Moved

Thanks for stopping by, but I have moved to my new blog at:

http://thecbutton.blogspot.com/

See ya there,

The miracle

Nothing can stop us from doing what we love to do. Live life to the fullest!!!

Nepal trip's Highlights

The trip

My main destination was Nepal but as I had to transit in Bangkok and I have never been to Thailand before so I took the chance to make it to Bangkok this time as well.

- 22/03 fly from Hochiminh city to Bangkok

- 23-24/03 spend time in Bangkok

- 25/03 fly from Bangkok to Katmandu

- 25-28/03 hang around Katmandu, mostly Thamel

- 29/03 fly from Katmandu to Pokhara

- 30/3 – 01/04 discover Pokhara , go paragliding

- 2/04 drive from Pokhara to Chitwan, do drafting on the way

- 2-3/04 safari tour in Royal Chitwan National Park

- 4/04 fly from Chitwan back to Katmandu

- 5/04 drive from Katmandu to Nagakot, stay 1 night

- 6/04 drive back to Katmandu, stop over at Bhutapur

- 6-9/04 Katmandu Valley, Patan …

- 10/04 fly from Katmandu to Bangkok

- 11-12/04 go around Bangkok again, mostly enjoy the Thai New Year festival

- 13/04 fly back home

After arriving in Katmandu, I checked around and finally got the Baniya travel & tours agent to arrange the whole trip’s accomodation & transportation for us. As we are just 2 tiny girls, going pack-packed is really not a good option. And our agent turned out to be a really good one with reasonable prices and good recommendations. They have great services as well so If you need a tour agent in Nepal, you should check them out http://www.climbinginnepal.com/

Immigration and aviation services

Nepal is definitely different from other countries that I have been to, and I could tell it right away when I finally arrive at Katmandu airport. It is a very human-based country.

For any traveller, you can get a visa on-site when you arrive in Nepal. And for the fact that there is no Nepal Embassy in Vietnam, I went to No-visa line when I got to Katmandu’s terminal. Seeing more than 10 lines of passengers with visas already beside us, I was wondering why people don’t choose the easier way to go with the visa. And going through all the on-site visa process pretty much gave me an answer for that. After 1.5 hours queuing in the line of “No-visa” board and all the Visa lines were cleared, an official came and dismissed our line, put us to another line with no sign board, and we started all over again, which took us like an hour more to get to the counter. Here I figured out that there are 4 people working on the visa hand-over for every passenger, which made me wonder why it took that long for the process. The first guy takes your money and then the second guy hand writes a receipt for you- taking the two pieces of carbon copy paper to reinsert them every time he has to write out a new receipt. The third guy just looks at you and does something behind the counter before pointing you to a forth guy that finally hands you your passport back. And as my friend’s comment, The visa looks like it was designed by a 14 year old.

All of that is for the part of Arrival. The departure part is another whole story.

We departed at Katmandu’s domestic airport to Pokhara. We got a porter to help us with our luggages for 20rupees (around 3 bucks) and then shamefully realized that they, with the agreement of the customs, were able to cut out the queue of other passengers to put our luggage onto the luggage conveyor first L

And this is how the local airport in Royal Chitwan National Park look like

Here everything was done manually. No machine at all.

This is the baggage check area where you have to open your luggage for some officials to check, and the officials here can bring their kids to work with them.

After checking your baggage they will bring your baggage in side. Then you have to go through security check, which is not an automatic scanner but 2 different rooms - one for male and one for female.

What happens in the male room is beyond me but there was a lady waiting for me in the female room, who asked to me to fill my name and passport number into a list, asked me if I bring anything dangerous and then let me go J

When you arrive, you don’t have to wait for the luggage belt, there will be someone take your luggage from the airplane, which parks like 20m from your waiting area, and hand over to you. How nice is that!!

One more thing, the domestic planes in Nepal are the tiniest ones that I’ve ever seen. They look just like a bus.

And there were only less than 20 seats inside. It is so tiny that the flight attendace has to struggle her way down to give us each passenger a candy and cotton pieces to plug our ears :P

The people

As Nepal is a tourism country, Nepalese are mostly friendly. And in a place that 80% of people you meet on the street are men, being an tiny Asian girl is kinda advantage. But also dangerous sometimes. In general, I like most of the people I met there. Our tour operators. Our driver. Our tourguide. The sales men on Thamel … And mostly the kids. They are so beautiful, naïve and lovely. Oh, and they are shy too.

However, like in any developing counry, the children in big city or tourist areas become a little cunning due to the affect of money matter. And that makes me really sad.

When we lost on our way to David Fall in Pokhara and asked for our way back, a 7 year-old boy offered to take us back to the place (the red one in the following picture). I refused as it’s just a few minutes away, I could managed it by myself and didn’t want to bother him. He insisted that he wanted to accompany us. I couldn’t refuse him so I let him tag along to the place and gave him 50 rupees to thank him, mostly helped him with what I think he wanted. Then, he kept following us everywhere we go, asked for more money, and when I made clear to him that I would not give him anymore money, he started to ask for food, and fruit, and juice, and things along the way... I can’t help feeling pissed so I just ignored him. When we got to the Tibetan Village, I saw a lot of kids so I bought a lot of candies to give out to the kids, I also gave him some (he’s a kid anyway) but he again kept asking for more. Being refused, he asked other kids to come to me and asked for more candies, which really made me uncomfortable with him. I told him that, and he said sorry. But just when we started to leave the place, he asked me if I could give him the souvenir I just bought. Very frustrated, I couldn’t even answer him but walked away.

The second one I met in Pashupatinath. A 12 year-old boy approached and started a friendly conversation while we were hanging around the place. He offered to be our tourguide but with my previous experience, I refused. He was cool with that and just came along to talk. Then when we set off for the next place, he asked if we could give him a lift because he lived near our next place. On the way, he kept asking what we were doing in VN, how much money we earned (????) and told us that he was on a school break so he just hung around with tourists to practice his English and he collected foreign currencies. Knowing that we have travelled to many countries and have many kind of currencies with us, he asked for them and we gave all to him, which totally make up to 20 bucks. Everything was fine until we said goodbye to him at the next place, told him that we wanted to go around by ourselves and asked him to go home. Then he asked if I could sponsor for him to go to school next year. I told him that what he did was like a trickery to me and I didn’t like it. He said sorry but kept following us. And this time asking for money. Just when I told that he shoulnd’t follow me or else I would ask for help, then he left.

Well, luckily they are only 2 among many kids I met on my way. I can understand and forgive what they did. But I feel sad for them and wish that somehow they can be back to a naïve and lovely kids just like others.

Sex and pilgrim

The most interesting thing to me in Nepal was that I could see Kama Sutra everywhere, even in Pilgrim and Buddish Bookstores. And they are not hidden away but put in the most outstanding areas, in all kind of forms such as game, book, cartoon, calendar, gambling cards … you name it. Tell me I’m outback but grown up in a country where girls normally don’t talk about sex until they get married, I was shocked when I run into conversations with SOME kids (some of them are 7-10 year old :P) like that:

“Do you have a boyfriend?”

“Hmm … kind of”

“Do you have sex with your boy friend?”

“Errr,,,,”

Well, it sounded like a scary “Truth or Dare” for me. So I usually had to divert the converstation before they asking more :P

Swapna Bagaicha - The Garden of Dreams

My favorite place in bustle and hustle Kathmandu is Swapna Bagaicha or Garden of Dreams.

If you want to relax, the very pleasant ambience and greatest silence of this place will make it perfect for you. Enter the garden, you will immediately fall in love with its beautiful surrounding, which is a combination of artistic unique design and its extraordinary details making it really amazing. Waterfalls, ponds, sculptures, small pavilions, exotic flowers and plants, steps integrated towards the lawn, circular gates and various other enchanting things of this garden of dreams make it a beautiful romantic place holding the visitors for long.

This Swapna Bagaicha is a beautiful combination of a moment of inactivity, a moment of rest and a moment of peace. Reaching to this place is easy because of its central location. Stepping into the garden will make you completely relax, as you cannot resist yourself by lying down on its cushiony grass.

Once you enter its vicinity, the noise of motor vehicles, the yells and the voices starts disappearing from your back and you will feel as if you are walking into the oasis of harmony and peace.

And here I am, in the Garden of Dreams.