the amazing adventures of puopillion effia and kanyire ajua

it's kind of like the country mouse and the city mouse. only with two different developing nations. and people, not mice. after visiting jenell in ghana for 3 weeks, i don't know how to sum it all up. it's not the storybook, i know i love my world more, moral of the mice friends. but i do know that this mouse might not make it in africa any longer than those three weeks. and that, though i know she'd hate me saying this, i have come to admire jenell even more after seeing her being AMAZING despite heat, sickness, village strife and power outages.






i've wanted to go to africa for as long as i can remember. like india, i had done some serious romanticizing. i hadn't given much thought to ghana's proximity to the equator or people's ranting about heat. and, for someone as heat intolerant as myself, this was a large oversight. the heat shut me down and made me feel like little green aliens disconnected my brain between 1 and 4 every afternoon. i know historians and sociologists typically minimize the impact of heat on development and say that people adjust, etc. but if i lived in ghana, i can tell you one thing. i'd be dead. but lots of things completely surpassed my expectations. the ghanaian people are incredible. barring the scores of marriage proposals i received daily, i loved the genuine warmth of everyone i met. when jenell introduced people to me, the common response was, "you're welcome!" i love that. i love that there was dancing and music everywhere.
jenell and i spent the first week on the most idyllic beach i've probably ever seen. after 2 days in a tro-tro, packed-to-the-brim-minibus, we arrived in jirapa, jenell's hometown. one of the sure highlights of jirapa, aside from sleeping naked outside in jenell's courtyard because of the heat ("tits to the stars"), was spending the afternoon at a school. when the teacher left and the students were supposed to be copying notes, i walked to the front of the 65 student classroom and started in. i told them they could ask me anything they wanted. and that i would ask them questions, too. after telling them about the fake husband who i made up in india and has been growing in my imagination since, they asked me to sing a song. i couldn't think of anything. and i didn't want to sing some pop song. so, i settled on "this land is your land." i don't even know where that came from. but the girls started clapping to the beat (what beat, i am unsure) and booty dancing in the aisles. feel it. feel it. something i didn't plan on at all is the fear some kids have for white people. (as a point of clarification, anyone who is not fully black, including mullatos, is considered white). my first encounter with scaring the shit out of a kid was in an extremely busy bank. i started making faces at the baby and she freaked out. after 5 minutes, and lots of coddling from her mom, she calmed down. only to lose it again when i passed her by. sometimes parents think this game is so funny that they bring their children close to foreigners just, well. i don't know why.


another highlight of the time was hanging out in pete's village. his village is much less developed than jenell's and lacks electricity and running water. the huts are circular mud huts with thatch roofs and a lot of water is gathered from a beautiful (especially because it's full this time of year) dam. the first night of our stay, we followed the drumming to a salah (end of ramadan) celebration. a man with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth drummed feverishly for hundreds of dancing women. the women were doing this incredible booty-bump dance with amazing, bull-charging-like footwork. obviously, jenell and i had to join in.










ghana is like no country i've ever seen. the wealth disparity between accra, the capital city, and the rest of the country is striking. in the tro stations in the south, little toys and things are sold. women have more meat on their bones and more junk in the trunk. people in the north, who were the ones sold into slavery hundreds of years ago, are more gaunt and don't enjoy the same infrastructure as most of the towns in the south. more kids have big, worm-filled, malnourished bellies.

from my experience, ghanaians are not businessmen and women. they don't really barter. they're too easy going to drop everytihng for a customer. life moves at a different pace. it's not indian time, elastic due to crowding and a bit of irresponsibility. ghanaian time is such because, well, it just doesn't matter enough to hurry. family is of extreme importance. poverty and begging are different. if you can help a family member who is struggling, you must. so, i guess what i am saying is these places called "developing" countries are way ahead of us in some measures. not really the newest news, but worthy of mention. taking time, loving their communities and families. but, of course, there is the quality of education, the availability of clean water, use of physical punishment at homes and schools and the prevalence of preventable diseases.

i feel kind of like a poser writing about my impressions of a place that is jenell's home. so, for an insider's view... here are the links to two of pete's slideshows from his time in ghana. www.peterdphoto.com/Waiting_for_the_Lights/index.html, www.peterdphoto.com/The_Dry_Season/index.html. the link to jenell's blog is in the right hand side of my blog.

p.s. puopillion means "happiness" and effia is friday born. these things also mean, jenell.
p.p.s. because i also wanted a ghanaian name, and since coco means porridge, we asked jenell's friend, elizabeth (the most incredible woman ever), to name me. "kanyire" means patience. ha! patience. that makes me laugh. and ajua means monday born.

gee, it's great to be back home

following a hotel room with a herd of cochroaches, a thought-to-be-broken foot garnered on the roof of a nepali bus, 20 men throwing rocks at me from the train platform, growing exhausted by traveler small talk and 115 degree heat preventing me from leaving my hotel room after 9 am, it was time to get the hell out of dodge. if dodge means traveling life. there's something wonderful about not knowing where the day will lead, seeing things that are completely novel and being in your element by being out of your element. but when chris said i could come back to the land of peace love and music or something like it, i jumped at the chance. getting off the janshitabdi in dehra dun was the biggest sigh of relief in my life. the rainwet roads and headlights illuminating narrow bands of the forest winding up to mussoorie reminded me of the first drive up the mountain, cole and i stepping out of the jeep, wide-eyed and so much younger. i prepared myself for a place void of many beloveds, and, newly, chose not to mourn and (largely) abstained.

after a week and a half of "blobbing" (as preeti terms the perfect blend of relaxing) to the tune of action movies, pizza, an excess of quality beverages, too much facebooking and being lazy, unemployed, and void of 97% or responsibility, i am restored. i could feel guilty. but. naaaah.

it's the smells. monsoon, mold, chris's clove cigarettes. wet streets, the temple doubling as urinal in the bazaar. the smell of green. defining places, in words, seems to marginalize their meaning. and woodstock... man. it's heavy and light and self-defining and so much. on my second night in town i accompanied chris to the junior/senior banquet. when my ninth graders, who i swear have all grown like 6 inches in the last 3 months, saw me they all started clapping. i can't say that didn't warm my heart, since if i did say that, i'd be lying. meeting the new blood is the weirdest. having to explain myself, i become defensive of my experiences and prowess in this place. i know, i want to yell. you don't have to tell me twice, i lived here too! though some of the lovethatmakesaplace are absent, i am still the queen poker contender-and-not-champion, chris starr is still the only star in my galaxy and the homeyness has not lost it's flavor.

when i woke up on monday morning i realized the end is now unavoidable. i consistently temper goodbyes, to people and places, with an escape clause. the, "oh, i'll probably see you again before i go" and the like. but the outs are gone. i've lived here for over 2 years. i've hated it and loved it more than any other place and experience in my life. defining it in any additional simple terms would demean something i love, something important, something essential. sure it sounds dramatic. and an amazing thing is that, even though i am writing this in my blog, for the first time, i don't want to try to explain so you'll understand this moment. a monsoon night in the dark. the end of this era. i've done enough explaining and sharing. i think i'll take this for me. one for the road.

tibet-kathmandu-sandwich!

i couldn't help myself. or stop thinking about tibet.

p.s. quomolangma= everest.

this photo is of a man is doing a kora around the potala with prostration. he puts his hands together in the prayer position, claps them above his head and lays himself out on the ground all the way around the building. some people do this all the way around mt. kailash. that's dedication, yo.

"what to do? kathmandu" (binod, my trekking guide)

not even in chronological order. disgraceful. but i wanted to write about kathmandu, where everybody knows your name. each time i return (currently on my third revolution) i feel like i'm on cheers. probably one of the reasons that i am so recognizable is the "holy cow fiasco." but we will get to that when it comes.

when i first stepped into the streets of thamel, the tourist district in kathmandu, i approached catatonic shock. it was like bangkok divided by india. on drugs. rickshaw drivers grabbed my arms, men shoved travel agency advertisements in my face, children grabbed my leg asking if i wanted hashish. somehow, over time, it's turned into a sort of home. this is probably due to the sangria, coffee, the international herald tribune, familiar friendly faces, amazing thai, mexican, italian and japanese food and the traveler's culture that i love and love to hate.

there is so much to do and see, and so many pictures to upload, but while i have many photos, i do not have endless patience. so, one of my favorite places in the kathmandu valley is bhaktapur, a pedestrian city with old architecture (tons of newari-invented pagodas), which i visited on gai jatra, the cow festival. the hindu celebration is dedicated to those who've died in the last year and the scores of parades are punctuated with mobile shrines to the deceased. newaris, a nepali ethnic group, believe cows will guide the deceased in the afterlife and the celebration is a raucous, dancing, singing event. (it's especially good luck to be holding a cow's tail at the moment you die. you know, keep that in mind). since bhaktapur is the best place in nepal to celebrate, i obliged. after wandering the streets, chatting with people who greeted me with, "you look nepali!" (i seriously hear this ten to twenty times a day), and pretending to be a photo journalist, i was stoked. boys in ascending order of age marched, two by two, hitting sticks together in a rhythym with drummers and horn players following. groups of dancers followed, stopping frequently to perform varying dances. the excitement and happiness that only occurs when i feel a part of something, connected to someone, in another country. it's the romanticism. it's why i travel. and, as all romantic moments, reality quickly set in.

i stopped at a converted pagoda to have a famous bhaktapurian lassi (amazing yogurt drink that is pretty much like heaven) to find my wallet gonz-o. the shaky hot feeling set in as i emptied out my purse on the table. i bolted out, through the throngs of people, in search of a way back to kathmandu. i thought of the time during college that i panicked when i thought i lost my wallet and cancelled my video update card. this was a bit more pressing than that. now, i think obstacles are experienced for learning purposes, and i thought that as i ran in the afternoon heat. keep cool. as in other crises in traveling, i only made use of emotion to garner understanding or empathy. however, fabulously, i found goodwill everywhere. the people letting me create a credit system at restraunts, the internet cafe. especially the amazing ron humm. things were learned, of course. i intend to be more gracious with people in the future (as the westerners were actually much less kind and helpful than the nepalis. we are suspicious of everything, yes?). i am now experiencing what travel was like before the golden age of plastic. mainly, i have stopped ridiculing people who wear money belts. and... fannypacks.

the rooftop of the world (subtitled: yaks are my new spirit animal)

om mani pame hum ("hail to the jewel in the lotus") is the mantra to avolokiteshvara (chenrezig) the buddha of compassion is the most famous buddhist mantra. it's written on all prayer wheels and prayer flags-- releasing the prayer to the wind as they are spun or moved. old men and women mutter the words as they perform holy koras (the circumnavigation of a holy site). om... is also the national prayer of tibet as the buddha of compassion's reincarnation is the exhiled dalai lama. and what am i getting at? tibet is un-real-ly diffuclt to encapsulate. but in a way, it's the hidden jewel in something that grew out of ugliness (the lotus can grow out of the most polluted of waters). you get my drift so far?
tibet is one of the most incredible places i've ever seen. during my overland drive on the friendship highway, which runs from lhasa to the nepali border, i thought about how i would explain this "rooftop of the world" to people. for anyone unfamiliar, tibet was captured by chinese forces in 1959 and the dalai lama has been living in exile ever since. during the years of the cultural revolution, tibet did not escape mao's wrath and millions of people were killed due to his policies. tibet, once a subsistence economy, was forced to grow crops unfit for the mountainous climate. thousands starved. monks and landlords (the enemies of mao's brand of communism) were submitted to thamzings, "struggle sessions," in which many were tortured and died. others were imprisoned for supporting the dalai lama against the chinese will or for not submitting to chinese power. even today, when i was in lhasa, an ngo worker was "imprisoned" for two weeks for "questioning." the dalai lama's photo is still banned in the country. what was once a small buddhist kingdom under the rule of a now-nobel-peace-prize-winner has become a colony of china. lhasa has become a large chinese city and tibetans are at risk of becoming a minority in their own country. tibetans are probably the most peaceful, beautiful, compassionate people in the world. and looking into the eyes of anyone over the age of 40-or-so is knowing that they've seen things more terrible than anyone should ever witness. they are the gems in the lotus.

frustrating rewarding ugly beautiful compassionate hateful. dream-like hell-like happy sad. a contradiction. it seems like tibet is now a big sea of china and the monasteries and small villages are the only remaining things tibetan. chinese tourist groups are everywhere in a concrete jungle. phallic-like chinese monuments stand in front of the potala and other famous monuments. monasteries have fewer monks and nuns now (since the chinese killed many of them) and are run by the chinese government. the photo of the hands is from ganden, the monastery hit the hardest by the cultural revolution. they are still rebuilding, these hands are for a tantric statue of compassion and truth. but. still. beauty.

and for some reason, the people are still amazing. the jhokang, which is said to be the religious heart of tibet, is surrounded with people prostrating and performing koras. pilgrims welcomed me to walk with them, sometimes embracing my hand. at a nunnery, i had momos and tea with a grandfather and his grandaughter, making paper airplanes and using my lonely planet to communicate in minimal tibetan. a monk led us around ganden monastery and took photos of shrines (that aren't supposed to be photographed by tourists). yak butter lamps burned in monasteries. smiling, warm tibetan women laughed and grasped my hand with love flowing. a nun, tenzing, asked me to sit down next to her during prayers. after i sat, she showed me her mantras then she touched my necklace. we looked and looked at each other's necklaces, touching them lightly. when she deemed me safe, she dug deeply for another. a necklace with the image of the dalai lama. the only picture of the dalai lama i saw during my time in tibet. my eyes welled with tears and i said, "yes! good!" she them made slapping gestures on her cheeks and said, "no, china. bad," and tucked the locket back into her robes, patting it to ensure its safety, and then gesturing, "sshhh."

and more. drinking beer with the driver who led our overland trip and the owner of the guest house. amazing tibetan and chinese food (i've always argued that the only positive thing about colonization in all it's forms is food). an incredible expat community and caramel lattes (!). the tibetan plateau and mt. everest base camp. off-roading and actually using four wheel drive as i bounced around, reminiscent to bumps on valley fair's high roller. the friendship highway, like a ride at epcot center, complete with cliffs and waterfalls.

alright. that's the best i could do. i've run out of steam, which i continue to blame on the kathmandu heat. i would like to upload every picture of mountains, beautiful tibetan women, monasteries, monks and the like. but. what to do. an om for us all. (and, p.s. that last photo is everest).

to tears (subtitled: into thin air and back again)

i started the annapurna circuit trek in besisahar 18 days ago. the trail begins around 1,500 feet and climbs to 17,764 at thorung la, the highest pass in the world. the path crosses four nepali districts and varies geographically from tropical rainforest to alpine mountains. now it seems like a dream.

binod, my nepali guide, and i rode a bus to the trail head. porters hoist chickens onto the roof of the bus. everything that enters the area is carried on the backs of porters. the trail is hot and i have the feeling i am cooking in the heat. a man passes, seated in a chair affixed to a porter's back. the porter wears only cheap, rubber sandals. it's over 90 degrees. maybe 100. the humidity is 110%. each night we sleep at a guesthouse. i'm shocked by the amount of guest houses on the trail. tea breaks, lunch and dinner are no problem. binod eats dal bhat (rice and chickpeas and curry) every noon and night. nothing tastes like orange fanta when it's this hot. corn fields, raging monsoon-full rivers, scores of perfect waterfalls and suspended bridges dot the tropical, hilly landscape. we meet a german couple, felix and nora, and we become a four person trekking team of water filterers and gin rummy players. we climb.

the fields of buckwheat flower pink. children greet us with hands held up in namaste. one night the maoists assemble with flaming logs and carry them through the street, chanting slogans. we find real, deep hunger impelled by true exertion that can only be quenched by dal bhat and a snickers at lunchtime. the divine heat of food. when i am succumbing to a bacterial infection, felix tells me of the tour de france and i somehow latch onto the wonder of the bikers to get me through the day. the weather cools and the buddhist prayer flags and prayer wheels increase as we enter the manang district. women pass, muttering om mani padme hum as they finger their prayer beads. i visit a schoolroom where they are practicing dancing and singing for a festival. the night is cold, the masala tea is hot and the pizza is stupendous. nora, binod and i visit a lama who has lived in a cave for 35 years to receive the blessing to ascend the pass. we begin the ascent to thorung la.

yaks become prevalent. the climb up to 17,000 feet is steep. the weather is cloudy and damp. the supposedly-amazing views are only in our imaginations. we rise at 4 am to begin the ascent to thorung la. the day has the feeling of the olympics, each individual representing a different country's glory. first the frenchman. i win the silver for america. the spanish couple, germans, american crew and a lone russian follow. at the top we dance and sing. we are joyous. now we have entered tibet-like mustang. a colt tails his mother in the beginning of his training to be a grown up horse. we descend 5,000 feet until my knees could pop out of my skin. upon arrival, we find the new buddhist monastery is performing puja. the gigantic drums, horns, bells and mantra chanting accompany the burning of rice, food, clothes and scarecrow-like people to bring the inhabitants of muktinath long lives and good luck. we celebrate the pass ascent with a beer on the porch and listen to tshering, the sherpa guide, tell stories of his two successful everest ascents.

the weather begins to turn sour in the windy valley. a bridge is washed out and we must ford the river. it's an awesome, wet rush. the rain comes and stays for two full days. i couldn't've been more wet. soaked from sweat and rain. i protect my last pair of dry socks like buried treasure. the thick clouds obscure the fact that we are in the deepest valley in the world. rainfalls and rivers have washed away the trail and we add hours and steep ascents and descents in the way of detours. we are disheartened. though i've chosen to hike during monsoon, i still had the expectation of mountains. in tatopani (which means "hot springs") we sit in the natural spring and consider stopping.

we rise. the rain has abated. we continue. we climb almost 5,000 feet in 9 hours of a grueling stairmaster course. i want to die. i cry out of exhaustion. we arrive in gorepani and hope the clouds clear for the famous sunrise at poon hill. as i fall asleep, i look out the window and think i hallucinate the white mountains illuminated by the moon.

the stars are numerous at 4 am and the lodge bustles with energy. i climb to the top of poon hill and, in my excitement, binod cannot catch up. as i come to the top of the hill, dalugiri comes into view and i begin to cry. it's all worth it now. i can't stop taking photos, though pictures can't capture it anyway. it's more than enough.

the rice fields return. the most wonderful green. red dragon flies dart and swoop. an old woman smokes a giant cigarette with her family all around. a small boy walks down the path, craddling a baby goat with the goat mama following.

we reach the road at nayapul and it begins to rain. we cruise with the windows down and nepali music blaring from the speakers. as the women sit by the road, spinning yak wool into yarn, i see the mountains one last time, golden from the sunset, through the thick clouds.