Elephant Sushi and Sad News from Home ~ Saturday, September 21, 2013

This morning I was up before the sunrise, despite not getting to sleep until after midnight the night before. I had a feeling the news from home would not be good, and I was anxious about not being able to contact anyone in the past week. Ranjan said we would go to an internet café in town after we visited the elephants in the morning. It was a short ride on his motorbike to the area where the elephants are kept; two males and a female, Lucky.

The elephants seemed to be well-cared for, although I don’t agree with them carting people around on rides and being used to for an income, but such is the world we live in. They were acquired from somewhere in India where they were used as working animals, carrying wood and other materials. Now, they go on 1-3 safaris a day, carrying up to 3 people at a time for about an hour before being returned to their home for a bath and some food. It seems like a decent deal.

Lucky, the female, was quite friendly, if not a little disinterested. She didn’t mind a little trunk-rub and stood patiently as her keeper and I rolled up her elephant sushi rolls (long, sharp grasses twisted and bent into little boats which held a palmful of rice and then wrapped up like sushi) for her breakfast and some extra for lunch later on. Weighing in at approximately 200kgs each, they consume about 15gk of food and 1000 litres of water a day. Good thing the monsoon is upon us.

There were two large males also there but I was cautioned that they aren’t quite as friendly unless their handlers are right there so we spent most of our time visiting with Lucky. As they had to leave to pick up some guests from a local hotel, we said goodbye to Lucky after Maru had a quick ride on her back. Hopefully, I’ll have to opportunity to visit again when they are bathing them in the river. The location is only about a 5 minute walk from the school, which is only about an 8 minute walk from the house, so I might jig some morning and go hang with Lucky, if I’m lucky.

After the elephants, we drove around the small community of mud huts that are adjacent to their little clearing. Ranjan pointed out several toilets that had names and various countries painted across their doors. These were constructed by him with money donated from past volunteers and their friends and families who have contributed some donations. It would be nice to try to do the same when I go home, so I am thinking of preparing a video presentation, perhaps an iMovie (note to self – start taking more videos) with interviews from Ranjan, some of the local people and also the teachers to describe the community and what their needs are.

Ranjan stopped the bike to show me one of the Bio-Gas containers; a small concrete tube-shaped hole in the ground where the cow and buffalo dung is dumped. There is a small lever that can open a little drain after the dung is mixed which allows it to flow into a larger container where the ‘gas’ can be fed into the homes so families have a source of fuel for cooking. While these devices seem simple, they provide a great source of independence and improved nourishment for the families. They cost approximately $1500US to install and the government has given subsidies to some families who can pay 7-800Rs (around 70-80$).

We stopped for chai at the little ‘vegetarian’ restaurant which brings our lunch to the school each day. There were hardly any women around and I felt like I was intruding on man-time at the local gas station, but Maru and I sat as I sipped my chai and we looked at our photos from the morning with the elephants. Ranjan ran around like a chicken with its head cut off, buying one that had had its head cut off for dinner later, as well as some cauliflower, potatoes and tomatoes for lunch. I was hankerin’ for another chai so Ranjan ordered me another and drove the produce home for Swapna to prepare for lunch. He returned to find a small crowd gathered around Maru and the foreigner and then we hopped back on the bike and headed home.

I hung out a weeks’ worth of barn-smelling laundry (real-world – 25 items, Nepal – 8) and reluctantly sniffed my garments as the animal soap smell wafted from them. God I can’t wait to have Sammy wash my stuff and hang it out to dry!

Ranjan was going to make breakfast/lunch so I had an hour to do some Yoga. After lunch we set off for the town where many souvenir shops, safari-themed hotels and National Park guided tours were available. Ranjan dropped me off at a cyber café and left his cell for the manager to call when I was finished.

I rapidly opened my Email and Facebook accounts to check out what was going on in the cyber world and felt my stomach drop as I read the first line of an email from my best friend’s mom “So sorry to hear of your Aunt Bunny’s passing…” to be honest, this was not the way I wanted to find out, but I guess it makes no difference. I stopped reading and went right into my Facebook to see if there was a message from Dad. Fortunately there was. Messages starting from last Tuesday that I skimmed through as I couldn't focus on what they were saying. I wished I could have been online at a better time to chat with someone live, but as it was 12:30am in New Brunswick, so no luck. It’s kind of numbing to read these things and not really get to experience it and so easy to just push it out of your mind. Then I feel super guilty because it’s like it isn’t important or doesn’t matter, but when you can’t properly feel something, it also doesn’t seem right to ‘fake’ it. Maybe I’ll just have to have some time once I’m home to let these losses sink in and become real. Or maybe it will hit me at some random moment. But this morning, it just wasn't sinking in.

I proceeded to write some messages to people, Beth and Andrea included and upload some photos and comments from the past week. Also read and replied to a bunch of messages from some people with whom I am hoping to connect with in the next month or so of travel. I was really excited to read that Amy & Dave Lings are coming to Nepal (worked with them in China) and hope to be able to meet up with them in Kathmandu in a couple of weeks. Anna is going to be in Italy and I invited her to come crash with the girls for a night if she can make it to Florence.

I was also looking into hiking options and think I have an itinerary figured out. Ranjan phoned a friend of his in Pokhara which will be the better option for doing a short hike, to Poon Hill. Pokhara is about 7 hours from Chitwan to the North, which would mean taking the bus there, staying the night, hiking for a few days, getting a taxi back to Pokhara from wherever the hike takes me and then a bus to Kathmandu. If Amy and Dave are going to be in Kathmandu on Friday, the 4th, I would like to get there by Thursday night which would mean starting the hiking on Sunday (a week from tomorrow) and leaving here on Saturday (a week from today) so I’ll have at least 4 days to hike. After seeing how uneventful the day has been, I don’t think it’s necessary to spend all day next Saturday sitting around doing nothing when I could be on my way to Pokhara and start hiking on Sunday. He said I could hire a guide for about 1,400 a day ($14) which does not include my own food or accommodations. This seems accurate as my research online informed me that one could expect to pay around $25/day if you hire a guide. I mentioned that I might consider heading out on my own as the trails are marked, there would be other people whom I am sure I could fall in with if I wanted to and by God if those girls from “Wild” and “Becoming Odyessa” could hike the PCT and the AT on their own with little to no hiking experience, I sure as hell can handle four days in Nepal. I think Ranjan was a bit disturbed by this notion and may have mentioned it to the next friend he called (he seemed to have a different friend capable of answering every different question I had and would call each one as soon as I asked it).

“So in general, it’s ok to hike alone?”

“It is ok to hike alone, but maybe not for women.”

“And why is that?”

“Women maybe should not do the hiking alone. Because they cannot.”

“Why can they not?”

“They just can’t do things. They don't know how, you know with the directions and the trails and the hiking.”

Well, that just about settled it right there for me, Sophia would hike alone.

The next day, on the bike ride to the elephants, Ranjan mentioned that he would like to join me on the hike, but has he has so many projects on the go, including getting the organic farming business up and running, maybe he would ask his cousin, Mouise if he could join me.

“Oh, that’s really ok Ranjan, I think I’ll be fine on my own.”

“Well, he can come with you and help you and hike with you, it’s ok I’ll ask him.”

There are very few individuals on this planet that I can tolerate for extended periods of time, especially on a hike. One needs to understand the appropriate times for quiet, for keeping either a little ahead or a little behind so that one may enjoy the sounds of nature, and just be in that meditative state of oneness with nature.

“Look Ranjan, I would really prefer to do this myself and I’ll see about getting a guide when I get there. I don't really know Mouise and I am a bit uncomfortable with the idea of spending four days alone him.”

“Ok, ok, no problem.”

After the internetting, we rode back to the house and Ranjan was off somewhere else again. I was left to chill with the girls (Swapna, Ama, Maru and Gorima who was napping). There seemed to be little to do so I have taken the opportunity to write. Now that I’ve had a chance to focus a bit and sort through some thoughts and events of the day, I am encouraged to interview some people and get some movie footage so I can put together an iMovie.

And with that, I am off for an evening stroll. Hopefully I don’t get any bows and arrows pointed at me, perhaps I’ll choose a different route tonight.