It was way back in June when I first arrived into Kathmandu, before making my way to Pokhara, which has been the base for my several travels since. Well do I remember in my earliest posts, describing the scene from my balcony at Greenhills, of the fields being plowed ready for the rice sowing.
The monsoon has continued across these intervening months, well into October in fact, with just occasional respites of sunshine, when you can see the mountains. The recent heavy rains have badly disrupted the rice harvest too.
Just yesterday I heard the sounds of loud shouting outside, and going onto my balcony to investigate, saw that the oxen teams had been brought in to plough the neighbours’ fields. Although we are in the centre of the Lakeside district of Pokhara, which is technically a city, it’s part of the custom for people to have small fields alongside their homes where they can grow crops sufficient for family consumption. With the recent harvesting of the maize, the land had been cleared and was now being plowed for the sowing of new crops. It seemed strange indeed to see this most medieval of agricultural technology in the heart of an otherwise modern urban district.
It felt in some ways like a sign, too, that this time in Nepal is coming to an end. I have been to Muktinath and returned, and my website is almost finished too, so both my goals have been achieved. So where now then? India (again) seems the obvious choice as it is so close geographically, but of course the pandemic continues to affect travel and India are only going to be opening their borders for independent foreign travellers like myself in the middle of November and with limitations on length of stay. To complicate things further, Britain has now been removed from the list of countries whose citizens are eligible to apply for (the easier) e-visa, putting us into the same illustrious category as China, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and (for some reason) Canada. I gather that the UK’s treatment of Indian nationals at our borders has prompted retaliatory action on the part of the government of India. So I am having to return to Kathmandu and make the application in person.
I will await the outcome of the visa application before making any further plans, but have tentatively decided that a return visit to Rishikesh, where I spent so many months last year, would, in its own way, be like completing another circle. And beyond that? An open question!
