We breeze down to Bangkok to suffer numerous frustrations
20th February 2006

Final religious ruins of Thailand
We don't like big cities but sometimes there’s no option
Service with a snarl
Everyone suffers in Bangkok
Ten days and finally something works out
We take a break from our busy schedule to take tea with the Ambassador
Our hassles are small fry compared to those of the world

A last cultural slice of Thai

After our little sojourn in Lampang with the Dutch contingent we headed Southwards to Sukhothai via a set of ruins, Sri Satchanalai. Both of which are ancient capitals of Thailand, with a lot of prangs and stupas. I get confused, I think the prangs are the phallic shaped ones that are hollow and have a doorway, and used to house a linga and base for offerings, whereas your stupa is more of a bell-shaped edifice which is solid and normally has some kind of buddha relic interned inside of it; a toe-nail or something.

We had a rather hot sticky time walking up and around temples dressed in our bike gear and then went on South to Sukhothai. Coen and Karin had recommended a place where we could camp and we were looking forward to being back in our own home for a couple of nights. Malcolm, a lovely Brit, runs the Mountain View Guesthouse with his wife Miao, a local Thai lass. Malcolm, who hails from Essex, had seen the light and realised that his quality of life would be much improved by being in Thailand. His retired parents had joined him, not novices at living abroad having moved from their home in Spain.

Apparently until the 50s Sukhothai was still consumed by the forests, the area of the old capital is Tikal-like in it’s size, with the countryside fairly littered with shrines and Buddhas. Walking, sitting, standing, reclining Buddhas - the full set, as it were.

What have the Khmer ever done for the Thais. Well there’s an alphabet, oh yes, and architecture, Khmer boxing and theres music and dance. But you’ll never get a Thai person to admit it. Looking at the ruins their influence was obvious.

Walking around the ruins we were entertained to hear a yank ‘educating’ his Thai girlfriend in English. She wanted to know what a word was that he had used. ‘Column, c..o...l...l...o...m.. it’s one of these.’ What can you say? I hope she gets some proper lessons.

Berthette was still carrying the coating of Laos dust and spilt oil from the leaky shock, so we treated her to a little shampoo and set, she looked all rather spiffy, with her new shiny look. Not bad at all for an old girl with 100000km under her swinging arm and 16 years old. Not exactly concourse condition but a smart looking workhorse.

We didn’t know what to say to Malcolm’s father, when he began an uninvited rant on the state of Britain today. He was right in some ways, but he laid all the blame on the multicultural nature of Britain. Trying to persuade him that actually many of the immigrant muslims have excellently behaved children in schools and it is often the anglo-saxons behaving like barbarians, fell of deaf ears. He was a man that found it easier to scapegoat minorities than face the truth that the reason that immigrants get jobs in the UK, is because they are often willing to do jobs that white Anglos refuse to consider. Did he not see the irony in being an immigrant in someone elses country? I felt awkward, here we were in a foreign country, our host married to a Thai and her father-in-law being wholly racist. I wondered how she felt about such conversation, unfortunately for her her English wasn’t good enough to understand.

As we left the next morning, Miao thrust a present in our hands. Had she overheard our attempts to placate her father-in-laws bigotry? What should we do? Sometimes it is customary to give a gift in return, we had nothing to give. And then we found it - a phrase book to help the kids learn English and Malcolm brush up his Thai.

It was the day for strange gifts. At a petrol station on the way South to Bangkok a random lady walked up an presented us with a snack and some water. Was it a welcome gift? Did we look so desperate? Was it auspicious to give to strangers around Chinese New Year? Who knows? I thanked her graciously, and remained bewildered.

The journey into Bangkok was amazingly stress free, until........No...how did that happen? We got stuck in some lanes entering a set of tolls. This is not us being meanies again, but it is illegal for bikes to go on the toll roads, but there was no way to get off. We had avoided every sign that said toll road on it, and here we were imprisoned by toll booths and a policeman coming towards us. I wasn’t in the mood for this. Was he going be a pain? Were we going to get a fine? He was OK, but there was now the issue of how to exit this road that had concrete bollards down the side. He suggestion was to ride back against the manic Bangkok traffic down four lanes of oncoming vehicles. Is he some kind of traffic sadist. In the end we cajoled him into unlocking the gate to the service road running parallel at the side. He did of course ask for a gate unlocking fee. We nipped off smartish.

So, why were we back in Bangkok?

There were two possible options for continuing the trip; riding across Myanmar or having to fly over the top. We’d put an application in at the Myanmar embassy when last in Bkk on the basis that they claimed it would take a month to process. Two months had now passed and so they must surely have news for us.....

It was not good. Although the Burmese home office had approved our application, clearance would also be needed with the military. They wanted not just the itinerary of where we were too be going but a set of specific dates that we would be passing through. We hadn’t provided this previously since we couldn’t be too specific about dates two months ahead. The prognosis was that it would probably take a month for the military to ponder our proposal and that they may well say “no” for all that.

With our usual lack of communication we interpetted the situation quite differently. I’d been working on the kismet principle; if our plan had been acceptable to the Burmese, we would have put in the visa application and headed on through Myanamar. I took this new hurdle as a bad omen and thought that we may end up extending our visas in Thailand only to be disappointed. Hippy read this initial approval as a positive sign and thought that maybe it would be worth making the follow up application. I guess I was somewhat pig-headed and decided not to further the issue without explaining to Hippy all of the thoughts running through my head.

Hippy was furious that I felt that I could make this decision alone. I think I shied away from the discussion because I knew how keen Hips was to try and get through. I was using this latest obstacle as a simple excuse for all my other misgivings.

I admit I was very disappointed, and was not looking forward to the expense (our house is empty at the moment and it looks like we will be running on savings till we return) and other hassle of trying to fly over the top. That could be potentially as complicated as trying to go through, but I was willing to give it another shot, while understanding that the timing was not in our favour. I saw the logic of Pat’s decision, but was unhappy that he didn’t think it necessary to even fleetingly discuss the options.

I was losing the plot. Bangkok was proving to be a nightmare. I’d been in touch with the White Power agent here for over three weeks and had only just received a quotation for a seal (the size of a ten pence piece for 100 dollars!). I hadn’t been able to get the money to them via a bank transfer as they’d given me the price on Friday afternoon, too late for the banks. The shop was closed on Monday (Chinese New Year). The shop was closed on Tuesday (Chinese New Year hangover). When I eventually got in to see the manager, he justified all the days off by the fact that we in Europe have a week off for New Year. Err, excuse me.
“Can you get the seal within a week so we can get the job done before leaving Thailand?
“Oh, you need it in a hurry?”
“Yes, I told you that in the e-mail three weeks ago.”
“I can get it in two weeks”
(pregnant pause)
“Is that soon enough?”
“I leave the country in two weeks”
Enough said. It was pointless. I’d e-mailed to White Power about my problem and they’d very nicely sent me a pdf document, complete with pictures, on how to strip down and rebuild the unit. They were adamant that I had to get this little seal through one of their agents. Even when I explained that I was getting no joy from their agent in Bangkok, they stopped comunicating with me. We’ll score that as a 3 out of 10 for after sales service, then.

There are two BMW motorcycle dealerships in Bangkok. Neither of them could supply an air filter. Come on, it’s not too much to ask for them to stock an airfilter, oil filter and a couple of spark plugs for one of the most prolific models they ever produced. By the time I actually found them (one had moved and the previous premises were empty and devoid of any ‘moved to’ notices) the two week delivery time was obviously unacceptable. I’d come across a great guy, Yut, at Dynamic Motors who’d suggested getting an airfilter made in BKK. Cool idea, the air filter for Berthette is a flat rectangle with a waffle of paper inside and should be easy to copy. Could I find the shop where air filters are made? It’s easy to obtain fake documents, dodgy watches and all manner of exotic drugs in Bangkok, but try and find a specific shop in the town with no sensible street numbering and you’re onto a loser.

And then there was the shipping agent .........

The Wicked Witch of the East

There’s an excellent travellers website, Horizons Unlimited, that we’ve mentioned before and included amongst their huge database of travel related matters are submissions from folk who have shipped between various countries. Myanmar having proved a paperchase too far, we were now faced with getting from Thailand to the rest of Asia so that we can progress back to Blighty.

Shipping is always a stressful time for us. Coordinating the building of a crate, uniting it with the bike and delivering the unit to the shipper is not so easy when you’re not on your own turf. One relies on the helpfulness of shipping agents to point out what needs to be done when and who can help. There was a glowing report about Sita Cargo on the web and so I was much relieved.

The establishment was not exactly cutting edge but I was more interested in the wonderful helpful people who were waiting inside than the lack of fancy lifting gear. The loading area below the office was littered with scruffy carboard boxes and huge sewn up sacks labeled as being filled with ladies and gents slippers - this is Thailand after all. Shippers ship all kinds of stuff so the lack of exotic cargo hanging around was no worry at all.

Joy, the general manager, was up in her office and received me graciously. We chatted about various options with regard to destinations, airlines and timings and I left armed with a bunch of choices to talk over with Hippy. Would it be Bangladesh, Nepal or India. Visa prices for Bangladesh proved exhorbitant and we’d been warned about customs procedure in India by everyone who has ever had the misfortune to ship in there. As a fait accompli, Nepal had lots of positives in its favour. Its cool at this time of year, folk are reported to be friendly (even the Maoist rebels are friendly about the way they demand voluntary contributions to their funds) and scenery is stunningly beautiful. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Anyway, we opted for Nepal.

Three airlines fly freight into Kathmandu. Biman Bangladesh only have irregular flights and their timetable ruled them out. Air Nepal cannot handle porky great motorbikes and so we were left with Thai Airways whose rates are, naturally, the highest. Heigh ho. So, the rate was 68 Bhat per kilo although every time I mentioned this Joy corrected me and pointed out that it was actually 57 plus 11 Bhat per kilo. Whatever. I needed to arrange for someone to knock a crate up for me and Joy knew a chap who could come the next day and quote for me. Brilliant.

Joy was schooled in the non-gentle art of being as rude as possible whilst still doing your job. Things progressed from indifference to stonewalling over the next week. The courteous Joy, turned into Miss Hyde, and there was no changing back.
1. Head down thumbing through a magazine ignoring polite inquiries.
2. Slamming the phone down mid conversation.
3. Not returning phone calls.
4. Saying aggressively ‘What do you want?’ when we were simply phoning when she had asked us to.
5. And to top it all, disappearing off to go shopping when she asked Pat to come to the office at 6:00, deliberately leaving him sitting on the doorstep for an hour.

Essentially she seemed perturbed by being asked questions and seemed to take this as an afront on her professionalism. And when we asked sensible questions like ‘When can we pick up the paperwork?’ She would only answer ‘I know what I’m doing!’ This as we all know does not answer our question, or help to reassure us that the paperwork would be back with us before we fly.

She clearly did not like us, and repeatedly said “If you don’t like it you can take your custom elsewhere!’ This may have seemed the most sensible plan, but bear in mind that by now she had our bike in a crate and all our paperwork, which she seemed unhappy to explain when it would be back. So she knew we were rather caught by the short and curlies.

As for professionalism.
1. She misquoted the prices to us.
2. We asked for the bike to be flown on Tuesday, so that we would be in Katmandu to receive it. She flew it on Sunday.
3. The guy she recommended to make the crate for the bike made it too short and we had to remove the headlight.
4. She weighed the bike at 385kg on her scales.
5. The airport weighed it at 360kg, she charged us for 380kg.
6. She lied when we queried the difference in weight, and refused to take less than payment for 380kg.
6. Her only explanation for lack of information was ‘You’re in Thailand, now!’
This is the kind of phrase that makes my hackles rise. It is generally an excuse for incompetence. And personally if I am paying European prices for something I expect European service. It was costing 500 sterling to fly the bike and her cut would certainly be considerably more the dollar a day a labourer receives in Thailand. The 20 kg rip-off amounts to 35 dollars for starters!

In the midst of all this we had been in contact with another agent at Transpeed Shipping. Beer (good name) we had turned down after he quoted higher than Joy, but it seems did not go to the same school of Thai etiquette as dear Joy. He reassured us by saying that the paperwork would take three working days. Ultimately it did, indeed, take three days, but why was it that someone who wasn’t even working for us could reassure us while she conspired to wind us up. We confirmed to Sjaak that his choice of agent was right on the mark.

We may be able to reclaim the overcharge that Joy billed us with Sjaak’s help. We’re more concerned that she doesn’t think see has got away with it, than for the money itself.

Other problems in the city

I was walking down the road to the cash till to get money for the freighting. A fracas broke out. A nutter was arguing with a taxi driver. I stood back, mindful of the empty beer bottle in the nutter’s hand. Well, blow me, but the loony lobs the bottle into the road right in my direction. A weighty chunk of it whacked me straight in the knee. It didn’t really hurt so I paid no attention to it - until the blood started welling up and ran down the leg of my trousers. It was not a significant wound in any way but it was the icing on the cake for me. It just about summed up our time in Bangkok. What had we done to make the gods so angry?

So that is all the stuff that wound me up in Bangkok and poor Hippy bore the brunt of it.

I was left searching out information on the internet about flights over Myanmar. I was not motivated, at all. Pat turned up after a stressful day sorting tyres and again being unsucessful in his quest for an air filter and some way of fixing the shock absorber. He could only criticise what I had managed to achieve. That was it....... I went to investigate flights back to England. The good thing is that Bangkok is fast becoming the latest package holiday destination so there are a million and one flights, but the down side is that this is high season and last minute flights are premium prices.

Poor Jan and Claudia were suffering from Bangkok blues, too. As well as having to listen our whining, they had set themselves a few simple missions that were proving impossible to achieve. Jan had a couple of German books to sell. He was offered a pittance for them on the basis that they were in German and so the market was smaller. When he pointed out that they had German books for sale that were considerably more expensive than any of those in English, the stall holder explained that there were less of them available and so they commanded a higher price. Try to fault the logic in that! Trying to clear out a load of gear to make Claudia’s perch more tenable was yielding little in the way of sensible offers from the ‘we buy anything’ merchants that set up in the backpacker area near Khao San. For example, un unused aluminium water bottle with a fancy drinking gizmo attracted an offer of 30 pence. He resorted to leaving everything he no longer wanted arrayed on the table of his hotel room when he left. He hoped that the hotel staff would get a better deal than he had.

Claudia had bought herself some rather natty bike trousers before setting out to join Jan. As she doesn’t ride a bike, she wasn’t aware that they were a little too tight for comfort when worn in motorcycling posture. Now 18000 km away from her motorcycle accessory outlet, exchanging for a larger size was out of the question. Thankfully she was in Bangkok, city of bargain tailors ............. None of the prolific clothing repairers would touch the job as their function is simply to put stitches back in the holes where they are missing - kind of like join the dots. None of the ‘clothes made to measure’ brigade would help either. It was not clear whether they were intimidated by the tough cordura medium or simply wouldn’t work on other folks creations in the spirit of prima donna. “I only work on creations that I can sew a Gucci label into, daaaahling”

Claudia also had the misfortune of being with us. Jan’s English is superb, and it was easy, too easy, to drop into fast English banter with him, leaving Claudia behind. She had come out to join him on his trip and I fear she felt bashful in our company. Without meaning to be cliquey or exclusive, we rambled about our experiences, leaving poor Claudia out on a limb at times. I felt bad, forgive us for our ignorance, Claudia.

It wasn’t just the farangs who were faring poorly. One of the delights of Bangkok are the superb food stalls that set up in the streets. This is a great Thai tradition, families will go out grazing in food streets of an evening. Vendors apparently need to be licensed just as most places. Failure to present a license to the police on their weekly rounds results in the confiscation of an apparently random object which is essential to their business and so forcing them to close. This form of taxation has a rather suspicious look about it. Analysing the contents of the police pickup as it completes it rounds reveals: a gas bottle, a stove, a set of scales, two tables, eight chairs a set of crockery and a variety of other items which by pure coincidence make up a set of everything needed to set up a street food stall. The more cynical of us out here wonder who might be the beneficiary of all this gear. A cop’s relation with a hankering to enter the food provision trade? Surely not.

Small victories

I had a minor success. Hoorah. Giving up on the hope of getting a seal for the shock from Europe, I went for the developing world approach. Could an equivalent be found or could a similar seal be ‘encouraged’ to fit. The first option would have been ideal but regrettably we had go with method 2, commonly referred to as ‘muntering’. The helpful staff at Siam Superbikes pointed me in the right direction for a suspension technician. His workshop was short of fancy equipment but his lathe looked quite workmanlike. He managed to source a seal of similar size and then machined the end cap of the damper unit so it would fit in. It all seemed pretty convincing and I watched over everything that he did like a clucky modern father in a delivery room. It was not sophisticated but I liked what he did. It remains to be seen if the seal is up to the job or not.

Another minor result was getting the bike tuned up by someone with the right equipment for once. I can just about manage to keep Berthette in moderate tune by feel but to really get the timing and carb tune correct, one really needs garage paraphernalia. Yut at Dynamic Motors is another Horizons Unlimited recommendation and this time everything went perfectly. It was not really correct to tune the engine with a pretty well used air filter in but we’ll have to make do. Everything was very smooth down below once the tweaking was complete. Thankyou, Yut.

The Princess of Darkness managed to return our bike paperwork on the Saturday before the Monday of our flight. As we’ve mentioned, she had me sitting out in the gloom on a street in a less than swanky area of Bangkok while she picked up a few essentials from the make-up shop. To add insult to insult she brandished the bag in front of me as she offered a hollow “Sorry” on her way from the taxi to the office. I made sure she had handed over the paperwork to me before launching into a tirade about how appalling her service had been. I noticed that the way-bill had the weight of the crate down as 360 kg and she had charged me for 380. Like a complete poltroon I handed over all of the money. I should have realised by this stage that the crate had been accepted by Thai Airways and I wasn’t over a barrel any more. I was so used to having to accept whatever line this woman sold me that I just handed over the money to ‘make it happen’. When I questioned the anomaly, she dismissed it as a typo - the fact that this typo meant that she was paying less to Thai Airways than I had paid to her was an irrelevance to me apparently. Dealing with this two-faced harpy has left me feeling pretty sick. I’m just glad it’s all over.

I had managed to perform the minor task of washing the bike gear and mending clothes. My hope was that if I could get the dirt out of our gear it may save us a couple of kgs. The process was not only hard work but I was shocked by the conditions the management expected their cleaners to do the washing. The hotel we were in was smart and organised, but nip up to the roof where the women hand washed the bedding, and it was another story. Not even the sophistication of a tap on the water tank to access water. They had to siphon it out of the top using a tube lined with algae and all kinds of nastiness. I tried not to think about the possible bacteria breeding the tube as I sucked to get flow. All the same, it did save 25baht (30p) a kg on washing. Needless to say I was unimpressed that Pat had allowed Cruella to steal money from us. Although I understood completely that he did not want any more contact with her than was absolutely necessary.

Sjaak had arrived at the Lamphu Guesthouse on his way from Cambodia to Phuket and back to Bangkok to also fly to Kathmandu. He looked shell-shocked by the insulting treatment we had received and said he’d try to collect our overspend back off darling Joy. He’d met with Beer, the other (more professional) shipping agent, and he, too, was horrified by the way she’d behaved. He was recommending reporting her to the Airforwarders Ombudsman or whatever the Thai equivalent would be. It is all something I’d rather move on from. I must just add a postscript on the Horizons Unlimited web site though.

Tiffin time

We had a delightful time taking tea with the British Ambassador at his residence. It has quite a remarkable location. Just along from Siam Square, nestling amongst the swankiest department stores is a corner of a foreign field that, one assumes, will be forever England. I’ve always understood that consular real estate is effectively a part of pertinent nation. I could be wrong. Anyway, it all boils down to the fact that when the plot was given over to the Brits the land was not surrounded so. Now the thoroughfare to the front is one of the major arteries and even has a light rail system passing at high level in front of the gate. Oh what joy, though, that at a peckish moment they can send someone off to the Dunkin Donuts a couple of blocks away. But seriously ....

David and Gwendoline had been VSOs in Papua New Guinea and this was our common ground. John Stopps had put us in contact with David originally when we were in Bangkok and we’d made a vague (aren’t we always) arrangement to meet up on our return. We were received most cordially and treated to afternoon tea dispensed by white-gloved staff. Makes a change from brewing up on a petrol stove in the middle of a desert but one has to be a little flexible. It is the mark of a successful diplomat that they can make anyone feel welcome and comfortable even when they don’t know quite what to do when presented with tea cup and then faced with a hovering servant bearing a tray of tea add-ons. Despite putting on our least worn and cleanest clothes, and being freshly showered, I could not help but feel underdressed, our faded, stained, and repaired rucksack slumped scruffly in a corner of their reception room that was filled with all manner of objets d’arte. I realise that if you invite people who have been travelling 4.5 years to tea, one cannot expect them to turn up in a tailored suit, but I was self-conscious. I don’t think we let the side down too much. I hope we didn’t bore them too much with our too-obvious talk about consular matters.

Meanwhile,Gwendoline and I were discussing much more important matters. Such as shopping, well more the mutual problem that we both faced when we returned to England after doing VSO. She like I had been shell-shocked by British supermarkets, having had 2 years being lucky if you could find any cheese at all, to walk into Tesco or Sainsbury’s and being faced by an aisle of cheese to choose from was overwhelming, to the point that you buy no cheese at all. This led us onto the more difficult question of what to do when we get back to England. I fear that the immediate need to earn money will mean that we do not actually take the time to reassess our situation and mindlessly fall back into the lifestyles we had been so determined to leave. And we will again be frustrated that relatively to rest of the world, earn a lot of money, but will not have the free time to enjoy it. As Britain comes closer, the more I am apprehensive about the known and the more I relish the unknown.

We certainly had a very enjoyable afternoon and left wondering whether a short career in the diplomatic service would suit us. There are three huge factors mitigating against this idea; 42 is probably not considered an ideal age for starting down this road, judging by recent dealings with Joy my diplomacy is questionable and when faced with having to offer the represenatation of the British government to child molesters and drug smugglers in foreign gaols, I’d probably let ‘em swing. I knew that I felt so unaccustomed to the lifestyle, that the only position I would be good for was assistant gardener or cleaner. It was nice to know though that Ghurkas are still employed as guards to our embassies. Some traditions remain.

World problems

We met a few people who have recently arrived from Nepal and confirmed our suspicions that news snippets about Maoist insurgence is somewhat overblown. There seems to be only one issue that effects tourists. Maoist checkpoints get set up here and there where taxation is performed. Once your 10 dollars has been extracted, you are issued with a receipt thanking you for your ‘voluntary’ contirbution to party funds. This is a ‘get out of checkpoint free’ card which, once waved under the nose of the next tax man means that you don’t have to make further contributions to the cause. I’m rather hoping to get caught twice, present my receipt on the second occasion, get waved on and then offer to make a contribution - just for the craic. More disturbingly from our point of view is the rumour that the police are enforcing a temporary motorcycle pillion ban. This is hopefully just for the duration of the election otherwise poor Hippy will be giving me directions from the rear window of a bus.

Nepal was not the only country hitting the insurrection news. There were demonstrations in Thailand over the corrupt activites of the Prime Minister, Thaksin, who seems to have amassed a huge amount of wealth out of insider knowledge of business dealings, avoiding 20 billion Bhat of taxes etc, etc. And the Islamic world seems to be done a great job of promoting a small satyrical magazine in Demark. I am sure it is profitting nicely now out the increased publicity and sales. I understand that Islamic people were offended and that the cartoon was tasteless and deliberately controversial, but I find it hard to understand why people in countries where it was not published would want to attract people’s attention to it, and potentially increase its circulation and offense.

Meanwhile Cheney, is shooting his friend ‘accidently’. I am dismayed that the media in the US seems only to be concerned rather churlishly that they were not informed, of the incident, sooner. Sorry, if a man that advocates war, cannot even use the weapon in his own hands safely, should he not be called to resign, can you really expect him to care or even notice if US soldiers hit civilians or even their fellow soldiers with ‘friendly fire’. Are the morals of the US media so twisted that having an affair calls for the resignation of Clinton but a war-monger shooting a friend does not. It seems that it is not shooting of a friend not once but twice (how do you do that by accident twice?), but the fact that be didn’t tell poeple, eh?? Even after spending nearly a year in the US, I continue to be confused by the standards and morals their media portray. For me it was the lack of discrimination. I believe the hunting accident occurred on a quail shoot. A quail is at most 6 inches long. The average American is in the region of 6 feet tall. A factor of twelve.

Anyway, with all kinds of insurrection and political nonsense going on in the world, a few Moaists in Nepal are not likely to put us off. In Loas we now discover that we travelled a famous drug running route the wrong way, and all we noticed was lots of friendly people. Perhaps if you go the same way as the drugs you may be suspected of being in competition and so the locals wouldn’t be so welcoming.

We left Bangkok as we had found it - in the rain. Our spirits were high. Thailand has some wonderful points, but overall we had found it frustrating and rather over-rated. Nepal sounds just the right kind of place for recharging our positivism batteries.