Bump. Bump. Bump Bump.  Bump. Go the wheels on the bus.  For a day, we wound our way north on pocked roads that would make an acne-ridden teenager feel a jolt of self-esteem.  I was comforted by the constant presence of a stranger’s hand on my headrest, allowing me to know that at least somebody was near.  We had left Varanasi where we had spent a few days taking in life on the Ganges, though sadly missed out on any floating corpses.  I did not have any religious epiphanies or awakenings though; those, apparently, cost extra.  Tori’s bowels gave her a rude awakening, and I don’t think she enjoyed the time there as much as I.  Regardless, it was with a sigh of relief we walked over the border into Nepal that night, ready for a break.

Tori’s ambition to be in a nice place drove us out of Sunuali, the border town, the next morning.  Apparently a dust-ridden border town does not count as a nice place to pass a day.  We spent the day on a bus.  Bumping up and down the roads.  Accompanied of course by many many locals.  We passed through towns, valleys, and numerous jerking turns before arriving in Pokhara.  A fun quirk of Nepal: there is not enough water to meet electric demands of the populace during the winter.  So rolling blackouts are a fact of life all throughout the country.  My previous schadenfreude over Tori’s bowel issues was cruelly punished by karma, as I then fell victim to my own thoroughly unpleasant illness.  This severely limited the scope of my activities in Pokhara, and thus I have nothing to report from there.

Another long day on a bus later, we made it into the Kathmandu Valley, home of the capital city of…wait for it… Kathmandu!  After spending 3 weeks in Indian cities, it was nice to be away from the cows, cow smells, and cow dung.  Kathmandu is actually far more charming than I’d expected it to be, and we spent the first full day in town acquainting ourselves with Freak Street, a leftover moniker from the days when Kathmandu was an outpost of the Hippie Trail, and Durbar Square, our immediate neighbor.  We were charmed by the 1950s style conference room for the king and cabinet, replete with antelope leg candles, zebra and giraffe legs lamps, and a rhino hoof for good measure.  Sadly cameras are not allowed to sweep over such relics, so I hope your imaginations are active.

The next day was spent taking in a pair of Buddhist stupas on opposite sides of the town and walking around, sanity recovered.  The pace, traffic, smells, and basically all the negative parts of the Indian experience are absent here, or at least greatly reduced, and it makes for a nice time.  The country has just elected a Prime Minister and after 10 years of ongoing struggles with Maoist rebels, the end of it pervades the city and country with a wonderful sense of optimism.  This is at least my expert opinion as an uninformed outsider with less than a week on the the ground and no knowledge of the local language past the official greeting of Nepal, “Namaste, please have a look!”.  Typically this is accompanied by a sweep of hand over one’s merchandise.

Yesterday was a fun day consisting of walking, lots of walking.  Given the seemingly perpetual state of semi-gridlock that characterizes Kathmandu, it was simply easier to go by foot for free.  I was the happy participant on the receiving end of Indian bureaucracy, making a pair of trips to the visa section to get re-approval to enter their country so I could then leave from it.  At least the trip was a success.  We also squeezed in a trip to nearby Patan and that town’s own Durbar Square, which has a similarly impressive grouping of temples that left me only regretful that my battery had not found a place to recharge the night before.

Nepal has been wonderful and especially useful as a place to recover from the stresses of India, a task for which it has stood in wonderfully.  Today Tori and I part ways, ending another successful Bennett kids travel partnership.  She goes back to Shenzhen and I make my way by air south to Bangladesh tomorrow for a new week of adventures to come.