November 22nd arrived bright, sunny, and chilly. We knew we weren’t going to get near a turkey, so settled for exquisite pancakes for breakfast. That’s about as good as it would get, unless we plucked cabbages from one of the many high-altitude farms we passed.

Leaving our guest house early,

we said goodbye to our hostess, working next to her homemade greenhouse, and our friendly, ubiquitous bird.

Anyone for cabbages? High altitude gardens abound as do water-powered prayer wheels, but beware of the yak curd (above at wayside hut) if you have a dicey stomach….

Yaks and Dzos graze

as we go in and out of rocky fields and ever-steeper terrain. Here are more scenes along the way.

No matter how rocky the terrain, we can always find a rest stop decked with flowers. Ask Cary and Christy…

and a waterfall over a rushing stream. The beauty overwhelms….

One of many Tibetans we met at various rest stops

And you guessed it! Christine and Erwin again!

It’s all yours, Christy. One of the challenges of the Himalaya….

Up and down dale….or is it down and up?

This was NOT fun!

Carrying logs home

Waiting for permission to enter Langtang Park

The Hotel Tibetan Guest House, our home for the night….

Pema and Buddhi are waiting for us,

As is our hostess.And, lest you think we had forgotten…here is our vegetarian Thanksgiving dinner…including pie for dessert

And another glorious sunset

Not a bad Thanksgiviing, eh? And there’s more to come. Stay tuned….

Just one final note on the cultural agenda, which I know you, my readers, are eager to hear, but not as eager as I am to share: There have been two Plainfield Symphony concerts, the first featuring Prokofiev and the final composed of excerpts from Verdi’s operas. If any of you saw the movie, Quartet, you know how great that can be. I highly recommend it.

Speaking of opera, I enjoyed over four hours of Handel in the Metropolitan Opera’s great production of Giulio Cesare starring Natalie Dessay. You can’t get any better, even though I am not wild over countertenors. Handel sure knows how to write music for them. As for theater, I highly recommend the new musical Hands on a Hardbody with one of my favorites, Hunter Foster; Hit The Wall about the 1969 gay uprising at the Stonewall Bar (the theater was right across the street); and The Testament of Mary, superbly acted by Fiona Shaw. Rather disappointing was the revival of Clifford Odet’s The Big Knife, with Bobby Cannavale. I also was thrilled to spend an evening with the Wyman-Kelly family in West Hartford and go to a concert at the Bushnell Theater put on by 8th graders. It was  outstanding! I remember the days when to go to a concert of elementary children necessitated earplugs. Not so this one. A band, orchestra and chorus of high quality. Leah Kelly was the lead trumpet.

My final musical adventure took place in Harlem last week, where my musician friend from England, Mike Fenton was putting the finishing touches on an article for an English Record  Collecting magazine about Maxine Brown, one of the original soul divas of the 1960′s. Look her up online. She sang with many of the greats and had her own singles as well. She’s beautiful, talented, and still going strong with a new group. Next week she’ll be traveling with Ben E. King and others to Germany for the Baltic Soul Weekend.

The inimitable Mike Fenton and Maxine Brown

Ride, anyone?

Sometimes a bus would get ahead of us…but not for long!

We stopped for veggies in a small town…

And finally arrived in Syabru Besi in mid-afternoon

The intrepid trekkers, Meg, Cary, and Christy settled for a night at the Yala Peak Guest House…

Lots of children playing games in the road as we took an evening stroll around town….

Chicken, anyone?

Our first day was very strenuous, reminiscent of the rocky trail in Sikkim two years ago. We climbed for seven hours with 3,500 ft. of gain. There were numerous long skinny swinging bridges and several stops for tea.

Take your pick!

I’ll take the swinging ones, thank you….

Typical lunch break

Way on a distant cliff were hanging beehives

We were never far from the Langtang River….

The mountains are getting closer and closer

Approaching Lower Rimche

We made it!

Erwin and Christine, German friends we met our first and last night in Langtang.

Our hostess used a most unusual stove, and was the food good!

Day is Dying in the West

And now for a long winter’s nap….

Majestic Swayambhunath, the monkey temple….

See, I promised to give you a fast trip around ye olde Kathmandu as I revisited the student quarters in Thamel, my favorite guest house, The Potala, and the temples of Durbar Marg. You’ve heard the statement, “You can never go back,” and I’ve been defying that for twenty-five years. But this year I finally am convinced that my lungs and my nerves have grown fragile enough to warrant moving down the road apiece and leaving the pollution and the center of town to the crazies. Hate to give up, but down the road apiece isn’t exactly dullsville. There’s a whole separate culture in Boudhanath and I loved being a part of it!

Monkeys, monkeys everywhere!

Top of the world…Kathmandu Valley spread out below

Temples, chapels, prayer wheels, worshippers….

Exotic carving…typical Newari architecture

Heading up the other side….

Three giant Buddhas

Their heads are a favorite perch for the monkeys!

Anyone for woodcarvings and singing bowls? Christy and I could not resist….

Heading back to Kathmandu

The Potala, my former not so fancy digs….

Christy went wild over the wandering cows

Durbar Marg, a feast of temples

Classic Hindu temples filled with erotic paintings and sculpture

Be sure to park your vehicle outside the square….

Raj Kumar, who makes the best espresso coffee in Kathmandu….

If you don’t believe me, just ask Christy!

So there you have it, folks. We’re un-jetlagged, we’ve found a good cup of coffee, and we’re ready to head for the hills. Next episode…discovering Langtang.

In closing I have a few words for the people who have ruined my life. Those who have put electronics in the hands of children so they can make the old and the wise seem stupid and useless. When a five-year-old has to explain why your screen is moving from side to side with no help from you, and the words and lines just keep bopping around senselessly, and then begs you to calm down and tell him the problem (just tell me where it hurts?), you know you’re ready for the ice floe. In fact, before very long you’re yearning for it.

My children and grandchildren tell me that I’m the only person they know who becomes violent when using an Apple computer. They’re “user friendly,” they say. Perhaps so, but WordPress isn’t. Uploading photos takes about as much time as waiting for someone from Verizon or the Bank of America to answer the phone. Is it any wonder that being a nervous wreck is becoming a way of life in these h’yer United States? So, you ask, why do you keep going back for more, Meg? Are you so imbued with the old-time Protestant work ethic that says that all life is a struggle, and the only way  you coast is downhill, that you can’t let go? Why not invest in a hatchet and let these blamed devices know who’s boss?

In the meantime, I do have my diversions or activities that feed my soul between bouts of computer depression and sun deprivation (it’s been a dreary winter). Have had a couple of neat symphony concerts, one of which was led by Sabin Pautza, our former conductor at the Plainfield Symphony. Along with his compositions, we played the Brahms 4th Symphony. That kept me out of trouble for some time.

Opera season is in full sway and, of course, Broadway is forever beckoning. Outstanding plays I’ve seen so far this year are the hilarious and unusual The Mystery of Edwin Drood, The Heiress, with the superb David Strathairn, Dan Stevens of Downton Abbey fame, and Judith Ivey, The Other Place, with an outstanding performance by Laurie Metcalf, and the stunning Steppenwolf revival of Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, with Tracy Letts and Amy Morton.

I’m still waiting for imaginative suggestions about where I can live, but none have been forthcoming. Is everybody frozen? Surely not my friends in L.A. or the Caribbean (I hate them, anyway). Hey, I could just sit tight and wait for Global Warming to do its job and wake up some morning with MIami Beach in my backyard. Who knows?

Blogs are supposed to be short and sweet, with pictures for those who are tired of the onslaught of verbiage in their daily diet. Pictures I have by the thousands with words to match! But suffice it to say that since my last entry on November 19, 2012, I have trekked to around 17,000 ft., sold my house in Maplewood, NJ, moved to temporary digs at daughter Martha’s, with the aid of my second son, Tom, who journeyed from California to keep me sane and on target, and managed to rid myself of sixty years of accumulated “stuff,” more, even, than the legendary George Carlin could imagine. And all of that in one sentence! The remainder of my memorabilia that I couldn’t bear to throw away is in a storage facility near Kean University just waiting for me to decide what to do when I grow up. I might add that the announcement of the sale of my house came as I was trekking in the Langtang region of the Nepalese Himalayas with daughter, Cary Peterson, and Christy Korrow, a writer and editor who, like Cary, lives on Whidbey Island, WA.  The message came in on Christy’s cell phone. We’ve come a long way since my first climb to Everest Base Camp in 1987! In those days, when you were away, you were definitely AWAY! I know, that’s a split infinitive, but who cares about grammar today, when half the newscasters on TV are throwing fig leaves to the enemy in lieu of olive branches? Things are just plain going to hell, aren’t they?

For those of you who read the dedication in the front of my book, you know that one of my mantras is: Never fear walking into the unknown. I’ve tried to live my life accordingly, but now am being tested big time to put my money where my mouth is. The next few months will be exciting and a bit scary. Any suggestions, no matter how crazy, will be welcomed. I feel very fortunate to have so many choices, but also am torn between my love for my town, my symphony, my friends, the opera, and Broadway to name a few of the advantages of the New York Metropolitan area, and the wild Northwest with its open spaces, its rugged mountains, and the delightful town of Langley, WA, where my daughter, Cary, lives…a stone’s throw from Seattle.

Let’s start from where I left off and take you, first, to the picturesque Tibetan enclave of Boudhanath, not far from the center of Kathmandu. When you take a cab from the airport, however, over unimaginably pot-holed and semi-paved roads, you think it’s far. This is unfortunately true of most of Nepal. The traffic has gotten worse along with the roads, but for some reason the tempers seem to be stable. I had to park my western impatience on the tarmac when I arrived.

It gets  worse the closer you come, and is positively treacherous if you’re trying to walk at night. No streetlights…just your wits and good humor!

Boudhanath is famous for its immense stupa with eyes that look out over the pilgrims who come there. Every morning and evening throngs of the faithful, of all ages, walk around the outside and the second tier, saying mantras and meditating. The stupa is 118 ft. high and if you want to see the action you can look it up on line. I found it a glorious place to be, especially at dusk when the candles were lit and the stores lining the route were filled with music. It was magical.

Notice the pigeons…they’re everywhere!

Hundreds of people light candles for their loved ones

And burn special incense

This little lady sat there all day blessing the faithful

This little lady captivated me with her saucy eyes….

And her father, too….

Boudha Gate

Stupa entrance

Scenes around the temple….people doing Kora; some buying and selling; others just watching

Public washing outside stupa complex

It’s almost impossible to convey the excitement and camaraderie surrounding this sacred place. We were so lucky to have found a guest house nearby, affiliated with the Shechan Monastery (pron. Say-chen), which I will show you in detail in a future post.  People from many countries enjoyed the courtyard…those involved in NGO’s, monks, and trekkers  like us…making our stay ever-changing and always interesting. Having been in Nepal several times over the last twenty-five years, it was especially amusing for me to see this quiet, meditative space invaded by iPads and iPods. Imagine monks in the old days sitting around communicating with these modern devices. Cell phones have long been the phone of choice in Asia, but the iPad blew me away!

Shechen Monastery

I had to laugh when the pilot on my first United flight came on the intercom to laud the grand new Boeing 777 with its multiple engines and luxury appointments. All I could do was wonder why such an enormous piece of machinery could decrease the seating space for the tourist class to the point where anyone with knees would soon be an endangered species.  Never before have I so envied first class!  I will say that the food during my flights was awful, until I boarded Thai Airways.  Now that was fabulous…the food as beautiful as the stewardesses.

For three days my daughter, Cary, and her friend, Christy Korrow,  have been staying at the Norbu Sangpo Hotel in the town of Boudha, which is famous for its enormous stupa around which devout  Buddhists do kora morning and evening. There is a much more relaxed pace than in Kathmandu, and nowhere near the smog and dirt that is becoming so prevalent in Asian cities. Temperatures are in the 80′s, since we’re in the Indus Valley, and poinsettias and bougainvillia abound. It’s spring all over again.

Yesterday Chisty and I did a grand tour of Kathmandu, starting at the famous Swayambunath Temple, swinging through Thamel, the student area, and ending up in Durbar Marg with all the Hindu Temples.  Next time I’ll write more about my sentimental return, but right now a car is waiting to take us to the mountains. For two glorious weeks we’ll actually be incommunicado, something I’m looking forward to after the hustle and bustle of the city.

I’m thinking of you as you approach Thanksgiving and will be with friends and family in spirit as you celebrate.

My beautiful backyard

The root of the problem

And this is nothing! Giant trees were uprooted all over town, and there are those who still have no electricity. I was only in the dark for five days. Fortunately, I had the foresight to install a backup to my sump pump after Hurricane Irene flooded my basement, so was spared last year’s misery. It’s actually heartwarming to see how people pull together during these near-tragic experiences. Churches, libraries, stores, and restaurants all welcomed those who had no heat or light. Free meals were served, phones were charged, children were tended, all in a loving, helpful spirit. The streets of Maplewood Village were teeming with families just walking together and enjoying community interaction. For the first time I encountered a long line outside our movie theater. And the two pizza parlors were bursting at the seams. It was almost like New York City on a Friday night…crowds everywhere.

All of this came days before I was to put my house on the market and head into the great unknown (which means that I really don’t know what the future will bring, but who does?). I returned in September from my usual mountain climbing in the Olympic mountains of Washington state (I’ll tell you about that in another blog), and decided that it was time to unclutter my life. Just trying to walk through the piles of “stuff” in my attic made me sick to my stomach. I bet many of you have felt the same way and come to the same conclusion…and others have just been putting it off, because it’s such a monumental task. I can understand why. It’s a horror! So while uncluttering my files and filling the dump with years of unnecessary memorabilia, I suddenly decided that I didn’t need a house and a yard, either, and had never found that maintenance was my forte. I’ve owned houses of varying sizes since 1958. Enough, already. Time to sell.

What I didn’t know is that nobody just sells a house these days. They style or stage it so that not one semblance of the owner’s personality is betrayed. God forbid that a human being once inhabited this domain. The goal is to get as near to Pottery Barn or a movie set as you can. Remove all rugs, all stair carpeting, and all photographs of family gatherings. And definitely remove books from bookcases like the floor to ceiling display of all my favorite authors past and present, and replace them with Roseville pottery and classy knick-knacks.  Dig out the crystal goblets you received as wedding gifts a hundred years ago, and put out a half-filled decanter of Scotch surrounded by shot glasses, and you show a family that doesn’t read, doesn’t cook (all counters are bare), doesn’t wash, but finds plenty of time to drink and look at candlesticks. Within a week you’re frantically searching for your tax forms, your toothbrush, and your aspirin. They’re all secreted away in the attic, the cellar, or miscellaneous bureau drawers. Living like this is like playing a constant game of Concentration. It may be good for the brain, but it’s murder on the nerves. 

I’m relating this to you, dear reader, because I want you to be forewarned. If you have had a similar experience trying to sell in the modern real estate market, do tell me. We can laugh and cry together!

The only good aspect of this rush to sell is that I shall leave for Nepal on November 14, three days after my Open House, and be lost in the Langtang region of the Himalayas for a month. By then I will have recuperated, the house may be sold (I have a wonderful daughter who will fend for me in my absence, while I shall be trekking with the other daughter), or I may have fallen off a cliff. At any rate I shall NEVER EVER  buy or sell another house!

Next post will be from Kathmandu.

Our first mountain expedition was the traditional Mt. Major near Alton, NH. It’s small but has trails that include sweet cliffs and ledges. A great starter. Tomorrow we head for the biggie…Mt. Washington. Will get back to you on that. This is great training for my return to the Himalayas in November. Nothing, except the increased altitude, is more challenging than Lion’s Head or Huntington Ravine on Washington.

Here is the Peterson gang, with Winnipesaukee and its islands in the distance.

Photo by Quinn Slayton, sculptor

Heading down….

I traversed with a French couple, a guide, and the cook. We walked through numerous villages and tribal enclaves, stopping frequently to exchange greetings with an assortment of people. Everyone was eager to be photographed. It’s the instant replay that fascinates. I’ve discovered that one of the best things about digital cameras is witnessing the glee with which the children view their photos. They squeal, jump up and down, run to show their friends, and immediately want MORE.  Kids are the same everywhere—a delight to behold.

Taung Yo, our cook. Farmer met along a bumpy country road

Wandering up and down dale

A lazy day in the village

We met lots of children along the way. Notice the sunscreen….

They found us quite a curious lot….

We camped at a Buddhist monastery along the way. Was fascinated listening to the youngest monks learning their chants. Here I am standing with the head monk.

Taung Yo’s makeshift kitchen. The food was a wonderful vegetarian cuisine. Each of us enjoyed a whole avocado daily!

Fishermen on Inle Lake.

A coveted job…digging rich soil from the lake bottom. Notice how one foot is used to paddle and steer the boat

Floating flower and vegetable gardens made from the fresh loam

More fisherman plumb the depths of the lake

Bridges and pedestrian walkways abound on the lake

A typical house on stilts on the lake shore

More scenes on Inle Lake

Many temples along the lake

Morning chores in Nyaungshwe

Heading for work

In front of the gate of one of many temples

A haircut right in your own backyard, before school….

Headed out of town on a Myanmar super highway, circa 2008. For the few who own cars, gas is sold in quart bottles

I’m not finished with Myanmar. Indulge me one more time as I post a series of pictures of the Golden Rock, the ancient city of Bagan, with over 2,000 pagodas and temples, Mandalay and environs, and Hsipaw, high in the mountains. I shall be back in July after attending the Mt. Laurel Autoharp Gathering in Newport, PA, and spending a week with my two sisters at our cottage on Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire. Summer is finally here and I love it!

Footnote: What a season this has been on Broadway! I managed to take in most of the Tony winners and especially liked Peter and the Starcatcher, the clever, fast-moving prequel to Peter Pan, and the hilarious Venus in Fur with Nina Arianda and Hugh Dancy. Also, a special treat was Harold Pinter’s Caretaker, starring the inimitable Jonathan Pryce, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) and Simon Gray’s Common Pursuit. I was thrilled at long last to see the stunning London production of War Horse...a birthday treat from Paul Sharar and family. There was also a provocative English import, Cock, and the Signature Theater’s revival of Athol Fugard’s My Children! My Africa! that I had seen in 1989 shortly after I returned from my initial trip to South Africa. It still packs a wallop. And guess what…tomorrow I see Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis in Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. How good is that!

Finally, I wish you all a happy, albeit not too warm summer. Let me hear from you.

Let me share another portion of my slide show, entitled Countries in Crisis: Myanmar, Tibet, and Ladakh. This week I will concentrate on Myanmar.

Feeding the monks outside the Motherland Inn (2)

                                        Yangon street scenes:

Family travel

Street vendor

Many open air markets

Repairing pavement

On-site muffler repair

Being watched during work

All in a day’s work

For your protection?

                                 Scenes from Shwedagon Pagoda:

A little whimsy at the elaborate entrance to the temple

Women volunteers for clean up on their birth date….

Men volunteers putting fresh flowers on the altars

Proud Papa

Proud Mama (white cream is sunscreen)

Beguiling children

That’s one large bell!

Historic ceiling decoration

Open air praying

Many small alcoves with gold statues that light up at night

The temple is made up of many sections….

Pagoda at sunset

Relaxing outside the temple

Next week I’ll post more slides of Myanmar showing my trek from Kalaw to Nyaungshwe, the Golden Rock, Bagan, and exploration around Mandalay.

For those of you eager to hear more about Broadway, I ‘ve seen some wonderful shows since I last reported in March, beginning with a repeat of the Million Dollar Quartet and the unbelievable new musical, Once. Others include The Lyons with the inimitable Linda Lavin; Leap of Faith with an impressive Raul  Esparza; a neat local production from the What Exit Theater Project of Christopher Durang’s comedy, Miss Witherspoon, with a electric performance by Bev Sheehan; a disappointing comedy, Don’t Dress for Dinner, and an amazing performance by John Lithgow in The Columnist.

I also was privileged to see the new production of Macbeth at the Metropolitan Opera, and the most superb rendition of Verdi’s LaTraviata I’ve ever heard, with Natalie Dessay, Matthew Polenzani, and Dmitri Hvorostovsky.

The final concert of the Plainfield Symphony featured a program of Gustav Mahler’s songs with Lisa Daltirus and Mark Walters, ending with his Symphony #4.

One last note. I went to Philadelphia last Sunday with Phyllis Bitow, who played percussion for the world premier of a composition by Andrea Clearfield using Tibetan folk music, chants, and instruments. This was done in conjunction with the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania Girlchoir, and the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia. There were also dances by Tibetans who live in the area. It was marvelous and brought back so many memories of my time in Tibet. The program concluded with the singing of the Faure Requiem.

Here are a few of the slides that cover my most recent adventures. All of the travel has been backpacking on a small budget, and the only tours were with trekking groups in the mountains. On this blog I shall show a small sampling of slides from one of the five major presentations. Tune in next week for more.

Put on your hiking boots and let’s go! An overview of treks to Everest Base Camp, Annapurna, the Kangchenjunga Range in Nepal and Sikkim, northern India, and Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

Overlooking Everest Base Camp from Kala Pattar, 18,500 ft.

Headed for Gorek Shep in the Khumba ice fields

Everest, Lhotse, & the Nuptse Ridge

Kathmandu

Climbing Kilimanjaro with daughter Martha

The porter's farewell song....

Sunrise with daughters Cary and Martha. Kangchenjunga in the distance.

Typical swinging bridge at high altitude

The Kangchenjunga Range appeared out of the fog

Clusters of prayer flags in the morning

A Buddhist monastery in the foothills

A few weeks ago we had a short heat wave, during which time spring sprang up in abundance. As I walked around Maplewood grooving on the flowering trees, forsythia, magnolias, and tulips I realized that I had filled a couple of blogs full of photographs in my April 9, 2010 blog. Now that the cold weather has returned and many of the trees have lost their blossoms, I enjoy referring back to that time to recapture the enchantment of early spring.