Nepal

I just got back from Nepal, where I was visiting my sister, Elizabeth. She's been working as a volunteer (doing social work) in a Nepali village since November. And I got to go meet her people and travel around the country a little bit. We spent a lot of time on buses, traveling from town to town, visiting folks or executing various adventures. These rides were long and hot and curvy and crowded, but completely perfect at the same time. For a reduced rate, the bus driver will let you ride on top of the bus on the luggage rack. This can be pretty exciting, especially when the bus passes through towns and you have to duck to avoid powerlines, or when fifteen farm workers (with tools) help prove that just as many folks can ride on top of a bus as inside.

One day we visited the supposed birthplace of the Buddha. Said a little prayer at the stone on which the Buddha fell when his mother gave birth to him standing up. Of course, the baby Buddha made an imprint on the stone, which is how it can be identified as the proper one. Anyway, temple after temple have been built around this spot for 2500 years or so. A place that has been considered holy for some time now. It's hard to tell how much human will actually imprints on a place...maybe quite a bit, especially over time...and how much expecting to feel something strong and special can really produce anticipated (or not) results.

Thinking a lot about economics. After being in one of the poorest countries in the world, the way I view the ebb and flood of capital in the US is changing. What do we label as crisis? And what would a real crisis actually look like? Also, having less money doesn't necessarily mean having less happiness or having less life. Of course everyone knows this intellectually...but losing money (especially lots of money) still constitutes a crisis from a particular point of view. But if the only things we could ever hope for were enough food to survive and other people to share our life with, then the only crises would be starvation or solitude. I haven't quite figured out what I want to say about this...

Meeting Nepali people and going to their homes and not being able to speak to them really, but feeling welcome and smiling a lot...these were some of the most amazing times for me...drank a lot of sweet milky tea and thought a lot about how interesting it is that people like me can up and travel to the other side of the planet and sit with people who have never left their village and seem really curious 1) how and why i came to be there, and 2) why on earth i wouldn't want to make arrangements to stay there permanently.