An old adventure - Nepal dreaming.

Life round here the last couple days has been a little essay filled and lacking general excitement.  Don't get me wrong, things are good; stew is cooking in the oven, James is making an apple crumble in the kitchen and the Christmas lights are twinkling, but things have been a little unphotogenic.  So I thought instead today I would share some old adventures.  The ones that these cold, quiet nights make me nostalgic for.  

These pictures are all taken on my old Nikon point-and-shoot, so the quality isn't always great and I can't size them the same as other photos on this blog (which is driving me a little mental) without making them all pixely, but I love each and everyone of them and I feel they deserve their moment.

Disclaimer: I really don't want to become one of those people who endlessly discuss their worldly experiences as - firstly they annoy the hell out of me and secondly I still have a long way to go before I can feel worldly.  For the most part I just wanted to share these photographs.

 

From endless leeches and monsoon rain to washing elephants and climbing mountains, Nepal is the most beautiful place I have ever seen.  We outran landslides and ate more bananas than I ever thought possible, befriended stray cats and got mugged by a monkey and had the best adventures.

 

We were fortunate enough to stay with the most wonderful family in the Himalayas, three days walk from civilisation whilst we helped teach English in the local school.  The family lived in one tiny room and cooked all their meals on a small woodburning stove, they ate nothing that they couldn't grow or trade (think pumpkin curry three meals a day) and maybe once every couple of days, for thirty minutes they would have electricity.  

In celebration of our arrival they had traded rice for dried yak meat (if you're curious - try chewing on the oldest pair of leather boots you own) and from that moment on we spent long, dark evenings sat around the log stove talking in broken English and our even more damaged Tamang.  

There is one moment especially I treasure.  Within minutes of our arrival, Maya asked us endless questions about how big our ovens were, how many rooms our house had, how many clothes we owned and how many 'technologies' we owned.  Eventually (using the small English-Tamang dictionary we all coveted at such occasions) I managed to ask Maya why she shook her head at each of our answers.

She responded that we would die young because of all our worries and stresses.  If you have less you need less choices and become happier.  

 

Nothing like being direct I suppose..