Nepal/Tibet

ROYALS!!!!





First off, I would like to apologize to the loyal readers of Matt in Indonesia. I know that my blog game has been nonexistent recently and you deserve better.

Quick rundown: school is going well. For Lebaran Break this year I went to Nepal and Tibet with Aaron and Nate. It was awesome (pics/info will come in a little). This year I am teaching 2 P6 English classes. They are good kids and hopefully I don’t screw them up too much this academic year. My form class, P6 Hope, is pictured below.

Life has been crazy the last 8 weeks (not an excuse for the lack of blog activity, I know). School has been busy and I have had to work through a transition to being back on the market. Life is good, though. I can’t complain. I’ve got a great job, great people in my life, and I get to travel the world. Life is good.

I get to go visit my good friend David in South Africa tomorrow. That won't suck.

The following blog will outline our trek from Jakarta to Kathmandu, Nepal to Lhasa, China then a road trip through Tibet where we ended up taking a helicopter to get back to Kathmandu (long story) and then our flights back to Jakarta.

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We headed off to Nepal on July 25. The cheapest way for all of us to get to Nepal was to do different airlines with all of us stopping in Kuala Lumpur on the night of the 25^th. All of our flight paths were the same except I was on a Royal Nepal flight to Kathmandu while the other two flew Malaysia Airlines*.

(waiting in line in KL)

* This is not for the reason you are thinking. I would have much preferred to fly Malaysia Airlines but the Royal Nepal flight was $100 cheaper round-trip. There were no problems with the flight and I actually had the best meal I’ve ever had on an airplane (tremendous curry chicken). The two negatives would be the herding of cattle to get on the airplane and the cockroach that I met on the flight back to KL. Minor details.

On the flight from KL to Kathmandu, I got that bule upgrade from 23B to 5F*.

* Window seats are game-changers on long flights. Not for the view, but you get the extra head support when trying to sleep.

We got to Nepal and our taxi driver, Bob, hooked us up. We chilled out for a little and enjoyed the rooftop area at our hotel.

We enjoyed a bomb meal at Curry Kitchen for our first taste of the incredible Nepali cuisine.

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One thing that Aaron and I were on the same page about is that you can never be too safe while in another country. This led to us having many brief safety meetings during this trip to ensure a good time.

Christian (my good friend who teaches at the other Jakarta campus for BBS) had been to Kathmandu before and had met a really cool chick, Bnu. She showed him around the city and offered to do the same for us while we were there.

Some of the things that we saw on our first day with Bnu included Swyambhu Stupa, Durbar Square, and eating traditional Newari food.

 

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I cannot stress how incredible the food was on this trip. Nepali food is very similar to Northern Indian food. We had an incredible Nepali omelet for breakfast that included…wait for it…bacon. Living in a mostly Muslim nation, you don’t take this for granted. Another great thing that Nepal had was milk tea (also masala tea if you like a little spice in there). It is an incredible drink and I would have it every morning if it were available to me.

Bnu came to our hotel and picked us up for another day of exploring. We took the public bus and it was quite the experience.

To say it was crowded would be the understatement of the century. But it adds to the experience.

During our travels on this day, we experienced Patan Durbar Square.

For dinner that night we went to a place that one of our teaching colleagues, Nava*, recommended during her trip to Kathmandu this last summer holiday.

* Let me preface this by saying how much I like Nava. She is a really cool chick and is one of the more enjoyable people to be around from our school.

Nava likes to pride herself on being a “true” traveler. She doesn’t pack much and she travels cheap. Good. Fine. If that’s what you like to do, do it. So when Nava recommended this Nepali restaurant for us to try, we were all expecting something really authentic. What we got was a pretty westernized place that wasn’t crowded at all. The food was fine, but we were surprised as to why she was raving about it. There was also a single guy from New Zealand who just weaseled his way into our conversation and made himself at home. Gotta love those people*.

* I don’t actually love those people.

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The entire next day we spent at Bhaktapur (a suburb and more cultural area of Kathmandu). The area was pretty cool and we got to see a bunch of different stuff.

Two highlights would be the paper factory and the big square where a bunch of clay items were everywhere.

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Our last full day in Kathmandu before heading to Lhasa was spent sleazin. We just chilled and ate a bunch of good food. Our hotel wasn’t too far from a place called the American Club and we wanted to go check it out. We had heard briefly about it, but we didn’t exactly know what it was. It sounded like a place for Americans to go chill. It was a walled off area really close to the Palace in Kathmandu.

We got there 2 minutes too early. We went up to the glass window and asked what exactly this place was. We had our passports and were hoping that we would be allowed to go in once showing we were American citizens. Not the case. It is a country club where you pay a fee (we are assuming a hefty fee) to go eat, socialize, etc. About 90 seconds after we got to the glass area, a white male went up to the window and said, “I’m here for the ultimate game,” and was let right in. We talked to him briefly before he went through the gate and he said he hasn’t renewed his membership for this year but he was meeting up with some friends to play. Oh well.

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July 31 we left Kathmandu to head to Lhasa and into the PEOPLE’S Republic of China*.

* China sucks.

Our flight to Lhasa was a little over $500. It was a one-way flight that took a hair under 2 hours. The government regulates all flights. If you are coming in, that’s what you are paying.

We could see Mt. Everest during the flight (pictured below).
 

When we got to China on our group visa (which each of us got to pay $140 for), we had to wait for our tour guide, Siri, to come pick us up and take us into Lhasa.

Instantly you could tell the landscape of Tibet is incredible. Very mountainous. Very gorgeous.

The airport is about an hour’s drive from the actual city of Lhasa. I’m not sure what the point of that is.

We got into Lhasa, dropped our stuff at the hotel and went out to get some food. The meat of choice is yak, so I got a yak burger accompanied by a Lhasa beer.

The burger was fine. No complaints. Nothing distinct about yak meat.

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Our group of about 25 tourists was split into 2 groups. One group got the more fluent, young, energetic tour guide. And we got Puchung. Puchung was a great guy. You could tell that he genuinely wanted to share about Tibetan culture and inform us on anything we needed to know. Unfortunately, his English was not very good (I’m being polite) and his accent was thick. But I cannot stress enough that he was a good man and the frustrations that might be expressed do not have to do with him personally.

Our 2-day tour of Lhasa started at Drepung Monastery. It is set up in the mountains and overlooks Lhasa. It was built in 1416. 500 monks live there. The 5^th Dala Lama lived here before moving to the Potala Palace (much more on this later). The 2^nd, 3^rd, and 4^th Lamas are buried at Drepung.

(this was pretty cool; there is a hole in the wall and you are supposed to walk towards it with your eyes closed from about 10m away: obviously, I was the closest of us 3)

I thought I had seen bad restroom stops. Remote areas of Palawan, Philippines and remote areas of Sumatra, Indonesia have some real winners. Nothing compares to a Tibetan trough.

We also visited Sera Monastery to wrap up the first day in Lhasa.

Thankfully we did this on the first day (it was rainy) and we did the more exciting day second.

(this was really cool; monks quiz each other in this large courtyard where you can go and watch)

 

(we got to spend a lot of time with our new Belian friends, Jef and Lies, in China; they were great people and a lot of fun to be around)

(...?)

Before getting to the really good stuff, a little info on Chinese people. Dude, they are gross. Guys and girls spitting wherever and whenever they please. It was nasty. The other really annoying thing about Chinese culture is that people will cut you in line for no reason whatsoever. I had experienced a little of this in Jakarta, but it was ten times worse in China. Now, Aaron, Nate, and Matty P don't take ish from anybody, so many Chinese were shouldered away or told to get back during our time there. There were many internal talks between us about this. We came to the conclusion that cutting in line is just straight up rude. We don't think there is anything cultural about clearly cutting someone who has been waiting longer than you. We didn't take any of that nonsense.

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August 2^nd, 2014 will probably go down as the most cultured day I will ever experience.

Lhasa is more or less the Mecca of Tibetan Buddhism. There are 4 sects of Buddhism and Tibetan Buddhism is the most popular (the one where the Dalai Lama is the spiritual leader).

The first thing we did on our second day was visit the Potala Palace. If you don’t know what it is (I had no idea before this trip was planned), Google it. Now.

I’ll wait. I’m serious. Google that ish.

The Potala Palace has 2,000 rooms.

(Aaron and I saw a couple Chinese girls doing this pose so we decided to do it as well; we are slowly becoming Asian)

(#asia)

There are two palaces: white and red. The White Palace is the newer palace. In here we saw the 13^th and 14^th Dalai Lama's thrones and the meditation room for the 13^th and 14^th Dalai Lamas.

The Red Palace is the older palace. What was described as the “most important” temple in the palace contains 498kg of gold. (Jaw drops).

The 8^th Dalai Lama’s tomb? 158kg of gold.

The 5^th Dalai Lama’s tomb? 3,721kg of gold and 10,000 precious stones.

At roughly $42,000 per kg of gold, that comes to…a s*** ton of money in gold (or roughly $183 mil just from those three areas alone).

The Potala Palace was incredible. It is where Dalai Lamas 5-14 have lived*.

* Currently we are in the middle of the 14^th Dalai Lama’s tenure as spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism. He is now living in exile in India. When there was a failed rebellion against the takeover of Tibet from China in the 1950s, the Dalai Lama sought exile in India. I will not go into my personal thoughts on the Dalai Lama because: 1) I don’t know nearly enough and 2) you should form your own opinion. I will say, however, that it is definitely worth it to invest an hour of your time to read up on the 14^th Dalai Lama and some of the things that he has done/said throughout his life – even recently.

I had no idea before going on the trip that the Dalai Lama is believed to be the same spirit reincarnated in a new body (maybe I’m naïve/not very smart, but I didn’t know this). Once a Dalai Lama passes, the direction the wind takes the ashes of the Dalai Lama leads the leaders of Tibetan Buddhism to the general area of where he will be reincarnated. The leaders will look for clues in young boys in specific regions and give them tests* to determine who the new Dalai Lama is.

* Apparently these tests include putting a lot of items in front of the young boy and seeing if he selects/prefers the items that were a part of the previous Dalai Lama’s life.

Once the new Dalai Lama has been spotted, he is traditionally taken back to Lhasa to study for 15ish years before officially taking on a leadership role. It is all quite fascinating.

For lunch that day, we got to try a Tibetan staple – butter tea. It literally tastes like a cup of melted butter. Not good.

That afternoon we walked to Jokhang Temple. This is the holiest temple in Tibet and a lot of Tibetan Buddhists will make a pilgrimage to this temple at some point in their life. Apparently, people will leave there home and walk all the way there. This can be hundreds and hundreds of miles. Some even go the entire distance by taking three steps, bowing down towards Lhasa, lying prostrate on the ground, standing up, then taking three more steps, bowing down towards Lhasa, etc. That's dedication.

It was a beautiful temple and it was incredible to see the people that were there on their pilgrimage.

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We started our road trip through Tibet on August 3.

Our first great view when we were on the road was Yamdruk Lake. We were 4,800m up at the lake.

The next stop we made at was Kharola Glacier which had an altitude* of 5,560m.

* Let’s talk about altitude. Altitude sickness is a b****. There is no other way to put it. It sucks. You will get it. No matter what you do. It’s just a massive headache that does not go away. The only time that it was unbearable was at Mt. Everest. We will talk more about that later.

We also went to Pelkhor Chode Monastery which is the only Buddhist monastery in the world that practices 3 different sects of Buddhism. It was founded in 1418 and had a sweet Mongolian-style wall to protect it from invaders.

Also featured here is the biggest stupa in Tibet, the 100,000 Image Stupa (directly above).

While we were doing the tour of Pelkhor, the tour guide gave us some advice if we ran into a yeti. All children in Tibet are taught that if you see a yeti, you should run down the mountain. The reason for this is that the yeti’s long hair will get in its eyes and it won’t be able to see while it chases you.

Our next stop was Shigatse. Shigatse is the 2^nd biggest city in Tibet behind Lhasa. Here we visited Ta Shi Lhun Po Monestary which was founded by the 1^st Dalai Lama in 1447.

We were told a story about why monks/Tibetans aren’t supposed to drink or have sex. There once was a monk who had to stay overnight at a family’s farm to finish his prayers and it was too late for him to go home. While he was finishing his prayers, the daughter of the family came up to him and said that he had to either drink a pitcher of beer, kill a sheep, or have sex with her. The monk thought about it and decided that drinking the beer was probably the least harmful of the options. Once he drank the beer, he was drunk and ended up sleeping with the girl. After that, he was so mad that he went outside and killed the sheep. That is why Tibetans are not supposed to drink, have sex, or kill.

Also at Ta Shi Lhun Po are the 4^th-10^th Panchen Lamas. They are buried here. The Panchen Lama is the second spiritual leader of Tibet, only behind the Dalai Lama. The current Panchen Lama was the first that was chosen by the PEOPLE's Republic of China themselves. The government maintains that it will be the one to choose the next Dalai Lama when it is time. This is all highly controversial and I, unfortunately, don't know nearly enough about it all to give you great insight.

At night, we found out that there had been a massive landslide in Nepal close to the Chinese border. This affected us because it wiped out the one road that connects Tibet and Kathmandu. Our options were to either pay $250 to ride a helicopter back to Kathmandu or travel back to Lhasa and try to figure our way back from there. Flights from Lhasa to Kathmandu were over $500 and that didn’t even mention the possible problem we might have with our visa expiring while we were still in the country. We went with the helicopter. We really had no choice. As shady as it was giving $250 to our tour company and not getting any kind of receipt, it was the only play.

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We woke up early on August 4 to head to Mt. Everest.

We spent the whole day in the car (11 hours) and easily the worst part was the final 4 hours where we were on maybe the bumpiest road I’ve ever been on.

We got to the highest monastery in the world where we would sleep. This is where the altitude sickness really hit. Maybe it had something to do with being at the tallest mountain in the world, I don’t know.

For dinner we ate chicken chowmein. That’s basically the only thing that was edible in Tibet.

RANT ALERT

Tibetan food suuuuuucks. It was terrible. It was really surprising going from Nepal (which is top 3 types of food that I’ve had) to Tibetan food that was easily the worst. So bad. I don’t understand how the spices and the good recipes stuck in India and Nepal and didn’t make their way across the border into China. It really was that bad. I’m not exaggerating.

The good thing that happened at dinner was that the clouds parted and we got to see the top of Everest.

(Jef !!)

Because of the bad headache, no one slept well that night. It was ok though because we were gonna hike Mt. Everest the next day.

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I went out of my way to wake up for sunrise to see how the mountain looked with the rising sun hitting it. The results were, less than ideal…

The other weaklings that I was with didn’t want to climb all the way to the top of Everest, so I settled and agreed to do a 4km hike.

(Skip !!)

It was really cool. Got to chat with Skip* for a good portion of the hike and just enjoy being on the world’s largest mountain.

* Skip is a Native American who grew up in Missouri, has traveled all around the world, and just recently finished working in Cambodia (look for a Cambodia blog post in January 2015). He was a really cool dude in his mid 60s who has lived life to the fullest.

We hiked up to Mt. Everest Base Camp. For some reason, in my mind I had an image of a really nice area that sold a bunch of knickknacks and souvenirs. Nope. It was a concrete building in the middle of nowhere.

Not a big deal, but I was expecting a little something more than that.

Unfortunately, the rest of the day was spent back in the car heading down the mountain. Man, that road was brutal.

(breathtaking)

We drove to the Nepal/China border that night as we got ready to head back to Kathmandu. We were on one road where we had to stop for extended periods of time twice because if you made it to the end of the road in less than 4 hours you got fined*. China, mane.

* The military presence in China is too much. All along highways (our guess is that we were stopped between 15-20 times during the road trip) there are posts where you and/or the guide has to go in and show the passports and visas of those traveling. It got really annoying.

We spent the night in a city on the border ready to take a helicopter ride in the morning.

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We woke up in the morning ready to get the day over with. We had a lot of travel left and there was a lot of uncertainty as to exactly what would happen once we crossed the border and tried to get on the helicopter. Our tour agency had assured us that everything would go smoothly, but there is definitely some concern when you hand someone $250 knowing that you will never see them again*.

* The helicopters took off just on the other side of the border, in Nepal. So when our tour guide dropped us off at the border, there was no going back or contacting him if something went wrong.

Once we got through the border, we took a taxi for about 20 minutes to one of the helipads. There were two helipads to choose from. One was where the 24-person helicopter took off from. The other was where the 6-person helicopter took off from. Since there were 11 of us taking the helicopter, we assumed it was the 24-person one.

We got there and there was a group of people on a Hindu pilgrimage that had been stranded in the town the previous night. We arrived and they were under the impression that we were trying to steal their helicopter from them. This was absolutely not the case. We were just trying to figure out if we were in the right area. It turned into a race*-based situation that was not pretty.

* Race is real. I didn’t realize this until moving to Asia. People can claim that it is made up all they want. That is not true. Race is very much a part of human body/experience/psyche/whatever. I won’t go further, but if you say race doesn’t exist you haven’t seen much of the world.

It turns out we needed to go to the 6-person helipad. Thankfully, it all worked out in the end.

Nate, being the selfish person he is, took the first helicopter with four others from our group while Aaron and I stuck around to catch the next one.

(the landslide that forced us to take a helicopter)

At the end of the day, we made it back to Kathmandu, which is all we could ask for.

Unfortunately, once we arrived in Kathmandu, I got brutally ill. This was the first time that I had gotten sick during a trip abroad. I know it was something I ate that morning for breakfast, but I had the same bread and eggs everyone else had. It didn't add up because two other guys in the group got the same illness. But we all ate the same stuff...

I was a little disappointed that this was the first trip I didn’t fully make it through, but it only kept me on the sideline for about 24 hours. Not terrible.

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I slept 14 hours that night just trying to recover.

I missed a visit to an international school in Kathmandu. Aaron* had done some research on the school and wanted to go meet the principal and take a look at the campus while he was there.

* This trip was all Aaron. When I first moved out here, Australia was the one trip that I wanted to do. No matter what happened, I was going to do Australia and I was going to do it right. Thankfully, I had Nate to go with me. That made that trip awesome. Aaron's one trip that he wanted to make was Nepal. He is into Buddhist philosophy and had been to China before, so when the opportunity presented itself to wander into Tibet and visit some of the most sacred buildings in the world, we had to do it.

That afternoon we all just hung out because Nate was leaving that night for KL a couple days before Aaron and I.

We discovered this incredible Italian restaurant during our second stay in Kathmandu, Fire and Ice Pizza.

We went there with Nate and then Aaron and I went there again the next day.

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Aaron and I had different flights back to KL on August 9. He left at lunch time and I left at around 11pm. He was going to explore KL that night and then I would join him to do the traditional touristy stuff the next day.

In KL, we first went to the Petronas Towers.

Pretty cool. We just walked around the area and then went into one of the malls in the area for lunch. We found a great sandwich place, The Loaf.

A few things we noticed about Malaysia:

Everything is more expensive than Indonesia

-        The logistics are infinitely better than Indonesia

-        You can’t get dirt cheap soccer jerseys like you can in Indonesia (this one made me really sad)

-        The sellers on the street are much more aggressive than in Indonesia

We then headed back to the airport and back to our regular lives.

Malaysia seems cool, but I think there are better travel opportunities at better prices in SE Asia (but I am basing this off the very short day that I spent there). As for China, I have no desire to go back. I am very glad that I saw it and I think that we made the right decision by doing Tibet instead of the major cities in Eastern China. It was a great trip, but I don’t expect to be back in China anytime during this life. Nepal was dope and I would be interested in doing a 2-week trek through the mountains there in the future.

It was an incredible trip with two incredible buddies. I am very fortunate that I have met both Aaron and Nate.

Thank you for reading and I apologize again for the delay in posting about my most recent adventure. As always, if you ever need to get a hold of me, e-mail me at: mattsphillips@cox.net

God bless !!