Cho Oyu expedition

Sunday, August 27, 2006 - 21:00

KHATMANDU

...soooo here we were wonderin' around just few streets away of Manang hotel and start doin' few pictures here and there with the first nepali faces and havi'n the first real sniff of the street...freaky faces whispering MARIJUANAAa , hmm ...TEMPTING ayy!? Just a puff and all my rucksak problems are going to be just a funny story floating away . Damn that bastard who missplaced my backpack ,it wasn't small or stinky... . he was not doin' he's job proprelly ,i'll hopefully get it . 
The next thing we've done was finding some medium size barrels for our gear so we can put it on the yacks. We actually have found a shop, but we had a lot of work to do in terms off convinceing the guy that he's price wasn't the right one,and actually our sugestion is the right price for the barrels . But you know... . he wanted 1200 nepali rupees per barrel!. wich would actually make our pockets thiner with 4800 nepali rupees, not a lot, but in off to make us negotiate till we got one barrel for 1000 rupees,and that is; the right price. I can guarrantee that; and you'll just have to trust me. 
While we were on the battlefields of medieval comerce, Ram, our base camp manager, calls and tells me that the backpack has arrived in Kathmandu airport and we have to go and take it. Shit!!! .That was my first reaction; hope is not just a''fake call'' coz i'll smack Ram....we just took a cab and shoot for the airport ,filled in a slimy piece of paper just vomittin' some info. about myself , and I just rushed to the luggage line ; I was right next to the hole that's civered with the flimsy bits off rubber,and after 5 minutes VOILA the pain in the ass ,was gone like it was never there. Thank God for that! HALLELUJAHHHHH!

As soon as I got out of the airport's arrival door I just let the bagpack fall to the ground; Alex was as happy as I was and filming me aswell... .I tell you that felt reeal good m8!

We got back to the hotel and start doing some pictures with the sponsor's flags and all the gear that we need for this light round. (SERGIU)

...we're already for three days in the city and it was so much to do and prepare in terms of having everything set for our departure that we hardly had the time to explore the city; but we did it as we were shopping for last remaining things: we still need it some snow pegs, the gas canisters for our Optimus stoves, a full bag of batteries for the headlamps and cameras, the barrels for storing all the stuff while "yak carring":) etc. And the big chunk of tibetan yak cheese we took for 350 rupiess per kilo is amaizing:)))We pretty much negotiated everithing and we had some quite good deals on all of them. For the Nepali, bargaining on every product they sell is a cultural thing and also a way to socialize. I think we already made some good friends in "The Holly Land Mountain Store" after the negociations story. Sergiu improvised an antisnow sistem for his Camp crampons adapting an antisnow from an old pair of Grivel we found in the same shop we took the barrels. he was quite proud about his crafty job and I was quite impressed about it:)) 
Some thought at a glance about Khatmandu: definelty a very very crazy city! BUT I love it:) In the most part of the city there is no road rules sistem implemented to respect. Pedestrians, cars, bikes, richsa's appearantly have no sense of direction, but meanwhile everyone find his way to the destination. They simply walk/drive in the street and the only accepted "covention" seems to be the continuos "Tooooot!!!!" (car horn)of everyone for you to pay attention they are there. Here everyone uses the "Toot!!)) but no one gets angry...contrary to Bucharest...so... an amazingly noisy city but this happens till around 10 in the evening when you'll find almost no one in the street. The second is the smell.....from horrible to nice asian scents in places where you would probably not expect. Third, is the extreme polutiion of the city...policemen in the street wear face masks while working.
That's now for the time being. We have to finish everything for our departure cause we want the 2 days left to also have a look at the soft/spiritual side of Khatmandu. Pashupatinath, Durbar, Sadhu people etc.:) (ALEX)

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