Fully Loaded

There's a term for the goods sold in the Thamel district of Kathmandu, Nepal: North Fake. This refers to the plethora of knock-off outdoors gear lining the walls of shops in the area; almost all it has a North Face logo adorning the breast. We've discovered that even within this world of forgeries there's many shades of gray. Much of the fakes are junk, but some of the knock-offs are of surprisingly high quality and Thamel has a reputation for being a fantastic place to buy shirts, fleeces, pants, hats, gloves, backpacks--basically, everything except footwear.

Jillian and I have spent the last two days stocking up. Unlike most trekkers, who fly into Kathmandu with most of their gear already in hand, we just couldn't travel around Asia with down jackets and hiking poles. Between purchases and rentals our money has stretched a long way. This morning Jillian bought a yak wool winter hat with ear flaps, totally cute, for three bucks. And I added to to my layering by picking up a North Fake fleece for four dollars.

Tomorrow we head to central Nepal to tackle the Annapurna Circuit, a 180-mile trek around some of the tallest peaks in the world. It should take us anywhere from 15 to 20 days and it's what's called a teahouse trek: rather than camping along the trail, we'll be staying in little guesthouses that have sprung up offering ultra cheap lodging and food. The circuit culminates at Thorung La (pass) at an elevation of 17,700 feet, which we should (weather permitting) be passing through about ten days into the trip. In addition to all the gear we picked up in Kathmandu, we also purchased the recommended amount of altitude sickness pills.

Great fakes, as far as the eye can see

We're really excited about getting out into nature for a few weeks after so much urban hustle and bustle. Already, after a couple of days in Kathmandu, we're feeling significantly more relaxed than we felt in India. Appropriately, our final day in India was spent on an unbelievably dirty bus (we were sitting in a pile of dust in the back) on horrible roads. 180 miles, 11 hours. Kill me.

Northern India was just crazy. I don't want to beat a dead cow on this, but the sensory overload (oh, the smell of cow crap!) was unstoppable. I kept thinking (perhaps dumbly) of Phil Spector's "wall of sound" from the 1960's in which a full orchestra sound was able to be transmitted over AM radio. India is a "wall of stimulation." It all hits you at the same time. For me the whole experience calls to mind the title of David Foster Wallace's story of his time on a cruise ship: "A supposedly fun thing I'll never do again."

Annapurna, here we come!

Slow Train Coming

Before we could see the River Ganges we had to make our own journey down the River Styx--a trip through hell. But it wasn't the burning-fires-of-damnation sort of hell, but rather an underworld inhabited by extreme boredom, enormous rats, creepy men under sheets, and hotel double bookings.

At 7pm we arrived at the Tundla train station. This is a few miles outside of Agra and is the sort of place where an American crime drama might be filmed. Or perhaps a horror flick: perched on wires and beams above the platforms were thousands of birds, all noisily cooing and flapping wings; the cement below has been bleached white by so many years of bird droppings. No sooner had we commented (with a smug chuckle!) on the decrepit conditions of the place, than we discovered that our train was delayed...by nine hours. Jillian almost fainted, but then she noticed that she would land in a pile of cow crap (on the station floor!) and promptly snapped to attention.

A couple of hours later we were in the Upperclass Gents Waiting Room with some Germans and Belgians, commiserating. Believe me, "upperclass" refers only to the ticket, not the clientele--more on that in a sec. I had been unceremoniously ejected from the Ladies Waiting Room for not paying a shamelessly demanded bribe. So we moved to the Gents area. The seats were metal, the bathroom was vile, and a cold breeze blew in whenever the door opened. Occasionally we would step outside to stretch our legs and watch the huge rats run along the platform and tracks. At one point we could count ten rodents in our sight.

It was boring. I was too tired to read and listening to my iPod was pointless--every twenty seconds the nearby speaker would blast an announcement about the latest delay. It seemed every train was delayed. The Gents Room began to fill up and soon we tourists were outnumbered by the Indian men, many of whom began pulling sheets from their bags and sleeping on the floor. Experienced at this, I take it. One man--and I wish I were making this up--fixed his gaze on the gaggle of Western women in the corner and quite obviously began to masturbate under his sheet.

The train arrived and we boarded, exhausted. There were men in our beds, so we first had to kick them out and find some clean sheets before we could finally be horizontal. A few hours later we awoke to men speaking at normal volume and cell phones ringing (thanks guys!). For the next several hours we sat looking out the window, pretending we weren't being stared at by everyone around us. And I mean staring, like they're watching TV or looking at a fish tank. You look back, they keep staring.

Then we arrived in Veranasi, the holiest city for Hindus. After our rickshaw driver took us to the wrong hotel we walked for twenty minutes, dodging cows and mopeds in the city's narrow alleys and finally stumbled upon, and into, our hotel. Except the manager had accidentally given our room to someone else. The place was booked. Do you remember Al Pacino's silent scream in The Godfather, Part III? That was Jillian at this point in the journey, except she wasn't silent.

Well, that situation was mostly resolved and the next morning we took to the Ganges. It is estimated that 60,000 people daily make a pilgrimage to this river, to either bathe (mostly men) or dip their feet (mostly women). Along the banks of the river are hundreds of ghats, or broad steps leading down to the river. The most elaborate of the ghats were built by powerful maharajahs from all over India. The pilgrims come by the thousands because the Ganges is believed to flow from the feet of Vishnu, who protects all that is good in the world.

More like Vishnu's toilet: in Varanasi, the Ganges is septic. As in zero dissolved oxygen. As in nothing could live in it. Wide sewer pipes empty into the river beside the ghats. At some of theghats, cremations are carried out over open fires (we saw one) and the remains are thrown in the river. Dead cows are thrown in. And men were bathing and swimming. Women were doing their daily laundry.

Bathing in the Ganges...got your tetanus shot ready?

We boarded a small boat at sunrise and took in the whole scene. It was very quiet; the most prominent sound was the splashing water around the pilgrims. When I think about it--bathing in fecal water--I'm as grossed out as I was seeing that man under his sheet in the train station. But there was something so peaceful and focused about these pilgrims, so intense about their reason for being in Varanasi, so strong as to brush aside the Indian government's warnings about the river, that a small part of me wanted to reach down from the boat and feel the river for myself.

Naaaah.

Boats and ghats on the River Ganges

Yogis (spiritual advisors) on the steps of a ghat

When You Care Enough to Build the Very Best

I just love the Google autofill tool. You know, you start to type in your query and it provides a list of popular possibilities. Many other websites use this, but in Google you get a glimpse of what the world is thinking about and searching for. For instance, I recently typed "How long" into the search bar and the first option was "How long does cocaine stay in your system?" Just now I typed "Why is" in and received "Why is my poop green?" as result numero uno.

And if you type "famous ways" and take the second option you'll arrive at a list of websites providing famous ways to say "I love you". There's no shortage, since from the beginning of civilization men and women have been devising ways to win each other over and show their affection. From the ancient tradition of drinking honey metheglin brew (where the term "honeymoon" comes from) to the flowery love poems of chivalric knights to the giving of knives in Nordic culture, it seems we've thought of everything. In modern times men hold boom boxes blasting Peter Gabriel over their heads and couples say their vows mid-flight during a bungy jump.

Then there's this:

In 1631 the wife of Emperor Shah Jahan died while giving birth to the couple's 14th child. That the woman made it through the first thirteen births in the 17th century without dying should constitute an honor of some kind; it is said that the Emperor was so grief-stricken by her passing that his hair went white overnight. But he bounced back enough to commit his empire's entire treasury to the building of a temple in her memory.

A few posts ago I wrote about our trip to Angkor Wat, which was simply stunning in its breadth. But no single temple at Angkor elicited the same reaction from Jillian and I as we stood in the dawn's light before the Taj Mahal. A combination of Islamic, Persian, and Indian architecture, the white marble mausoleum dome surrounded by other tombs, four towering minarets, and a reflecting pool took over twenty years to fully complete. It's size and simple beauty create a stunning combination.

We spent an hour or so wandering the grounds at the base of the Taj Mahal, peering into the mausoleum of the emperor and his beloved wife and admiring the Islamic script covering the walls. We then enjoyed breakfast at one of the many rooftop restaurants in Agra with an excellent view of the temple. But nothing topped simply standing silently at reflecting pool's edge and staring in wonder.

And perhaps that speechlessness is the best "I love you" of all.

Street Seen

We're currently in Jaipur, a city a half-day's trip from Delhi. I hesitate to write that it's less chaotic than that mind-blowing, sensory-assaulting capital, but it is. But only slightly. In Delhi it was basically impossible to step back and enjoy the tableau, so thick was the static of the crowds and filth. Jaipur is turned down ever so slightly and we had a blast just walking the streets and looking around.

Jaipur is the brainchild of a Maharaja, the great Jai Singh II, who ruled in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. This guy was a true renaissance man: he not only laid out a walled city (the Pink City) with neatly divided rectangular sections which promoted (relative) order, but he commissioned a remarkable observatory. It's called Jantar Mantar and upon entering the low-walled site you might get the feeling that you're in a sculpture park full of geometric monuments lying at all angles. But they're actually instruments for measuring things like time and the movement of the planets and for calculating eclipses. Before the observatory was built, Jai Singh sent his best thinkers to Europe for two years to learn astronomy. Jaipur grew strong and prosperous under Jai Singh's rule, attracting the region's best merchants.

Today Jaipur is the swirling antithesis of western suburbia: asymmetrical, disorderly, filthy, bright colors on dull, decrepit backgrounds, and loud, punctuating sounds. The animation is at a fever pitch with people jostling each other, the women in beautiful sari and salwar kameez and the men's teeth a sticky red from chewing paan. Rickshaws swerve and motorbikes avoid one near collision after another. We've posted some pictures in "Our Photos" as usual, but here's a few of our favorites from the last couple of days.

Seeing Red

A young guy who works at the Delhi hotel where we were staying stopped us on the stairs as we were headed out for some dinner.

"You know what I have?" he asked quietly with an eager smile. I, on the other hand, wasn't too eager to hear the answer. In every country we've visited thus far, men approach me on the street, purportedly inviting me into their shop for some cheap t-shirts or a tailor-made suit. But they get too close and soon their lips are near my ear, whispering the true nature of their business: "Opium, hashish, weed." It's more amusing than anything else and since I can simply keep walking, it's no big deal. But being cornered in my hotel and solicited? That's a bit more uncomfortable.

But then: "Beer," he whispered with a grin.

"Is it secret beer?" Jillian asked. We were both a bit confused, but our pusherman quickly explained. Sure, alcohol is legal in India, but conservative Hindu and Muslim cultures have seeped into the regulation of it. It's heavily taxed and difficult to get a license to sell, so most places don't even bother. We were staying in one of the most densely populated and popular sections of Delhi and we were within walking distance of one bar. So naturally we went and it felt like we were entering a speakeasy. As opposed to every other storefront on the chaotic street--wide open, bright, loud--the bar's doors were dark and behind them was a staircase leading to an upstairs room full of Indian men and Western tourists. The Indian beer is Kingfisher and the label reads, "Alcohol content exceeds 4% and does not exceed 8%." I suppose every batch is different.

Delhi is insane. Sensory overload doesn't even begin to describe the sensation of walking around that city. For starters, it feels at bit like the episode of Star Trek in which Kirk, et al, land on the planet with too many people. I kept feeling like all of Delhi's 12 million denizens must have decided to come downtown for the day. In addition to overcrowding: honking cars and rickshaws, infinite men offering their services, cows, the pungent smell of urine, women in dazzling saris of all colors imaginable, children rummaging through garbage on the street, beggars, men launching snot rockets from their noses on the pavement in front of you. And that's just the first hundred feet.

It was Valentine's Day and while Jillian couldn't help but remark that Delhi was just about the most unromantic city she'd ever visited, we managed a small connection to that faux-holiday by visiting the Red Fort. The fort was constructed during the mid-1600s by an emperor seeking the pomp he felt he deserved and it houses a massive interior full of halls, residences, towers, and a mosque. Our favorite was the Hall of Public Audiences, where the king demonstrated his solidarity with his subjects by hearing their complaints and worries. Except that the seat he occupied during these sessions was at least six feet off the ground and constructed of marble--not exactly down to earth.

I wonder if any of the emperor's subjects began by explaining that the crops had failed, his cows had died, and his children were sick and then, leaning in as close as possible, whispered, "I have beer."

In front of the Red Fort

One of the king's many receiving halls

In the Ever

The soil under our feet was full of dull white fragments, some long and thin, others round or splintered. Everywhere we stepped we stood on them. They are recent history coming up out of the Earth. They are, in fact, human bones, and mixed among these gray-pale pieces are shards of cloth, the victims' clothing. The shards look as though they were recently planted there like flowers and not, like the bones, surfacing slowly thanks to erosion. They are memory erosion in reverse: with each bone pulled from the ground, with each filthy remnant of a shirt or pair of trousers freed from its shallow grave, the story of the Khmer Rouge becomes more impossible to forget.

Ten miles outside of Cambodia's capital city, Phnom Penh, lies the Choeung Ek Killing Fields. The name doesn't leave much to the imagination. It was on this couple of acres of land that approximately 17,000 Cambodian men, women, children, and babies were executed by the paranoid and ideologically bankrupt Khmer Rouge in the late 1970s. It's not the only site of mass graves in the country, but it's the largest and most famous. Only 9,000 of the victims have been removed from the ground thus far and their remains are encased in a tall memorial stupa, or Buddhist structure, but they are not hidden away.

In order to conserve bullets, executions were carried out with knives, machetes, and hoes. Babies were smashed against trees in order to prevent future revenge killings.

The grounds around the memorial stupa are cratered with evacuated mass graves. The path winds its way around these shallow holes, itself littered with bone fragments. Next door to the Killing Fields is a primary school; during our visit the silence was broken only by the sounds of children at recess.

Nearby is the former detention center (built as a high school) known simply as S-21, where prisoners of the regime were brought for torture and interrogation. Those who survived the electric shocks and water dunking were typically then moved along to the Killing Fields. Today, most of S-21 stands as it did the day the Khmer Rouge fell--barbed wire, cells with metal beds and chains, and a high wooden bar from which prisoners were hung from their arms. One building, though, has been turned into an effectively chilling remembrance of the victims of S-21. Hundreds of pictures line the walls and stories spill forth from panels.

The Khmer Rouge--essentially a rather small collection of often well-educated amoralists who seemingly would not or could not see their social experiment for what is truly was--controlled and used the nation's peasantry like a blunt tool. Through fear they forced many young people from the countryside into assisting their horrific program and left a generation with PTSD of the conscience.

A cell at S-21

I suppose, as an American, the appropriate utterance here is "never again." It's our requisite response to such slaughter, whether that be the Holocaust, Rwanda, Bosnia, or Darfur. Cambodia between the years 1975 and 1979 certainly belongs on that list and this country will be dealing with the scars for many more years to come. As I looked over the piles of skulls in the monument and the bones underfoot on the grounds and the manacles on the beds at S-21, I couldn't shake the feeling that horror happens and no matter how many times we tell ourselves that "never" shall it transpire again, mankind is still a long way from finding the antidote to mass murder.

Insert Your Own Superlative Here

I just had some of the best Italian food I've ever eaten, hand-rolled fetacini and gnocchi and sauces of incredible flavor. No, Jillian and I didn't drastically change our itinerary and hop a plane to Rome--I was dining at our guesthouse in Siem Reap, Cambodia. It's owners are three men from France, Spain, and Italy, and the menu downstairs on the patio reflects these origins. After a full day exploring the temples of Angkor in the hot sun and sticky humidity, kicking back with some red wine and one of these homemade dishes was just about perfect.

Siem Reap, until recently a quiet little town, sits a couple of miles south of the temples, so Jillian and I opted for a pair of the guesthouse's ancient, Wicked Witch of the West bicycles. They were small--I looked like a 12-year old riding a tricycle--but they proved to be an excellent way of getting around what is essentially a national park. In fact, it's an extremely well-maintained park with near-Western standard infrastructure and organization. It's been less than twenty years since the country was totally freed from the grip of the brutal Khmer Rouge and less than ten since tourists began coming in large groups, but already Siem Reap and the temples are humming along nicely with activity.

Wow, Dan, this is all very interesting, let's hear more about your diet and choice of transportation. Shut up and get on with the temples!

Describing the temples of Angkor is like describing the Grand Canyon or the guy who mugged you in that dark alley: it's damn difficult. There are hundreds of temples scattered about the area that once housed one of history's great empires. Between the 9th and 13th centuries Angkor dominated the region, battling rivals and neighbors Siam and Vietnam, building a still-impressive irrigation system that helped feed a population of one million, and commemorating all of this with a vast array of temples dedicated to their religion (a mix of Hinduism and Buddhism) and their kings.

First and foremost is Angkor Wat:

Angkor Wat is the national symbol of Cambodia. It appears on the nation's flag and currency and is a source of honor for all Cambodians. Jillian and I walked around the immense grounds (1.5 km x 1.3 km) on three separate occasions, taking in the grandeur of the pyramids and marveling at the intricate base reliefs along the outer wall, each relief panel telling a story from either the empire's history or religion.

It was during our first stop at Angkor Wat that Jillian and I started seeing all the monkeys. They're everywhere in the park, often simply sitting along the side of road or walking across the path. And best of all, we saw several families of monkeys climbing around on the entrance steps at the east gate of Angkor Wat. What's better than monkeys on ancient ruins?

Maybe this: The Bayon.

Situated inside Angkor Thom, a walled city near Angkor Wat, the Bayon was built in the late 12th century to celebrate a reunification of the empire. Without a doubt its calling cards are the 37 (down from the 54 when it was built) complex face-towers. Each tower, rising impressively from the Bayon's third level, is adorned with four faces, each of Avalokiteshvara, the Buddha of Compassion. Jillian and I climbed the steep and slippery steps near sunset and were simply blown away by what we found. From the ground, it's a bit difficult to ascertain what all the hype is about. It's not until you're at eye-level, such as it is, with these towers that the immensity of the project sets in.

The temples, like the monkeys, appeared everywhere we looked, around every corner we steered our bikes. We passed numerous smaller temples--amazing in the their own right--completely devoid of tourists. You could surely spend an entire day at Angkor and nary see another Westerner. There are simply that many temples.

One more: Ta Prohm.

This temple gained some fame when it appeared in the movie Tomb Raider. What makes this temple so interesting is that when Angkor was "discovered" by Europeans (they found hundreds of monks living there) in the mid-1800s and began restoration projects shortly thereafter, the decision was made to leave Ta Prohm as it had been found: devoured by the jungle. Though less impressive from the outside than many of the other temples we visited, Ta Prohm was the most fun to explore.

Alas, the monkeys stayed away from Ta Prohm, thus preventing my ascent to photography nirvana.

As always, more pictures can be found by clicking on "Our Photos" on the right sidebar.

Her life is in ruins

A Delicacy from a Desperate Time

From 1975 to 1979 Cambodia was ruled by a group calling themselves the Khmer Rouge. It's difficult to overstate how brutal this regime and it's nominal leader, Pol Pot, were and how thoroughly Cambodia was decimated by those four years. By the way, anyone still consoling themselves with the post facto reason for invading Iraq of "Saddam was a despot who killed his own people" should read up on Pol Pot. He made Saddam seem like a neophyte; Pol Pot orchestrated a draconian reordering of Cambodian society that resulted in the death of a quarter of its population (approximately 2 million people) and Western nations weren't exactly falling all over themselves to depose him. In fact, it took an invasion by the Vietnamese to dislodge the monsters.

During and after that reordering, in which the capital city was completely emptied so that Cambodian society might become a Maoist agrarian society, widespread famine ensued. Desperate, the people took drastic measures to survive. This included eating spiders--specifically Skuon spiders, palm-sized tarantulas. The Khmer Rouge is gone, but the habit of munching on arachnids is not. At a stop over during the bus ride to Siem Reap (the city outside Angkor Wat), we came upon a food stall serving up Skuon spiders. Watching the live ones scramble over each other in a cardboard box, I wasn't remotely curious about how the fried ones tasted.

Before:

After:

Coasting

We just want all our friends and family to know that we're taking the utmost precautions in our travels. This means moving about with only the most reputable (if uncomfortable) bus companies, eating street cart food only if it's prepared in a pan on the sidewalk and not on the sidewalk itself, and staying in hostels with the most select clientele. I mean, just listen to the types of people barred from our hostel in Nha Trang: "drunkers, defected peoples, insane, persons not permitted by doctor to leave hospital." And our current sleeping spot in Saigon? "Prostitutes are forbidden from the rooms," says the placard on the wall.

We're about to wrap up our stay in Vietnam and head on over to Cambodia. We've spent the past four or five days traveling down the country's Route 1--imagine Route 1 in America if every single driver was experiencing road rage--and stopping along the way in cities of interest. Unfortunately we were subjected to another overnight bus and this time we were the last ones to board. I was stuck "sleeping" in a five-across arrangement in the back of the bus next to an Australian guy. With equally broad shoulders, we were unable to sleep on our backs at the same time. Jillian, meanwhile, was perched up in a bed next to a support beam, thus giving her exactly zero comfortable positions for rest.

First came history-rich Hue, the imperial seat during the Nguyen dynasty (1802-1945) and that family's rule produced the Citadel and Forbidden City where only the king, his wife and concubines, and the court eunuchs were permitted entry. Jillian and I rented bicycles in Hue, which gave us the chance to explore the surrounding area a bit, including the country home/bachelor pad/tomb of Tu Duc, the fourth emperor in the Nguyen line. The brochure explained that these gorgeous grounds were where the emperor came to escape "royal and domestic problems." Was the queen really asking too much that the emperor put the toilet seat down when's he done?

Inside the Forbidden City, Hue

The tomb of Tu Duc, eternally escaping domestic problems

Next we came to Hoi An, which was sort of a smaller version of what we had expected to find in Hanoi on our first day: lots of French architecture. The Old City of Hoi An is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and, beside the fun of walking around these fun little streets, it's also a shopper's paradise. On at least a dozen occasions we commented that if Vietnam had been our last stop on this trip, we would have absolutely loaded up in Hoi An. Tailor-made suits and dresses; fabulous (and unbelievably cheap) rice paper paintings; traditional Vietnamese wall hangings; totally awesome authentic propaganda posters from the war. The list goes on. And Hoi An was a really wonderful place to explore at night when the cool ocean breezes sway the hundreds of paper lanterns hanging over the streets.

At the Japanese Bridge (16th century) in Hoi An

After history and shopping came the beach. Previously I hadn't thought of Vietnam as being a great place to catch some sun and sand, though I suppose the famous China Beach should have clued me in. We arrived in the city of Nha Trang fully prepared to hit the pavement and explore the local landmarks...but one look at the strip of sand a block from our guesthouse and we changed plans. So we splurged, spent the whole day under a thatch umbrella getting served drinks and food, and racked up a bill of, well, $19. In Vietnam, that's an expensive day.

And good, because we need to save our money for the hostels that keep the prostitutes out.

On the beach in Nha Trang