Leaving India ..

November 3rd, 2006

Okay, all the festivities over, it’s time to say goodbye to Delhi and Hello to Kathmandu. If I remember it correctly our flight with Indian Airlines, was IC-813 and was scheduled for around 1 pm IST. And there was another problem, we are not supposed to carry currency note of 500 (INR) into Nepal, its not that we cannot carry, but it wont be accepted, so taking all the cash in 100’s was a headache. We stocked some bundles in our pockets and rest went securely into luggage.

So lets come to the Legendry Indian Auto Rickshaw, contrary to popular belief that they rip western tourists, they do not spare even their Indian brethren, and when you tell them you want to go to International Airport, then it automatically rings a bell that you are more moneyed than the average man on the street. So after lot of haggling we hired an Auto Rickshaw and reached Airport at around 11 AM.

At the air India counter we were given some immigration forms, which we filled promptly, collected our boarding passes and the rest of the process was like a breeze. We were asked couple of questions at the immigration and there were no major hassles.

So there we were sitting in the waiting terminal of International Airport, surrounded with well heeled Indians and foreigners. In fact I have heard a lot of criticism about the condition of Airports in India, however since I have not seen any airport other than Indian ones and now Nepalese, I somehow still find them quite okay. Maybe that’s because I have nothing to compare them with. So we were sitting there observing the mannerisms of all sorts of passengers, kids, staff, Air Hostesses ;-).

Boarding started quite late from the scheduled time, which made us worry about Mr. Manjit Thapa, as he was supposed to pick us up from the Airport in Kathmandu as 3:15 PM. And once we were on the place, it didn’t take off for another 30 minutes or so, as there was no slot for it on the runway.

Finally we were airborne by 2 pm, and anxiously started to wait for the meals to be served. We were quite glad that the staff didn’t waste much time and started serving as soon as the seatbelt sign went off. I don’t exactly recall what was served, but it was not very filling, however was of decent quality.

I struck a conversation with a fellow passenger was quite a regular visitor to Nepal. He told me that we could have booked Royal Nepal Airlines instead, as they served liquor on board. So next time it would be Royal Nepal Airline for me. He also told us about the distance between Kathmandu and Pokhara, various means of transport. He told me that there was no need of changing the IC (Indian Currency) to NC (Nepalese Currency), as everyone in Nepal would welcome the IC and would give us the change in IC or if they return the balance in NC they will give it according to exchange rate. All across Nepal they followed the standard rate of 1 IC = 1.6 IC. So it means that if I purchase something worth NC 80, and hand over a IC 100 note, so they assume that they have got NC 160 and will return NC 80 back. It might sound confusing but its very simple concept.

Anyways as we were nearing Kathmandu, we were able to get some awesome views of the snow capped Himalayas. It was a thrilling sight. I am uploading some pictures that we took from the plane.

Waiting for Festivities to Start !!

Late August 2006

So things have started to heat up now. We were somehow biding out time, before we went to Kathmandu. Actually for Naveen, this would have been first opportunity of Air travel. Infact I myself flew for the first time in February of 2006 itself. But till this time I had already made 3 trips ‘by air’, all to Mumbai for business.

Flying for middle class was not as easy as it is today. Before the low cost carriers like Air Deccan, Spice Jet , and others started their operations few years back, flying was almost out of reach for average Indian, barring people who flew on company business or who got travel reimbursements from their employers. A two way Delhi-Mumbai ticket used to cost anything in range of Rs.10, 000 (USD 225), however that figure has come down to Rs.5,000 (USD 115). This has brought Air Travel in reaches of middle class families.

Coming to the buildup to Kathmandu, preparations were on in full swing, we were discussing about the trip with anyone we can get hold of. Collecting a lot of information about currency, prices, casinos, nightlife, bike rental, trip to Pokhara. Infact we were waiting for October to come, as from September end the festival season would have started, triggering a whole lot of festivities. Navratri , Durga Puja, Dussehra, Dhanteras, Bhai Doooj, Ramzan, Id-ul-fitar, Guru Purab, Diwali and many more. You can check this list of Public Holidays in India to realize how much we celebrate ;-).

So more than a dozen festivals thrown in 40 days time, add to that 1 billion people, with a growing economy, and you can imagine the kind of time we have in that period. So we were waiting for second half of September, as next 30-40 days would be filled with excitement after that period within a week we will be headed to Kathmandu.

Nepal - How it started ?

Second Half of July 2006

For last couple of months Kathmandu was repeatedly coming up in conversations with friends. It was discussed that people from Delhi and other parts on India go there to party and have fun; they go on a Saturday, spend a lot of time in casinos and would return on Sunday. Even though it all sounded very glamorous and I was tempted by all this, however it seemed quite out of reach and I never really thought of going due to various reasons.

However in middle of July 2006, I happened to visit Dalhousie and Khajiyar (Himalayas), for a 3 day break, more on that later. After returning from there I was discussing the experiences and other details with my friend, Naveen. He got very excited and was looking for a escapade for himself as well. Couple of days later he showed me the package tours that were being advertised in newspapers, I do not recall them exactly, but they were like Rs.10,000 – 11,000 (USD 225) per person, including airfare and 3 day 4 night accommodation is 4/5 Star hotels. The package sounded pretty decent, however all of them had validity till September and we planned to go there after Diwali. So we decided to get the tickets done for early November (3^rd – 8^th), which cost us Rs. 6,000 each (USD 140) Delhi – Kathmandu – Delhi on Indian Airlines, now known as Indian.

After that started my research on Internet. That was first time I used internet to gather information about a place that I was visiting (Even though I am hooked to WWW for more that 12 years now). There was lot of information available on the internet, but that was from western tourists and their perspective. On the basis of the same we decided that we will also visit Pokhara, as according to most of the travelers it was a beautiful place.

There were couple of more people who wanted to come with us and got their tickets booked, but after that got them canceled due to individual problems. So started the hotel inquiries, we wanted a decent place to stay, range was never a major constraint, but we wanted to try our options. A special mention to currency difference (INR 1 = NPR 1.6). In the process I stumbled on Annapurna Guest House, Thamel, Kathmandu. There was not much information available on this one on TripAdvisor, VirtualTourist or other websites, however the rates that were mentioned on the site (http://www.annapurnaguesthouse.com) seemed reasonable enough (literally cheap). However since there was not much information available on the internet, I decided to send a mail asking for the best rates and availability. Infact I had sent mails to some other reasonable hotels; however I got a response from Mr. Manjit Thapa, owner of Annapurna Guest House. He sent me all the details, with rates in INR and also offered free pickup from the airport.

In following days, I exchanged a few more mails with Manjit, he gave a good discount to me, and we booked our room in Annapurna Guest House, Thamel. We paid around INR 400 (below USD 10) per day for a double room. I have always believed that service provider who is prompt in answering his mails can be relied upon. And this time I was proven right and how (more on this later).

Over here a special mention to a primary difference I have noticed between Western and Indian traveler. Most of the western travelers (few backpackers might be an exception) give high importance to getting a hotel booked in advance. They try to get the hotels booked along with the tickets, however generally Indians do not get them booked in advance. We prefer to go to the place first, physically see the hotel, negotiate and then decide. I am not sure how right I am in this assessment; maybe your comments can throw some light.

The Lord of the Rings

The Lord of the Rings (LOTR), the trilogy is listed everywhere among the all-time top 20 movies. However I never had a 'real' chance to watch them. I have watched the 1st and 3rd one, however at that time I was not familiar with American Accent, and ended up with little understanding of the movie, that there was an evil ring and Frodo (Elijah Wood) was supposed to carry it to the evil city and destroy it. And others Gandalf (Ian McKellen), Gimli (John Rhys-Davies), Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), & Legolas (Orlando Bloom) were the ones who were the good guys and supported him. Other than that I enjoyed the extravagant war sequences and special effects.

However I always thought that there must be something special about these series and that is the reason so many people actually love it, and now that my understanding of foreign accented English has improved, I wanted to see all of them again, but never got a chance. In fact I got all three movies on DVD (Extended Editions), however was not able to watch them.

Yesterday being Sunday, and nothing major to do, I thought "today was the day". So I sat through entire day and watched the entire series again, yes the entire 12 hours of it. And was I glued to it !! even though I found them a tad lengthy (but maybe that is the reason they are "Extended Editions" and were not released in theaters) but I loved them. Specially the story, as it was something very new for me, I am sure that 95 % or above Indians, have never heard about LOTR or J.R.R. Tolkien, and that is the reason we are not familiar with elves, orcs, hobbits and all.

There might be another reason, because our history is full with huge epics and mythologies, two of the most important ones being Ramayana & Mahabharata. So LOTR might be the work that gets closest to Mahabharata in terms of scale and proportions, however latter was written thousands of years back and is still among the lengthiest piece of writings. Other then scale there are other similarities like good versus evil theme, however there is a major difference, and I believe this difference is due to religion and cultures. LOTR is work of west, which is being dominated by Christianity, and Mahabharata is an Indian tale, in fact it would be more appropriate to say that its a Hindu tale. Even though I am not knowledgeable enough to comment on this, but I still feel that Christianity is Black & white religion, either you have good OR evil, however Hinduism is bit different in this regard. We have a lot of Grey. That is why Mahabharata is so different, there is always a conflict in minds of characters, more from the point of Dharma VS Karma. The story of Mahabharata is far more complicated, huge in scale & humane in nature.

But lets not get drawn from LOTR for the time being, I immensely enjoyed the movies, specially the fact that special effects and great artwork, never took over the actors. They were brilliant in there roles. Peter Jackson despite the scale, always had a grip on the story and didn't let it all fall apart, which was a major possibility in a work of such proportions. In fact they excelled in almost all the departments like screenplay, make-up, background score etc.

I really hope that I again get a good Sunday to myself and I can watch the trilogy again ;-) !!

Why Nepal !!

As I have mentioned in my profile that I have been able to strike a balance between tradition and modernity, however we all know that necessity is the mother of all inventions (ok.. balance in my case). In our contemporary Indian life, its important for us to realize and attain the balance. Even though our society is progressing (not essentially westernizing but to some extent), both socially & economically , however it is not possible to override the values and traditions as well, specially those which are as relevant as they were before OR with the advent of Western culture have become more relevant then ever.

Now the reason I have written the above paragraph is to justify my Visit to Kathmandu. Kathmandu is the capital of Nepal, which has an open border policy with India. Nepalese people can easily come and go from India and the same is with Indians, so we no not need any passport or permit or currency exchange to visit Nepal.

Nepal is a Mountain Kingdom and almost the entire country is based in Himalayas, leaving it landlocked. Manufacturing is not very common in Nepal, maybe due to high transportation costs, lack of local demand OR non-supportive government policies, that is something that has to be thought of by economists.

Now you might be thinking in what direction I am taking you, the reader; I simply wanted to emphasize that since there is not much manufacturing going on, so there main source of income besides agriculture & cottage industry is tourism. And Nepal is particularly famous for its Treks, may that be Annapurna range or Everest. There are hordes of western tourist coming to this place every year, and due to this fact there is a lot more influence of western culture on Nepal.

So In stark contrast to the reason westerners visit Nepal, when people in India want to gamble in casinos, spend nights in discos and enjoy free flowing food & liquor, they head to Nepal.

A brief History

I intend to start this blog from November 2006, when I visited Kathmandu and Pokhara in Nepal. However since I consider myself travelholic, one who travels for the road, not mentioning a brief about my previous travel exploits would be injustice to this blog, on the other hand I cannot go too much in the past as it would take a lot of time and I might not be able to gather all the facts. I am mentioning some places here, many of them would be of interest to foreign tourists and almost all of them to Indian tourist. Would not be able to write details about each and every place at this stage, however as time will progress I will keep on posting whatever I can recall of, or on request of any of the readers.

(In no specific Order)

1. Udaipur, Rajasthan
2. Jaipur, Rajasthan
3. Mehndipur Balaji, Rajasthan (Hindu Religious Importance Only)
4. Salasar Balaji, Rajasthan (Hindu Religious Importance Only)
5. Khatu Shyam Ji, Rajasthan (Hindu Religious Importance Only)
6. Mt. Abu, Rajasthan
6. Dalhousie, Himachal Pradesh
7. Nainital, Uttarakhand
8. Chandigarh, Punjab/Haryana
9. Mata Vaishno Devi, J & K (Hindu Religious Importance Only)
10. Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh
11. Mumbai, Maharashtra
12. Agra, Uttar Pradesh

I have highlighted some places by using Bold Characters, these are the places that should be there on the Map of a Western tourist to India.