The Nepalese Adventure: Day 22 (1st issue was incomplete)

Day 22 - Sunday

(Apologies if you received half finished post. Internet is so fast here and my hands were flying over the keyboard like Liberaci until I hit Publish instead of Save that is. Doh!)  

• Woke up this morning in Paradise. Remember? The bed, the AC etc. It was only 6am so I set the alarm for 9, snuggled in a bit deeper and went back to sleep.

• Got up, had a perfectly temperate shower and went down for breakfast

• Breakfast: 2 poached eggs on, errr, bread? Orange Juice, Toast and Jam- though the "toast" had clearly fallen out with the toaster. Black coffee. Ate it leisurely whilst catching up with the BBC News over the FREE Wi-Fi. Man, this is living!

• Voting today. 

• Election fever has certainly hit the country and everyone wants to talk about it. In fact, when I was climbing Everest on Friday, I got stopped by two women, in the middle of absolutely nowhere, who started talking to me in Nepalese. I managed to follow what they were saying as far as "Namaste" but that was about it. No amount of shaking my head and repeating "I don't understand" would dissuade them; though I did detect the words "Nepali Congress" somewhere in there which is one the key parties. Next minute one of them got out a well worn plastic wallet, about the size of an international driving licence, and extracted what I'm guessing was her party membership card. But by this time, I'd outgunned them with my book on Nepalese phrases so at least I could tell them "Maile bhujhina" in a language they would understand. They understood alright, but were not to be dissuaded. After a good 10 minutes (I needed the break from climbing anyway) I made my excuses and bid them good day. Maybe they were trying to convert me to their party cause but I don't think that three weeks here entitles me to vote. But you never know.

Lots of post earthquake construction..

Requires lots of bricks!

After breakfast I decided to head into town to see what was open today.The answer was very little. Quite a few people just milling about and a bit of an army and police presence too. I did look for somewhere that the voting was taking place to see how it was done but was unsuccessful in this. So, having walked the full length of the high street (maybe half a kilometer) I turned around and walked back to the hotel; buying some mangoes and a watermelon on the way. That was heavy! I was dripping with sweat by the time I got back to the hotel. Temperature was low 30's, humidity high 80's. Nothing that a shower and a bit AC couldn't fix though.😅

Residential road to Battar from hotel

• I skipped lunch today and had some grapes (bought yesterday - See, I don't tell you everything!) and made a start on the watermelon. And every fruit salad needs a bowl as crafted in the pic!

• I needed to start planning my return journey to the UK, via Kathmandu. I had been putting this off as it involves counting the days that are left with pro's and con's: If there are a lot of days left, that's good because still so much to do. On the other hand, that means there's a lot of days left.😩 
• Anyway my itinerary is now looking like this:

Mon - Finalize tasks in Battar and head back to Gorsyang

Tue - School

Wed - Bus to Kathmandu

Thu, Fri, Sat - Recreation in and around Kathmandu area

Sun - Flight Home

• So actually, not much time left at all and very little of it back in my home village.

• I will need to settle up the bill with Theresa for the extras I've had from the restaurant; Beer, Water etc. A little more expensive than I had anticipated. You know those 30 pence (30 Nepalese Rupees) beers I mentioned? Well it turns out that Theresa often gets confused in English on the number of zeros associated with numbers. 30 was in fact 300! And I've been merrily chugging down beers at nearly 3 quid!! As you can see from the picture of empties on our roof, that may pose a small problem!
  
  

• Heading down for dinner now. Not sure what it's going to be but it won't be Dahl Bhat.