Adventures in Kathmandu: My Almost Last Travel
He is almost screaming at her. She answers with the same intensity. My colleague and the driver of the taxi we took have been arguing for over ten... probably even 15 minutes now. In loud voices. As if there wasn't another person inside the vehicle. No one wants to back down.
I cannot understand a single word being hurled. At this moment, fear starts to creep in. I just want to get out of the vehicle, take my luggage, and start walking to the airport.
How can I not be scared when I do not understand a single word they were saying. Why is the driver and my colleague they fighting? I do not have the slightest idea where in Kathmandu are we. I don't know how to get to the airport by myself because I do not even have enough local currency to take another taxi or something.
Nepal is very different from the Philippines. The culture there is very different from ours. In the Philippines and in Southeast Asia in general, one may find it easy to approach people when they are lost. At least in my experience. Here, it is difficult to just go to random people in the streets to ask for directions, mainly because we don't understand each other.
Silently, I start to panic. If I can only make it home, I am never traveling again, I said.
Earlier that day...
I was an international observer 😂 in an impromptu biryani cooking session with a Pakistani colleague and her Nepali friend whom I just met. According to them, biryani is a dish that is always present in every occasion in their respective countries. I was watching the process starting from the preparation of the ingredients until the cooking while sipping on a beer and munching on nuts and cold cuts. In my mind, I was telling myself: Wow, who knew your last day in Nepal is going to be this eventful.
I was supposed to just stay at the hotel and do some work before my flight in the evening. In a place where you don't speak the language and you're not confident to go around because taking public transportation is complicated, staying at the hotel is the right thing to do, I figured. But when I learned that everyone was flying in the day and that I'd be left behind, I kind of felt lonely. Ironically, even if I prefer being left alone most of the time, I do long for some company, especially when in a foreign place where I don't know anybody.
On my way to have my lunch, I was saying goodbye to a group of colleagues from India and Afghanistan and when one of them learned that I would be alone at the hotel waiting for my flight, he told our Pakistani colleague who's meeting her friend to take me with her instead. It was a fight between my introversion and the longing to have some company. If I tag along, I will have to talk with these people. If I stay at the hotel, I can get some work done so I can sleep all I want once I get home. But she was quite convincing. I gave in. A couple of hours after lunch, I found myself drinking beer at someone else's dining table.
We had an early dinner of biryani, which I immensely enjoyed. Finally, I can now say I've tried home-cooked Nepali food, and twice at that. In the few days that I am in Nepal, I've been to two houses in Kathmandu where I both had dinner and drinks, met kind, interesting (and famous~ people), and listened to a lot of interesting and inspiring stories.
My colleague's flight is a couple of hours earlier than mine. We did leave her friend's house with enough time before her flight, but we forgot to take into consideration the rerouting and road blocking because high profile people who attended a high-level meeting are leaving the country that day. We were going smoothly on the road at first. Before it got dark, we even passed by a wedding. Traffic was then starting to build up in that area so I had a good look at the people in the street going inside a building for the wedding.
I cannot understand a single word being hurled. At this moment, fear starts to creep in. I just want to get out of the vehicle, take my luggage, and start walking to the airport.
How can I not be scared when I do not understand a single word they were saying. Why is the driver and my colleague they fighting? I do not have the slightest idea where in Kathmandu are we. I don't know how to get to the airport by myself because I do not even have enough local currency to take another taxi or something.
Nepal is very different from the Philippines. The culture there is very different from ours. In the Philippines and in Southeast Asia in general, one may find it easy to approach people when they are lost. At least in my experience. Here, it is difficult to just go to random people in the streets to ask for directions, mainly because we don't understand each other.
Silently, I start to panic. If I can only make it home, I am never traveling again, I said.
Earlier that day...
I was an international observer 😂 in an impromptu biryani cooking session with a Pakistani colleague and her Nepali friend whom I just met. According to them, biryani is a dish that is always present in every occasion in their respective countries. I was watching the process starting from the preparation of the ingredients until the cooking while sipping on a beer and munching on nuts and cold cuts. In my mind, I was telling myself: Wow, who knew your last day in Nepal is going to be this eventful.
I was supposed to just stay at the hotel and do some work before my flight in the evening. In a place where you don't speak the language and you're not confident to go around because taking public transportation is complicated, staying at the hotel is the right thing to do, I figured. But when I learned that everyone was flying in the day and that I'd be left behind, I kind of felt lonely. Ironically, even if I prefer being left alone most of the time, I do long for some company, especially when in a foreign place where I don't know anybody.
On my way to have my lunch, I was saying goodbye to a group of colleagues from India and Afghanistan and when one of them learned that I would be alone at the hotel waiting for my flight, he told our Pakistani colleague who's meeting her friend to take me with her instead. It was a fight between my introversion and the longing to have some company. If I tag along, I will have to talk with these people. If I stay at the hotel, I can get some work done so I can sleep all I want once I get home. But she was quite convincing. I gave in. A couple of hours after lunch, I found myself drinking beer at someone else's dining table.
We had an early dinner of biryani, which I immensely enjoyed. Finally, I can now say I've tried home-cooked Nepali food, and twice at that. In the few days that I am in Nepal, I've been to two houses in Kathmandu where I both had dinner and drinks, met kind, interesting (and famous~ people), and listened to a lot of interesting and inspiring stories.
Then we reached this road where every vehicle was being rerouted, to a street that turned to a parking lot because the vehicles were no longer moving. After maybe 20 or 30 minutes in that situation, the driver grew impatient and floated the idea of us just walking to the airport. Had I understood what they were arguing about, I would've got off immediately and started walking. But my colleague insisted that we wait for the traffic to ease up or the road behind us to be opened again.
After the intense exchange of words, I did not understand, my colleague explained to me what they were arguing about. She probably noticed that I was started to be scared. The driver suggested that we could just walk since the airport is already near. I told her that maybe we should just walk then. I was also starting to worry that she might miss her flight. She finally agreed. We took our luggage and started walking to where the driver directed us. He even helped carry my colleague's luggage. He's kind after all. 😂 When we reached the crossing where the police have been manning the rerouting, we were about to cross, when funny in a twist of fate the road was opened once again for traffic. The driver told us to wait for him in the corner. He drove us to the airport, and indeed the airport was what, just 200 meters away from where we got stuck. Inside the taxi, I was telling my colleague how worried I was that she might miss her flight because we both know how our colleagues managing the finance will react. But good thing nobody missed their flight. All is well.
