It has been almost a week since I last posted anything in this blog.
No doubt it has been a busy and productive week, full of new experiences.
Last week, right after arriving back from Pokhara I started planning my next trip. My goal was to join Mrs. Pratima Sharma at the Jhuwani Library, where she was providing a 5 day long training in leadership and strategic planning to the members of the Library Management Committee.
Jhuwani library is located close to the entrance to the Chitwan National Park (previously named Royal Chitwan National Park), one of the main tourist attractions in Nepal. The park was created in 1973 to preserve the ecosystem and to protect several species from extinction, among them the one horned Indian rhino, elephants, royal Bengal tiger and gangetic dolphins. Chitwan was added to the Unesco World Heritage list in 1984
Due to the challenges of transportation in Nepal, I had to wait until Saturday when I could obtain a ticket in the daily tourist bus that goes from Kathmandu to Sauraha, the main gateway to Chitwan National Park. This tourist bus is the best, more comfortable and safer land transportation option from KTM to Chitwan.
The bus scheduled departure time was 7 am on Saturday and the departure location, was not a bus station but one of the centrally located streets in KTM. At first I was worried that it would be difficult to find the bus, considering that there was not a gate, spot or any other precise indication of where to catch the bus... what a western mindset!!
When I got to the specified block on Kanti Path ( the name of the street) I found a line of buses and before I decided to ask, someone came to me asked where I was going (they could easily see that I was a tourist trying to get somewhere...:-) ) and gave me very good directions to where I could find my bus. This is what is interesting about Nepal, at first things look chaotic and unorganized to our western eyes until you find out that they only have a different way to organize things and that, in the end, everything works very well they way they do it.
The bus departed on time and thankfully it wasn't full. By my side, sat an American from Seattle that has just come back from a 14 day long trekking in the Annapurna range. He would soon be going to China and Thailand. He was really nice and we had a good time exchanging our experiences in Nepal. He gave me the contact information of the company that organized his trekking trip and it might be a good information in case I decide to try a fun expedition before I go back to US...
It was good to have someone to talk to and kill some time. The 169 Km( 104.8 miles) from KTM to Sauraha takes 5 hours!!! Even though the roads, Prithvi Hwy until Mungling and then Mahendra Hwy, are two of the main roads in Nepal, they are narrow, winding and in a really bad shape... It is a miracle that there are not more accidents...
As usual the scenery is unbelievably beautiful!! As the road leaves the Kathmandu Valley it abruptly goes down the Mahabharath Mountain Range and follows the valley of the Seti River. Pretty, pretty, pretty!
There was one stop at 9am for breakfast, during that time I got into a conversation with a very nice Nepalese young man that was also on the bus going to Sauraha. He asked me where I was going, when I told him that was going to visit the Jhuwani Community Library he became all excited and told me that he was a member of the library! He told me how much the library has been helpful in his studies and exam preparations and how much he enjoyed visiting it.
I couldn't be happier, it made me feel very proud to be working for an organization that elicit this kind of reaction in people!
What an auspicious start for my journey!!!
No doubt it has been a busy and productive week, full of new experiences.
Last week, right after arriving back from Pokhara I started planning my next trip. My goal was to join Mrs. Pratima Sharma at the Jhuwani Library, where she was providing a 5 day long training in leadership and strategic planning to the members of the Library Management Committee.
Jhuwani library is located close to the entrance to the Chitwan National Park (previously named Royal Chitwan National Park), one of the main tourist attractions in Nepal. The park was created in 1973 to preserve the ecosystem and to protect several species from extinction, among them the one horned Indian rhino, elephants, royal Bengal tiger and gangetic dolphins. Chitwan was added to the Unesco World Heritage list in 1984
Due to the challenges of transportation in Nepal, I had to wait until Saturday when I could obtain a ticket in the daily tourist bus that goes from Kathmandu to Sauraha, the main gateway to Chitwan National Park. This tourist bus is the best, more comfortable and safer land transportation option from KTM to Chitwan.
The bus scheduled departure time was 7 am on Saturday and the departure location, was not a bus station but one of the centrally located streets in KTM. At first I was worried that it would be difficult to find the bus, considering that there was not a gate, spot or any other precise indication of where to catch the bus... what a western mindset!!
When I got to the specified block on Kanti Path ( the name of the street) I found a line of buses and before I decided to ask, someone came to me asked where I was going (they could easily see that I was a tourist trying to get somewhere...:-) ) and gave me very good directions to where I could find my bus. This is what is interesting about Nepal, at first things look chaotic and unorganized to our western eyes until you find out that they only have a different way to organize things and that, in the end, everything works very well they way they do it.
The bus departed on time and thankfully it wasn't full. By my side, sat an American from Seattle that has just come back from a 14 day long trekking in the Annapurna range. He would soon be going to China and Thailand. He was really nice and we had a good time exchanging our experiences in Nepal. He gave me the contact information of the company that organized his trekking trip and it might be a good information in case I decide to try a fun expedition before I go back to US...It was good to have someone to talk to and kill some time. The 169 Km( 104.8 miles) from KTM to Sauraha takes 5 hours!!! Even though the roads, Prithvi Hwy until Mungling and then Mahendra Hwy, are two of the main roads in Nepal, they are narrow, winding and in a really bad shape... It is a miracle that there are not more accidents...
As usual the scenery is unbelievably beautiful!! As the road leaves the Kathmandu Valley it abruptly goes down the Mahabharath Mountain Range and follows the valley of the Seti River. Pretty, pretty, pretty!
There was one stop at 9am for breakfast, during that time I got into a conversation with a very nice Nepalese young man that was also on the bus going to Sauraha. He asked me where I was going, when I told him that was going to visit the Jhuwani Community Library he became all excited and told me that he was a member of the library! He told me how much the library has been helpful in his studies and exam preparations and how much he enjoyed visiting it.
I couldn't be happier, it made me feel very proud to be working for an organization that elicit this kind of reaction in people!What an auspicious start for my journey!!!
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