Monday, March 15, 2010

Greetings from Kathmandu

Well hello you lot. I've made this blog so that I can just sort of rabbit on about what Robin is doing, what I am doing and what is happening with the GHT, both here in Nepal and in the rest of the Himalaya.
Since we got back to Nepal about 3 weeks ago, we had the disappointment of our Tibet trip being cancelled at the last minute and the excitement of seeing just how much interest there is in trekking the GHT - certainly here in Nepal where it all sort of started.
Robin goes a bit stir crazy if he is stuck in Kathmandu for very long, so fortunately he was able to fly out west last week with his trusty sherpa guide Pema, and big Dawa, to research trails out west that he didn't get to last time around. Sadly, there is still a lot of poverty out west, food is in short supply but dust isn't.
Meanwhile I have been here in Kathmandu trying to remain mildly sane while battling with the noise, pollution, touts, limited electricity, and lots of friends arriving back for the season and wanting to catch up. oh dear.
But right now life is good. The sun is shining (so we get hot water) and I can use the internet. I'm never short of something to do or someone to meet up with. In fact getting to India in a couple of weeks will probably be a good chance for me to chill out a bit - although I will still have lots of work to do I think the electricity is a bit more reliable.
So what is the plan? We head to India on the 25th March, then Robin and Pema will go to Arunchal Pradesh to have a look around, before Robin then heads to Bhutan. I will be in Delhi, then come back to the 'du in mid May before I go to Bhutan for a look around and to collect Robin at the end of his trip.
The big news in town now (apart from Tibet being closed which is putting a few people's plans out of whack) is that time is running out for the new constitution to be written. I think it is due in mid May - and if the parties can't agree (which it seems they clearly cannot) the Maoists are threatening to 'assert' themselves. For some reason none of the parties seem to able to agree with any of the others about anything. Which is a shame as it is the regular folk who suffer when the government 'dilly-dallies' (as the papers are fond of saying!)
But, more spectacularly, the prison authorities in Kapilvastu (southern Nepal) are in strife because there was a tunnel dug in January whereby some rascally prisoners escaped, and the prison authorities don't have the money to FILL THE TUNNEL IN AGAIN. Apparently everyone is queueing up to be put into cell number 7! Consequently....
Well enough of my opinion for now.
I'm off to do some more work before the power goes again.

Judy

3 comments:

  1. Hey Judy...
    How's it going? When and why has Tibet closed it's borders and do you know for how long?
    Hi to all.
    Cheers
    Ben

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  2. Hi Ben. because they can I think. I heard it will be open again on about the 10th of april. Cheers

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