Update to Travel to Wild Post 1 (The Nameless Friends)

As I reminisce about my travel today, I can’t help but chuckle at the turn of events. The bus I got on was from Kathmandu to Kakarvitta. The first thing I noticed was the digital clock with “:” blinking to show seconds passing. As the “:” blinked, I could feel the distance between the comfort of my home and myself increasing. I would not say there was no self-doubt in me, but more than the self-doubt, I was drowned in excitement.

As the bus went forward, it felt as if the blinking “:” had gone slower and slower, as if time itself had come to a halt to let me process what I was doing. With a very volatile network to get online and a very awkward personality, I finally gathered enough guts to talk with people around me. Then began the talk of the nameless friends. Four people talked throughout the journey of over 12 hours of topics from work, to socio-culture, to politics, and whatnot. But in the end, we all had to get off to our own ways. Parting away, it dawned on me, that although the talk itself was no less than one between old friends, neither of us got each other’s name, and neither of us got off at the same location, marking the end of the saga of four nameless friends who will never meet again.

I got off at the last station, Kakarvitta (to those who do not know, it’s the east-most border). As I got off, I had very little charge, and no charging cable, stressed about having to charge my phone, I wanted to run off to find an electronic shop. But I got distracted, “Bhai Assam jane ho?”, “Bhai Paisa Satne ho?”, “Bhai khaana khana jane ho?”, were the few sounds which tried to get me away from what needed to be done.

Ignoring them all, showing hand sighs that I didn’t want to be bothered, I roamed about the city to find shops that had what I needed. Eventually, I found that and gave my phone the juice it gravely craved so much.

As soon as that part of what needed to be done was over, a growl came from within me, as if my stomach was complaining of not having had dinner last night. Trying to silence my stomach, I went to whatever thakali I could get to at the time. Even though I had no care for what the place looked like, the one that was closest looked quite fancy.

They turned on the AC even though I was the only one at the restaurant. And believe me, I ate like a Nepali son-in-law for a price of 360. Completing my lunch which compensated for both meals, I left the establishment with only one question in my mind… “How is it that the trash I saw yesterday cost the same as the gem I encountered today?”

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