After Colorado, I decided to look into earthbag home workshops. Eventually, I decided on a program in Takure, Nepal called Conscious Impact. For the past 2 months I have been preparing for my trip. I arrived in Kathmandu last week. 

My trip began in Houston. I was fortunate to be able to get hosted and hangout with a long time friend, Oliver. It was good to catch up! While in Houston, I visited the Rothko chapel, a chapel dedicated to peace amongst all people and religious traditions. It’s a silent space with a skylight in an octagonal building. There are black murals on every wall of the large room. In my experience, there is a sense of peace that starts to open up and percolate through the brain when meditating in these kinds of spaces. It is as though the pineal gland grows up and out like a tree. Before I left Houston, I had amazing GF pancakes at Snooze.

I can’t figure out exactly how long my 2 flights were, but they began at 5pm on a Wednesday and I arrived in Kathmandu at 2am on Friday. It was probably the longest flight I’ve ever taken.

At the taxi stand, after landing, a fellow traveler, Jack, overheard my destination and asked to split the ride. Jack is a young guy from DC who works for Amazon and was taking a 2 week holiday to trek the Annapurna circuit. When we arrived at the hostel, we were greeted by a sleepy doorman who checked us off a list and gave us a double room, telling us to pay later. The Nepali vibe is quite relaxed.

I spent 2 days in Kathmandu. It was fun to revisit this place. Thamel, the touristic downtown area, offers lots to do.

While looking at a Hindu site, I was approached by a man, La Lama, who chatted me up and told me he was a cultural tour guide. He offered to take me to a stupa down the road. He introduced me to different store owners and encouraged me to buy products. I wasn’t interested in accumulating stuff, but I was happy to discuss the rich symbolism in the tanka paintings with him and the shop owners. After looking around the stupa and the shops, he offered to take me to more places, but I declined. I offered him a tip but he refused. He said he wanted more money than I was offering. I didn’t feel like that was justified as most of our interaction was going into shops and asking me questions. He tried a variety of tactics to try to cajole the money out of me. I held my ground and rebutted his arguments on premises of ethics and sale effectiveness. In the end he left angrily.

It’s important to hold your ground and stay cordial.

The rest of the time in Kathmandu was relatively pleasant. I had some nice Thai food; not in any rush to try the local spicy cuisine. There was a sense of familiarity being in culture that encompassed Tibetan Buddhism.