It was just me and one guide (no stick) and we found fresh looking rhino footprints. “that’s interesting” said the guide. So feeling a little nervous but kept walking through the grassy wetlands in the early morning mist when we hear strange noises coming from the trees. Kind of like a movie, can’t see anything but there is grunting sounds, heavy footsteps coming from out of the mist. “Shhhh, Rhino” and montions me to follow him. By now I’m completely freaking out. “Can’t we just climb a tree now?” then all of a sudden, we hear a running noise of a charging rhino coming closer then silence. I’m basically having a heart attack and my guide explains that’s a warning sound before it will actually charge us. “well lets get the f*#k out of here!” I keep saying while eyeing up trees suitable for climbing. Slowly and quietly we walk away and eventually reach the parks edges and I can finally relax. Who know bird watching could be so exciting?
So we didn’t see many birds but I was just glad to be alive! OK so maybe that’s a little dramatic but no more jungle walking!

After my exciting morning I went down to the river side with Adrian the Swiss guy to get a bit more elephant action. In the form of elephant bathing. Every lunch time the elephant keepers take the elephants down to the river to have a bath, its great to watch, always around 6 elephants rolling around in the water like big puppy dogs. And the best part for around $2 you can jump on the back and have a bath with them. So scrambling on top of the massive elephant with nothing but a rope around its neck to hold on to I was sprayed, thrown off and spent most of the time trying to get back on, its pretty crazy the elephant just falls over in the water and you’ve got to try balance yourself to stay on the back. The trainers can do the whole thing and stay dry but after a few dunkings in the river, I was completely saturated. Was very very cool though. There’s something a bit surreal about standing up on a submerged elephant while its trunk is spraying you with water. After I’d made it back to the river bank we stayed to watch a few more tourists get thrown around then I went to the elephant breeding centre, where unsurprisingly they breed the elephants used for park management and riding. It’s a bit sad to see some elephants chained up and clearly not too happy about it. But good to know they are actually looked after well and I guess you can’t have all these massive elephants just wandering around. The coolest thing was the baby elephants who are just running around and come up to you. They’re sooooooo cute, one of them was only about 10 days old.

So Chitwan was all good times, watched the sunset by the river, watched more elephants, read lots and sat by the fire. All in all a really nice few relaxing days before I made the big journey back down to Delhi

My last day in Pokhara was very relaxed just hung out and watched TV, in the evening Manu gave me a cooking lesson in Nepali food, Dahl is so easy to make! So next year it will be dahl every night! My bus was leaving at 7.30 the next morning so early start and managed to fit everything back into my pack. The bus to Chitwan was, like all the buses, dodgy looking and after watching the news the night before of 2 major bus crashes and 1 bus hijacking I was a little nervous, we arrived safely but not after passing about 5 crashes on the way and empty bus shells down the side of the hills…so safe. Anyway I sat next to a nice Swiss guy who’s been to Chitwan before so went with him to a hotel once we got here. Chitwan is the big national park here and we were staying in the little town just outside the park. Very relaxed place, and nice to spend a few days hanging out here. Have a really nice room in a garden, its great! Signed up for the 2 day activity programme which would start the next day and spent the rest of the afternoon hanging in the sun as it’s a lot warmer down here. Spent the evening sitting around a campfire then off to bed for early start the next morning.

7am after breakfast myself and 3 Spanish people headed down to the river for our dugout canoe ride, the water bobbing dangerously close to the edge as our guide explains about aggressive crocodiles…super. Spent most of the hour on the water looking at birds, which is not really my most interested subject. Always thought bird watching was an excuse you came up with when then weren’t any real animals around to see. This was definitely the case as we were supposed to see lots of crocodiles but ended up with lots of birds instead…the Spanish were interested and even had binoculars. So we ended up in the middle of the park for our Jungle walk.
Now the jungle walk is where you set off into the jungle in search of wild elephants, charging rhinos, man eating tigers and angry bears, but don’t worry your guides are armed with a stick. A stick!!! What the hell is a stick going to do?? Surely a gun would be better, I mean I’m all for animal welfare but when it comes down to my life or some endangered tigers I more selfish. So we were given a safety briefing on how‘to save the life’. Run away in zigzag or up a tree if a rhino charges you, don’t run up a tree if a wild elephant charges you, tigers you don’t run anywhere just stand still, bears we will fight with the stick. Oh good at least the stick is useful then. Suddenly I think about how much I like zoos. So by now I’m a little freaked out as all around are crazy sounds that apparently are the rhinos fighting because its mating season and they’re very dangerous. Even better. We set out off into the jungle, to look for these animals, which is really the last thing I want to do. We hear a distant roaring sound. “A bear” they whisper to us and take off IN THE DIRECTION OF THE ROARING. Surely we should head away from it? As we get closer our guide reminds us ‘if they attack they make big scary noise but don’t run away’ oh right we have a stick to protect us. Luckily we didn’t find it, in fact we didn’t find anything much to my relief. Other than some very impressive tiger and rhino footprints and a cobra skin, reaffirming that there is no way I want to find any animals. So back to the hotel for some lunch and a nap then its time for our elephant ride.
The cool thing about the town is there are elephants everywhere, hanging out on the road, wandering through fields, its very cool. So we climbed aboard our massive elephant and set back off into the park to look for more animals although feeling much safer now on the top on a 3 meter mammal. And we did find animals! We found a mother and baby rhino who seemed relaxed about the fact there were about 10 elephants with tourists surrounding it taking photos. Was really cool to be so close! Crossed a few rivers and saw some crocodiles, deer and loads of monkeys. Nice to just wander through the jungle on the back of the elephant. At one point all the elephants decided to have a ‘who can make the most noise’ competition. So lots and lots of noises followed us out and back to the hotel and no charging rhinos thank goodness!

For the evening I went off to the cultural programme. Always bound to be cheesy and painful ‘cultural programmes’ are as bad as each other the world over. So we all filled into a strange little theatre with a ‘typical village scene’ painted on the back wall. The show was a whole lot of dances, some very impressive with lots of sticks, others bollywood style romance and one with a guy dressed as chick and not looking too happy about it. A hilarious narrator ensured the whole thing was unintentionally funny. Basically what you would expect from any ‘cultural evening’.

I’m bruised, blistered and very, very sore, but I made it!! Arrived back after 9 days of trekking in the Himalaya’s, we did it in 9 days rather than 10 cause we were so fast (well that and I was over it by day 6).Anyway the Annapurna region is the most popular trekking region in Nepal, even more so than around Everest, because it’s a bit easier and there are lots of different options, from the whole circuit taking 3 weeks, base camp, and any other number of days.So yeah we did the trek to Annapurna base camp via Ghorepani and Poon Hill, we planned on 10 days but managed to do it in 9 after a big day that happened to be mostly down hill.I ended up going with Hom and Manu’s (the people I’m staying with) brother Chitra. Guides are pretty expensive when you’re by yourself so this worked out to be a lot cheaper as I just payed for his food and accommodation. Was also kind of funny cause he’d never actually done it before or even been trekking before (maybe that explains the dress pants and shirts), but it was fine as lots of people around to ask directions. The best thing about trekking around this region is that there is no sleeping in tents or eating freeze dried peas as all along the way there is guest houses and restaurants with hot showers and heaters! Ironically the only hot showers I’ve had in Nepal were way up in the mountains. So overall the whole thing was pretty amazing, the views were incredible and the base camp is 4200 meters in this mountain amphitheatre, along with monkeys in the tree’s, rivers, valleys…it’s easy to see why it’s so popular. It was pretty tough at some points, lots of up and down hill and fitness not being my strong point some parts I was not happy! But, dare I say it, it did get easier as the days went on and I found that I could in fact walk up 3000 stairs without taking too many breaks. I think walking up hill is all about mind games, so had a lot of arguments with myself! 9 days was definitely enough….especially once we got to ABC on the 6th day and then had to walk back out the same way for a couple of days. So don’t think I’ll be doing the circuit any time soon. And as much as I like being by myself sometimes trekking is really made all that much better by the people your with, so I did hang out with some cool people quite a bit but I think in a group it would be a bit more….fun, I guess would be the word, as it stands though it was incredible. As in Peru there are porters willing to carry your stuff and did see some guys with 4 or 5 packs strapped to their backs, but I just feel so bad paying some one to do that, and its not like you have that much to carry without food/tents. Always a good way to make yourself feel useless to see these guys running around in flip-flops while you are struggling up the hill! Did happen to stumble upon Anton Oliver (All Black, yeah I didn’t know until some other kiwis pointed him out) filming a documentary, very random….So what follows is my day by day summary from my journal I wrote while away, did a lot of thinking and journaling and thanks to a few conversations before I left (thanks Duane) stressing about life decisions, had way too much time to think about life.

Day 1 Birethanti to UlleriHad to actually get to the start of the trek so a life-threatening bus ride which smelt strongly of vomit along winding mountain roads got us there, luckily, in one piece. Signed in at a few places and first encounters with the Maoist rebels. Now tourism in Nepal is way down because of these guys but to be honest two 16 year olds sitting behind a desk asking for tourist tax and giving you a receipt didn’t seem too dangerous. Just annoying because it’s a lot of money that you know is not going to a good cause. So followed the track along a nice river, up and down, mostly up lots and lots of steps. Nice to see the same people along the track and ended up walking with an Aussie couple for the last bit and hanging out with them for the next day. Finished up at a nice guest house at the top of a massive hill, 2 hours walk up a lot of stairs. Basically all guest houses were very similar, amazing view, freezing rooms with paper thin walls, fire/heater in the dinning room and a standardized menu that was the same everywhere. A Irish couple also arrived who are finishing up a round the world trip so we all had a good night swapping travel stories and tips about our next destinations. Early to bed as would be usual and already a bit sore!Day 2 Ulleri-Ghoepani and Poon Hill.The 5 of us and our guides spent the day together, more up hill but not as steep as yesterday, lots of monkeys in the trees. Pretty relaxed day, with frequent breaks. Reminded a bit of home with the scenery, very green, ferns and things everywhere.Arrived in Ghorepani around 3 then headed up Poon Hill behind us for sunset. Apparently the best view in the area and can have up to 2000 people at sunrise in high season. Only about 20 of us that night, I was not keen on a 5am start up this massive hill so evening was good option. Very tough getting up there and had to stumble our way down in the dark because no-one thought to bring torches! However the view was incredible, especially with the sun reflecting on the snow, being above the clouds and the moon rising as we arrived. Pretty shattered after that last climb, nice dinner and stayed up till late chatting with the Irish couple who are very cool.Day 3 Ghorepani-TadapaniThe Aussies left us in a different direction and we continued on with a big group all heading the same way, First part of the day was lots of up hill (great views of course from the top) then lots of down hill through forest, dodging horse poo and the horses. To finish the day we had a big climb up to the village and stayed in a really nice guest house, lots of people there and we even got a dance and singing cultural evening. Which was cool but very repetitive and high pitched and long….full moon which made the views even more amazing with the snow in the above mountains all lit up and could see the other villages in the distance.Day 4 Tadapani to SinuwaLeft pretty much everyone as they were all doing a shorter trek and we had a fairly easy day along the side of the hills, marijuana plants growing everywhere which was a bit odd, guess they’re for the tourists who aren’t high enough off the altitude. Made it to our destination then decided to get a big hill out the way and climbed up to the next village. At the beginning of the way to ABC now so only 2 days walk from here. Very sore now, blisters are setting in, that’s what you get for hiring boots and the pack I hired is pretty crap, waist and chest strap is broken so shoulders are feeling it!Day 5 and 6- Sinuwa-Himalaya to ABCUp and down and up and down, these 2 days we would go back over on the way out, not happy to walk for an hour down really steep steps knowing I’d have to come back up. Less villages, people and animals around as we get higher and it gets colder. Meet 3 kiwis who saw on and off for the next few days which was nice. Getting to ABC was a tough hike up through snow for the last bit. And at altitude which is never fun, we arrived at ABC late afternoon, so many clouds I could hardly see a few meters ahead. Fingers crossed it will be clear tomorrow as the view from here is the reason for the trek! Was freezing cold and started snowing so everyone spent the night crowed around the heater drinking hot chocolate and playing cards. Slept in everything I had and still cold!Day 7 ABC to Sinuwa.Woke to find a clear morning so got the beautiful views, standing in the middle of some of the biggest mountains in the world, pretty flippin impressive! Had a long day as covered the last 2 days in one. Has to walk up those damn steps we went down on the way there. Arrived late feeling very, very sore, feet are all blistered and I was pretty over it. All my clothes are dirty, haven’t had hot water for the last 4 days and have been wearing pretty much the same clothes the whole time including sleeping as it’s too cold to get changed. I think after getting to ABC, that was it and the last 3 days to walk out just seemed like a bit of a pain!Day 8 Sinuwa to GhandrukAnother long day, up huge lot of stairs, down a really steep hill then back up the biggest hill of the trek to finish the day. At least its warm! As we’re back down to normal altitude, Stayed at a really nice hotel which had clean bathrooms and hot water! Best shower of my life!! Played cards all night with a nice German guy who started a one year found the world 3 years ago and never went back home….could be me!Day 9 Ghabdruk back to Pokhara.Pretty easy day, all gradual down hill and flat, got it done pretty quickly as I was keen to get back to civilization. Walked through lots of villages, lots of people and animals around. All the kids keep coming up and asking “hellas-wheat” which I eventually worked out was “Hello, Sweet?’, obviously trying to get a lot out of trekkers and donation boxes all the way along for schools and medical clinics. Arrived back to our starting point where I was supposed to show the Maoists my receipt to avoid paying again…but of course I’d lost it, only the most important thing I had! We talked to some of the trekking official guys where you sign out and they said “No talking, just keep walking past”“they’re not going to chase me with like guns or anything are they?”“No talking, just walking”So we did just that, walked very quickly past them while they called after us, luckily they gave up and didn’t follow us! Definitely most of Nepal are not too keen on then especially the trekking people who obviously find them annoying.So we made it! Hurray! Had to take an even more life threatening bus ride back to Pokhara and now I’m back at Hom and Manu’s, warm, clean and happy! Was a great trip but enough walking for awhile! My feet need time to heal, so only flip flops for the next week. Was cool to see a lot of older people walking, lots of people have been wanting to trek here for years, and lots of people come to Nepal just for trekking. I’ll recover here for a couple of nights then head down to the national park then back to Delhi as I’m leaving the subcontinent for Christmas fun in the Philippines in a week! Looking forward to beaches….

My few days in Pokhara have been lovely, staying with Hom, his wife and their gorgeous 3 year old daughter. Being looked after very well with my own room (with on suit), great food and rides around town on their motorbike! Basically they do a lot of stuff similar to the youth work we do at home so has been good to meet them and hang out. Got to go to one of their English classes they run…interesting as they decided I should be the one to run the first part of it, decided without telling me. “Ummmm…so I’m Arnika and I’m from New Zealand….” Thankfully the real teacher turned up and saved me from a potentially very bad situation.
Had dinner one night with their brother and his family where I spent the evening entertaining the kids with my amazing origami skills…well I can make one thing but they were pretty impressed!
Then the kids all danced and sang for me..for a long long time. But was pretty funny and it was just such a typical buck of kids. The older 6 year old girl who wanted to be the star and made a point of knowing all the words and action, the little 3 year old boy who had no idea but was just trying to copy a few moments behind, the other 2 just kind of half going along and then the 7 year old boy who clearly hated it and refused to join in. Very entertaining, well for the first 10 minutes anyway.

Also spent a couple of evenings watching some hilarious Nepali television. I mean do you really think its even worth attempting out of space programmes with space ship battles when you don’t quite have the technology to make it look even half realistic?….think hallowean style bad guys and plastic models of spaceships with a riducolously predictable story line, I’m sure you can imagine. But must be popular as its on constantly. As well as the always entertaining Indian music channel…..what I watched tonight was probab;y the best show ever. like Amereican Idol but with kids dancing their hearts out to Bollywood songs, everyone asked if people in NZ danced liked that…ummmm no, they’d probably be locked away if they danced with that much enthusiasm with those dance moves.

Also checked out some caves with bats on the roof and went up a bill hill that overlooked all the amazing mountains that surround the valley and watched all the paragliders floating around the air. If I had spare cash I would definitely do it but not this time.

And tonight I even ran games at the youth group, (for those SYC related, evolution paper scissors rock wasn’t so good as they didnt know paper scissors rock to begin with but BANG went down well!)
So I’m all ready for my 10 day trek tomorrow to Annapurna base camp, should be interesting, I’ve got the full gear the makes me look like a space man. I’ll be out of touch for the next wee while so don’t expect any emails/blogs/any sort of contact, but hopefully I’ll be alright wandering around the Himalayas.
Hopefully the weather stays nice although it will be cold!
Bye for now…