Into the hills

Okay, so I've managed to steer myself away from the varied delights of the Lakeside restaurants in Pokhara and struck out into the wilderness. Well the surrounding coutryside at least. After spending all my Nepalese waking hours in a city shrouded in motorbikes and a town shrouded in pashmina shops I took decisive action. Which as any of you who know me at all will realise is big news under any circumstances. I booked myself onto a mini "cultural" trek of three daysrucksack and set off with my guide Dil who also helps out at my guesthouse. We trundled over the Seti (White) River and the water really is white. Or maybe sort of like the bath once you let it drain, but anyway...across some vegetable growing fields and then began climbing into the sort-of mountains. As a girl from the Mendip area these are mountains, to the locals they are mole hills. However the views are substantial and the green terraces started dropping away to the Tibetan refugee settlements in the valley below with some conviction. I breathe in. Finally. I've escaped.
Our first stop was with Ram's family (Dil's uncle who manages the guesthouse). We wound our way thorugh a bewildering pathway between the ox sheds, chicken runs, millet drying, haystacks and rice paddies which I later realised I was paying no attention to as I tried to take a short stroll and couldn't get more than 50 metres from my lodgings without ending up in a neighbour's goat shed. On arrival Dil set to work on a lunchtime dhal bhat in an oven on the floor fed with firewood and I smiled and facially gestured to grandma who didn't speak a word of English. Ram wasn't there till the evening and Ram's wife spoke no English either. The daughters spoke a little but generally the conversation was limited to smiles and they got on with the day-to-day around me. (Where are those "moments" bonding over a game of volleyball, laughing at eachother's hair styles or helping with some household chores that you see when celebs visit a developing nation?! Faked the lot of it!) Due to being the honoured, naturally, paying guest I cannot help with anything. It is also customary for Le Guest to eat first and alone. How embarassing. Then the family eat. So if the kids are hungry you are acutely aware that they have to wait with their eyes following you from behind the kitchen wall ("Hurry up English girl!") until you're done. But this is Nepalese hospitality and no arguing so I chow down and even take seconds, what the hell, I"m hungry and they are throwing extra food at me. All those famished days on boiled vegetables are catching up with me.
The view is spectacular and I spend alot of time on the porch drinking tea, exchanging the odd comment with grandmama about the dog or applauding her as she successfully swats a fly with her swisher. Occasionally she gets up to adjust or move something on the terrace then creakily lowers to her floor mat or lies to sleep on the rammed earth floor. A little different to the luxuries of home. My berth for the night is to be a loft above the animals where the two daughters Borsa (14) and Mala (13) normally sleep. I climb a corner ladder wedged right infront of the ox's head. I decide its best to greet him each time I pass like I'm welcoming a visiting dignitary. He's quite big and the room for manoeuvering past him up the ladder is quite small. I wallow through the hay and narrowly miss the chicken shit as I swing my gear into the loft. I have a tiny wooden balcony. And the Himalayas loom outside.
After a peaceful day and more dahl bhat Ram, my guesthouse owner and man of the house, escorts me up to my loft. "Bed is comfy here, Borsa sleep here...." He demonstrates with enthusiasm. (Borsa has helped with household chores, cooking, bufflao meat chopping and drying and is now attempting to finish her homework at gone 9.30pm by lamplight). "And Mel, if you need to go in the night.....You must go Borsa! Toilet!" (He demonstrates me shaking her shoulders vigourously). "No Ram I've lived with an outside bathroom, I'll be fine, " I try to reassure him. "NO MEL!" says Ram, his eyes wide and face very serious. "Leopard!!" From his position at the top of the loft ladder he stares at me intently. Tipping my chin and rolling my eyes slightly into my eyebrows I look into his eyes. "Raaaaaaam! You are joking with me," I laugh. "No Mel! Ate my neighbour's goats. Dangerous. Not outside on your own at night!" The idea of a grown woman of 34 waking a girl of 14 who's gone to school all day and worked all evening to provide an escort to the facilities is more than faintly ridiculous. I narrow my eyes and study his face. Ram is not prone to lies and from what I have experienced so far I don't think sarcasm or practical jokes feature high on the Nepalese radar. I think he's serious. "Okay Ram. No going outside alone", I concede. Clearly tonight I will not drink water, this girl has done enough without me Borsa-ing! her at 3 in the morning. Ram closes the loft hatch (I had wondered what the point of it was) and retreats. The chickens are put in their cages and the small goat herd of seven is herded up and locked in to a shed beneath our beds. One layer of floorboards separates us from the assortment of beasts. I tuck up feeling a bit guilty as Borsa works on. Throughout the night I hear the ox chomping rhythmically on his hay stack which is strangely comforting. (Insomniacs take note - installation of one calm ox below your bed could help you get up to seven hours extra sleep a night). I count myself lucky as apparently on the down side he's known to be a snorer of epic proportions. But not tonight. Periodically I hear the goat herd tottering and skittering in an unsettled way aound their wooden locked shed. I wonder if the leopard is specking out the rich tasty pickings below. As it would lay heavy on Rams' conscience not to mention being an insult to his skills as a host to find a mauled English woman lying on the front steps in the morning I stay where I am.