Kathmandu, Nepal

3 years after first planning a trip here I finally made it to Kathmandu. What a trip, what a crazy place. On Sunday (22 October) Ben and I woke up at 6 AM due to 'jet lag'. Tibetan time is 2:15 ahead of Nepalese time thanks to the Chinese wanting to keep the entire huge 'country' on the same time zone. None of the restaurants were open at such an early hour so we opted for donuts at a bakery. We were done with breakfast before 8 AM! I spent the day doing errands. So many things to take care of at the moment after not being able to do much of anything in Tibet. I have a slight head cold and finding a pharamacy was harder than it should have been. I'm still having problems with my eyes so I've been wearing glasses. In fact I had to wear my glasses the entire hike out of base camp which is a big deal to me since I hate wearing glasses and it affects my vision. I got my shoes fixed this morning when someone came by and said to me "do you need your shoes fixed?" I had my pants down over the destroyed part of my shoes so I guess it was a completely random question. So for $4 (I think I actually got ripped off) I got my shoes all fixed up. I was planning on having to buy a new pair here. Then I found some new insoles for $3 because my current insoles were completely trashed from the last 4 months of hiking around. I bought a Nepal guidebook and another book to read after being bookless for the past 3 weeks! (no chance of finding a descent english book to read in Lhasa). Got my safari hat fixed for $.50, which tore on my hike. Found contact lens solution which they don't have in Tibet outside of Lhasa. Hopefully new saline solution should fix my current contact problem.

I have a bunch more things to do here in Kathmandu tomorrow. After my head cold goes away, my eyes get better, and my blistered feet heal (I guess the high elevation really did a number on me!), I'm heading out to do the Annapurna circuit trek, which should take about 3 weeks. I have up to 2 months in Nepal on my visa and I may be here that entire time. There is so much to see and do here and I am really digging the Nepalese at the moment. It makes me want to go to India, being so close here.........