After breakfast – a thoroughly splendid meal – we hired bicycles to ride down to Immigration. One pays for a month’s visa on entering the country, but is given only a week. In order to claim the other 3 weeks, one has to go down to Immigration. A bit of a silly + inefficient system, I’d say, but it’s not my country. It also gave me an excuse to take the bikes out, which is an amazing experience. All the streets are used by all traffic, so cars, motorbikes, rickshaws, bicycles, trolley-pushers, + pedestrians compete for space, jostle for position. One signs on as part of the throng simply by going out for a walk, but by travelling by bike one is an even more vital component, + the extra speed it gives means you have to be that much more alert – a parallel would be cycling along the pavement of London’s Oxford St. A bike also provides all the speed you can use – thro’ town, only a motorbike is quicker. Another advantage is that a bike cuts down the number of approaches by touts. There is a thriving black market in Nepal, + the touts are the most obvious manifestation of it – along the busy routes, one can be approached every couple of yards, with offers of souvenirs, money-changing, or drugs… or, more usually, all 3. Even when moving at quite a speed this morning on my bike, one guy was quick enough to try “Change money?” to my face, + then a bellowed “Good drugs!” at my departing back.
We got lost on the way to Immigration, road-works upsetting our carefully memorised directions. And when we got there, the place was chaotic – there was just far too heavy a crowd for them to cope with, even tho’, in their own, stiltedly bureaucratic way, they were reasonably efficient. They just weren’t equipped to cope with problems. Fortunately, we had none – it was simply a matter of filling in a form, waiting in line to hand it in, + then being told to return this afternoon for our stamped passports.
We spent the intervening time wandering around the city armed with a camera. Both the city + the people are wonderfully photogenic, + we found the zoom lens a real boon. There were too many pictures to take actually – the only real problem was finding a vantage point from which one could take photos without feeling awkward or embarrassed. Can anybody wield a huge camera in such circumstances without experiencing such things? Americans + Australians perhaps. We found the best thing to do was sit down quietly + wait. A sidewalk café would have been perfect, but unfortunately Kathmandu doesn’t have any, so we made do with a low wall.
After a while I left Val to it, + set off to collect our passports. It quickly became an exasperating errand however. We had wandered into an unfamiliar part of town, + first of all I got lost trying to find my way back to the hotel to collect a bike. Next I had to climb all 12 flights up to our room to pick up the receipt, + that was a mammoth task in itself. Next I had to find Val’s money-belt – it was concealed somewhere in the room. Only too well concealed, for it took me 15 mins of diligent but exasperated searching before I was able to turn it up. By this time, I was running out of time – the immigration office shut at 4, so it meant some furious pedalling + clanging on the bell. Kathmandu is great for riding a bike around, but not the sort of place one wants to try to get to in a hurry. However, I made it, + picked up the passports with no problem, but climbing on my bike again to come home, I had the same feeling of weary dread that I used to have before climbing into the car after teaching in London, + driving home thro’ the rush-hour traffic. The journey back seemed correspondingly longer.
Val gave me a haircut when I returned – she made a good job of it too – + then we went out. We spent a little while looking at the hand-knitted jumpers they have here, + Val wants to buy one, but we didn’t find one she was keen on, so we postponed that particular task, + went down to Freak St to eat. We called in first on R + A – they took quite a long time to open the door, + from other signs too we suspected they had been having a row. I can’t say I was surprised – if we were living in a hole like they were, we’d be fighting all the time. But all credit to them, they were able to keep their fighting private, + stopped when we arrived – I can’t abide people who row in public. We had a small bong, just enough to provoke an appetite, + then went out to eat. They chose the place, an unpretentious little place called The Lunch Box, + a wonderful choice it was too – we had a magnificent meal, topped off with a wonderful apple crumble + custard. Beautiful.
We left them at around 8, + caught the bus out to the casino. The casino has a special deal for incoming air passengers, giving them $5 worth of chips free – not to be sneezed at. The problem was, as we discovered when we got out there, the tokens were for one free turn on each of 5 different games – roulette, spin the wheel, blackjack, pontoon, + Beat the Dealer – a dice game. However, we were obliged to play upstairs, as we were Europeans, where the play was for dollar stakes, + we were the only ones in the place, rather than downstairs, where the play in some games was in single Indian rupees – 10 to 1 exchange rate – + the place was really humming. So we quickly played our 10 free games, achieving an entirely respectable conversion rate, + getting back 5 dollar chips. These we cashed in immediately, + we took our winnings downstairs to play roulette. I lost most of my chips very quickly, but Val did pretty well, + even tho’ we also had a quick fling at blackjack once or twice, we came away at 11 o’clock (the first free bus back to town) with a small profit. I’d looked forward to the evening, but didn’t, in fact, enjoy it very much, partly because, I suppose, I was playing with such small stakes, + it wasn’t really my money anyway. Which is but further proof that, with gambling, the money involved has to matter or there’s no excitement.
Definitely a place to take pictures, as the scenes on the street are al wonderfully photogenic. But careering through the streets of Kathmandu had its attractions too, even when I suddenly fojnd myself (and not for the first time!) in a desperate rush. But we are certainly enjoyiong the culinary delights of the place – all deliciious, with a wonderful array of choice, and, best of all, easily affordable, even on our budget.
The photo I have chosen is actually one of our favourites from the whole trip.
