“What are you going to do in Kathmandu? Are you going on a safari?”
“No, I’m actually going on a trek in the Everest region!”
“WOW! How luxurious!”
“No actually, it’s not… I will be walking the whole time!”
“You have to fly all the way to Kathmandu just to go for a walk? That’s luxurious in my book!”
It took me a few minutes to realize what just happened. I think I was in a state of shock after I finished talking to the airline agent. I can’t believe I finally had the courage to book my flight to Nepal.
The first time I heard about the (former) Kingdom of Nepal was when I was about 12 years old from my great aunt who claimed she met a prince from Kathmandu and apparently had a crush on her. He invited her to visit Nepal but she didn’t go because she was married at the time. Of course no one knew if she was telling the truth but it sure made a heck of a story!
The second time I became aware of Nepal was when I was reading a travel magazine and saw a picture of an elephant amidst the exotic backdrop. I was fascinated and remember thinking how cool it would be to go there someday. But it wasn’t until I read a blog two years ago that I became seriously interested in going. I would daydream about trekking up in the mountains (despite my aversion to the outdoors back then). Seeing the snow-capped mountains in the Himalayas became an obsession.
Unfortunately on April 10, 2015, my son’s cancer came back and life was on hold for a while. Two weeks later, on April 25, an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.8 devastated Nepal making it the deadliest disaster to hit a Himalayan country. Over 8000 people perished and many were left homeless. It was heartbreaking to see and hear about it. Nepal and I now shared one commonality: suffering.
During our stay at the hospital and when life was filled with uncertainties, I compared our journey to summiting Everest–a very daunting feat but if combined with strong faith it can be achieved with great success. Our “Everest” was looking for a perfect bone marrow match for my son. However, there are only about 4% (multiracial ethnicity) registered as potential donors worldwide. It was going to take a miracle for us to find one. But we did! Out of the seven billion people in the universe, one woman with a generous heart from Germany became my son’s angel. She helped us summit Everest. After his bone marrow transplant, we now had one goal: to return to base camp safely.
Today, Nepal and I are still healing and as life goes on, we move on. I am getting my life back by doing what I love to do–travel. And Nepal is definitely where I would start (plus they need tourism to help rebuild the nation). Nine months from now, I will finally come face to face with the country I’ve identified with during my darkest hours. I will be trekking in the Khumbu region (northeastern Nepal on the Nepalese side of Mount Everest). Because it is going to be my first time, I chose to do the ‘easy’ Everest trek (which covers only half of the route towards base camp). This has given me so much motivation to go on my two hour walks and soon increase it to 3, then 4 and hopefully I can walk for hours without a problem.
One day I was at REI looking at backpacks and the salesperson happened to be someone who has gone to the Everest base camp. He told me stories about that trek (which he did in 2008). I mentioned to him I’m a bit petrified of the suspension bridges.
“Are you scared of heights?” he asked.
“Yes very much so!” I answered.
“Well one of the bridges is quite high! You’ll have to cross many of them before you reach Namche Bazaar!” He also casually said they swayed up and down not side to side. “You can fall if you don’t hold on with both hands,” he added.
“Are you serious? Hmm…I think I want to cancel my trip now!”
We both laughed. I told him I was going there to overcome my fears– of being alone, of heights, of inconveniences in life and oh…pretty much everything! He looked at me with a grin on his face, tinted with skepticism. It may have been a look of pity thinking to himself, “this poor thing thinks she will survive it there!” Yeah dude it was that obvious, no need to say it out loud!
“Where do you stop if you’re not going all the way to Base Camp?” he asked.
“I’m going up to Tengboche. Then I retrace my steps back to Lukla,” I said.
“Tengboche is not that far from the base camp. You shoud just keep going! You will regret it if you don’t!”
Maybe or maybe not. Honestly, I have no desire to go all the way to base camp. From the many blogs I’ve read, altitude sickness seems to start kicking in after Tengboche. Most experience constant migraine, loss of appetite, and fatigue. One of the bloggers wrote that the best part of the whole trek was the route to Tengboche. I decided since I’ve already had my share of mental and emotional strain lately, I wasn’t going to welcome the physical strain on my vacation. A trek is meant to enjoy not endure. My conversation with the REI sales guy may have left me wondering– will I regret it even if I don’t make it all the way to base camp? Uh, unlikely!
I decided not to go with anyone on this trip. I haven’t gone on solo travels since I got married but I really need this time to be alone. They say to never use travel as a crutch to find yourself. I wasn’t planning to do a soul search in this trip. It is more like a pilgrimage, a spiritual quest. And sometimes I find it hard to disconnect from my stressful life thus the solitude will give me the freedom to think and clearly hear my thoughts.
“Alone time is when I distance myself from the voices of the world so I can hear my own” ~Oprah Winfrey
*all images borrowed from the Internet
I totally understand. Well, I have a space saved for you. While I am thinking about it, any ideas for increasing web traffic to my site? And, if you don’t mind sharing, on average how many visitors do you get a day to your blog? Thanks! Take care! Jason.
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I’m probably the wrong person to ask. But from what I learned with blogging is to start following others and making sure you read and interact (comment on what their posts). Then they will get to know you and it will expand from there.
Right above (before your first comment) is the editors journal. She is the one who can help since it’s what she does. You may want to get in touch with her. She has posted on how to get over 250k views in her posts before. I am not full time with my blog so I haven’t had the chance to get a lot of traffic.
With views, it all depends. If I had just posted I’d probably get about 75 views or more. And that’s not much. I do have my regular readers. And some will just find me.
Hope that helps.
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I did reach out there, and received some very useful guidance already. I really appreciate the suggestion. It is lying dividends already!
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Hi there. I have finally created the guest blog portion of my site. I have included a couple pieces already. I was hoping that you might have the time to write a guest piece too. Hope ally is well! Jason
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Hi Jason,
Sorry I just saw your comment here. For some odd reason, I didn’t get any notification from WordPress. Yes I would love to write for you but it may take a while. I have been extremely busy and can’t really find the time to write lately.
Hopefully in a month or two I can get to it. Thanks for asking me!
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Woah! Sounds amaze -balls! Will you be able to blog as you go? Great advice from Louise there!
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I hope so! The lodges I will be staying at says they have Internet. I just don’t know how strong. I can’t wait!!!
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Oh excellent! That means I can come too! 😀
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Enjoy!!! You might not want to watch the movie Everest though before going but I’ve heard so many good things about Nepal. Solo-travel is always the best kind of travel, at least for me. 🙂
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Haha! Yes I actually did see Everest. But remember I am not climbing Mt Everest (I’ll surely die if I do lol)! If you remember in the beginning of the movie where they trek before making it to base camp? That’s the one I’m doing. My layover is in Doha by the way 😄
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How many hours is your layover? There are so many bloggers who are coming by at this time of the year in Doha. I am getting confused now! 😂😂😂
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Going is overnight (arrive around 5pm then leave at 4ish am the next day). Coming back is arrival at 3pm and leave the following day at 8am. I was thinking of doing a complimentary city tour offered by Qatar airways.
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What dates are those? We can definitely meet up. 😊
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Not till November. I will surely let you know when it gets closer! Would love to meet up with you if I can leave the airport 😄
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Yes just start out slowly. General fitness first and then at the six month point we made the training more trek specific, starting hill training, I started practising with me trekking poles. I will do another blog about my training. Knee exercises are good because they will take a beating if not.
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Thanks Louise. That’s a great idea. Yes please do a blog on the training. I heard about the knee exercise, and I need to work on that. The problem is Dallas is so flat and I wish we have hills close to my area.
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How’s the planning and training going Boots? Hope all is well with you and your family.
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Hi Louise! I’ve been doing well. Training is ongoing but I feel I need to work on it more. Probably need more strength training (going my lower body stronger). Is that what you did? Thanks for dropping by!
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Good on you! Goodluck.
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Thanks so much!
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Oh Boots, what an amazing story – and I am so glad that you have booked this journey to Nepal. And more importanly, your son is on the mend. This will be the trip of a lifetime for you – I agree, more people need to get back to Nepal after the earthquakes. I never did Everest, but I did do the Langtang and have to say Kathmandu is a wonderful place – I have fond memories of the spirit of the people. I will look forward to following your journey 🙂
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Thank you so much Ting! Wow Langtang! I’m hoping I’ll survive this trek in the Everest and so I can do other treks in Nepal. I hope you can go back there with the little monkey 😄. I’ve read kids as young as six do the base camp. I know it’s a little too young but perhaps when he’s 12 or 13 he can do it. I wish my boys can do this with me.
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Wow, it’s one of my favorite countries I’ve never been to. I’m lookign forward to the stories you will write after the trip. I’m sure that will be a really meaningful journey, both geographically and spiritually. And yay for solo trips. I hope all is going well with you.
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Wow! You are going to realize one of my dreams to get to Nepal. The awesome Everest view alone is wonderful treat but trekking in there (Khumbu region)–dream come true!
You may have a very sad analogy of your upcoming trip’s history or should I say background yet it’s a impressive one more so when you get to think of it deeper. I’m just amazed at how you find perfect connection to your, let’s call it innermost sad thoughts, to the tragedy that struck Nepal last year. You channeled it to positivism in the most exemplary way.
Keep safe, Boots! I will look forward to reading your post about the trek and Nepal!
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Thanks so much Sony! I hope you’ll get to do this trek one day. From all the blogs I’ve read, it can be done cheaply (it’s amazing how the teahouses- lodges- can cost as little as $2.50). But I’m doing the more high end lodges because I’m not sure if I can use squat toilets or not shower for 10 days haha!!
Anyway, I’m hoping things will go my way and everything will be smooth in terms of my son’s health. Then I can go without worries!
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Nepal has always fascinated me. I admire your strength and courage and look forward to your posts on this epact journey.
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Thanks Ingrid! I can’t wait to write about it either. If only I can fast forward the time 😄
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This is fantastic! I am so excited for you. 🙂 I checked in today because I was thinking about you and hoping that all was well with your son. So happy to see that he is doing well — and that you are recovering from it, as well! You were my first follower on WordPress, and that was so encouraging to me. I have always appreciated your early support. I’m happy that you’re back to blogging, and off to super-exciting new adventures!!!
All my best,
Nikki
(formerly Peace, Love, and Veggie Burgers, and now Nomadic Nikki!)
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I was wondering what happened to your blog 😄. I will hop on to the new one and follow it. I didn’t realize I was your first follower. I’m glad it somehow gave you encouragement. I’m happy you continued with blogging. Looking forward to it!!
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I can feel it will be your amazing travel. You must be very excited and anxious to make it happen soon..I hope someday I will be able to follow your step to do a solo traveling. I haven’t done it for ages!
Do you do special preparation for that, lots of training perhaps? Wishing you the best, Boots!!
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I’ve been walking a lot. Also I do some strength training. The good news is I still have nine months to go and I can really train properly for it.
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Thanks Indah! Also I’m glad you are enjoying your life in Minnesota so far 😄. Hope it isn’t too cold!! Enjoy the snow haha!
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Hi Boots, that sounds amazing. I know it’s a little ways away, but I’m sure the time will fly by and I look forward to hearing all about it.
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November seems so far away and I am constantly thinking about it. I’m nervous and excited at the same time.
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What a great post Boots! I totally “get it”! You and your family have been through a lot with your son’s battle. And I believe you will inspire him by making the journey. Your story is an inspiration for me to keep working on my own stories of Nepal. Stay tuned! Nepal is a magical place!
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Thank you Larry! I am hoping my two boys will find this trip inspiring. Please keep writing about Nepal. I look forward to your blog. You write beautifully.
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Oh!! This is such a good idea. The way you write about this journey — I can tell it comes from your heart, and that’s the best kind of reason to go, because your heart and your soul are moving you to do it. And you CAN do it! I wish you the best of luck on the preparation and the trip itself. And I’m so happy you were able to find a donor for your son. Hugs and love from Cebu.
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Thank you so much! I’ve been trying to train for the trek. I just hope I’ll have all the strength for the 4-6 hours of walking each day lol!
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Congratulations Boots. You did it, you booked your trip. I am very excited for you need to go to a trekking store and buy your boots and start breaking them in. Don’t go to a camping store.
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Thank you Louise! I already have broken in a nice Salomon trekking shoes. 😄
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Great. I am going to check out Salomon shoes next they are quite light. The ones are took were very heavy.
When are you going?
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Not until November 14.
The Salomon shoes are definitely the best ones. I didn’t need to break it in for so long. The merells were extremely heavy and uncomfortable. I had it for two weeks and still couldn’t break it in.
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That is so inspiring. Good luck with your journey. You are so independent I haven’t yet tried travelling alone. I have it on my to do list, though. 🙂
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Thanks Chia! The downside of traveling alone is the loneliness. But you get to do what you want without worrying about your companions. Hope you can try it someday!
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