Back To The Terai

Posted on March 19, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses. No one to lean on, rely on, or blame. The gift is yours – it is an amazing journey – and you alone are responsible for the quality of it. This is the day your life really begins.”

Though I could have spent weeks exploring other villages throughout the area (I didn’t want to impose any longer in the one I loved), I felt that it had been the perfect experience, and that I was ready to spend a week idly walking around, reading, and writing. I headed back down to the terai, the flat plains of Nepal, where I rented a room at a small “hotel” for four days. I spent most of my time reading and finished six or seven books (almost two thousand pages). I wandered around a bit, but, once again, was slightly put off by the inordinate amount of attention I received, so I spent most of my time on the roof of my hotel.

Purple Three Eyed Alien

Posted on March 17, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“I am going away to an unknown country where I shall have no past and no name, and where I shall be born again with a new face and an untried heart.”

I am pretty sure I have grown an extra arm. Or maybe I am purple from head to toe. Or possibly I am eighteen feet tall but haven’t realized it yet. That’s how I feel when people stare at me here, I feel as if I am an extraterrestrial. It continues to surprise me how, just because my hair is a little lighter and my eyes are blue, I am treated as if I am a different species. I am constantly pointed at, stared at, and followed, just because my skin color is a bit different. Though I have always been happily different than most of my peers, conformity is definitely not something I stand for, there are times that I wish I could just blend in. I want to live life in these rural remote villages, but I don’t always want to be the center of attention.

Five Hours to School

Posted on March 15, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“If you’re twenty-two, physically fit, hungry to learn and be better, I urge you to travel – as far and as widely as possible. Sleep on floors if you have to. Find out how other people live and eat and cook. Learn from them – wherever you go.”

I have read about children walking hours to and from school, but I never imagined it to be quite like this. I set off one morning with two of the boys, thinking I was taking a trip to the “market” a few kilometers away. About an hour away, when I was ready to turn back, I encountered half a dozen other children from the village walking down the small winding footpaths to the valley as well. I didn’t realize it, but they (and I) were all headed to a school function, a cultural program where they sing and dance and preform for the parents. They kept telling me “school, school,” but after so many hours of walking, I couldn’t believe their school was really this far away. Sure enough, over two hours later, we arrived.

Run With The Children

Posted on March 12, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Travel is rebellion in its purest form… We follow our heart. We free ourselves of labels. We lose control willingly. We trade a role for reality. We love the unfamiliar. We trust strangers. We only own what we can carry. We search for better questions, not answers. We truly graduate. We, sometimes, never choose to come back.”

On the second morning of my stay in Far Western Nepal the eight year old girl signaled me to follow her. We ended up running up and down the little paths that connect the houses, collecting children from different houses along the way. It was hilarious and one of the best moments I have had yet, flying down the hillside with a half dozen happy children.

My Little Love Story

Posted on March 11, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Maybe some women aren’t meant to be tamed, maybe they’re supposed to run wild until they find someone, just as wild, to run with.”

You know that scene in a movie where the girl runs into some guys arms in the airport and they just stand there, holding each other, as if the thousands of rushed travelers around them seem to melt away? Yeah, you know that scene, and yesterday, I was that lucky girl. This very real movie-like moment took place at the Kathmandu airport when Kevin and his bicycle arrived in Nepal to join me.

Life In The Smokey Mud Hut

Posted on March 10, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Travel is about the gorgeous feeling of teetering in the unknown.”

Their house is filled with smoke, and without electricity, the natural light seeping in from the open door gives the mud hut a homey feel. A couple and their two children I met in a field in Far Western Nepal have brought me back to their small humble abode, a one room mud house with a few blankets on the floor in one corner, and a pile of wood for the fire in the other. The ceiling is covered with hanging corn, drying to be made into flour, and besides that, there is hardly anything else in the house. They have three or four cows outside and fields surrounding them where they grow crops, they are self sufficient farmers living off of the land. Their small village is composed of a dozen or so houses spread out near the top of one of the rolling foothills in the Himalayas.

Where Time Stands Still

Posted on March 8, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“It’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you’re ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.”

After hoping up off the bus I walked alongside the road for a few minutes until I saw a small path leading down. I took it and found myself staring at a group of six or seven children around a huge steaming cauldron. They peered at me cautiously, and the youngest ones even ran away. I stayed where I was, not sure if I should approach even though I was curious as to what they were making. A few minutes later a women, followed by a pigtailed eight year old girl, came up behind me and laughingly invited me down. Though many of the children stayed away, obviously still frightened by me, the women asked me where I was going. Pretty soon a man approached, her husband, and handed me a warm thick heap of brown sugar on a leaf. Sweet and flavorful, unlike any sugar I have tasted in the west, I realized the huge steaming pot in front of me was filled with sugar cane syrup they were transforming into sugar.

Living in a National Geographic Documentary

Posted on March 6, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Every so often a bird gets up and flies some place that its drawn to. I don’t suppose it could tell you why, but it does anyways.”

I stopped for tea just before reaching the village I would be staying at. There were two small mud huts with an open fire outside where you can stop for food while traversing the hills. Sitting there is like being in a National Geographic documentary, life here in rural Nepal is a whole different universe.

The Slowest Ride

Posted on March 4, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Not all those who wander are lost.”

The bus is tilting precariously, again, and the boy who has been hanging out of the door jumps out to place a large rock behind the back wheel to prevent us from slipping any farther back. The driver restarts the engine and with a lurch we are off. The boy is running alongside the bus while holding onto the handle, we are moving so slowly it isn’t hard for him to jump in and out as he pleases. I am headed up and over the foothills in rural western Nepal on a “road” where only one bus passes daily. Besides that, the path is used by villagers herding their goats or cows and by the occasional daring motorcycle. Though it can’t be more than thirty kilometers to the top, it is nearly a three hour treacherous journey.

Headed West

Posted on March 1, 2014 by The Wandering Nomads

“Don’t tell people your dreams, show them.”

Nineteen hours of sitting on the bus and a full twenty-four hours of sleepless travel later, and I’m finally here in far Western Nepal. Besides that vague description, I actually don’t have a clue where I am. Far Western Nepal is a foreign land even to the Nepalis themselves. Delhi, the capital of India, is closer than Kathmandu to this region which results in it being left out politically and even physically. In fact, until the mid 1990’s when the bridges and highway were finished, this section of Nepal was completely cut off from the rest of the country during the monsoon season every year. Guide books, which cover every other section of Nepal extensively, put in just a small paragraph saying it is a remote region that lacks facilities and is virtually unexplored. And the Lonely Planet wastes no time adding that it is a very dangerous region, controlled by the sporadically violent Maoists, and should be avoided. To be honest, I am very glad the guidebooks have such a hilariously inaccurate description of this area as it has kept it tourist-free, a hidden gem in a country which relies so heavily on foreigners.