Pokhara to Kathmandu
03/22/10
“Are you a safe driver?” I asked the driver, examining his eyes. “Yes,” he nodded, then closed his eyes, giving me the same glowing smile a five-year-old gives when asked if he’s Superman. “We have precious cargo, you understand?” I asked, pointing at Boxie-boo. He looked confused, as if I had just told him I was pregnant with dinosaurs and she was the father. I asked Phil, the owner of Phil’s Guesthouse who recommended the driver, to relay my statement and remind him to be careful. This message in a bottle was lost at sea, later discovered by pirates who used it to make rum, then got drunk and sank to Davie Jones Locker. I realized this within minutes of watching our driver’s hands grip the wheel, turning him completely, and utterly, insane.
In his mind, I imagined, the driver was running from a war zone while being chased by a helicopter firing bazookas. The result: He broke late in mid-corners, the tires squealing and near locking up, sliding Boxie-boo and I together in the backseat, smashing my face into the window. He could have been a rally driver on time trials, bouncing the car over potholes, turning his suspension into mush. The taxi swayed like a boat white water rafting, knocking my head into the ceiling, causing my stomach to be pinched by the seatbelt.
“Please slow down,” I said, the first time politely.
His shifting was about as smooth as a Prairie Fire - a tequila shot topped with tobasco sauce - is on the stomach. My breakfast from Be Happy Restaurant was unhappy. The eggs had hatched in my stomach and the baby chicks were flapping their wings, flying through my bowels. I even thought I heard them chirping, until I realized it was actually the sound of us bottoming out so badly the tires were squeaking high-pitched against the car, while the metal frame scraped across the pavement.
Passing a sluggish truck, he turned us directly into oncoming traffic ever-so-slowly, before jerking back into our lane right before a head-on collision. In this moment, I knew, without a doubt that one day this driver would die behind the wheel. I did not care whether I offended him or not. I did not want to be there when it happened. I began taking backseat driver to the next level out of fear for our lives. This driving tactic continued – from speeding recklessly, to going slowly in the wrong lane, even through blind corners.
Each time I told him to slow down, it lasted five minutes tops. It was the first time in my life I was motion sick in a car without a hangover. I was going to puke and told Liam, who asked Mr. Madman to pull over. On the side of the highway, I swallowed my nausea medicine, then waited for Nepal to stop spinning around me. I was so stiff and tight from fear, I could almost hear my butthole tightening. Standing still on the side of the road, I felt the strain of my entire body, which was easy to do, since my brain and I were no longer on speaking terms. I had told myself that hiring a driver would be safer than taking public transit and not too expensive. I walked aimlessly on the side of the road, venting to Liam who tried to calm me down.
At this point, we had a solid four hours left to go before making it to Kathmandu.
“I’m gonna kill him,” I told Liam. “I am going to rip him out of the car and drive it myself. He has near sent us off the cliff a dozen times and almost caused at least five head-on collisions.”
Back on the road, our driver had calmed down for at least a few minutes. I thought he had finally come to his senses, until I realized he was not even paying attention to the road. Mr. Madman was busy searching his glove box and other holder areas, before he began throwing his cassette tapes out the window while trying to dial a number on his cellphone. Meanwhile – while skidding us into corners and constantly bottoming out, cutting off cars and coming within inches off the cliff edge – he showed us one of his favourite things to do on a long drive. He ironically liked to point at road-side wrecks, from rolled trucks, fire-burnt taxis to de-capitated buses, as if to say we should be careful. I hoped he wasn’t foreshadowing.
Take a hint you moron, I thought.
As we skidded on a late pass, cutting off a massive truck to avoid another head-on collision, while we bottomed out hard, my head slammed into the window and then the ceiling, almost simultaneously. I again asked him to slow down, this time sternly. By sternly, I mean I was screaming and cursing, while control the urge to not use the back of his seat as a punching bag.
He did slow down. I realized this was not a good thing because he lacked common sense.
The only time Mr. Madman went slowly was when he passed cars right before blind corners, then often in them, the engine bogging by his inability to drive a manual car properly. He was too stupid to down shift gears. Within a few meters of one blind corner, he bogged the engine, going 35 km/h in fourth gear. The one time we would have wanted him to go fast was while passing, but that was the one time he went slow, causing my nails to dig into the seat and every hole in my body to tighten, making me look ready to disappear into a puff of smoke.
“Please stay on our side of the road on blind corners,” I said, leaned forward between the two front seats, pointing with two open hands for extra effect. I never thought I’d have to tell someone this on a two-way highway with one lane in each direction, where there were no railings, massive steep cliffs and gravel, with only the occasional honk for our protection from certain death.
Minutes later, he swerved through a village at 90 km/h dodging children.
I. Lost. It.
Completely.
“Slow down you maniac, there’s children!” I screamed, adding in words that rhymed with duck and bucking. In response, his head shaked from side to side - the Nepalese way to say okay – while he honked at the kids. I swore I heard a rattling sound in my state of rage; his small brain bagging against his near empty skull. Had I choked him, his ears would have released a sound similar to a squeezed rubber ducky. For the rest of the drive, I took backseat driving as seriously as an erection problem, which looking back, may have possibly saved our lives. I literally would be surprised to find out that he was still alive today.
As we began to climb another steep road that would deposit us into Kathmandu Valley, we came to a grinding halt. We have found ourselves at a traffic jam outside the city that had us traveling no more than 20 km/h for well over two hours. Although tiring and time consuming, a part of me was glad.
I knew we had made it to Kathmandu when Boxie-boo spotted a bicycle covered in live chickens, dangling from their tied feet off the handlebars. I praised the gods for our survival, from Zeus to Allah, to Wayne Gretzsky and Oprah Winfrey. As he helped to lift out backpacks from the trunk, I looked down and discovered he was unable to tie shoelaces. We had put our lives in the hands of a man wearing Velcro shoes.
We grabbed a room at Hotel Garuda in the Thamel district, amid the madness of the “Seven Corners” - an area of Kathmandu for foreigners packed with restaurants, lodging, stores and Internet cafes. I talked down our room from 2500 Rupees per night to 3500 Rupees for two ($75 Canadian/US). It was not a great price, but we were too exhausted from being on edge driving for hours, from dealing with aggressive salespeople as we walked into the guest house, while at the same time, men grabbed our wrists to buy Tiger Balm and others attempted to guide us into their shops with gentle pushes.
At night, two hours later after refusing to move from the bed, we headed outside to discover a group of Nepalese blocking the entrance to our guest house. Traffic in the alley-wide street was at a standstill. Everyone was laughing. I stood above the short Nepalese men and peered out onto the street, telling Boxie-boo to stand behind me for protection. I thought this might have been a Maoist demonstration. A fight was lit up by stilled motorcycles, their headlights illuminating two larger men who had pinned down a small man, maybe 120 pounds. They pounded his ribs and face into the concrete, beside a small pile of garbage that was kicked by his flailing legs. The locals continued laughing. It was a two-on-one beat down. I was not amused.
“I’m pulling them off,” I said, moving through the crowd in a swimming motion. On my way, I saw the build of the young man, maybe in his early twenties, looking thin like a Grade 8 boy. A Good Samaritan pulled him out, dragging him against the concrete - and he ran. I followed an Internet cafe employee into his shop, who laughed out loud with each step.
“You think it’s funny?” I asked. He smiled in response. “Those guys easily outweighed that guy by 50 pounds each. I outweigh you by about 50,” I said, glaring down at him. “Would it be funny if I pounded you into the concrete?” His smile diminished. “No, it wouldn’t be,” I said.
Back in our room, I felt bad for scaring the guy. I just hate violence, especially when two people beat on the small and weak. Maybe I was still grumpy from the drive, annoyed by the salespeople, hungry, exhausted and pissed off by own exhaustion. Regardless, there was nothing funny about two men beating a small one. I will never forget the two sounds battling for control of my understanding – a crowd laughing, while one man yelped, coming up for air in agony between blows.
Maybe I would have felt different, I suppose, if the man had been wearing Velcro shoes.
That’s all for now.
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