Here I am, my last night in Nepal. Yup, this is Paul writing a guest entry. Where to begin, I ask myself. The whole experience has been so many different things. First of all there is the one main reason for coming here to see Kaisa, obviously. And as a special bonus, I got to experience your crazy minibus, a 160 meter free-fall, Nepalese culture, friendly Nepalese people, good food and so much more. It sure helps having someone with you who knows how the country works, especially for such an inexperienced traveler as myself. She’s so amazing at this whole thing.

Do I take anything back with me from this trip? Most definitely. I’ve done some amazing things here and will be able to use a new skill! Haggling! (which I had never needed to do before) I’ve also seen the good (and beautiful), the bad, the really bad and the ugly. This country is in such a weird state. In some locations you see people living in tents they made from some blankets and such. And then the people who are a bit better off can still be living in the back of their shop it seems. So I will be putting things in a new perspective a bit, back home. You hear things are bad, you know things are bad, but during my time here there have been a couple of “oh wow, THIS bad” moments where you just have no words for. But the people here do all seem to be united in their beliefs. Worshipping is a daily experience they all seem to do, young and old, poor and less poor. Everywhere you see shrines, big and small. It’s quite an interesting thing to see.

If you think you can handle it, I do recommend seeing Nepal. It has enough to show you and we haven’t even been to the Himalayas. Only saw those from a distance (when the clouds finally made their way out of sight for a tiny bit). And that bit was breathtaking already. I can’t even describe it properly. So you know what? Go and take a look for yourselves.

Thanks to Kaisa, I had this unique opportunity for my first out-of-Europe trip. It’s been amazing. The travel-itch will not be going away and I hope we will be seeing a lot more of the world together. Perhaps not always this somewhat extreme, but hopefully always this good.