Tuesday, May 13, 2014

The Travelers Pack

The life of a traveller, the dirty shoes thumping on the muddy roads and trails of every corner of Nepal’s young Himalayan flood plains to mid hills to the lesser Himalayas itself. The worn out jeans, a small handheld camera, and a dust riddled North Face bag and infinite road ahead. Never as planned, well nothing goes according to plan anyways! But as a part of a career in Wildlife Biology/ Ecology, travelling is a must. I do love being in nature, the sound of birds, the winds rattling the leaves, the cricket’s noise is melody to my ears, there’s nothing I love more than being in nature, the soft scaly wings of butterfly breaking the waves in a silence, flying past us, teasing us, “Take my photo, catch me if you can”.  I spent 20-30 minutes chasing a butterfly for a good photo, at times never getting it in the end.  Nepal is Nature at its best! What do we not have here? I could spend years and years of my life year, I don’t believe in past or next life but a single life is not enough to travel and praise the beauty that Nepal possesses. But every time I’m somewhere, weather is the floodplains of Terai, some deep forest of the mid hills or barren lands of snowline; I’ve always had a pack of Wai Wai with me. I hadn’t thought of it at those times but recently after few of those crazy expedition, I came to realize that where ever I’ve been to, I’ve have had Wai Wai in the most strangest of the places as well! Be it raw of , cooked! I always have a travelers pack!!

 Well the strangest to start with has to be a recent trip to Champadevi, sitting on top of the South Western hill of the Valley; Champadevi offers the shortest and good hiking experience for a single day. We reached the top and with our theory of never coming down the same way that we took, we took a different way, the one we had no idea about, shortly after few hours of walk, we were lost, guessed our way through the fragile trails, ended up in stony paved stairs leading down into some kind of valley floor. It was almost thick forest and we had no idea where we were going, but then we heard faint sounds of Madal playing then we realized we had touched a part of Makwanpur, and there was this small hut, a shop. Out of all places in that wilderness, there was one shop! Would there be a better place to have Wai Wai?

High up in the Himalayas, this time Langtang Valley, climbing up the steep ridges of Kyanjin Ri, without  even a bottle of water, well no body even thought of carrying a bottle of water,  and I took the long and the wrong way ended reaching the peak alone but could see ant sized friends way below. With hunger creeping into the stomach, where else could be the best place for Wai Wai other than 4800 meters? Btw, a single pack of Wai Wai costs 100 in Langtang, Glad that I had bought few in Balaju!

I had always heard about Kalinchowk, always wanted to go there. But never had a chance, sometimes some friends weren’t free and sometimes I was broke and all but then few months ago, everything lined up! Decided a day ahead, and then went to Charikot the next day. What I thought was that Kalinchowk is few hours hike from Charikot, 2 to be precise from what I had heard but it turned out to be far more than that, Kalinchowk was 1.5 hrs away from Kuri which  was 5-6 hours from Charikot, we reached Charkot at 3 PM! Then directly started ascending up the hills, well mostly flat lands for few hours! Before reaching this small quiet village with a different essence, rested there for a minute and again asked the shopkeeper for noodles, and Wai Wai again!
The stories goes on and on, regardless of where it is, be it Far West in Mahendranagar, or the birth place of Buddha or Chitwan, Pokhara, Palpa, Syangja, Jomsom Muktinath, Gorkha anywhere I go, there’s always Wai Wai!

The fun thing is, you ask the shopkeeper for a Wai Wai and he cooks up Mayos, Wai Wai means Noodles in Nepal! At least as far as I’ve known and I was thinking about this thing and a pact that I will be taking Wai Wai with me where ever I go and I will Eat wai wai in all the Districts of Nepal!! #BucketList
Rings a bell about that Wai Wai add, wherever it is, There’s Wai Wai in our heats! #HamroManMaaWaiWai

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