Voyage to Nepal

The trip to Nepal is a bit of a long haul…to say the least. For me it started at about noon on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. That’s when I loaded my suitcases into the back of my mom’s Toyota Matrix and commenced the two and a half hour drive from Huntsville, Ontario to the Toronto airport, arriving right on time to get checked in and meet my Aunt Janet for a cold beer and a snack before crossing the ominous threshold of AIRPORT SECURITY. About an hour before the 6:20pm take-off I ended up at the gate and met fellow JPC (one of the total six of us JPCs starting at UNDP Nepal this month), Taryn Russell there. The last name is just one of the many things we share in common, including a Welsh first name, an April birthday and vegetarianism – but I’m sure there will be much more on Team Russel(l) later.

Our Jet Airways flight took off right on time, and landed in Brussels ahead of schedule at just after 7:00am Belgian time. It was somewhere around 1:00am by our time, so we deemed it appropriate to spend our 2.5 hour stopover running to the nearest pub and filling ourselves with a little Belgian beer (all the better to help us sleep on the next leg, of course). And sleep we did, almost the entire way from Brussels to Delhi. I woke up six hours into the eight hour flight, just in time to see Afghanistan and Pakistan as we flew over them, which I’m glad I didn't miss. All in all: everything went smoothly…until we got to Delhi.

The last leg of our voyage – the 1.5 hour flight to Kathmandu – would have to wait the next 8.5 hours to begin. So that was a bit of a bummer, but we were prepared for it. What we were not prepared for was to be pointed in the wrong direction by nearly every single (very unfriendly) person who worked in the Delhi airport. We were told to leave the area we clearly had to go through (international connections) at least three times, sent on a wild goose chase, denied access when we finally came back to the right area because we used the wrong lift, then sent back when the “right lift” wouldn’t work, only to be turned away again. When we finally got through security we arrived in what I can only describe as an airport mega mall that was duty free and numerous other designer and name brand shops. At this point we had been travelling for approximately 24 hours and made the quick calculation that spending the cash on lounge passes was a worthy investment.

Unlimited food, drink, internet access, comfortable chairs and an air conditioned napping room (in the city that was 36 degree when we landed in the middle of the night) soon proved us right. Although the charge for the lounge use was $25 US for two hours, the manager offered it to us for 8 for only $5 more…as long as we paid in cash…and I’m sure the company saw every penny of that….mmhhmmm. We were very comfortable and treated extremely well in the lounge. In fact, perhaps it was a little too well. We were checked in on by the lounge manager every 30 minutes, and the conversations usually went something like this:

Him – Oh you are having a drink, very good. You have everything you need? You are enjoying?

Me – Yes, thank you. Everything is great.

Him – You should have, I think, just a small glass of vodka, with some ice, a little bit of orange juice. You will be very relax!

Now, I’m not usually one to turn down vodka, but it was all just a bit much.

Me- Oh no, that’s okay. Thank you.

Him – Okay? Yes. I make for you!

Me – No, no! No thank you. No vodka for me.

I don’t know if it was just us, but we found the level of service to be…perhaps slightly too intense for our tastes. The icing on the cake was when I peered into the napping room, to see if there was room for me to have a quick sleep. My buddy the lounge manager came up behind me and wanted to open the doors to show me inside. I tried to explain that I only wanted to check if there was room.
         “Yes yes, there is. You should go. You should get rest.” I decided he was likely right, so I went back to our seats and told Taryn I was going to try to take a quick nap. Upon entering the room I found two of the four couches already occupied by sleepy travelers, but grabbed a nice looking spot near the back of the room with a couple of pillows and shut my eyes. I drifted in and out of sleep for a while, and was aware of the two others leaving at some point, presumably to catch their planes. The next time my eyes drifted open I was startled into full consciousness at the sight of a figure bending over me.

         “Oh hello! It is you. I was not sure it was you I did not see you out there anymore.” One guess who that was. Who else did he think it would be? More importantly: why does it matter? “Yes yes, you sleep now. You know you should just have a small glass of vodka with a little ice. It would make you very relax. You sleep.” At this he mimes passing out, which at that time instantly became the last thing I wanted to do.

         “No no, it’s okay. I’m okay.”

         “Okay. I go make for you?”

         “NO. No vodka! Thank you.”

         “Okay,” he nods his head. Then turns his attention to the next thing he can do to serve me. “Here, you see you just cover like this,” he starts grabbing pillows from the surrounding couches and covering me with them. “Then you be very warm and very relax.”

You know what doesn't make me “very relax”? A man I don’t know trying to tuck me in with pillows in a dark room and get me drunk on vodka. After that, it’s safe to say that I was wide awake until we boarded our final flight to Kathmandu.