by request
The flight into Kathmandu is alarmingly precipitous since the city is nestled in such a deep sided valley. The city itself I remember as full of mud, sagacious sādhus, naked children, beautiful centuries old wooden buildings, drunken stupas, and copulating dogs. The single lane roads are hewn into slopes similarly alarming. Buses tumbled off them all the time, but they were only a cause for concern if tourists numbered among the victims, which I found disturbing.
We talked to this amiable 40 year old school teacher, and when he told us, plaintively, that "they cut down my grass tree", it took us a little while to figure out what he meant. From what I gathered it was US pressure that led to the crack down, rather than anything domestic. (Similar pressure had suppressed the notorious Ko Pha Ngan full moon parties just before we got there, and we heard horrific rumours in Mandalay of hill tribe villagers getting macheted by SLORC soldiers over their opium crops.)
From there we went to Chitwan National Park, a World Heritage Park and beautiful. We went elephant trekking, and I remember looking down at the wrinkled hide of our elephant like a map. I also remember some Indian tourists in our train who were absolutely outraged by Independence Day which had just been released (and to be honest, I don't blame them). We were almost charged by a mama hippo we stumbled across, and then, just as we came out of the jungle and into a wide open field, we were almost struck by lightning. It was so close, I remember the hairs on the back of my neck standing up; I actually put my hands over my ears before it hit, an instinct from who knows where. And the thing was, we were easily the highest thing around. Lucky.
The following day, a local man guided us into the forest on foot, largely to see the monkeys. But he was nervous because there'd been sightings of a tiger! recently, close to the villages, and indeed to the lodge where we were staying. My boyfriend and I were very excited when we came across the unmistakeable paw print on the path which the guide told us could have been five minutes old. He thought we were nuts, and was genuinely terrified that he might have to defend our lousy firangi butts with nothing but his walking stick.