four pieces from the next Pour
into
The Bucket Of Unused Ideas
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can i invent the word “wanderalogue”?
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and write one from my pouch of a perch of a balcony
above Sedi and the lake at Pokhara
where i am once again
alighting from the thermals of the winds of chance
the accidental randoms of the whims of fate
after some easy plan-changing
and easier hitch-hiking
took me where’er the winds would go
and off the route of my planned amble
from Methlang to the chai-shop’s viewpoint
over terraces and jungle and valley and lake and city
after the super-sweaty uphill traipse
from breakfast with Italian cyclist Maury
who doesn’t drink
yet drank exotic ritual Tongba
a fermented rice millet
last night with me and Guvan from Maharashtra
in the fancy-ish East Nepalese resto in Sedi
and wasn’t drunk
but then spent hours lying staringly awake for no apparent reason
and, from now on, will stick to smoking
like all the staying foreigners here
including the Indians
who are all stoners
except me
while breakfast got disturbed by our cook
spotting a venomous green snake in the bush
three feet behind Maury
[see photo]
a Nepalese Pit Snake, no less
which is apparently only dangerous at night ...
yet ...
so, i ascended in the clammiest clammy morning air
and, by the time i got through Methlang to Kabaudi, i
already
looked like i just did an hour Fringe show in a small hot unventilated sweatbox-theatre somewhere in the Canadian Prairies
even though i repeatedly stopped to enjoy the stunning views
of the lake, the forests, the two wide valleys,
of Pokhara itself
which looks much nicer from a distance
as a mosaic of colour rooftops
rather than a tight hodge-podge of distempered concrete and off-greys
busy, friendly, likeable
and more interesting the more i explore
but not pretty
so the hitched motorbike from Methlang is heading up to Sarangkhot
with the temple and the tower and the five-headed Ganesh
up a beautiful winding road of green forest
and green jungle
and greener rice-paddy terraces
yet, unexpectedly, he doesn’t go up the final slope
so i think
should i stay on?
like i did with a bike-lift three days back
when it and i headed way along the high slopes of the ridge into the total unknown
through village after village
until i reached what turned out to be the main road
at a place with many spellings
Nadonda, Naugdanda, Naudanda, and more
and a big road allowing a neat hitch-hike back into the actual city
or
should i head up the steps?
to see if i can break my own unbroken records for sweating
or
should i take the clambersome stone steps directly down
which i guess i should
if i want to get back before mid-afternoon
and get any writing done
so i climb off the bike
creakily
as my tendons are made of unstretchable wire
and take the path down
amongst the old stone houses and banana trees and terraces
and shiny new tiled houses
and barking dogs
where flipflops on the steep stone steps isn’t perfect
but is manageable
till i reach the vistaed chai shop
my original destination
where i don’t have to order
and the woman will simply bring me my cold water and chai
the cold water being my third litre out of at least ten for the day
it being
did i say?
clammier than clammy ever could be
so i rename myself Mr Soggy
while i attempt to finish the Hemingway
The Sun Also Rises
bought because Pokhara has an unspoiling paucity of booky choices
yet elect to wait to finish this not-bad
this increasingly admirable
book
and pick myself up to head down more of the steep
the stone
while i’m again surprised to hear voices above me
which must be swooping paragliders
or passengers in the cable car
and where the utterly irregular steep steps
here overgrown
there flattening into a cliffside amble
require concentration
attention
so descending takes a while
though i can’t stop
because... mosquitoes
though i do have check for leeches
as i work my way down
passing a few support stanchions of the cable car
thinking of the opening of Herzog’s Aguirre: Wrath Of God
and thoroughly, happily
immersed in the lushly sumptuously verdantly jungly greener-than-green
i mean the lush
the sumptuous
the verdant
and the
greener than green
while dripping sweat from my nose and
half-blind from the salt in my eye
as i swivellingly zag
and ziggingly swivel
until i
now renamed Mr Soggy-McSoggy
because Mrs Soggy and Mr McSoggy
met here
and married
and gave birth to me
Mr Jeremy Soggy-McSoggy
until i am down
onto a flattish concrete lane
which will take me drably into Sedi
for quick shopping
some quicker hydration
and the easy walk back up here to my perch
to have a cold shower
and write this
thinking of the minor
and the major
whimsical winds of
fated chance
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in other news
after six weeks
no plans to move for a fortnight
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