(Leah and I recently returned from a three week trip to India and Nepal. This is the 14th of about 16 daily posts I will do, sharing photos and journal notes I made as we traveled.)
Kathmandu, Nepal
July 18, 2014
Leah and I traveled to Nepal in 2007, and it turned out to be a trip loaded with many "firsts."
--It was our first trip overseas.
--The trek we did to Kala Patar near the Mt. Everest Base Camp was the first time I'd experienced any problems with altitude sickness, even though I'd climbed most of the highest peaks in the Cascades, including eight times to the summit of Mt. Rainier.
--It was the first time Leah was no-contest stronger on a mountain trip than I was (the altitude sickness reduced me to a whimpering wreck.)
--That trip was the first time I met Tibetan refugees, or visited a Buddhist monastery.
Today our Nepali host (he was our guide in 2007) took Leah and me on a walking tour of the neighborhood where he lives in Kathmandu. The tour included the traditional, circular kora walk around Boudanath Stupa, a sacred site which, on our trip here seven years ago, was my first encounter with Tibetan Buddhism...but it sparked something that is a huge part of who I am today.
As we joined the pilgrims making the clockwise circle around the stupa seven years ago, I was very much a tourist.
Today I felt right at home.
