During the 25 minute plane ride from Pohkara to Kathmandu (on Yeti Airlines, no less) we were treated to a panorama of Himalayan views. The snowcapped mountains seemed to blend with the clouds, but more often poked up through them.
Back in Kathmandu, we hired a guide to take us to Bhaktapur, one of the oldest cities in Nepal, full of intricately designed temples, stupas, and palaces. The city is no museum, though; the Nepalese were celebrating the rice harvest and not only were there piles of rice in various places throughout the city, there were lively vegetable markets right in the main squares.
On our last day in Nepal, we had the privilege of having coffee with Goatam and Rehka Rai, a Nepalese couple Matt first met 12 years ago during his first visit to Nepal. At the time, Goatam ran a momo restaurant, but since then, he and Rehka have joined Word Made Flesh (the organization Matt volunteered with in India) and are raising 18 children, many of them orphans. They've been an example and testimony to their neighbors, and they were a great encouragement to us during our brief time together.
One thing that boggles my mind about Kathmandu and Nepal in general is that while it seems like such a chaotic, crazy place, its inhabitants, like Goatam and Rehka, exude peace and calm. The Nepalese seem like truly laid-back, friendly people, curious about the world around them, and proud of the way the country's main religions (Hinduism and Buddhism) exist in harmony.
We had a lot to pack into our last full day of vacation, which we spent back in Kolkata, India. There were several places Matt wanted to re-visit from his 6 month stint there in 1998, and although we couldn't get to them all, we made a valiant effort. First up was Sudder Street, where we had breakfast at the Blue Sky Cafe, after first discovering that the building Matt had lived in was no longer. Or rather, it was torn down and is on its way to becoming something else. We took a peek inside the courtyard of the famous Fairlawn Hotel before meeting up with Sarah, a Word Made Flesh staff member, for lunch at Khalsa's.
There are two subjects I felt well-versed in long before we came to Kolkata: Khalsa's and Tuna. When Matt volunteered in Kolkata he was a frequent diner at Khalsa's, and one of his frequent lunch companions was a guy named Tuna. Tuna suffers from mental illness and has lived on the streets of Kolkata for many years. Like many of the poor in Kolkata he relies on money from strangers for basic needs. But most important to him is companionship; he doesn't just want a few rupees for a meal, he wants someone to sit down and share the meal with him, to simply spend time with him. Tuna was an art student before his mental illness took over, and still sketches if he's got a piece of paper and pencil in front of him. When we arrived at Khalsa's to meet Sarah, Tuna just happened to be there.
With a few hours of daylight remaining, we headed out to the decaying beauty of the Park Street Cemetery, the final resting place for British subjects in India from the 1700's to the early aughts. After wandering around for a while, marveling at the haunting, peaceful atmosphere of the place, we walked the short distance to the Mother House, the convent of the Sisters of Charity and the former home of Mother Theresa. Her body is entombed there in the middle of a simple chapel in which the sisters gather for mass. It's the antitheses of the Vatican or, for that matter, any other remotely grandiose Catholic church.
From the Mother House we walked through a Muslim neighborhood that, according to Matt, seemed virtually unchanged since the last time he'd been there. To me, it seemed virtually unchanged since about 1900. There were goats tethered to fences and few, if any, storefronts or signs distiniguishing stalls where food was being prepared and consumed as proper restaurants. We kept walking, by this time in search of dinner. India was celebrating Diwali, a Hindu festival of lights, and the mood in Kolkata was festive; as it grew darker, people jammed shops, stalls, and restaurants in search of sweets and gathered around temporary shrines to various gods and goddesses; near our hotel they beat tin drums to mark the hour. We had a list of possible restaurants to try for dinner and found them all closed for the holiday. I began to suspect that Diwali was regarded a bit like Christmas is in the West, an idea that was confirmed when the only place we found open for business was a Chinese restaurant called 'Freak Out' (kind of like the last scene in 'A Christmas Story', no?).
We had an obscenely early flight booked out of Kolkata (2:50 am) and took one last crazy cab ride through the city, marvaling at all the lights strung up and the fireworks going off randomly (sometimes right under passing cars).
The thing that most struck me during this, my first trip to India and Nepal, was the realization of how profoundly different life is in other parts of the world. I've visited many places in the U.S., traveled throughout Europe, and lived in London, and yet I was almost totally unprepared for Asia. I'd heard stories and seen pictures of Matt's time there, and while we didn't have time to re-visit some of the more troubling places he'd been in Kolkata (such as Howrah Station or the House for the Dying), the banality of poverty there was on full display. Yet in both Kolkata and Nepal, there's an attention to beauty in the details of life, and a vibrancy of color and sound that that makes everywhere else seem a bit bland in comparison.
