Nepal Day 1 - Everest Flight

We're back in Dubai and still a bit high from our trip to Nepal (figuratively, but we did see pot growing by the side of the road). I hope you'll enjoy some photos and stories from our trip. Click on Photos above to see more pics.

We hadn’t arranged transportation to the Hyatt, and Jim let one of the hucksters talk us into a ride. It turned out he worked for a tour company, and though it all seemed like a shill, Jim let him set up a meeting at the hotel with the tour company boss for an hour later. We cleaned up (I’m still sweating from my airport ordeal), had a quick swim and went for the meeting. The boss, Raj, turned out to be a really sweet young guy, and totally on the up and up, and we sat and arranged our entire week with him. We booked the Everest flight for the first morning (it is very weather dependent, and we were told we might have to try on multiple days), and then took the guide’s suggestions for some other tours. We booked a driver and guide for 3 different days in the city, and an overnight excursion to the Chitwan National Park for an elephant safari. We decided to have a car drive us there and fly back. It’s only 120km by road but apparently takes around 5 hours (six as it turned out, and only 20 minutes to fly back!). All the transportation for the whole week was arranged, including to and from hotel, airport, and even to the airport to fly back home; the driver would bring us to our hotel after tour days, then return for us to go for dinner. We left 1½ days free, but were given the option of adding in tours those days, all included. The grand total, including all the airfares, guide, driver, entry fees into all but one of the attractions, overnight accommodations for the safari including all excursions (elephant and otherwise) and all meals, came to $1,500US. For both of us. Jim handed over the credit card.

I was a little nervous the first morning as we waited at 5:30 for the driver to take us to the airport for the Everest flight. It could all be a total scam, and the $1,500US will have vanished into thin air along with all our credit card information, but the driver was there, along with Raj’s brother Ram to give us our typed itinerary for the week and all our tickets and receipts. The weather looked fine (they do a test flight every morning, and if it looks ok, the tour plane leaves at 6:30), and the driver would be waiting for us when we returned to take us back to the hotel to rest, then take us to pick up our guide later in the morning (time of our choosing) for a couple of sights.

The Everest flight was AMAZING. Buddha Air is set up in the domestic terminal, a dark, cavernous hall of a place with clench-inducing bathrooms. We milled around with our fellow Everest spotters, and took off on time, feeling very lucky to get the flight on our first day of trying. It only took a few minutes to fly past the Kathmandu valley and see the Himalayan mountains bursting from the valleys. Buddha Air thoughtfully handed out a fold-out illustration showing the names of the peaks, and their heights. The stewardess went up and down the aisle helpfully matching up the map to the view from the windows. There were about 20 seats, in only 2 rows and the aisle, so everyone had a window seat. Jim had the mountain view for the first half, so I strained over him and our other fellow passengers, snapping photos and oohing and ahing along with everyone else. I went to the front to look out the pilots’ window for my first glimpse of Everest. Stunning! Words and pictures can not convey the feeling of looking at the famous peak, surrounded by its equally picturesque neighbours. A few wispy clouds couldn’t detract from the beauty. The plane turned around in front of Everest, not as close as I’d hoped, but awe-inspiring nonetheless. I got the Himalaya side on the return, and took lots of photos of the mist-shrouded peaks, and the lush, deep green valleys. The stewardess continued to point out the peaks, seemingly the top ten of the highest mountains on earth (that one’s the fourth highest, the second highest, etc) and noted that Gauri Shankar is sacred and is not open to climbers. I got a beautiful shot of it with the sun spiking off the clouds clinging to the peak. An absolutely stunning experience, it even brought me to tears a little (I know, shocker), and was over all too quickly. We were back at the hotel by 8am. Jim was in complete awe, and was wishing we’d gone for the 10 times more expensive option of the helicopter ride to the base camp. Definitely one of the places on earth that one needs to see in person to really get it…countless shows and photos don’t convey the awesomeness of it. And the word awesomeness should never be used for anything less!

#2 - Dubai Service Industry

There are lots of things service-related that this Canadian girl finds interesting in Dubai. In stream-of-consciousness order:

Shop hours are called "Timings". I don't know why I think this sounds funny, but I even laugh at myself when I call the pharmacy and ask, "What are your timings?"

You can get anything delivered to your home. You can call the local shop and have them deliver one can of Coke if you'd like. This is most tempting for me when I run out of milk, but I'm afraid if I call they will look for the oldest milk in the fridge and send that one. Once we were out of all mixes and had company coming, so we phoned for 6 cans each of Soda Water, Tonic, and Bitter Lemon (a wonderful concoction of tonic and lemonade). Five minutes later, a man arrived with six cans of soda, six cans of tonic, and six lemons. Oh well.

You can also have your laundry picked up at your home and returned to you cleaned and pressed. Laundry service is insanely cheap here, running about a dollar for a laundered and pressed dress shirt. This sounded like a dream in theory, but the shirts always seemed to come back smelling of damp and incense smoke, so Jim's taken to dropping his off at the dry cleaner's, for a much increased rate (but stink-free). There are dry-cleaners in our area who drop off cards advertising pick up and delivery, but we haven't had much luck communicating with them by telephone. (See future post on how everyone in Dubai speaks English, sort of). As an aside, I am acutely terrified by the sight of men teetering along on their bicycles in heavy traffic laden with plastic-wrapped shirts from the laundries.

The other thing to have delivered is food. Not just pizza and curry, either. I find it hilarious that you can get Burger King to deliver here. This would be way better for me if I actually liked Burger King. The food delivery men are nearly as terrifying on the roads as the laundry bikes; they weave in and out of cars on their tiny motorcycles with the insulated metal food boxes on the back. Thankfully, they usually wear helmets.

My favorite thing to have delivered is water for the dispenser. The five gallon jugs cost 7 dirhams, or $2, and they will deliver them to your door five minutes after you call. In our case, our apartment building keeps them on hand and a maintenance man will bring your bottles to you in a grocery cart. I love it!

Staffing of retail shops is also an interesting thing in Dubai. Now that I am working in the retail industry, I know for a fact that many shops (not ours) pay their retail staff 1,000-2,000 dirhams (less than $300-$600) a month, and full time is legislated to be 48 hours. I'm sure this seems like a lot to the people who come here for those jobs from Philippines and India, but Dubai is expensive. The low wages have a few consequences. For $300/month, you do not get very educated or well-trained staff. Stores seem to compensate for that by hiring way too many staff, none of whom will know what you mean when you ask for, say, Ginger Ale. I was once with a friend, the only customers in a 400 sq foot yogurt shop with no fewer than 12 people working there. In this case there were way too many of them, but they were all super nice and friendly, and the frozen yogurt was perfect. It all seems like in an investment in quantity over quality to me, and in fairness to the hapless underpaid staff in Dubai, they don't seem to be given much training, or much of a chance to succeed. This is certainly not true across the board, as there are many fine establishments who have well-trained and seemingly contented staff, but sadly it's not uncommon.

Also in shops, the staff have a tendency to follow the customers. This really makes me cranky, though I try to be understanding. I have realized (again from working in retail myself) that many local shoppers expect the staff to follow them around in case they have any questions. It still makes me crazy to be tailed like a teenaged shoplifter, though, and I have on occasion snapped at a camera/phone/shoe salesperson that "I am just looking, I will find you if I have any questions!"

My absolute favorite crazy thing about spending your money in Dubai is that no one ever has change. I totally get asking if you have 25 fils or a couple of dirhams (coins) when you are paying at the grocery store; it makes the change easier. Fine. What kills me is that taxis never have change for a 100 dirham note on a fare anywhere less than 50dhs. That's like not having change for a $20 bill if your taxi ride was six bucks. I've had cab drivers drive around asking other taxi drivers for change. Shops will be the same...Chloe and I went into a self-proclaimed pharmacy hypermarket, and they didn't have change for a 100 dirham note. This would all be fine if the ATM's dispensed 20's or 50's, but they usually give you 500 or 1,000 dirham notes, for which NO ONE has change. I've carried a 1,000 dirham note around in my wallet for days until I could get to a big grocery store, the liquor store, or even a bank. Luckily we keep a bag of coins here at home to pay for small things, like the water delivery. Sadly, we've paid for pizza in mostly coins! Luckily, the delivery guys never speak enough English to give us any crap about it.