The whole rest of Nepal (for us)

Our day in Jomsom prepared us a bit for what we're likely to expect for the rest of our trek towards Muktinath. Every day the weather seems to turn out the same way; it starts off very calm and sunny, but as the day gets hotter the winds pick up, until in the middle of the afternoon it's a veritable wind- (and hence, dust-) storm. The clouds develop, sometimes there's rain, sometimes there's not. Either way, people go indoors because it's no fun to get pelted with dust outside. In the more bored recesses of my mind, I nickname this effect "the weather machine."

[But first, a note of clarification regarding these notes about our trek in Nepal: I'd mentioned the plight of Gavin and Jade, how Jade had come down with giardiaisis, and how if you didn't bring your own medications with you, you could be in serious trouble. I didn't go on to reassure our mothers that we were carrying a pretty good pharmacy of our own. The point I was making, to myself, it seems, was that we weren't carrying a readily available medicine to treat giardiaisis, as we were hoping to avoid that particular bug - you tend it catch it by drinking local water. We were carrying water purification tablets, which we used liberally.]

After getting the best of a first impression from Jomsom, the next morning we packed up and set off on the road towards Muktinath. We passed by groups of children bound for school, all dressed in the same uniform: grey jumpers and black trousers or skirts, depending on whether you're a boy or girl (just in case that's not clear: the boys wear trousers, the girls wear skirts). They didn't pay us much attention as we go: tourists are common here, especially as many choose to fly into Jomsom and trek back to Pokhara. It's a slightly easier variation of the trek because you've got more downhill than up.

It was a fairly easy stretch towards our destination for the day, Kagbeni. As Jomsom is a very critical location for the area (military, travel, judicial focal points) the road to and from Jomsom was probably one of the first to be completed. Consequently, our travel goes pretty quickly, and we're passed by several motorcycles (with and without extra passengers) as we go. We pass by a very interesting collection of houses, seemingly built out of the rocky crag of a mountain, and all the same colour of yellowish-brown.

The stone-filled basin.

While we could have probably taken the road all the way to Kagbeni, Bhakta preferred the scenic route of the stone-filled basin. Walking over the millions of mandarin-sized rocks filling the chasm floor is only a small challenge on the ankles, but the real challenge is coping with the boredom, as it takes a while for the scenery to change, and the path is invariably straight and flat. Bhakta tells me that if you're lucky, you'll find a fossil among the rocks. Indeed, this route towards Muktinath is regularly scoured by fossil-seekers, as they're particularly precious to Hindus of the brahmin (religious) caste. So, it turns out to be a great way to pass the time, convenient because you're already looking that way to avoid ankle-destroying stones. I don't find any, however, which isn't a surprise as the route to Muktinath is travelled regularly by pilgrims who have much better eyes for this sort of thing than I do.

As we round a gentle bend in the basin, the mountains reveal two settlements in the distance: Ecktabeni, the closer, and Kagbeni, actually set onto a plateau a few hundred metres up from the basin. Ecktabeni, by contrast, is at river-level, and it we would reach it first: we stopped for tea. The sun was high in the sky just before noon, but the weather machine hadn't really picked up yet: it was blazingly hot. Ecktabeni is a collection of lodges, a staging point between Kagbeni and Jomsom, which is a bit odd as Kagbeni is really only another hour away of fairly easy walking. An hour later we were walking into the outskirts of Kagbeni, passing one of the many contrasts you'll note in Nepal: lush, green, grass-filled terraces overlooking the dry rock bed of the empty river basin. As we approach the town, I can't help but note an odd zig-zag pattern scarred into the side of the mountain on the other side of the town; it carves a path from the base all the way to the top.

Kagbeni occupies an interesting position in the Annapurna sanctuary for tourists; it's the farthest north you can go with your ACAP (Annapurna Conservation Area Project) trekking permit. Crossing into the zone north of Kagbeni takes you into the Upper Mustang province, which requires a separate permit worth USD$700. In addition you have to go with a licensed trekking tour operator, and you have to have a completing accounting of the gear you intend to take with you. When you come back, you have to go over the accounting again, and there are serious fines if you don't bring everything back - including your garbage. They take littering very seriously in the Upper Mustang, apparently. But for us, it just meant that our visit to Kagbeni was done with an awareness of which streets we could walk on and which we shouldn't. Even crossing the border by accident can incur a fine of USD$200.

Our stay in Kagbeni would be at the Red Lodge, so named for its choice of exterior colour scheme. Walking through the town to get there, we pass two shops that clearly know their target market: the first, a shop with a hand-painted 7-11 sign hanging proudly over the door; the second, a small restaurant named "Yak Donald's", complete with hand-painted golden arches.

We have to walk up six sets of stairs to get to our lodge, so by the time we get there, we're out of breath. But we're received warmly, shown to a room and told we can order some lunch whenever we like. When I mention that we'll have dal bhat with everyone else, she tells me that they have dal bhat for dinner in Kagbeni, not for lunch. It's just one of those things. The place has a very Tibetan influence in its furnishings and general decor (there are several pictures of the Dalai Lama): as you go further north, the proportion of residents of Tibetan heritage increases.

In one of those coincidences that can only happen when you travel in a small country, we run into Beranice and Monica in the Red Lodge (we met these two in Tatopani at our lodge there) and share some stories while waiting for lunch upstairs on the rooftop solarium (the Red Lodge was a bit fancier than some lodges). They tell us about their trek up the nearby mountain with the scar on it in the early hours of the morning to catch the sunrise. The scar, as it turns out, is a newly constructed walking path carved out by the hotel's owner and a friend of his. It's a long, and slightly dangerous ascent, given that the wind picks up dramatically as you climb and the path isn't really finished yet. But when you finally reach the top - 4,800 metres, by the end - you have an unparalleled view into the Upper Mustang. As they talk, I find myself wanting to scrub our plans to go to Muktinath and climb this mountain instead, but I also want to get to the end of our road in Muktinath as well.

Dust storms in Kagbeni.

The rest of our day is spent wandering around Kagbeni, doing some laundry, and marvelling at the approaching dust storms as the wind starts to pick up in the middle of the afternoon. We find a device that looks like a cross between a satellite dish and a mirror, aimed at the sun with a pot of water at its focal point: yes, it was heating the water, and the water was plenty hot. I asked Bhakta at one point why there wasn't more use of wind power in this area, given the extraordinary wind activity that occurs almost every afternoon. Apparently there are some issues with the "feast or famine" level of wind in the area when it comes to wind as a power source, but the real issue he decided, was that the people of Nepal aren't the greatest when it comes to technical maintenance. He cited a few examples of infrastructure investment in Nepal which had run down to ruin, owing to the lack of technical training to keep them running.

At dinnertime the guests of the lodge congregate in a hitherto-unseen dining room, complete with under-table heating, for piles of dal bhat. Amy and I are joined by Beranice and Monica, a french couple named George and Marie, and another Parisian named Julian. After dinner George and Marie retire for bed, but the younger set stick around. It's only a little while before some decks of cards are assembled and the rules for Racing Demon are passed on to some new players. In the end there were five players - our largest number yet: myself, Bhakta, Padam (playing with a helper), Tanzig (the hotel's owner) and Julien (who alternated with Beranice). It was fast and furious, as it usually is with larger groups, but great fun.

The next day we rise and head out for Muktinath, taking Beranice with us. Monica only has a few days to get back to Pokhara, so she figures she's got some long trekking days ahead of her on her way back down towards Jomsom. Before we leave Kagbeni we take a tour of a Buddhist temple, but no one can really translate for us, so much of the details of the place, while being clearly made with high quality craftsmanship, are lost on me.

Otherworldly blue.

We begin our ascent towards Muktinath. The trail is carved into the side of a mountain range, for the most part, so we get fabulous views over our left shoulders. I'm stopping every couple of moments to take pictures, it seems: but the sky is just so blue, and every look brings a different composition of mountain and sky. The mountains themselves are radically different than what we've seen so far: bulbous areas on top leading towards flat plateaus, and as they stretch downwards into a long valley, their walls have eroded into complex cave patterns. And the coffee brown against the royal blue of the sky is a colour combination you'd have to work pretty hard to replicate. My theory on the intensity of the blue colour of the sky is that normally, if you look straight up pretty much anywhere in the world, you see the same colour of blue, but it thins and lightens as your eyes drift to the horizon. So it doesn't look as impressive. But here in the mountains of Nepal, the horizon is masked by mountain ranges, so all you can really see is the deep blue.

Hard to describe, but it's quite something.

The trek upwards is more difficult than anything we've yet done, owing to the altitude: crossing the threshold of four thousand metres seems to be like adding a stack of bricks to my pack. It's a lot of vertical movement and it's extremely aerobic. Fortunately, Bhakta has been expecting this, and we take many breaks. As we get closer to Muktinath, we see something we haven't seen since the beginning of our trek into Annapurna: sales tables, replete with the same selection of Tibetan-style jewellery, scarves and paraphernalia. I would have died laughing if I saw a "I trekked all the way to Muktinath and all I got was this stupid T-shirt," but alas, none is to be found. We also encounter something we haven't really seen yet in rural Nepal: the hard sell. The sales pitch is the same: there are no tourists, we're hungry, there is no business, please buy something.

We stopped in Jokpath for lunch, which was surprisingly hard to find: the cooks had gone down to Jomsom for the afternoon. Eventually, Bhakta finds a lodge with someone willing to rustle up some dal bhat. Beranice, being on a much more open schedule than us, decides she's going to hang out in Jokpath for a few days. We say our goodbyes and head onwards to Muktinath.

A sadhu on the road to Muktinath.

The last bit of the trek from Jokpath to Muktinath wasn't so long, but it was a grind; it's a fairly steep trekking path, and what would normally be a slight bit of work is intensified by the altitude. But finally we were there, walking through a large arch welcoming one and all to Muktinath. We found a hotel, the Bob Marley Inn, a room and crashed. A bit later a stroll through the village: this wasn't going to be the place to buy souvenirs, as everything is a bit poorly made and too expensive. There's also a lot of hassle to buy, including being taken by the arm and having scarves thrown around your neck. These folks don't take "just looking" for an answer, and they've heard it all before. If you say you'll be back later, they try to extort a promise out of you to return. But despite it, it still wasn't as aggressive as some parts of Delhi.

Muktinath wasn't much of a stop, for us at least - for someone to whom Buddhism or Hinduism was important, this is a very significant place, with dozens of temples in the area, and two of the biggest in Nepal. But for me, the trek was more about the journey rather than the destination, and we were certainly afforded some pretty amazing views.

The Bob Marley Inn seemed to be pretty inactive in the low season, but it was fairly well populated. It must be a welcome sight for people arriving from the Throng La pass: lodges on the eastern side of the circuit are less cushy than the western side, and the BMI was certainly cush. A bit cold, owing to the season, but cushy. The under-table heating was welcome, and it was entertaining for a while to play racing demon in the dark (or near-dark) until the solar-powered fluorescent lights came on. With everyone staying at the hotel huddled into the two under-heated tables, it was quite cozy and familiar, and our game kept people entertained at our table.

We didn't visit the temples in Muktinath. We'd seen enough of the temples, and Amy had a headache that could have been aggravated by a further trip upwards. So we made our way back down, encountering many of the same vendors that we met on the way up. As we wound our way down, we barely had time to react to the voice of someone saying "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" before a mountain bike careened past us. We scattered to the side of the path to see a rider and a very expensive mountain bike blaze down the trekking path, the first of about six on a Himalayan circuit that actually took them over the Throng La pass. At that altitude it's got to be hell. I managed one acceptable photograph as we had precious little warning before they skidded past us, probably set off in intervals.

The rest of the walk back to Jomsom was windy and other-worldly: while we had timed our travel towards Kagbeni to take advantage of the still morning, we wouldn't be so fortunate on our return, as we decided to take a short cut and go directly from Muktinath to Jomsom with a short break at Ecktabeni. When the wind picked up in the early afternoon, we put scarves over our faces and hoods over our heads: I felt like an astronaut walking on the moon. It was especially comical to take photographs. It was a long haul but we finally arrived at Jomsom, trudged through the village and returned to the Anka Marco Polo.

There were lots of little things to while away the day. A brief walk through town, a hot shower. Beer and lovingly hand-made apple fritters. Eventually we reconvened with Bhakta and Padam and started a game of Dal Mara (so we would remember the rules) - and then the biggest Racing Demon game we'd played, with six in total. Utter chaos, but good fun chaos.

A chaotic morning followed: we awoke on schedule with lots of time to prepare for our 7:45 arrival at the airport (across the street), but Bhakta was at our door at 7 AM to alert us that the "airlines-man" had advised him that the plane was coming early and that we needed to be ready much sooner. It all happened very quickly - we had to hurry, but Bhakta seemed certain we still had time for breakfast. Our Tibetan bread had barely arrived when we heard the drone of an airplane and Bhakta said we had to go, now. Tibetan bread hanging from my mouth, we slapped some money in Bhakta's hands to pay the bill, lumbered across the street with our bags and sped to the departures lounge. It was then a matter of hurry-up-and-wait as we watched people get on board "our" plane, while we waited at the check-in desk. It turned out we were still scheduled for the second flight, that 7:45 would have been well sufficient, and we would never have made the first plane anyway as we still had to go through security.

Armed with this extra time, we got a chance to say some decent goodbyes and went back to wait for our plane. I'd love to tell you the full story of "going through security" but, the internet being the funny thing it is, it has some details that could get people in trouble. So I'll tell anyone who asks, the story, in person. Suffice it to say it left me shaking my head in wonder, and happily, no invasive body-cavity searches were required.

Our plane touched down. It was a small, twin-propeller job that held eighteen passengers and their luggage, and (as Ghorka airlines' literature glibly promised), "every seat is a window seat." Our flight back to Pokhara was an eyes-glued-to-the-window affair, with views of the whole Annapurna range from an unrivalled aerial perspective. It was amazing to think that the journey we had made on foot in seventeen days took us a mere thirty minutes by airplane.

Without much fanfare, we arrived in Pokhara. Pokhara is lovely and laid back, a small city with excellent weather, a launching point for excursions north into the Annapurna Sanctuary or south into Chitwan National park. Unfortunately there's a power cut between six and nine at night which puts a dent in nightlife, but there are a lot of generators in town to prevent too many tourist dollars from staying in tourist pockets.

We had a great, relaxed time in Pokhara: the city tends well to people who are looking to relax and spend a few dollars. It tends ever better to those who realize that the exchange rate between pretty much any major currency and the Nepalese rupee and the local prices make almost everything really cheap. So without too much of a dent in our wallet, we lived pretty well. I think for many people this is a major attraction to many countries in this area of the world.

We met many interesting people in Pokhara, and had a few fun days trotting around, but to give all the details would probably become pretty boring. So I'll choose one highlight: our hike to see Mount Sagarkot. On a clear day, Sagarkot is one of the closest peaks you can see from Pokhara, but you have to leave early because as the day heats up, a light haze fills the air, and visibility is dramatically reduced. We had some fuzzy directions from our guidebook, and armed with our intuitions, we set off out of the main road south of the city.

We made decent progress up the back hills of Pokhara, past people's houses and gardens, climbing ever upwards to get to a precipice from which we could see our last panoramic mountain vista. As we got further up though, we quickly lost our bearings as to which path would continue taking us up. We encountered several young children, each one offering to be our guide, for ridiculously low sums of money. We didn't want a guide: we wanted to do this on our own. For each we graciously thanked them, but said we wanted to go on our own.

We arrived at a point where the paths really didn't make any sense: they went directly into people's back yards, which we thought probably wasn't a good idea. Just milling around drew attention, and soon a child of around six years of age was asking us if we knew where we were going. We gave him the usual, but we didn't even get through our gracious denial before he shouted out something in Nepali, to his friend Basanta. I didn't need to know the level of Nepali required to know it translated as "Basanta! Tourists who want to see Sagarkot!"

This is how we met Basanta, a Nepali pre-teen who, along with his extended family, all live in the surrounding area. He was a really nice guy, and offered to take us to see Sagarkot: by this point I was willing to pay for a guide, but when I asked him how much he'd like to show us for, he replied, "some things you do because you feel proud of where you live, not everything is about money," which made me feel very small.

He then took us up a hitherto unseen path, which scaled the side of the mountain; he was wearing flip-flops and negotiated the track with no trouble, while us, with hiking shoes, were taking extra time. Walking these trails is something you clearly grow up with around here (the routes some of these mountain kids take to school will turn anyone into an athlete), and Basanta was no exception. The only time he paused to consider whether a particular path would be the next leg of the journey was to leap across a five-foot wide chasm on the side of the mountain: he looked at us and said, "I think this is too far for you, yes?"

We climbed further and further up his family's back forty, passing terrace after terrace: many had been planted with mustard, which had bloomed into a bright yellow carpet of flowers, some were left fallow with grass. He showed us a terrace that he and his youth group were expanding so that they could use it as a cricket pitch. He was very proud of the accomplishments made by his youth group: they had built a shrine, installed a water system and a welcome sign for their village, and their next focus was this pitch. Clearly, these kids aren't hanging out at the convenience store for fun.

As I began to wonder if we would ever get to a point where we could see anything but mustard, we arrived at the top of the mountain, which opened up to show us not only Sagarkot and its neighbours, but also all of Pokhara, spreading out before us. It was about eight in the morning and the activity in the city was clearly underway, with smoke rising from dozens of houses, and a light smog filling the air. Sagarkot was a more fulfilling view, interesting in that the haze had already begun, but from the ground up: the mountain appeared out of a misty base, along with the peaks beside it. We took pictures, promised to send copies to Basanta (we did), gave him a donation towards his youth group, and descended back to Pokhara

After our stay in Pokhara, it was back to Kathmandu by tourist bus. Our bus was set to depart at seven-thirty in the morning, so we woke early and paid our bill, and proceeded to the bus depot in the early, misty morning. The only reason Western tourists walk around in the early, misty morning in Pokhara is to catch a bus or a plane, so every taxi who passes slows down to see if you'd like to fork over some cash for a ride. We knew it wasn't far. We were walking.

We'd already figured on an empty stomach for the bus: we'd even bought a few small things to take with us for the ride. We knew there wasn't going to be time for breakfast. At least, this was what we'd planned on, but when the guy on his bike stopped beside us, with a platter of freshly-baked goods balanced on his shoulder, one look at what he had to offer told us we were in for a treat. Croissants, fresh from the oven; jelly rolls; cinnamon buns; you name it. All of them still steaming, and the price he commanded was a pittance, especially if you consider the mode of delivery. We bought a few and ate them as we walked.

And then realized that he wasn't alone, that other guys on bikes were making big dollars ferrying freshly-baked goods to the bus depot for the consumption of passengers. Ingenious. We were hailed by a guy as we arrived, who seemed eager to help us out and direct us to the right bus. He looked at our tickets and pointed us to a certain bus, which we boarded and waited. More guys came by with freshly-baked goods. The bus departed.

It must be a common theme among buses in India and Nepal: big, old, clunky, slightly uncomfortable, but workable. We settled in for a long, bumpy ride. We read, we lounged, I remarked how we must be taking a different route because I didn't recognize any of the scenery. We stopped at a roadside restaurant for a break. While there, I chanced to chat with a girl from Denmark, there to study for a semester at a university in Kathmandu (Denmark apparently has big ties to Nepal). It was only by turn of chance during our conversation that she let us know that the bus we were on was not going to Kathmandu; it was going to Chitwan national park, some four hours south of Kathmandu. As we headed back to the bus, we confronted the driver about this, who confirmed that we were indeed going to Chitwan.

Here is a lesson to be learned by one and all when travelling in countries where transportation systems are more "thrown together" than carefully regulated. Make sure you know where your bus, train or rickshaw is going before you get in. And in a case such as ours, rather than having someone tell you that this is the bus you want, ask them where the bus is going and then confirm that it's the bus you want. Because here's how the money flows in the bus system in Nepal: you buy a ticket from an agent, and then give your ticket to the owner of the bus. The bus takes you to its destination, and then the bus driver takes the ticket to the agent, who redeems it for a certain amount.

However, there's no incentive for a bus driver to be honest: all he wants is butts in the seats, and preferably, a completely filled (or over-filled as the case may be) bus. If we hadn't asked, he would happily have driven us to Chitwan and left us at the side of the road with no options. Informed of our problem, there wasn't much discussion, but a wavery committal that at the next stop - a larger town - he would find us a connecting bus towards Kathmandu.

And he did - a minivan, packed full of people - but staunchly refused to pay for our transport to Kathmandu. Not his problem. Legally, he's probably right - it's probably our responsibility to know where the bus is going. But that didn't help us from feeling pretty resentful towards the guy. The minivan was packed with fourteen people. There wasn't much room for anything but to enjoy the scenery. Conversation was slight. There was the fun game of waiting for the subject of payment to come up, and not wanting to give in too early. But we did.

When we finally arrived in the outskirts of Kathmandu, it occurred to us that in the smaller vehicle, we actually made better time than in the bus. However all of this was for naught, as we got caught in a nasty snarl of a traffic jam. Vehicles vied for position, but eventually, everything ground to a halt and we sat there for a half an hour, weighing our options. We could wait it out; we could get out and walk. Waiting was easier, however, we don't wait easily. Walking would have been more attractive, except we had only a sketchy idea of where we were. No one in the van could speak English, and even when we produced a map, it didn't really register to the kid who had taken our money for the tickets. Armed with a compass and a feeling, we got our bags and marched.

We marched for a while, but eventually, found some landmarks that inspired us with the confidence that we were marching in the right direction. However, we marched for an hour and realized that we were only a third of the way to our destination: Jonnche (a.k.a. "Freak street," so named for its hazy, hippy-era past). Feet started to complain, and we found a waiting taxi who agreed to take us to Jonnche for a very reasonable price.

We walked around the Freak street area for a while, until we saw a hotel that Beranice had recommended to us: the Annapurna Lodge. Four stories, reasonable rates, a decent restaurant and an attached bathroom: we were sold, and stayed there for the four nights prior to our departure from Nepal.

The next few days in Freak street were fun - even more fun than in Thamel, probably because there are fewer tourists in Freak street. We found a restaurant a mere block away from our restaurant - it had no name - simply because our guidebook had pointed us to a place that no longer existed. But this place served up the tastiest, cheapest Indian food we'd ever had, so we went back several times. I'm not kidding: we stuffed ourselves for the sum total of about seventy-five cents each. The best part was paying: we had to point out the items we had on the menu. This place doesn't deal in receipts. And then there was the place next door for dessert: a cake and pie place with drawings and paintings on the wall, preserved from the seventies. Cakes and pies to die for.

We hooked up with Bhakta again and he took us around Kathmandu. We did some more shopping, we had some tea, we said a proper goodbye. We shopped for gifts, we ate well for little, we saw some sights. We whiled away the rest of our time in Kathmandu. We decided to send a whole bunch of things home. This proved to be more complicated than we anticipated - isn't it always?

Our first stop was at TNT, an international courier akin to FedEx. They answered all our questions about international shipments and cheerfully told us it would cost us about two hundred dollars to ship our box - the cheapest option for them. Obviously reading the colour our faces had turned, he suggested that the post office might be a bit cheaper. He did help us out enormously, not just by filling in the blanks on many of our questions: but he also gave us a big box we could use.

Walking back along the crowded thoroughfares of Kathmandu to Freak street, with a five-foot by four-foot folded up box, was surprisingly fun. Not only do people look at you because you're from the west, but they look at you extra-long because you're carrying something weird.

We weighed the pros and cons of making two boxes or one box for shipment; Nepali post is supposed to be only partially reliable. We settled on one large box for everything and a roll of the dice. We packed everything in; we added stuff to protect our goods; we wrote out a list of everything. We taped it up. We went out to dinner, confident in tomorrow's postal task.

The next day we lugged our parcel down to the post office; it had rained, so we had swaddled our package in our pack covers. We were practically the first in line. The bureaucracy of the post office suggests why companies like TNT exist, to deprive the consumer of the giddy processes required to send a package from Nepal. The steps involved aren't indicated anywhere; it's learn as you go.

The first step was to tell the guys in the processing office what you wanted to ship, how big it was, and where you wanted it to go. We looked at our options: air, air express, or sea. I don't know the difference between the first two, only that it was actually cheaper to go air express, and no one could satisfactorily answer why you would ever choose the other. And while sea was less expensive, it would take four to six months. We chose air express. The guy I was speaking to gave an encouraging nod, and then directed us to take ourselves and our parcel to customs clearance, the second step.

At customs clearance, we were given a form to fill out. The form was, of course, in Nepali; helpfully, they supplied us with an English version of the form, laminated, with which we could divine the meaning of the boxes, and helpfully, which ones we actually had to fill out. We filled out the form, asked for some clarifications. Then the customs guy asked us to open up our box and show them everything. With internal reluctance, we cut through the four layers of tape, and showed him everything, item by item. They don't leave much to chance. But he was convinced that we were shipping what we said we were shipping, and then we were allowed to repack it and tape it all up again. He prepared a bill for "customs services rendered." But the best bit, worth absolutely every penny of the customs clearance experience, was watching an old lady sew up our package in canvas, and seal up the seams with wax. You don't get this kind of service with Canada Post.

We then took our package back to the processing office with the appropriate forms, to pay the bill and send our package on its long journey back to Canada. It was less than TNT charged, but ten times as entertaining.

The rest of our time was pretty much a blur. We cabbed it to the airport, where we waited in line for no reason at all until it was our turn to go; I made no less than three trips around the airport in order to do some last minute stuff like changing money; we met a really nice Aussie named Rosemary; we dined on dried fruit. We waited for our plane to arrive, and when it did, we got on and took a long flight to Thailand.