Nepal and Tibet

Only minutes into the trip, we come to a waterfall, which is washing across the road, to continue on its way as it tumbles down over the cliff on the other side. We drive gingerly into the rushing stream but we get stuck. We cannot go forward so the driver puts the bus into reverse and tries to back out of the situation. He backs crookedly and a hush descends over the bus, when everyone realizes that he is perilously close to the edge of the road, which has a sheer drop down into the rainforest. I am petrified. I begin to pray and wonder what I am doing up here where I have such a good indication of how edgy the driver seems. My heart is pounding! There is a lot of talking between the driver, and a friend of his, who is hitching a ride as well as Birendera over the way to deal with the situation. The hitchhiker and Birendera hop out and pack rocks under the wheels to assist the bus to move forwards. It works and we are soon out of trouble. Thank Heavens!

We are now on our way. The driver is really a very careful driver and I soon relax. I enjoy the drive immensely. The scenery is beautiful and the villages, we pass through are great to see. We all live such private lives in comparison to these people who live in the public eye. They squat in front of their buildings, often working together. They wander along the road, chatting, as they follow their cows to pasture. The kids play together, often in the middle of the road. I see one lady doing her washing in a plastic bowl on the edge of the road. The driver actually has to slow down and drive around her. We stop for goats, chickens, ducks and cows. We have to watch out for people on donkeys, in carts and on foot. Women carry huge basket of wood slung across their foreheads. We see men carrying such huge loads of some crop, perhaps corn that they look like a walking haystack. And forever we drop down and down into the Kathmandu Valley.

Whereas the Tibetans seem to grow mostly canola and barley, the Nepalese, in this region, grow rice and corn. The hillsides (there is no flat land near this road) are terraced. These terraced fields grow corn as well as rice. The corn is most obvious. It seems to grow from the sky down. We see buffalos pulling ploughs. We see women, in colourful sarongs, bent double, planting tiny shoots of rice.

The three storeyed farmhouses look quite substantial. Apparently, the ground floor is used to house animals. All the way, we follow the Sunkosi River. It rushes and tumbles its way down into the valley. There seems to be an industry, where river rocks are brought up to the roadside and broken into small pieces with mallets. Both men and women are employed to do this job. We notice this stone, which is quite white, has been used to fill potholes and mend roads. Most of the road now is sealed and from Zhangmu on there have been sedans on the road. We had not seen a sedan since Shigatse. We constantly blow the horn as we come to corners on this narrow road, to warn others that we are coming.

It is great to sit up here and take photos. The view of the daily goings-on of the people is fascinating. However it begins to shower and the raindrops on the windscreen put a stop to the photography. We are stopped at the checkpoint and a soldier enters the bus. The driver's mate, who has been sitting on the engine cover between the driver and me, is questioned and his papers are produced. They allow him to stay on the bus. Apparently they are being very vigilant at the moment since the recent Maoist uprisings in the country. The young man does not come all the way to Kathmandu with us. We stop in a village, where he alights and where the driver takes a rest. We have been driving for hours and the he has not had any lunch. It is a very pretty village, with a lovely bridge crossing the river. It is good to have a chance to stretch the legs.

Soon we are back on board. We are obviously much lower now and the landscape is beginning to flatten out. We have been driving for a while when the driver stops and removes the metal plate which covers the engine housed underneath it. I cannot believe it when I see him attempt to take off the radiator cap. It seems to happen in slow motion. Hot water spurts out, hissing and spluttering and steam fills the cabin. I wait for it to start hurting but it just grows very hot. I can see nothing because my glasses have steamed up. Someone is screaming out, "Denise, Get out! Get out!" But I cannot escape because the metal plate is covering the door into the main body of the bus, which is my only means of escape. There is no passenger-side door. The driver quickly replaces the lid to stop the steam but, in doing so, he burns his hand very badly. I finally have the chance to leave the steamy, hot cabin and hop off the bus. I am shaken but not hurt but we decide from then on I will remain in the back of the bus with the others. Birendera and I swap places. One of our group has a first aid kit and another, who is a nurse, bandages the driver's burnt hand so that he can continue on. I feel sorry that he burnt his hand so badly because he did so to save me from the hot water however, it was a very silly thing for him to have done in the first place. Surely a bus driver must realize the danger of such an action! Even I know and I'm of the mechanical-knowledge deprived, female species!

Our guide has discovered just how to press my buttons. Not long after we set off again, she walks back down the aisle of the bus and says to me,
"Well, how long are you going to keep that glum look on your face?"
I am not aware that I have a "glum look" but perhaps like everyone else, I have had a long day and I am not exactly smiling. I ignore her and treat her with the contempt she deserves. I am finding it increasingly difficult to hold my tongue. I do not want to cause any unpleasantness. I'm not one to make enemies easily but obviously I've upset her. Robert thinks that she's probably intimidated by "strong" women, because all those in the group who are upset by her, refuse to be bullied. I shrug it off and decide that it is her problem, not mine!