We weren't looking forward to our flight on Royal Nepal Airlines since we figured it would ruin our good memories of Bangkok Air, plus it has a horrible reputation of just not showing up. It did arrive relatively on time however, and even departed on the scheduled day, so we considered ourselves pretty lucky. We got ourselves situated on the right side of the plane so we could watch the Himalayas pass by us as we approached Kathmandu which was good luck on our part. The mountains sort of fade into view, so one minute you're looking at clouds, and then you realize you're looking at the top of a mountain sticking through the clouds. It was surely one of the most impressive flights we've ever taken as far as views are concerned, so we guess that makes up for the flat Coke and smelly seats.

     Kathmandu is an assault on the senses, and it seems to be in a perpetual state of chaos, sort of riding on the brink of disaster. Everyone told us it's safe to be there and there's no need to be concerned about the Maoist rebels that take over sections of the country from time to time, but one look at the king's motorcade surrounded by an entire military convoy as it went by had us thinking they may not be too sure about that. It's downright dangerous to walk in the streets without keeping your eyes wide open for all sorts of random vehicles careening down the street, from rickshaws to Humvees. It doesn't seem to matter to the drivers which side they drive on, and in most cases the streets are so narrow it doesn't matter until two cars meet going in opposite directions. In that case more primitive rules kick in and it's the bigger car that wins, usually giving only seconds for the smaller vehicle to run a few people off the sidewalk as it attempts to guarantee it's own survival. We did actually see people get hit by cars, once we saw a woman get spun around as a car clipped her handbag. Amazingly it seemed like no big deal as long as the person was still standing. This resulted in all the westerners looking like prairie dogs, popping their heads into souvenir shops for quick glances before looking around for the next oncoming vehicle.

     We had to buy a few things for our trek, and Kathmandu has plenty of stores with equipment, including North Face, Mountain Hardware and others. None of the stuff is authentic of course, but the jackets are real down and will definitely stand up to at least one good trek. If we were climbing Everest we  probably would have steered clear, but for our needs the local fakery was just fine.

     The sales tactics used on foreigners are pretty aggressive, and once again, the six foot four dollar sign attracted no small amount of attention. In one of the first stores we went into the sales guy kept saying things like "I think you don't really want to buy", and other stupid sales techniques that annoyed us. Proving that we were made of much more sophisticated stuff, we had a lot of fun walking by his store to taunt him each time we bought more equipment over the next few days.

     We happened to hit Kathmandu right at the end of one of their biggest holidays of the year called Desai, sort of like Christmas and Thanksgiving rolled into one. This was both good and bad: the good was that we got to see a lot of celebrations, the bad was that on the big last day, everything was closed and we couldn't get out of town. We were also informed that essentially every family in the country has goat for dinner on this particular day, sort of like Americans have Turkey on Thanksgiving. The difference is that we buy our turkeys already dead. Besides the goat we saw tied up in front of every house the day before, be were told that the king presided over a massive sacrifice of a few hundred goats the night before right in the town square. The sacrifice thing is so important, apparently, that Royal Nepal Airlines sacrifices a goat for each plane it has. We thought it best not to ask if that meant they only killed half a goat for the piece of junk we bounced in on. Nevertheless, we chose to stay in the hotel the night of the big sacrifice, especially since we've sort of taken to the things since our time in Mongolia.

     And now from the What Were We Thinking Department: We decided it would be an experience to see some of Nepal if we took a 15 hour locals bus to the border of India on our way to Sikkim. Think about that for a second. We who couldn't stand an air conditioned sleeper bus in China for 12 hours, and we're getting onto a bus with no A/C and regular seats on one of the poorest countries on the planet. Top this with the fact that the buses didn't run on the day before and half the country was going home from the holiday, which meant that when we arrived at the bus station, Andrea actually tried to convince me to eat the cost of our tickets and run away as quickly as possible when we saw the mobs of people waiting for buses. When our bus did show up, we were really unlucky to have the second to last row, but luckier than those who had bought tickets for standing room only in the aisle for 15 hours. Once again, the bus wa jammed to the gills, cementing our position in the bus with literally no way to get out. To make things worse, one of our two seat backs was broken and the people in the row behind us didn't take kindly to one of us sitting back on their laps. We didn't take into account that this was an overnight bus either, robbing us of any potential scenery that might have taken our minds off of the people who started throwing up behind us 15 minutes after the bus left the station. There was one mother who was riding with her two daughters, probably about 8 and 10 years old. The mother had the window seat and refused to give it up as both girls continued to get sick, making them even more miserable by scolding them and smacking them on the back of the head. We don't remember a head smack being on the list of carsickness cures, so we did our best by giving them a couple of plastic bags and some of the 100,000 handi-wipes Andrea keeps stashed away for such occasions.

     The driver, of course, drove like a disgruntled postman and seemed to get sincere enjoyment out of running other vehicles off the road since our bus was about the biggest thing out there. We swear he would actually accelerate and swerve at oncoming vehicles forcing them often to veer completely off the road. The passengers being flung about the cabin were just an added bonus, although people were packed in so tight no one was actually catapaulted from the vehicle that we know of. Meanwhile in the back over the wheels, we were just dodging vomit and trying to keep people from landing in our seats. Around midnight we were stopped at an army roadblock who told us the road was closed for a few hours because of the Maoist rebels up ahead. We hardly noticed that the entire time we were stopped that not another vehicle pulled up to the roadblock on the only road across this part of the country. This was actually one of the better parts of the trip, because we were able to get off the bus and sit around in the warm evening with nothing to do but cover ourselves with handiwipes. Being that we were probably the only westerners stupid enought to ever take this bus, we had quite a crowd around us of people practicing their English and wanting to know about America. It was really amazing to exchange views and learn about each other, and the Nepalis were sincerely touched when we told them we were aware of the current political situation in the country, and the corruption of the government after the massacre of the royal family in 2003. It was just as distressing, however, to listen to their sincere opinions that somehow, Americans were actually better than them. We tried explaining that essentially we as individuals were simply luckier to have been born in America, and that as humans we were no better, and it was disturbing to see them reject our opinions of the matter. Maybe it had to do with their vision of America as some Nirvana, a place to strive for that the image couldn't be tarnished so they could simply believe that such a place exists somewhere. The point was driven home when one of the men asked us for Geoge Bush's address. Not knowing what else to do, we gave it to him so he could keep his hope alive, as heartbreaking as it was to do so. At one point during our stop, a little tea shop opened up on the roadside and some of our crowd insisted we join them, practically becoming offended when we offered to pay for everyone's tea, pennies to us, but a much larger sum to them. We politely declined several offers to join families at their homes at various towns on the way to the border because we knew they would come with requests for assistance to help them get out of Nepal, something that we were as powerless to help with as they were.

     Eventually the army secured the road ahead and the bus was allowed to proceed, only breaking down once for an hour throughout the rest of the night. We arrived at the border to India 22 hours later, exhausted, dehydrated and dirty, and to add insult to injury, we were charged an extra $60 at the border because we overstayed our transit visa due to the buses not running on the holiday. Not a journey we would recommend to anyone, it's definitely one we'll never forget.