FLIGHT TO POKHARA - OUR NEPAL JOURNEY

 We came down to the Hyatt Regency foyer with our suitcases and there we found a new travel person from our travels waiting for us , he was fairly bristling in anger , actually we were only 2 minutes late and we didn’t understand why he was so angry and upset

He told us that we had missed our 9.20 am flight to Pokhara as we were late, we were puzzled as we didn’t have an Itinerary with us, were clueless about the flight timings and had been instructed to be ready by 8.30 am last day which we did

We were told that a Whatsapp message was sent to my hubby’s phone to be ready by 7.30 am which he had not seen and there was no follow up phone call made by them

By then I was literally biting my finger nails which were vehemently protesting that they had enough of my biting and may not be able to grow back again, both my husband and I controlled our anger with great effort as having come so far from home we wanted to go ahead with our tour and not have an argument and ugly scenes there and spoil our holiday mood

My hubby promptly rang up our Indian tour operator and appraised her of the situation, she spoke to the tour organizer and assured us that there was some mis-communication on their part and that a flight would be arranged to Pokhara shortly

Finally after waiting for an hour which I spent happily doing window shopping at the shops in the foyer we were told that re booking of the tickets was done for the 10.30 am flight and we moved to the waiting car, I bid a soulful goodbye to the hotel assuring it that I would come back to sample all it had to offer for its customers, alas! foolish me, I didn’t know what was in store for us in future 

We were left at the airport with strict instructions to watch out for the flight announcements, maybe our travel person thought we both had senile degeneration of our brains! He rushed off probably in search of some more innocent and unwary tourists 

As the flight was not announced  yet , I sat observing the people around us, there was a board advertising the early morning chartered flights, we hadn’t booked it because of time constraint , these flights pick up the flyers early in the morning and fly quite close to the Himalayas for nearly an hour ,only hitch is that the skies have to be clear and air free of turbulence

In almost all airports in Nepal we could see young travelers even as young as 6 or 7 year old children carrying heavy hiking kits , most of them were from U.S, U.K, Russia and Ukraine too and were there in Nepal for a week or two to do trekking. I got them talking ,they said they were enjoying the country they had no problem with the food except for its spiciness and Nepal had KFC which offers the fast food they are used to ,one of them said they had problem with the toilets as some commodes in Nepal were still of Indian type 

I enquired if they had visited India which is indeed a beautiful country, the immediate doubt they raised was whether we had mountains like in Nepal, I said yes of course we had many, that too in the eastern part of the country .

My husband who usually silently follows my conversations with other travelers when we travel abroad remarked to me in a wry tone that the central government would give definitely give me an award if it recognizes my efforts in advertising the tourism and beauty of our country 

For me Nepal was almost like any other state in India, almost everyone was talking fluently in Hindi, women were either wearing shalwar or saris, the younger ones were wearing jeans and T shirts , some men wore Gho and Kira the traditional dress of the people of Bhutan. 

Though the dresses are a part of their cultural identity, the law mandates government officials to wear them. Gho is a knee-length cloth tied at the waist with a cloth belt known as the Kera.

I know a famous Medical Educationist Dr Shital Bhandary working in Patan Academy of Health Sciences in Nepal who had come as guest faculty for our State Conference in Medical Education Technology ,he used to wear cute little handmade Dhaka topis , these are so called because previously raw material for the caps came from Dhaka capital of Bangladesh and became famous during the rule of King Mahendra. 

The ‘topis’ are of great significance in Nepal and we saw almost all men wearing the caps. The topi is compulsorily worn in rituals, weddings, funerals, etc. 

Daura Suruwal( Shalwar) is the national dress of Nepal and has religious significance. It was introduced by Prime Minister of Nepal of the 19th Century Jang Bahadur Rana. It is also worn vastly by men of Sikkim and Darjeeling. Daura refers to the upper shirt or Kurta and Suruwal are the trouser worn.

It also consists of a closed neck which is symbolic of the snake over Lord Shiva’s neck. This is mostly worn by the Brahmins due to its religious significance.

Dhoti is worn on a regular basis by men residing in the more humid parts of Nepal as a substitute for trousers. Lungis are similar to dhotis worn but with the purpose of comfort wear. The ends of the lungi are sewn together and they are worn by men as a long sort of skirt with one end open. 

Gunyou Cholo is the female equivalent dressing of the Daura Suruwal. It is used to mark the specific age of a girl (7 to 8 years) and entry into womanhood, it consists of a cholo (blouse) and a skirt 

I saw many Nepali women wearing sindoor, married women start wearing it from their marriage when it is applied by their husbands, the tika I observed everyone wearing mainly in religious places with a liberal dash of sandal wood powder and kumkum applied along with rice grains, the size of the Tika was huge in some maybe depending on level of their devotion 

The previous evening we had tried Dal Bhat national food of Nepal, it is rice, dal and a curry with pickle, except for the milder taste it was almost like our dal rice

I also observed lot of momo stalls in Nepal ,we eat momos not only in the North eastern states of India but also in Hyderabad , momos have rice paper wrapping with stuffing of leafy vegetables or minced chicken and is considered healthy food as it is steamed

Newari khaja , Sel Roti is a thinner version of the doughnuts and is mostly prepared in festivals

 Gundruk is a popular dish in Nepal made from the fermentation of green leafy vegetables like mustard leaves, cauliflower, and radish leaves, 

Gundruk ko achaar which again was like our own desi achar , Yomari is a dessert prepared from rice dough stuffed with coconut paste, we call it kobbari louzu a favourite sweet in South India, Maasko Bara also called bada are light and spongy rice flour pancakes which we call vada in India

Gud Pak again a sweet was very much like our Mysore Pak and our teenager’s favourite dish the chat is known as Chatpate a spicy snack of Nepalis

Chataamari is Nepal’s Pizza made of a thick batter of rice flour and decorated with vegetables and meatballs, giving it an exotic look, Panipuri is known as Phuchka and eaten by many as a snack 

Soon it was time to board the Yeti airlines flight to Pokhara, as we had checked in our luggage we had only hand luggage to carry

As it always happens when we have the front seats, the back door of the flight opened so we had to go all the way across the plane to reach our seats

Though the flight was quite small it was bigger than the flights we would be taking to Jomsom and back 

As the time was only 25 minutes for the 200 km distance, we were given some toffees and water bottles, within no time we were flying and we could see Kathmandu city disappearing from our sight and hills appeared all around us  tipped with snow ,we landed safely and came out of the Pokhara International airport ,eager to see what awaited us in Pokhara