February 5, 2001 Night. Now I am writing by kerosene light on this bed on the balcony of a house in a village FILLED with sassy smiling children. The village is situated in that perfect valley-side position (like the place where we stayed in Tolua) where it does not get too cold at night. Only my feet are a bit chilly. Who knows, maybe I will se Sylvie show up tomorrow in the morning but I doubt it. Not interested in anything more than friendship with her but it was fun sharing a tent together. Her charm was on in the dark talking in that cute French “I can’t speak ze English too well” accent. I just stopped in this village for tea mid-farsi-tape and when they village people rustled up the English speaker among them all was clear. I saw the nice kids, the good vibes, the old shaman chanting the Rai ethnicity thing with gestures (name of this shamanistic tradition starts with “M” but I can’t remember it). I learned that I could spend the night in this cool balcony. Then that English-speaking fellow disappeared when I went to wash up and another guy with a hilarious speaking style appeared. He said “my sisTER was made a wiDOW in the PRIME OF HER LIFE” over and over again. Some local people have just come along are beating away the children standing below my balcony shouting “hello mister” repeatedly. Thank you! Thank god I finally got to bathe a bit. I feel more cheered up about my folks after Fabrice’s talk yesterday. Here is my mantra of the day… oh wait. Another visit from a 58 year-old man who proudly shows off that he has the body and health of a 29n year-old. He served in the British Army’s Gorkha regiment and finished in 1974. He collected pension for 26 years. He does the amazing feat of walking from Diktel to Bodjpur in one day! This same distance will probably take me three days. Good English too! He said the best Khukuri knives come with a wooden scabbard and can be bought for 1000 Rupees (US $15). Ok, he left, Mantra time: This is Mahasiddha Thantong Gyalpo’s outer-inner and secret refuge vow: Together with all beings as numerous as the sky is vast, all of whom have been my mothers, I take refuge in the precious lama, who is the Buddha; I take refuge in the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. Ma namkhatang nyampe’ semchen tamche’ lama sangye’ rinpoche’ la kyabsu cho. Sangye’ cho- tand gendun nam la kyabsu cho. Dorpa-Dumli February 6, 2001 Morning 6 AM. Truly rural Nepal is on the natural rythems. They vainly struggle to stay awake past dark and long before the sun is actually up all people are up and out. In the dark I heard one girl leave the house at 5 am and say some sort of pun on “om mane padme hum” as she left. I have had two nights in a row now I solid sleep and a nap yesterday and so the ideas are just cranking out faster than flapjacks at a Yukon breakfast. Two precepts of US mountaineering for me to observe from now on: always have a bag big and bold enough to be comfortable for sleeping. Also, end the day at 3:30 or 4 PM to do chores etc. and by 8 PM everyone should be asleep. I had several thoughts about my ex-sweet pea Jessica this morning. I dreamt that I was at home (alone with her, I guess), she left me on some late night errand and in the dark I heard her up to me in the room saying “the couch is on the landing.” I came down to see the cleaned couch she had brought, the furniture she had put there, thought “oh. I should talk with her” and then looked out the window to the driveway and as if on cue saw her pulling out. She left. I guess this dream represents a feeling I have or used to have, a feeling of loss when she went away and a powerlessness to stop her/catch her (if that isn’t grasping I don’t know what is). Funny, when I think back about how she said to me “this is great. You should pursue your dreams” when I told her about my plans for this trip some months after we had ended our romantic relationship. Then about how I heard she went into full freak mode when I left in May of 2000, then I think about how I felt about any unified movement when I was with her: it was like attempting to run while tied down by guylines and tent-fly ropes and trying to maintain unbroken a legion of glass vases on poles on narrow, wobbly tables on my back all the while. My mind is weak and capricious. I need to trail it like a child. It wanders all over and what I have indulged as representing creativity is merely a reckless squandering of mental energy. I must be strong enough to be able to have a relationship and continue to advance spiritually/physically (that means strong boundaries must be set on what the relationship demands). Its like this: my mind is constantly circling around turning up ideas that are intended to evoke feeling of pleasure or excitement. A kind of reckless mental masturbation is constantly going on. That creates the chattering thought-noise in my head that hinders my progress. Here is an unrelated human anthropology idea I had: I think the Rai people of Nepal and the Bai people of China’s Yunnan province come from a linked common cultural ancestor.