Top Tips : First time in Nepal?

So you have decided to go to Nepal. Where is it on the Globe anyways, this tiny speck of a country which has the highest mountains of the world? (interesting fact: between 70m to the top of the world around 8.5 kms up in a meagre 250 km breadth and hence the steepest country in the world). Let me try to ease you into this amazing country called Nepal.

# 1: Quick Facts
Its in between China and India, has about 27m people, over 150 ethnicities and languages - from the Sherpas who are the Worlds top climbers (the current world record is 21 times up Everest, soon to be broken) to the Tharu - the only ethnic group in the world resistant to Malaria.

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# 2: Visa on Arrival
Nepal has one of the easiest entry rules in the world. Barring a few countries, very very few, all nations are allowed in on a Visa on Arrival. You could fill an online application and come with the receipt, or fill it in at the airport, pay the visa fee, and welcome to Nepal. Easy as that!

# 3: English is more common than you think

You will be mildly surprised how easy its to get around Nepal, especially if you can speak English. The official language is Nepali, which has a 36 alphabet script of its own, but most schools teach English, so we have a huge percentage of the population who can speak English, making travel in Nepal super easy.

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# 4: Internet penetration is super high
An opening of the cyber space investments by the Government in the early 90s has paved a way to get pretty decent penetration for the internet. Since the last ten odd years, the 3g networks have started and you can get fairly fast internet connectivity. It is also probably the country with the highest percentage of tourism providers offering free wifi. So you will never lose contact with your loved ones.

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# 5: Its affordable
Getting to Nepal can be expensive, specially if you are coming in Long Haul, but once you are in the country, its quite inexpensive. This is quite a boon for budget travellers.

# 6: You will like the food
There are a very few travellers who have gone back after a trip to Nepal saying. “Your food sucks”. The Dal Bhaat (rice and lentil soup with other side dishes), the momos (dumplings and sauce) are super duper hits, and everyone love them.

# 7: Its safe
Crime is very very low in Nepal, and specially for travellers it is very safe. There have been incidents here too of course, but its rare and nothing untoward that could not have happened anywhere else in the world. Practice standard precautions, and you will be fine.

Photo by: Rocky Prajapati

# Smile like a local
We smile easy, and so it works really well if travellers do the same. We make friends very quickly and its not uncommon to meet a guy at a bar the first time and he will get into a fight for you by the end of the evening, if need be!



# 8: Its not all trekking and mountains
Its popular for trekking, but there are so many other layers. ParaHawking, Cayoning, bungy jumping and a giant swing, mountain biking, stand up paddling, you name it - a wide variety of safe and fun softadventure experiences are right here.

# Bring along a great attitude
Its not what you think it is. So bringing along a right attitude could be critical in determining how much you will enjoy Nepal.

Happy Journeys!

Ropain: The rice planting festival 2015

Pic courtesy - https://www.facebook.com/jaysan.photography

Carrying on with the tradition of celebrating ROPAIN as in yesteryears, socialtours organized a group of expatriates and tourist to travel to the southern ridge of the Kathmandu Valley to indulge in one of Nepal’s most colorful and exuberant festivals. After the earthquake of April 25th this was one of the major events to take place.

On 27th June, 2015, the journey towards the paddy fields began at 8 am and we reached the Bajrabarahi temple after an hour of driving through earthquake damaged village houses and well manicured terraced fields. A brief stop at the temple and the team was on its way to the fields. After a quick change of clothes the planting began in earnest. Fifteen minutes of rice planting then gave way to over three hours of fun and frolic in the mud. Mud wrestling, tug of war and mud racing then over took rice planting.

In between local rice beer, rice wine, Newar style sautéed buffalo meat and spicy potato was served. This served as an energizer for the mayhem in the mud to continue for another two hours. After another hour in the fields mingling with the local farming community and giving continuity to on the spot invented games, it was time to relish a typical village Newar lunch. After shower and change of clothes under the open sky an eight course Newar lunch was laid out. Food was as varied as from beaten rice, chicken, bamboo shoot to your regular potato curry. 3 pm and we were pulling our tired bodies into the bus for the ride back home.

This year the crowd was smaller than in previous years due to the earthquake, but let me assure the fun wasn’t. It was an occasion that everyone relished and spoke highly of. It was also a measure of how far we had come after the earthquake in terms of getting our lives back to normal. socialtours has come back stronger and better after April 25th and we promise you a bigger and more eventful ROPAIN 2016.

All photos sourced from https://www.facebook.com/jaysan.photography

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Psychological preparation for disaster

Today, at socialtours, we had a short session with one of our senior city guide Sarita Shrestha regarding the human psychology during and after the natural disaster.

The session started with the sharing of experiences related to the earthquake that hit Nepal on 25th April 2015 with the magnitude of 7.8RS. Everyone had their own stories about where they were, how they felt, what was their immediate response, what was the lasting impact and so on.

We realized that there was something common in the stories we shared. We all were in the state of high alert during the quake and were trying hard to find a safe place for oneself. This taught us the fact that the greatest threat of human being is the threat of life; it makes us ready to do anything... and that means anything.

Then, we evaluated the impact of disaster in our mental health. We found that most of us still have not recovered from the fear. This session, however, helped us to realize that it's normal for anyone to go through such trauma, everyone will get back to their normal life; the pace of recovery depends the personal strength.

On the whole, the session was quite fruitful.  

Socialtours would like to thank Sarita for her time and effort.

Internalizing Environmental Responsibility

I can see that it is getting progressively more and more complicated to "put your money where your mouth is" in the world of responsibility. As we "develop" ourselves, we generally get more and more "irresponsible" if we live normal lives, and unless you turn yourself into a eccentric ascetic, you might as well be ready to compromise heavily on what you believe in. I think a beggar in the streets of Kolkata is more environmentally responsible than I am, though I might consider myself the more "sensitive".

Living now in Austria for short time has reinforced the Western dominance in the world of environmental degradation and energy consumption. Agreed, most things seem unavoidable, but I feel that life in air polluted Kathmandu beats living in Austria in terms of environmental responsibility if calculated in terms of "per capita negative impacts".

I work in a cold cellar, with a heater on (I try to turn it off from time to time) and with the onset of winter, its also dark, so I use lights. Everything around me guzzles electricity, and the moment I walk out, I need to drive to go anywhere, mostly alone, as public transport is few and far between where I live. The mailboxes are always full of junk paper, which I would rather not have in the first place, and I need more energy to cook each meal, as I also have to drive to the grocery to bring the stuff back, usually alone in the car. Everything I buy has tons of packing on it, usually plastic, the fruits even have a small brand stamp, which I have to chuck. I could go on, roping in all facets of responsibility, but I think the point is made.

The one thing that I can appreciate is the waste disposal mechanism, where everything is sorted, recycled or vanishes out of view. I think, in Kathmandu, I produce less than one tenth inorganic waste than when I am here, except my waste in Kathmandu is probably on the streets, later taken away to ugly open dumping sites! On the trek, I probably produce very close to zero inorganic waste!

It is also true that one can live a "green" life even here, but I am just a normal person, wanting to live a normal live, albeit a slightly "greener" one.

Unfortunately, in this world, we are all moving towards the lifestyles of the west, and though one might think that "progress" is when Kathmandu will be like Vienna, I am glad I will probably not be there to experience it.