It's kind of strange to get out of the habit of having this blog. In India/Nepal/Tibet, when interesting things would happen, or even not so interesting things, I would make mental notes of how I could write about it here, and I've found that I still do that here. I guess I could continue the journal I started. I'd like to do that, but I've never really been good at keeping journals.
It's strange to be back now though. I've been back for almost two weeks now, and I guess I just felt like I should write some concluding thing to this blog (if only because my mom sometimes reminds me that I should, although I suspect she's the only one who will read this entry). I guess I also don't want to write a conclusion to this. I mean I know I'm home and all, but it still seems so final. Also, I started this just to try to keep people I cared about up to date with what I was doing, but now I'm home, with internet access all day long and a cell phone that works, so I wonder what the point is. Also, sometimes the whole experience just feels so far away. Will came to visit, and that was really fun, and a little strange, because I didn't know him before India, so it was just strange to introduce him to bits of my life pre-trip. I don't know. Anyway, he's gone home now, so I'm back in the old routine, which feels so normal that it scares me a little. Did I not even change at all? It makes it all feel so far away. It's just like any old summer Sunday. I'm sitting in my room, wasting time online, wandering over to the kitchen to munch on string cheese if I get hungry. I'm also making myself fat trying to eat all the foods that I missed while I was gone. String cheese, avocados, fresh friut, soy milk, BJ's pizza, all things frozen.
I'm happy to be home. Really happy. Bored but happy. That's how it goes I guess, and if ever I get too bored, at least I have a cell phone, and I can always drive over to the beach. It's comforting to know that home is like this, and I'll go back to India at some point in my life if I have anything to say about it, but for now, I guess I'll enjoy listening to music and wasting time with this wireless internet we have here. And the familiarity of a place I've known as long as I can remember and people who've known me through many of the awkward phases of my life (the one before India anyway, India was different kinds of awkward).

I guess this will be my last post from India, although I’m not sure if I’ll get to post it while I’m still in India, and knowing me, I might put some more pictures us just for the sake of finishing this thing out, or actually I might feel like writing something more while I’m waiting in the airport, but anyways. I’m in Delhi now. I got in early this morning on the bus from Kathmandu. I guess I really haven’t written anything in a while. Tibet was quite a trip, and Lhasa was really a shock. I didn’t post anything about it while I was there because I was paranoid. Once I actually said the phrase ‘Free Tibet’ on the Barkor, and I immediately clasped my hands over my mouth and was scared that I would never be allowed in the country again or worse, but it seems to have been okay. Also, for the record, I think I was quoting something when I said it, but it may have just been quoting what I would have liked to have said at some point. Lhasa brings out those feelings though. I mean, I know we spent the semester learning that the whole Shangri-la myth is exactly that, a myth, and that especially with the railroad now, Lhasa is really modernizing, but it really made me sad. I mean, Dan speaks Tibetan, and there were a lot of places where that didn’t get us around. While I was there, I kind of wondered what Tibetans there felt. I mean, it was strange to going from a place where there were pictures of His Holiness all over to not seeing his picture at all, but there were little signs that there’s still devotion to him. I saw a few pictures around (I’m still paranoid, and I’m not going to say where though), and the people we gave the blessing cords too really appreciated them (it’s a nice story, ask me sometime), and some even asked if we had any after we had given them all out. There was one night too that something seemed to have happened. We were upstairs in a restaurant, and on the street there was a lot of yelling and a bunch of people went in one direction and a few minutes later a bunch went past in the other direction. There was a lot of tension in the air on the street that night, but we never found out what happened. Maybe it was really nothing, who knows, but it made me hopeful and sad at the same time to see how stifling it is, but also that there’s still hope. I don’t know.
I think my favorite parts of the trip were when we went out of the city. My favorite place was Shugsep, which we visited with Mike’s group. It’s a Chod nunnery up in the hills. It’s really beautiful there, and the nuns were really fun. A bunch of them wanted their pictures taken, so I have a bunch of pictures of nuns that I hope eventually make it back to them (I never had time to print them before I left, but I left them with Dan, so hopefully they’ll make their way to Mike and eventually to the nuns) and a bunch of pictures of us with nuns. I also really liked Terdrum, where Dan, Marissa, and I spent two nights. One day we went on a rather crazy hike/search for the abbess, because they said we could meet with her (she’s an incarnation of Yeshe Tsogyal, so she’s kind of a big deal), but alas, we never found her, and ended up just wandering around the hills in the rain. It was really beautiful there though. The landscape of Tibet is really beautiful. I really will try to post some pictures.
The trip back was a little nerve-wracking. Our visa expired on the 22nd, so we had to make sure to be out of the country by then. We found jeeps that were leaving on the 21st, and were supposed to make it to the border in one day. For most of the day it was rather pleasant. I had my ipod and book, and it kind of felt like the road trips we used to take (some of the scenery even reminded me of Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado), but in the evening it started to rain, and one point we stopped in, what kind of looked to me like a stream (I think it was just that the road was really wet). At this point we were all afraid we weren’t going to make it, because there’s one part of the road between Neylam and the border where they’re doing construction, and we were told that it was only open in the direction we needed to go from around eight to eleven or midnight, and unfortunately, when we got to Neylam, the road was already closed, but we were told that it opened again at 6:30 in the morning, so we slept in the jeep, and in the morning set out again. It looked like all was well until our caravan stopped because there had been a landslide in the road, and we couldn’t get through. We sat there for another hour while they brought the construction equipment in and another hour while they cleared the road (I have to admit that I was terrified the whole time, because every time they pushed a big boulder over the edge, I was afraid it would cause another landslide), but we made it through eventually, and managed to cross the border around noon and to get back to Kathmandu in time for dinner, so it was kind of an exciting trip, and it ended in good food, so there goes.
The bus back to Delhi was less eventful, although the Indian authorities seemed to suspect someone on the bus of something, because they stopped and searched the bus twice. I don’t really know what was going on there.
So now here I am in Delhi, and today, after I dropped my stuff off at the guesthouse, I took a taxi over to Connaught place and walked around there. I shopped some and got ripped off but not nearly as badly as I did the first time I shopped in Delhi. I think I might even miss bargaining a little when I go home. I caved in and bought the new Harry Potter book too (I bargained for that too), and I’ve already started it, so it’s entirely possible that I’ll read it the whole way on the plane. It depends on how tired I am. I walked to the YMCA and stood outside for a few minutes and reminisced. It was so strange how far away it seems now. Steve always told us that we wouldn’t go back the same people, that the people who came don’t really exist anymore, and I guess he must be right. I didn’t think I’d changed that much, but I guess people at home and at Swarthmore will have to judge that, and everything at the YMCA seems so far away now. I passed what looked like a TYC hunger strike too. I kind of wanted to stop and talk, but what do you say to people who are on a hunger strike? How are you feeling? I think it might not have been quite as effective as they were hoping either, because I think next to their tents were like tents where families live anyway, and where families probably don’t get enough to eat everyday. I don’t mean to sound like I don’t value what they’re doing, but I don’t think a hunger strike on the streets of Delhi has quite the same effect as it would in more affluent cities. It’s admirable that they’re doing it though. I don’t think I could ever go on a hunger strike.
Last time I left Delhi, I was so ready to leave. I was just unhappy and lonely, and I couldn’t wait to get to Kathmandu. This time, I’m still really excited to leave, but I’m also sad. I think it’s a good mix. The weather and being ripped off and all that have made me happy to leave, but thinking about the first time I was here has brought some of it (I don’t know what it is exactly) back. I don’t think any of this makes sense. I guess I just mean that I’m ready to leave, but I’m ready to leave with a positive impression and a desire to come back, so if ever any of you want to come to India and want someone to travel with, give me a call. There’s so much of this country that I’d still like to see and some places that I’d really like to go back to. It really gets under your skin here (and under your nails, and if you’re unlucky, into your digestive tract too). I don’t think it’s possible to come here and be neutral about it. I know I’ll miss it a lot.

We're going to Tibet!!! I'm sitting in Cafe New Orleans (where they have wireless) in Thamel. We came here today to see the travel agent, and we put down our deposit, so on July 7, we'll be leaving for Tibet. Actually I had to borrow money to put down my deposit, because Wells Fargo hates me now or something, but I already knew that. So yeah...Tibet...woo hoo.

The internet sucks, so excuse the lack of posts. There’s a wireless network that appears sometimes, so I usually try to wait to go online until it appears, but it appears pretty infrequently and it’s not a very strong signal, so occasionally I give in and pay to use the internet downstairs. I’ve been in Kathmandu for about a week and a half so far. I’ve mostly just been hanging out or going in to Thamel, the touristy part of the city. Diana left the day before yesterday, but before she left, we went river rafting, which was really fun. We went for two days on a river called Bhoti Kossi, or something like that. The second day was supposed to be like class four or five rapids. I don’t know what that means, because I’ve only been river rafting like once before, but I think it may have meant that I shouldn’t have done it, because I’ve only been river rafting like once before. Anyway it was really fun. A little scary and quite exciting when our raft flipped. It sucked though, because our guide hurt his arm. Also, I almost lost my shoes, but fortunately they both floated past me in the water. I really would not have enjoyed walking through Kathmandu barefoot. All the people we met were really cool too, as were the guides.
The day before yesterday, we went to Pharping, which is outside the city. There’s a monastery there and a Padmasambhava cave. We had a picnic on a beautiful hill that was covered with prayer flags, and we hung some prayer flags, or actually everyone else hung prayer flags and I took pictures. Yesterday there was an all day Chod ceremony. I went with Marissa to the beginning, but I left early at one of the breaks, because I just haven’t got the ability to sit still for anything for that long. Also, I spent far too much time this afternoon, sitting here making a mental list of foods I want to eat and restaurants I want to go to when I get home. What I wouldn’t do for a smoothie right now…

I'm in Katmandu right now! It's really cool. Here's an entry I started a while ago in Delhi:

So all those things I said about being alone in Dharamsala and challenging myself and all that, well, I take it all back, or at least, I take back that I feel up to the challenge. Spending one day in London alone was almost lonelier than I could handle, and being alone in Delhi is just depressing. I had over nostalgia-ized it. I thought it was Delhi that I liked, but it was just the people I was in Delhi with that I liked, not Delhi itself. While I was here, I wanted to go wander around some of the places that we first went to during orientation in January, but it’s so disgustingly hot out, and I don’t think I’m even going to leave my room more than I have to. So right now it’s my first night in Delhi. I went back to the guesthouse that I stayed at with Justin, Tom, and Kendell when we were all in Delhi just before leaving. I tried to stay awake this afternoon so I could call home once it was a decent hour and so that I could sleep tonight and hopefully not be too jetlagged, but I fell asleep anyway and didn’t wake up again until it was too late to go out (well not really actually, but I didn’t want to wander around a place I didn’t know after dark trying to find a phone), and now it’s almost midnight, and I can’t sleep, so so much for that whole plan. Also, so much for the whole going to Dharamsala/being independent plan. Tomorrow, I’m going to try to figure out if there’s a way I can get to Katmandu in the next week. I want to be in a city where I know people, and Marissa, Diana, Amalia, Dan, Amber, Steve, and Karen are all there right now, so that’s where I want to be. My visa expires in about a week, so hopefully I can find a way to get there before that happens so that I don’t have to deal with extending it. I guess it’s a little sad that I can’t handle being alone for even a few days, but that’s just how I am I guess, and I don’t want spend a few weeks being miserable just to try to prove that I can. I just wish I could sleep so that I can wake up so that I can try to find a way to get to Katmandu. I’ll go however I can, plane, train, bus, whatever (well actually just plane, train, or bus I guess). I really, really hope this works out. I think maybe I took embracing the ambiguity a little too far and should have made more concrete plans. I never really enjoyed the ambiguity that much; I kind of like to have a plan. On the bright side, I did see an elephant on the side of the road today. TII.

Okay, so yeah, I’m in Katmandu now. I went to talk to a travel agent about getting to Nepal before my Indian visa ran out, and he called a few airlines and said they were all booked, except business class, and I’m already worried that I underestimated in my grant proposal, but I saw an advertisement on his wall for a Delhi-Katmandu bus, which it turned out was going to leave in a few hours, so I went to exchange some money, bought a ticket, packed, checked out of the guesthouse, and got on the bus, and that’s where I’ve been for two days. Not quite two days really. The bus left at around three in the afternoon on Thursday, and just got in around five or six this morning (it being Saturday as I write this). I even have a shiny, new Nepali visa in my passport. If only getting a new Indian visa had been so easy (at the border, I was required to fill out a form and to give them a passport picture and $30 cash). I think I’m going to sleep for a few hours now, since I didn’t get much sleep on the bus. My seat wouldn’t stay back, and I’m not sure what time zone my body thinks it’s in, but I think it’s somewhere between here and London. Also, we didn’t stop for dinner last night until around eleven, and we got in pretty early, so I don’t think anyone slept much. Also (this doesn’t really have to do with anything, it just amused me), last night there were a chicken and three chicks wandering around where we were eating dinner.

So I’m really glad that I came to Katmandu. I’m staying in Marissa’s room for now, and Diana lives across the hall. Dan and Amber live upstairs, and Karen just moved to an apartment nearby. She and Steve were staying in Thamel, but he left today, so she moved to Boudha, where we are. I’m glad I got to see Steve one last time before he left though. We all got together for dinner last night. It was sad to have to say goodbye all over again though.

So I feel like this second trip to India is really starting soon. I went with Amy to the airport and sent her off with my huge (almost 30 kg) suitcase (sorry Amy). After I got back into London, I wandered around a bit. I tried my luck at the Indian consulate again, managed to find it this time, which is better than last time, but I was told that I’d need five business days to get a new visa, so that wasn’t going to work out, but the man there did tell me that I can probably just get my student visa extended when I get to Delhi. I was glad to hear that, although I’m not too excited about spending more time in Delhi than I have to (Amy and I looked up the weather in Delhi, and it does not look like it’s going to be fun). Anyway, hopefully that works out. I mean, I don’t really have to go back to Dharamsala, but I think it’ll be easier for me to work on things while I’m there rather in a new city, and when I left, I assumed I’d be returning, so I don’t feel like I’ve said proper goodbyes to everyone that I wanted to before I left the first time. Also, maybe this will sound really silly, I don’t think I said a proper goodbye to the place itself, and I often find myself missing it. I think I feel more at home there than I do here, which makes sense in some ways, because I’ve spent a lot of time there, but also seems strange in some ways because here I at least speak the language, but English will get you around there anyway, and I speak with an American accent, so just because I speak English here, doesn’t mean that I don’t sound out of place anyway. I’ll be sad to leave though, or at least I was sad to see Amy go. I’m such a lame person to travel with, so I don’t know if she had fun anyway, but I had a good time. I almost feel like this part of the trip has started already though. I realized that this summer, or at least the first part before I go to Katmandu, I’ll really be traveling alone. It’s probably not a big deal for most people, but (don’t laugh at me too much for admitting this) I won’t even go to the cafeteria at Swarthmore if I don’t think there will be someone there that I can eat with. I feel like this summer is going to push me to be more okay with not having people I know around. At least I’ll still know people in Dharamsala, but not like anyone I can go to dinner with or anything like that. I don’t know if any of that makes any sense, but oh well. So anyway, I feel like that part of the trip is starting, because I’m staying in a hostel alone, and I’ve been wandering around London alone all day (after the consulate, I went to the Museum of London (I found it kind of boring, but there were some interesting things, and it was free, so I’m not going to complain), and I walked around the outside of St Paul’s cathedral (it cost a lot to go inside, so I didn’t go)). So anyway, now I’m here in the hostel, contemplating my impending return to India and contemplating starting all those things I’ve been putting off for two weeks and wondering how I still have so much stuff if I sent so much home with Amy (seriously, the suitcase would barely close, even when it was fully expanded).
I think I may also feel like I’m going back, because for the last few days, I’ve had clothes hanging all over the room drying. I was so excited about finding a laundromat somewhere here, and I did find a few finally, but they were so expensive (at least $7/load), that I just washed my clothes in the sink. Some of my clothes anyway. The bathroom was tiny, so I didn’t really think I could manage to wash my jeans or my fleece, so I guess they’ll just have to wait until I get to India, where everything will probably get so wet that I won’t bother to wash anything, because nothing will ever dry anyway. I should stop with this train of thought though; it just makes me question the decision to go back for the summer. It’ll be fun though, and at least I won’t have to return to Linens-n-Things and my favorite line, ‘thank you for calling Linens-n-Things. This is Katie speaking. How may I help you today?’ Let’s just hope I didn’t underestimate on the grant proposal budget.
I feel like I should go out and do something on my last night in Europe, but I suspect tonight will actually just be internet, trying to repack the suitcase better than I did, and sleep. Tomorrow hopefully I’ll see Lucy though, if I can get any phone around here to work (I tried two payphones. One wouldn’t take my coins, and the other ate my money (I liked the first one better)). I should work on that being productive thing for a little bit though. You’d think it’s like summer or something with the way I’m slacking off.

How quikly things can change. All of a sudden, I'm not in India anymore, and some things seem so different. I feel like I've been all over. I mean I haven't really, but I spent most of the semester in one city, and now since I've left India, I've been to London, Edinburgh, Killarney, Cork, Dublin, and Paris (which is where I currently am). I don't feel like I've felt much reverse culture shock, but maybe that comes later, or maybe just ignored it or something. I admit that I probably got more excited about going in a grocery store than most people do, but I think that's about it. I wonder if I'll feel any culture shock when I go back. It's strange when I think of where everyone is now. That group that was like my surrogate family for a semester is now all over the world. I'm starting to stress out about things that I'd sort of put on hold for a semester (mostly worrying about my last year at Swarthmore and what I'll do after that last year). Traveling with Amy has been really fun though. I think we're a little hampered by our desire not to spend money, but we've found decent cheap food and activities. The sun is finally shining too. It felt like the rain followed us. It would only get to be sunny the day we left a city, but we just got to Paris, and the sun is out, and it's warm (it's been so cold so far. Imagine how shocked I was when I got to London where it was about 50 degrees after leaving Delhi where it was at least 90). I think I finally found a laundromat too. I've been dragging dirty clothes all over in hopes of not needing to hand wash them when I get back to India, but for some reason, I haven't been able to find any laundromats so far, but we passed one today, so maybe I'll get a break from bucket washing my clothes. Although, I'm also tempted to just send my clothes home dirty in the suitcase that I'm sending home with Amy (sorry parents). I've been pretty lazy about taking pictures, so I don't know if I'll have any to post, but maybe I'll take some here in Paris. I should go now though, because we're meeting Monica for dinner, which is so exciting, because I haven't seen Monica in so long. Au revoir.