Of Water Shortages, the Bird Flu & Landslides

Just as I was about to lament my lonliness over a solo dinner of thentuk and momos at Dekevas a dozen Bhutanese college students walked in and sat around me. What ensued was a long conversation about Bhutan and its beauty and the fact that most of these boys are actually slackers that couldn't get into the only college available to them in their homeland. Hence, they packed their C average bags and moved to Darjeeling to earn a bachelors at St. Joseph's College. One of them offered to sell me drugs and another one took my email address. Next year is Bhutan's 150 year anniversary and the $200 a day visa price will come down considerably to allow more travellers to participate in the celebrations.

All this commontion around me made the three other westerners at the restaurant eat their dinner quickly and leave...except for one. He scoped out the scene and sat there waiting for the guys to leave. Then he non-challantly walked over and we went for a few drinks at an English style pub that made me remember all the dingy little places I love to drink at in Toronto. I was supposed to meet the dude this morning at 4am for the sunrise over the Himalayas but I didn't quite make it on account of the hotel owner had locked me into the second floor of the hotel for my own protection over night (I'm the only occupant of the floor).

Watching the sunrise with about 200 tourists is quite a different experience. Once the sun started coming up people started pointing at the big red circle and the crowd chatted excitedly. It was quite hilarious. Alas, it was a cloudy day so we didn't see much of the mountain range but about half way through the ever-so-exciting sunrise Everest appeared like a cloud in the sky as the morning fog lifted for a few hours. I took a picture but the black thing on the lens has been replaced by my thumb print (trying to get the black thing off the lens) and consequently mixed with a bit of lint hanging around the glass. Keep this in mind when you are looking at my pictures in future and wondering what the black thing is and why there are fingerprints on the monasteries.

On the way back I stopped at several Tibetan monasteries and even caught a morning prayer in progress. The little monks looked incredibly bored and were passing notes and yawning and playing with little toys hidden in their robes during the chants. The old monks didn't notice a thing and kept drumming and reading their prayer books. Saw the original copy of the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Had lunch with two local teachers that told me the water supply in Darjeeling is trucked in on a weekly basis and people ration their water to last until the next delivery. This explains the lack of running water at the hotel. Also, the fear of bird flu has brought down the price for chicken considerably. Apparently almost no one eats chicken anymore and some vendors have started to give it away for free. In Sikkim, just north of West Bengal, more than two dozen dead hawks were found. It is believed they died of the bird flu after feeding on infected birds. The conversation then turned towards the landslides. The monsoon hits this part of the country in June and July wiping out roads, houses and trees. The poor are the most common casualties of the season. Darjeeling is growing so fast that the local economy can not support its inhabitants. Drug addiction is becoming more common. Pot is grown all over the region but it is the 'brown sugar' addicts inject that is more of a problem.

Then I went and watched a patriotic Bollywood film that featured a 41 year old man playing a 20 year old college student, lots of 'cool' drunk driving scenes and suspiciously clean Delhi streets. The seats at the theatre reclined. I mean really reclined. Properly. A security guard with a baton was posted at the exit and the power went out ten minutes into the film.