Every Nepali I talked to last night (all of which were selling me things) told me they might not be open in the morning cause of a called bandh. “It’s 9 p.m. and you don’t yet know If you’re opening tomorrow?”, I asked. “How do you find out if it’s ON? Is there a phone tree???” They laughed but the replies were completely inscrutable. One guy said he’d just open late to give himself time to see what was up. I think, in practice, it comes down to basic word of mouth.

I needed only to walk the half-block to the main drag to know the deal on the bandh this morning. The shutters were up which meant the bandh was off so away I trotted to the Pumpernickel. It’s not that the food there is anything special but the courtyard is nice and sunny in the morning and they usually have english language newspapers so I can read my horoscope which today warned me that the hardships that I’ve set up for myself are optional and I could just bail. huh.

I plan to leave my new beloved rolly luggage behind when I head off to Bhutan and Sikkim which has freed me up to acquire Nepali stuff with wild abandon. Most of what i’m buying is heavy (metal statues) and I’m glad to not have to carry it around with me. In fact, if I were carrying it I would not be buying it. Today I’m setting things up for the major transits left on this trip – I’ve already got my ticket to Bhutan and am planning to leave there via land into India and then back into Nepal but I’m not too psyched about overland travel on Nepal’s sometimes unsafe highways so am buying a plane ticket back to Kathmandu for the end of my trip. It’s a civilized 40 minute hop on Buddha air from the eastern border of Nepal which will save me a 14 hour overnight bus-ride. Since these in-country flights are not always reliable I’ve built in a buffer of a couple days back in Kathmandu before my return flight to Bangkok which means I also need to setup a place to stay for those few days. I’d like to have have a plan for my arrival back in Kathmandu as the instant I walk out the airport doors I’ll be smothered with people trying to bag a fare or a guest house commission. Not sure why I find that whole scene so stressful.

Yesterday’s mass mail prompted lots of quality replies from peeps back home so I’ve spent most of this morning replying to private notes. This electronic connection is unbelievably important to the long-time travelers and some are really sophisticated in their methods. I’ve seen people sitting in my internet hole-in-the-wall with headsets and webcams talking to friends using skype or just instant messaging with and without webcams. Sometimes it’s hard not to notice the interactions at the pc next door. Yesterday I sat next to a woman laughing and smiling as she instant messaged her girlfriend who held up the cat to the webcam, then the jack russell terrier, then lifted her shirt at which point my neighbor turned bright red and tried to cover the screen. Ahh technology. What would we do without it – be content with traveling to foreign lands in search of banana pancakes, I guess. That, in case you have never been on the budget travel circuit, is a reference to the peculiar subset of western comfort foods that are available no matter where you go.

Sue Borchardt in Kathmandu. February 13, 2006 at 11:40 a.m.

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