Justin was starting to feel much better having been on his antibiotics a few days now, and my negative reactions to the antibiotics were starting to simmer down. I rested, and he took a long walk to the nearby waterfall, hand-washed our laundry despite the horrendous stench and strange looks from the local women, and then sat outside in the warmth of the sun to play his flute.
The flute supernaturally transforms the atmosphere around you. Its tune dances about as a gentle breeze beckoning the surrounding atoms to vibrate in unison. Your soul becomes transfixed by the call. On cue your eyelids slowly blink and then close as you take in the song. The air, thick with melody, is breathed in slowly and deeply, flowing through your nose and filling your chest with life. You dance on the razor’s edge of reality and dreamland. You give in and are swept away. Your worries are far away as though a distant dream and your only thoughts are gently led in a cryptic waltz. The deep throaty sound of the Native American flute drew me from my bed, and out to the balcony. I gazed down at Justin, sitting outside with the owner, playing his flute with eyes closed, entranced, all worries melting away.
The next morning we woke up to birds singing and the sun shining. This helped improve my mood slightly until I heard Justin packing up. We were leaving, and I wasn’t so sure that I had enough energy to make it to out of the house and down the stairs, let alone up a 1,500 foot hill back to the pass. We ate as much breakfast as we dare chance (our stomachs are still not to full strength), wrestled the packs onto our backs, and headed out the door. Even though I felt a lot better that day, I had no confidence that we would make it very far. The hill gradually sloped through the town, and our feet were clumsy and heavy on the muddy terrain. Each step felt as though we had already walked a thousand. I look ahead with promise, only to be sorely disappointed.
We were only 20 feet from the ‘witch’s’ house, and she was outside glaring at us with an amused, pleased-with-herself smile sweeping across her cockled old face. Justin ducked into a small overhang with two benches, and sat down his pack. “I’m going to run over to the next town to see if I can find a porter,” He informed me doubtfully. He had already spent the past few days trying to locate, communicate, and negotiate with a porter, but it had been a frustrating debate that went nowhere, and only exhausted what little energy he had. “You’re going to leave me here – ALONE – with the ol’ bat!?” an urgent whisper is all I could muster up as I peeked through the window of the lean-to in fear that she was glaring in. “Someone has to watch the bags, and you can’t speak Nepali.” He was so matter-a-fact in his statement that I had no room to argue, and could only sit and watch the time pass one agonizing minute at a time.
I pulled out a Snickers from our pack, and justified not sharing it with Justin as it could be my last treat before I was turned into a frog – he would understand. The rain began to fall as I looked down to inspect my watch once more, only two minutes had passed. This was going to be a long wait. Would he find a porter? Could we afford him if he did? Could we afford not too? Time passed and the sound of the rain on the thatch roof switched from soft pitter-patters to the consistent beat of a loud drum. I dared to peek through the window once more. Just then Justin came jogging around the corner with smile and a young Nepali guy not much taller than my chin. He was going to carry my pack, and a little more if we added some of Justin’s weight. I have seen them do amazing feats, but even the locals look at Justin’s pack and marvel. They ducked in out of the rain, and with few words he lifted my pack onto his back.
Is it possible to have your manhood stripped from you if you’re not a man? The shame was insurmountable. While Justin was trudging on ahead with 73lbs on his back, struggling just as much as before, our porter practically skipping along the trail ahead of us stopping every few feet to wait for us, and me prancing about behind with nothing. . . I became cross with the lack of knowledge given to me about this new turn of events. How much were we paying him? How far was he taking us? Why was he only carrying my weight and none of Justin’s? In my mind this completely defeated the purpose of getting a porter. I watched Justin struggling with each step, his legs shaking, his face red, the sweat dripping down until he could hardly see, and my annoyance with the situation quickly turned into a vehement anger. I spewed my frustration onto Justin, voicing my concerns in a less than delicate fashion, and demanding that he give me answers. I couldn’t watch him struggle one more step. “I’m going to tell your mother!” I spouted out at him. He froze in mid-step, placed his foot down slowly, and then turned towards me as the words sunk in deeply. “Please, don’t do that!” he said in a pained face. I started to cry, and tell him how concerned I was, and that I wasn’t going to frolic happily behind with no weight whatsoever all the while admitting my defeat while he went on killing himself. He gave me ten pounds off his pack to appease me, and promised, “We will just get to the top of the pass and then we will figure everything out.”
The top of the pass brought little comfort, and the following two days little joy. Although we added more weight to the porters pack, if we knew that there would be a ‘misunderstanding’ in the price when we finally reached Jiri we would have given him much more. Cheaper than any of the other porters that we had tried to negotiate with, but still far too much. Lesson number #65: Write what you think the negotiation is on paper to make sure both parties understand and agree. We finally reached Jiri half-hearted; and yet, the thought of safely prepared food (mostly a pizza), and a hot shower lightened our spirits.
The morning bus was packed, and despite the fact that we had purchased our tickets the night before, our seats were taken, and we were forced to stand. Justin uncomfortably bent his head and tried to fit inside. The bus was full of children on their way to school, and as it was National Children’s Day – they were very excited! Two girls on the bus decided to practice their English with me, and asked me where I was from. “America.’ I let them know. Their faces suggested that I had said something wrong. They pitied me, saying, “America is the devil’s country.” They were very sorry that they had to be the ones to inform me. I could only smile and nod. Later Justin would cue me in on the fact that we were ‘from Canada’. This bit of knowledge would come in handy a lot in the weeks to come. The kids unloaded from the bus, and the seats cleared. Although ‘cleared’ may be a bit of an over statement as the seats we had purchased were in the very back of the bus and only ¾ the size of the other seats. We squished into the small seats and uncomfortably bumped along. They kept selling and re-selling the ‘seat’ next to Justin and my thoughts raced. Who can I complain to? How can I get my money back? This isn’t even a whole seat! How can they keep cramming more people in here? We paid for these seats – probably twice as much as anyone else in here! The injustice of it all was maddening. My American sense of entitlement left me well blinded and begrudged. I had only to open my eyes a little and let the world around me in to see how ridiculous I was being. I laughed at myself. Who in the world do I think I am? Just because I knew the world could be a different, less chaotic, more comfortable place, did that give me the birthright of privilege above everyone else in this bus?
What a hypocrite I am at times. Part of the reason I travel is to discover pieces of me in the world. . . I don’t like my ugly, pompous annoyance. That part of me I’m going to choose to leave behind. The bedlam around me hadn’t change, but my attitude did, and that was all the transformation I needed to make for a more contented six-hour bus ride back to Kathmandu.
1 comment:
Beautifully said! Can't wait to hear more :)
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