I had a bad fever and our train ticket to Gorakhpur was still #35-36 the day before the trip to the border of Nepal. Our visas were expiring soon so we weighed our options and thought of:
a) going to the border of Nepal by bus - a two-day project that would be hard to attempt given my health situation (I was coughing out blood!!!) plus, the bus fares would be triple that of the train fare
b) finding another train route... which would end up with us taking the bus again at one point or another, and if we couldn't get on the train that we booked more than a month ahead, what would be the chances of us getting a train a day before?
c) getting a plane from Delhi to Kathmandu
Well, all options considered, we realized the two most feasible were going by bus or taking a plane, and because taking a plane was only 50 euros more than the bus option, we thought it would be worth paying the extra 50 for the convenience of taking a plane.
So while Henri cancelled the train ticket and looked for the bus station of Delhi, I tried to book the plane to Kathmandu.
February 26 – 27
So we took a bus to Delhi the next afternoon, and outside our window was a virtual greatest hits of sights we saw on our five-month road trip in India.
The breathtaking landscape, the wandering cows, four acrobatic men in one scooter (the most we could do was three: me, Henri and the bike renter, who came for us when our bike was stolen by a drunk Israeli in Auroville), and let's not forget about the bikes carrying livestock, bed frames, and once, even a washing machine!
Sometimes the villages would remind us of other places we've seen; either back when we were wide-eyed newcomers in October, or in the months that followed, when we were sleepy-eyed backpackers just dreaming of the next shower.
But we also saw the heartbreaking side of India: the indiscriminate mining and destruction of mountains, the trash, the pollution, the way they play fast and loose with their treatment of children.
Our last stop was a roadside restaurant where Indian passengers are left alone to pee, but foreigners like us are hassled to pay 5 to 10 rupees. Oh, I won't miss that! It was just in front of a cement factory that turned the sky black even before sunset.
We reached Delhi at 8. Dropped off on the highway, we had a vague idea of where the airport was (no more than 2 kilometers away) and taxi drivers offered their services for 300 rupees. Maybe they thought we were stupid because they kept trying to convince us the airport is “very far” after we told them to get lost. But one guy found us and said he'd take us for 50 rupees, that sounded about right so we quit trying to be heroes and took a cab to the airport. Mheheh.
It felt a bit nostalgic to be back where it all started. We never planned it, but the trip in India came full circle. Look at how much Henri has changed! He didn't have a “moustak” back then.
Our flight was at 7am, and after some hijinks at the departure area because of silly airport rules (everything has a catch, I don't understand why they have posters up announcing they have the 2nd best airport in the world – who voted in this poll? Their moms?) we were flying!
We watched in amazement as the Himalayas issued forth, breaking through the dense gathering of clouds. The pilot even tilted around the towering white giants to give us a better view. Beautiful, majestic, immortal.
Kathmandu, on the other hand, looked like a kid left playing in the dirt. There was a brown mist floating over it. Was it pollution or the dust, ever flying, never settling – disturbed from its sleep by godless motorists or its people, kicking the dust as it rushes through tired streets? Never settling, always flying, like the brown cloud that looms over its head.
And then, just like that, we were waved through immigration and we were in Nepal.
The first thing we did after scoring a place to sleep was – yeah – SLEEP!
What woke us up was Yangling, a Tibetan-Nepali restaurant where Henri got an Everest Beer (in a Tuborg bottle, they take recycling to a different high here) and we had THE BEST dinner we'd had in A LONG TIME. It was like rediscovering the joy of food.
It was so different from our last month in India. There were dance clubs, men could hold hands with women, the streets were clean, you didn't have to leave town to get a beer, you didn't have to HIDE in your room to drink beer, and in the next few days, we found out it was hard to get a bad meal in Kathmandu – even if we tried.
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| REAL BACON!!!! |
Of course we loved it. It's a whole new (dusty) world.
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