Welcome back to the riverside...

I couldn’t take the heat of Bhairahawa anymore, so I decided to hit the green hill paradise of Nepal, Pokhara. After a seven hour long journey with one of my friends, Sandy, I was welcomed to their home by Don and Homy. The whole week I spent here was great. If I untie the bag of stories I have from here, it won’t finish till next summer vacation. So let’s cut it short.

Fewa taal.

This is the area where I stayed with Don in his house. It is one of the main tourist attractions of Pokhara and we did boating here a couple of times. After my arrival, I was shortly joined by PP and Dilipo-Filipo. We did boating the whole afternoon, shooting photos and enjoying several snacks throughout.

Power house.

This is not exactly a tourist attraction, but it is a beautiful place to spend some private time. We were showered by the rain half way there, making everything around us as green as ever. We took shelter in a small hut where me and the guys enjoyed a little rain dance.

Davis falls.

I was fortunate to visit this place as I didn’t get a chance to visit this place last time. This time we were accompanied by a crowd of ten and Don was the tour guide. The place was named after the person who fell into the falls…myth or truth, I don’t know. There was a little wishing well at the exit. Although I didn’t believe in that stuff, I flipped a coin just for luck.

Forestry campus.The forestry campus is one place where you can see the “white” river of Pokhara plus, where you find some interesting wildlife. I went there to meet my best friend’s brother, Vivek. It was nice meeting him after a long time and he gave me some post cards.

Manipal Medical College.

The only place where other Maldivians were rumoured to be studying in Nepal was this place. We met our old Biochemistry teacher, who gave us a tour of the place. It was humungus and had better facilities than our own college. What it didn't have was students who respected their teachers and hot girls!

Apart from visiting all these cool places, we played basket ball every evening. We also saw a movie in the theatre, Kites, which I didn’t find that interesting or that boring. I also had diarrhoea for a day and enjoyed a night at the rooftop at my Homy’s place looking at the mountain tops gleaming in silver in the moonlight.

And now, I’m back in Bhairahawa again, and like someone said, time to become a nerd again!

Alone in hell...

After the guys left, I was one of the three seniors staying in the hostel apart from the juniors. I had huge plans for the remaining 14 days. So I started off with cleaning my room. Boy that was hard work. I upturned all the beds and pulled away the cupboards while cursing the worker who cleans the room. It was so dirty! I sprayed all the little bugs and chased a little mouse out of the room that had made his home inside my room partner’s old shoes. I finished cleaning in 3 hours and took a shower. It was almost 3 in the afternoon and the sun was scorching hot.

The temperature was around 45 degrees and I felt drained. I settled on my bed and immediately fell asleep. When I walk up, I was drenched in sweat. It was around 7 in the evening and yet there was no light and no change in the temperature. The heat added to my boiling temper.

The same night, around 12 midnight, a “helicopter” entered my room and I had to search for him for an hour before I could sleep again. (Helicopter is the name I gave to a big beetle that represents a dung beetle but is in golden yellow color. He’s extremely noisy and loves crawling under dark places which are extremely narrow.)The horrible one day alone in the hostel changed my mind and I had a change of plans…I headed towards Pokhara.

Second year summer break...

The heat in Bhairahawa was draining everyone out, when the college finally decided to give us a break of 17 days. I already had plans to stay in the hostel and utilize my privacy to do some interesting stuff. And so, the first day kicked off with my room partner heading towards Pokhara to meet a friend. The next thing I knew, I had agreed to go to Palpa with a gang of ten including some very interesting people.

So first stop this vacation: Palpa

Palpa was a beautiful place hidden within the hills. It took us two hours to reach there but for me, it was like 30 minutes as I was half asleep the whole journey. The amazing thing was although the sun was shining, it didn’t have the burning effect of Bhairahawa. Invited by a dusty cyclone, we took rest near the biggest tea pot I have seen so far. We roamed around a bit, going to several places and finally hit Nanglo to have lunch after walking through the largest gates of Asia.Then after a bit of rest in Nanglo, we headed towards the Mission Hospital.

On the way, we walked up and down a hill, catching glimpses of the valley and its natural beauty all around. It was fun enjoying with the guys and I felt a bit relieved and happy that I came along, because I was initially planning to cancel the trip because my room partner was not going.The mission hospital was big and well maintained. The interior was clean and represented qualities that our hospital lacked. After the tour of mission hospital was over, we finally started to search for a place to settle in. Almost all the places were packed and we finally found a place which was far better than most of the places we’ve checked.

The Greenhill Hotel and Lodge was a small 3 story building maintained by a very friendly Aunty and her kiddo was the “DON” of Pokhara. The night fell and we enjoyed a spectacular party in the dining room where I discovered and found out several new things which I didn’t know previously. The party helped me get some answers that I searched for and I was finally free to let go of things. It was fun fun fun and more fun till the last minute before everyone called it a night.

The next morning we went to Ranimal, the Taj Mahal of India in Nepal. It was a long journey on foot where we had to cross 5 hills. We discovered our new symbol and had a great time running up and down the “orallo’s”. The place was beautiful but the inside was hollow as it was being renovated. We didn’t spend much time there, and the journey back to the starting point took us almost 4 hours. Everyone was tired, but we caught a bus and returned safely back to Bhairahawa.

Next morning everyone went their own separate ways, leaving me to my own mischief ;)…

Chapter 4: The Letter

7th February 2000

After the happenings of the previous events, I had half a mind of sending her another note.
One night me and my friend Bishal Gurung, were alone in my room and I had the craziest idea. I thought of writing a letter! So I started writing one. I completed it and it actually was kinda good. My friend thought I should give it to her. But I had a better idea…
Anyway, first the letter. This is the original..

Dearest,
A letter like this and I kind of have an idea what you may be thinking. But no, this is not a love letter. This may sound ridiculous, but I’m not a person who runs after girls or flirts with them till they drop dead. I just want some friends from the opposite sex.
I mean, I kinda’ miss the friends I have at home, most of the girls there I mean. Because in my +2 class, there used to be only three boys and twenty four girls. We spent 24-7 together so I guess that makes me miss them a lot. Plus I have a feeling that hanging around with boys for the rest of the year or maybe 6 years time may “gay me out”.
So please, just friends? Mujse dhosti karoge?

Anyway, what I did was I wrote 2 letters, gave one to her and the other to the second girl. See ya :p

Parasites...

Normally, in the world of Medicine, in simple terms a parasite is an organism which requires a host to survive as it obtains food and shelter from the host. The host is harmed while the parasite survives. Until now, I thought as parasites as organisms that existed only in the medical world. But, if you take a closer look at our existence, you’ll be surprised to find parasites among Homo Sapiens too.

I’ve spend nearly one tenth of a decade in a place far away from home, with friends and no family. I’ve met so many different people in this short period of time and I’ve got to say that there is one particular disease the Human parasites love enhancing; Mental Poisoning or Emotional Blackmail.

Nobody can survive very long only on food and water without companionship. Somehow or another, a person must find away to interact with another to feel as part of the same existence. When we meet people who share a common interest, we call them friends. We share each others happiness and sorrows together eventually leading to a good relationship built up on the foundation of trust.

After trusting a person, we open up a bit, crawl out of that shell we’ve been hiding in for so long. We taste the sweet smell of a whole new world and we become free fliers. We expand our borders of freedom and start dominating our lives and that’s when the true personality of a person shines. We start discovering ourselves as we slowly discover the nature of the people around us.

Now let me tell you how to identify a human parasite. The human parasites have three major characteristic features. One, they are your friends. Two, they’ve got a huge Ego problem and three, they love backbiting.

If you tell them that they're making a mistake or doing something wrong, they'll tell you that they’re always right and you’re the one who’s wrong. If by chance you become closer to one of their friends than them, they’ll tell you not to get in between them and friends. If you tell them a secret, they remember to spread it out as soon as you’re out of ear shot. If you tell them not to commit crime, they’ll tell you that you’re not their father to order them around.

If they're“high” and you tell them something, the next day they’ll come and say you tried to shoot us down while we were flying high. If they're enjoying with their friends with you alongside and when you’re invited by their friends to join in the fun, they’ll say he’s not one of us, leave him out. When you’re not around they love polishing your name with mud and making you look like a low life. When they want something, they’ll come to you and say that you’re the best, when they get what they want, you’re just one of those “other” people around. When you ask why, they just say you’re different and they only hang out with people like them!

I haven’t discovered any particular cure for this, but there was a saying in one of the Community Medicine books I read, “Prevention is better than cure”.
So, I guess it’s not important to put all your trust in your friends, sometimes learn to use your enemies too.

Chapter 3: Luck and Notes

3rd February 2000

Finally they caught me and dumped me into the Freshers, I was supposed to be the slave master…It was a horrible day for me as I was woken up by the seniors to hit the stage at 10 in the morning without any breakfast. I was in the back stage dressing up (it didn't look like a slave masters clothes, more like a girls bathing suit) when I saw the nervous faces of my batch mates lining up. I was ready to tease them with the huge stick like thing I had and was about to go when my eyes caught a glimpse of her. Wearing typical Nepali clothes she looked…

I was spellbound by her very sight. The senior said that all I had to do was escort them to the stage. I was thinking that this was my lucky day. Suddenly, out of nowhere, the host of the show appeared. "You there" pointing at me she said, "You'll escort the boys!" My face shattered like glass. It felt like a stupid little black cloud was hovering above my head, shooting thunder bolts with heavy rain. Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeez…why me and why now!

The show was amazing any how. I did as I was told and I got the chance to watch her dance. Not, the whole thing but just glimpses. It wasn't so bad I guess. Anyway at the end of the show I was just changing in the changing room with a howling stomach when all of a sudden the door opened and there she stood! A sweat drop clinging on the back of my forehead, I was only in my half pants and body naked. She just stared and I stared back. "Sorry" she blurted out and went away and I collapsed on the chair behind me with a sigh. I guess it was my lucky day after all.

This morning in class, I wrote a note to her. It said,
"Congrats on becoming Ms. Freshers 2000. I passed a note 'cause I didn't want to create a scene."

= Maldives =

(Nazim)

I expected an immediate reply, but instead she passed the note around and a lot of heads turned in my direction. I was kinda' embarrassed. But as usual, my split personality was greater.
I was feeling down when the thought occurred to me that she might just ignore it. I mean who was I right? A complete stranger…

After class I was having lunch and one of the guys came with a note. He was smiling. I opened it and it said…
Thank you….. = _ _ _ _ _=

Chapter two: Facts and reasons

31st January 2000

It’s funny how it actually started. I mean I never looked at any girl in class seriously. One fine morning, I just walked into class and she smiled at me. That’s how I noticed the first girl in the first bench. To tell you the truth, I’m straight and I’m not gay. But still, even though the fact remained, I had no interest in getting myself hooked up with girl for time pass; typically, it means I’m not a jerk! I had no intention of falling into a deep whole from where I couldn’t pick myself up or something, ‘cause I’ve been there and done that.

It was just after lunch again, me and Bishal were returning to class and Bishal took a detour to the boys “common room” and I made my way to class. There she was again, looking at me and smiling again. There definitely was eye contact and people say that eye contact means something. Yet I took it lightly, I think I smiled back but passed the day as usual. I’m sure nothing had happened ‘cause, I heard no violins and I saw no rainbows.

Later, while we were walking back to the hostel, I confessed this to Bishal and he said to me that girls smiled at you for two reasons, 1. They like you (in a friendly way), 2. They’re teasing you. For a moment I pondered on the facts and imagined myself, a big walrus with pot-belly and thin limbs, yea right! She was probably teasing me. Hey, don’t get me wrong, I may be a bit bulky (5’8” and 96 Kilos), still I don’t fail to cast my charm on the opposite sex and look sexy!

Well, the practices for “Freshers” have begun as well. It’s actually a mass ragging type of thing where all the juniors will be on stage and you’ll perform and you’ll be rated and if you fail to catch the bar, you’ll be ragged by all the seniors there. Imagine the horror! Well, to tell you the truth, I can’t ‘cause I’m not part of it. Catch ya laiters amigo. Night..