Living La Vida Loca

Our dear friend Laura, who used to be our next door neighbor in Carlsbad, has remained an inspiring and beloved partner in “Tikkun Olam” (Repairing the World) activities both Andrew and I are passionate about.  Laura has started food programs for homeless communities, builds houses in Mexico, and now has created Culturekova with the goal of connecting people with other cultures through small, guided tours and cultural immersions. Laura has started with Nepal where she has established close relationships with a wide variety of religious, artistic and environmental experts and activists.  I was fortunate to be able to join her very first tour that not only included Nepal, but also Bhutan. There were only six of us including Laura and her daughter, Julia, and it was an incredibly rich and memorable adventure.  Bhutan was an “add on” that only two of us joined – Laura wanted to explore whether this is another stop worth adding to her roster of tour destinations.  The two countries have as many differences as they have similarities, and I hope I can describe these through my writing.  Both were well worth the very long journey to get there!

Given the extreme length of the flying to Nepal, I opted to splurge and upgrade. Singapore Air gets five stars for its business class comfort. With 16 hours in the air from LAX to Singapore I did get to sleep five or six hours lying down! Even the food was delightful and the flight attendants could not have been more kind.

The Silver Lounge in Singapore was real treat.  Having a hot shower, a blow dryer and the ability to change clothes was a godsend. I had a very eclectic Asian breakfast. char siu bao, steamed veg potstickers and more. Since my layover was more than 10 hours, I took a free bus and tram tour of Singapore highlights. And met people from all over the world in transit as I was. I wish I’d had more time to explore Singapore center city but the highlights I saw told me it’s a very modern, clean and tourist-friendly place.

The flight to Kathmandu was a bit different story.  It was a very old plane, but Singapore Airlines is in the midst of upgrading this smaller fleet. My seatmate was a cardiologist from Tucson, originally from Nepal. We had a good conversation about healthcare and politics in Nepal that gave me a bit of pre-visit insight.  He is moving his parents from Nepal to be closer to family.

Small story…upon landing I got ready to go through security. I asked one of the guards whether a sealed bottle of water was OK to take through. Instead of answering me, he took the bottle of water and waved me to the front of the line with all my gear and basically got me through in about one minute. I suspect it had to do with my “advanced” age so I don’t know how to feel about that. But hey, that would never happen in the US so I’m not complaining.

Getting through immigration and customs was a breeze. Laura had given us a little video tour as she went through a few days earlier so I just followed the steps. It was really quite easy and everybody was very helpful. I found Laura just where she said I would in the main reception hall – she’d arranged for a car that brought her and took us back to the Kathmandu destination – a lovely guest house on the grounds of a monastery. The rooms in the guest house were spartan but very clean, comfortable and incredibly quiet.

After we dropped my bags off – it was already evening – we took a walk around the stupa closest to where we were staying. This is the Bouddhanath Stupa – one of the largest and most sacred Buddhist stupas in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This mandala-shaped monument is a center of Tibetan Buddhism in Nepal, with thousands of pilgrims and Buddhist followers daily. The stupa’s huge white dome represents the earth, with painted eyes of Buddha gazing in all four directions on the top, symbolizing the all-seeing wisdom and compassion of the enlightened mind. The area surrounding the stupa is filled with Tibetan culture, shops selling prayer flags and singing bowls, and cafes where you can sip traditional butter tea or milk tea while watching the endless stream of devotees circumambulating the stupa clockwise, spinning prayer wheels and chanting mantras.

Because it was a festival week, the streets were filled with young people, singing, dancing, and clearly having a good time. It was really beautiful to see so many kiddos so energized without creating unrest! Most of the buildings were decorated with bright lights, and there was music everywhere…we did have to dodge motorcycles, but I guess that’s part of the fun.

After a hot shower as I lie in bed, it’s peaceful and quiet except for a miscellaneous bird call. Time for sleep.