Pokara, Nepal, 04 November 1987:  I was high in more ways than one at the Mt. Annapurna base camp:  firstly, altitude (13,500 feet), and secondly, unconfirmed word came up the trail that the Minnesota Twins won the World Series!  Hallalujah!!!  I tried desperately to find out the results of the 6th and 7th games before I began my trek, but there were no newspapers here in Pokara.  I even tried calling long distance to the American Embassy, but they didn't have word yet.  I had to wait for several days later, asking every American I met coming up the trail.  When I heard it, I wasn't convinced, and I had to confirm it two more times with other Americans before I believed it.

I'm so used to Minnesota ending up in second place in everything that it seemed to be breaking the rules that we would end up first in something.  Four times, the Minnesota Vikings went only as high as second place, as did the Twins, North Stars hockey, Fighting Saints hockey, and the Minnesota Kicks soccer team.  Outside of sports, Minnesota also only made to second place on a number of things.  Once in the 1970s, we were rated by some study as second in quality of life to California.  I've seen us on lists as second in life expectancy (to Hawaii), second for medical care facilities (to Massachusetts), and second on per capita spending on public education (to California).  Even on the negative side, high state income taxes, we made it only to second place (to New York).  Two U.S. Vice Presidents from Minnesota earned the second highest office in the land, but not the first.

As I recall now, there is some precedent for Minnesota making it to first place.  The Gophers basketball team did it one year, and the Olympic hockey team in 1980, made up largely of Minnesota players and a Minnesota coach, took the gold medal from the Soviets.  Still, the Twin's win, after so long on the bottom, must have been the sweetest victory of all.  I'm sorry I missed it, although I and several other Minnesotans that I met here in Nepal were each privately jumping for joy!

Now, as you can see from the front of this postcard, life in Nepal has plenty of thrills to offer regardless of what's going on back home.  My trekking partner, Patty, from Minneapolis, decided to turn back after two days due to problems with her knees.  It was a wise decision, I thought, as I continued for six days, since my knees also seemed brutalized by thousands of feet of uphill and, far worse, downhill.  The scenery was fabulous, however, far surpassing anything I've seen anywhere (including last month's trek to Everest).

Through bamboo and rhododendron forests, past a couple dozen breathtaking cascades and waterfalls, I climbed from the tropics to the tundra where I had a 360 degree panarama of peaks, each well over 20,000 feet and covered with snow and glacial ice.  It doesn't get any better than this!

Peace and love,
Deano

Kathmandu, Nepal, 08 November 1987:  Namaste (Hello)!  I hate to begin with this topic, but the events of the present can't help but affect me.  This evening, a young Austrian traveler presumably jumped out of the third story window of the Trekker's Lodge where I am staying.  He successfully killed himself.  Four hours later, he still remains lying on the pavement with a perpetual crowd of mostly Nepali onlookers gathered around him.  Events such as this are not handled in a professional manner in Nepal.  I and one other traveler with a camera were asked to take photos, including closeups of the gruesome sight -- a large young man, his head dented sharply inwards with blood pouring out from the point of impact and spreading all over his mostly unclad body.  He may not have jumped; he may have fallen or, I think less likely, he may have been pushed.  Most apparently, he appears to be a victim of drugs.  I talked to a couple people who saw him an hour beforehand and say that he seemed to be behaving quite strangely ... likely intoxicated by something.  He walked into the 4th floor room above him (coincidentally, my former room), muttered something in German that the people were unable to understand, chewed on a plastic water bottle, and pulled down his underpants, the only thing he was wearing.  They talked him into going back to his room.  An American with whom he was going to trek said he was fearful when he last saw him, believing him to be violent.

He has been carried away now, finally, but the authorities here are useless.  They didn't lift a finger.  It was mostly Western tourists and the hotel manager who had to lift him onto the van.

I could elaborate further, but most of the hotel residents, including myself, are pretty disturbed by the event.  Some checked out this evening.  I may do the same tomorrow, not so much because of his death, but because my dormmate, an Australian woman, seems somewhat "loony tunes" as well.  She worked in psychological warfare in Vietnam and claims that this hotel has "bad kharma".  She's not a drug user, but by her behavior one might think so.  She's definitely out of touch some of the time.

On happier notes, I have more funny coincidences to report.  The other night, I received a letter from my long time friend in St. Paul, Jay Schmidt and his wife Janet.  They told me that Janet had a cousin who had been volunteering here in Kathmandu at a place called Dilaram House, a Christian outreach center intended to help drug addicts and other young down-and-outs who are attracted to the lifestyle of Kathmandu (which has a reputation similar Amsterdam or San Francisco for its attraction to free-spirited youth).   The following morning, while standing in a four-hour line of more than 100 people waiting to apply for an Indian visa, I met a guy who also worked at Dilaram House who said he had known Janet's cousin.  What's more, this guy, whose name is John, is from Minnesota ... the fifth Minnesotan I've met in Kathmandu by happenstance.  He also turned out in one respect to be my salvation.  Having been away from newspapers and magazines while trekking, I had been searching newstands to find old editions reporting details of the Minnesota Twin's victory in the World Series.  John's parents sent him the Minneapolis Tribune from the day after the Series.  I spent two hours reading it and having a great time!  He too was anxious to find a fellow Minnesotan, someone with whom he could "go gonzo!" and celebrate.   Nobody else gets very excited.

For more coincidence, John introduced me to a young man named Chen Feng, a participant in last December's student protests in China who fled first to Burma, and later to Nepal where he obtained refugee status, moved into Dilaram House and became a Christian.  He has since written an article for a magazine and a book he hopes to publish.  Two weeks ago, he had the honor of going to Daramsala, India to meet with the Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama.  He played for me a cassette tape of his interview with the Dalai Lama, and showed me notes that the Dalai Lama had given him.  The coincidence comes in that these notes contained accounts of last month's riots in Lhasa, part of which described an incident where an American friend of mine, who sang with me on several occassions, had his hat shot off his head by the Chinese while he was participating in the riots.

Life is sometimes quite strange.

Peace and love,
King Mahendra

Kathmandu, Nepal, 12 November 1987:  Namaste (Hello)!  Here's more on my continuing list of coincidences:  1) At breakfast the other day, a couple from Canada, with whom I hung around in Beijing and at the Great Wall three months ago, literally bumped into me from behind while I was eating my porridge in a restaurant.  2) The next day at breakfast, I sat at a table with a young woman from Alaska.  Two hours later, where I was signing up to go on a raft trip, I met a young man who also was from Alaska.  In the evening, I had dinner with my Canadian friends and a friend they had just met, a lawyer who was also from Alaska.  The three Alaskans didn't know each other.  Prior to this day, in 21 months of travel, I haven't met any Alaskans.  Unbelieveable, but true!  3) After dinner that day, I returned to my hotel room to find a British friend of mine, whom I'd seen two months ago in Lhasa.  He came to Nepal via a different, much longer route through Pakistan and India.  Of all the thousands of hotel rooms scattered about Kathmandu, the one dorm room he checked into the first night he arrived was, amazingly enough, my room!

I've met a couple other friends I knew in Lhasa who were forced to leave China.  One guy, from England, ran a non-profit cooperative bookstore and an information service for travelers in Tibet.  He and his wife were evicted from the country, not treated very kindly, and their books and other materials were confiscated by the Chinese authorities after the riots in Lhasa.

I go tomorrow with a group of 12 on a two-day raft trip, followed by two days in the Chitwan Game Park, followed by a bus to India.

People, very occasionally do fall off mountains here, but if you're going to worry about me, worry about this!  Vehicle drivers in the developing world drive insanely!  They're infinitely worse than in the U.S.  When I'm a pedestrian, on a bicycle or riding a bus, that is when my life and limb is at greatest risk.  If an Indian bus driver gets in an accident, it's just fate -- meant to be -- "bad kharma"!

Peace and love,
Deano

Varanasi, India, 18 November 1987:  Namaste!  Relentlessly intense and colorful, India bombards the senses!  Only Cairo and Beijing before this on my trip functioned at a similar level of madness and chaos.  Only Morocco and China were more difficult to completely relax in ... Morocco because of unabatable harassment by would-be guides and rip-off artists, and China because of bureaucrats and others who work with tourists from whom you must pull teeth, tonsils, and appendices to get any service, or even recognition of your existance.  Nepal was a breath of fresh air for me, between India and China, the two most populous nations.

Still, India is more easily traveled than Morocco or China.  The would-be guides here are usually more respectful and eventually take "no" for an answer (after the 12th time you've said it or after you literally step on their foot and say "no").  The bureaucrats here are often slow and incompetent, but they usually politely recognize your existance ... and they do speak English.

All in all, the rewards of travel in India will likely far exceed the efforts required to cope with it, even though those efforts may be great at times.  There is no other country that offers the variety and intensity of experiences.  The movie "Gandhi" six years ago planted a seed in my mind that inspired this whole journey I am taking around the world, and after 21 months, I've finally reached the destination of that first inspiration.

Going first to the city of Varanasi is like diving into freezing or boiling water.  It is India at its most densely populated and poverty stricken; and yet, it is among the holiest of cities.  Hindu pilgrims come from everywhere to bathe in the sacred Ganges River, and many are also cremated along these banks.  For Buddhists, on the other hand, this is where Buddha (Siddhartha Guatama) gave his first message of enlightenment.

The streets are choked with people and cattle, bicycle rickshaws ringing their bells, and auto rickshaws and other traffic blaring their horns.  People crowd on the sides of the road to sell their wares or simply to beg.  Mostly slim and very attractive women dress in their shear and brightly colored saris.  Children run around often butt naked.  A sacred cow decides he has an itch and stops to scratch his head and side against a loaded bus waiting in traffic.  Even with your best efforts to avoid doings so, you will step in the excrement of some animal (quite possibly the human animal).  If you pause to eat at a street side stand, there will frequently be a rodent or two to share your company.  A friendly "Hello!  Where are you from?" by someone walking beside you turns into an attempt to sell you a sitar, and when that fails, to sell you silk, and when that fails, to change black market money, and when that fails, to sell you dope, and when that fails, to offer to buy your camera, and when that fails, if you're lucky, to say "goodbye".

People walking down the street trailing beside you can offer very diversified services; they can be a musical instrument manufacturer, a silk wholesaler, a banker, a photographer, and a pharmacist all rolled into one!

On the way to India from Kathmandu, I stopped to take a wet and wild whitewater raft trip for two days.  There were thrills, spills and all sorts of excitement.  At one point we nearly flipped over.  Our guide and another crew member were thrown from the raft.  The danger was not great, but it did make the addrenilin flow.

Likewise, walking through the jungle and riding on an Asiatic elephant while looking down on a rhinosaurus was adventure seeking that was greatly rewarded.  Four days earlier, a young uncautious Swiss traveler was gored to death by a rhino.  He wanted a close photograph.

Peace and love,
Johnny Quest

Agra, India, 22 November 1987:  As I sit looking at this undeniably beautiful structure, the Taj Mahal, I can't help but feel a little ambivalent towards it.  When I saw the Grand Canyon, the Pyramids, and the Great Wall of China, I felt a similar ambivalence.  It must be due to the overexposure I've received of these places in photos and films that makes actually being here seem anticlimatic.  There's little surprise.  I've been much more blown away by sights I'd never heard of before -- Edinburgh castle (Scotland), Welichka Salt Mines (Poland), the Cappadocia region of Turkey, the Motherland monument (Kiev, USSR), Abu Simbel (Egypt), to name several.  I've also valued places that seem more "alive" than places such as the Taj Mahal ... which is just an empty building with not much action going on within or around it.  There is so much happening spiritually at places such as the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, the Jokang Temple in Tibet, and the Ghats of Varanasi, along the Ganges River here in India.  Finally, places of more recent political symbolism touch me much more deeply than does a structure built long ago with little consequential meaning on the present.  For example, I am much more moved by the Berlin Wall, Auchwitz Concentration Camp, the human skeletans of Uganda, the Tibetan refugee camps in Nepal and frankly, just everyday life here in India.

The Taj has history and beauty, but it doesn't move me as I thought it would.  My lack of enthusiasm may be a product of feeling jaded, a little burnt-out, from travel;  but I think it's coming more from the uncomfortable hassles that preoccupy me just outside the walls surrounding the grounds of the Taj Mahal.  It gets very quickly tiring when you are looked at only for what you have to spend, to sell, to give, or to be taken.  Far too often, the people you meet are the people whose only duty is to separate you from your money.  The Indians dehumanize me by thinking of me only as a walking rupee (Indian coin), and I, in turn, dehumanize them by thinking of them only as service providers.

So often, light hearted conversation turnes into a sales pitch, and I get so I don't even want to be friendly.  The "hard sell" is more intense and imposing here than anyplace I've been (except Morocco, where sometimes I was threatened with violence).  There are no threats given here, but my personal privace and space is often invaded.

Worse yet is the deceit.  Several times today, attempts were made to deceive me out of my money by various locals.  Even the official ticket seller at the entrance to the Taj Mahal twice blatently tried to short-change me.

I did choose to come to India to observe and experience these things, motivated by both poverty and greed, but that fact makes constantly being on my toes nonetheless wearing.  The Taj may be magnificent and beautiful, but appreciating it today has been bittersweet.  Culture shock includes adapting to all aspects of the best and worst.  This is India forreal ... not just a movie.

Love,
Dean

New Delhi, India, 26 November 1987:  Namaste (Hindi "Hello")!  So far, I've received two envelopes from you here in New Delhi, including the news of great grandma's death.  Before I read this, I had been thinking a lot about her recently, and was going to suggest to grandpa Oman to mention me to her the next time he saw her ... not that she would have remembered me (for more than 10 seconds).  They haven't come up with a memory pacemaker yet.  Seeing her in recent years has changed the way I look at things.  I realize now more than ever that there are very few things of long lasting importance, and many more things of only transient importance.

Thanks for the World Series clippings.  During the past couple days, I've also had the extreme pleasure of viewing the videos of the sixth and seventh games at Ben's nephew's house here in New Delhi.  Kevin is a very busy guy, rarely here.  I haven't had much chance to talk with him, but it looks as if he is doing quite well in his suit coat and government vehicle, which he borrows from the U.S. Embassy.  Although Kevin is not here much, he lets me experience many simple pleasures that I haven't had in a long while ... ice cold cans of American-made Budweiser and bowls of Cheerios and Rice Krispies with cold (rather than boiled), fresh (rather than powdered or preserved to death) whole milk from a cow (rather than a yak or water buffalo).  Also, I get good ol' Cambell's soup served to me by his Indian maid.  What a life!

Outside of this haven of relative sanity is India for real in all its intense, chaotic and colorful splendor.  There's not another country I can think of that demands so much of a traveler and yet rewards him so much.  One cannot be non-committal or a passive observer in this place.  Daily, one is forced to respond and take a stand.  One feels as a parent with a young child, with "no" becoming the predominant word in one's vocabulary.  There even a T-shirt for sale that has the word "NO" in huge letters and says "NO carpets, NO rickshaws, NO hashish, NO change money, NO one rupee, NO problem!"  In the face of both massive wealth and abundant poverty, and the predatory harassment from those touting a wide variety of products and services that you don't want or need, you quickly learn the narrow limits of your tolerance, patience and compassion.  Sometimes, you just want to go into your room and hide!  Still, there's so much life here and so much to live that it's compelling.

Indian women may be the most attractive on Earth!  It's little wonder that Indian men are busy making so many babies here.

Love,
The Maharaja

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