While Kathmandu is almost as the same elevation as Boulder, there is a reason Kathmandu is not also a running mecca. Extremely humid and crowded, to avoid traffic, pollution, and poop, I ran 111 miles (~60mpw) on the 300m driveway of the
Shanker Hotel. The hotel used to be
Prime Minister Juddha Shumsher's palace so the driveway is a big loop around a lush courtyard.
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| The driveway wraps around this courtyart. |
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| By the hotel entrance. |
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| One stretch of the driveway. |
Luckily winters in Ithaca, NY have provided me with many miles of indoor running and that conditioning (plus my iPod) helped me get through running in circles. Running is not very common in Nepal, so the hotel guards often asked me if I was "a marathon player." :-)
Whatever Kathmandu lacks in running, for better or worse, it makes up in having ample delicious whole plant-based foods.
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| Bike vendors with veggies are very common. |
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| Puts most grocery stores' pepper sections to shame! Left to right: peppers, tomatoes, onions. |
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| Mobile or stationary produce! |
Typical Nepali meals feature a variety of vegetable dishes and are always eaten with cooked rice (bhat) and lentils (dal).
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| A typical Nepal meal. |
In this meal, prepared by my Nepali grandmother, there is aloo (fried potato, left-most corner), tomato achar (the red dish), dal (the two bowls of yellow soup), and another aloo dish (the bowl to the left of the lower dal bowl). On my father's plate you can also see some saag (in this case cooked squash tips) and radish achar (the brown bits between the saag and aloo on his plate). Eventually, recipes for each of those dishes will be posted on this blog.
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| I will also eventually post the recipe for my grandma's delicious mushroom dish. |
While in Nepal I generally did not eat my typical oatmeal breakfast, but instead ate Nepali hashbrowns (fried aloo with some spices and greens mixed in) and dosas.
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| Me eating a plain dosa and black tea. |
Dosas are generally stuffed with aloo and spices, or eaten with curry, but right after my morning run I just wanted to snarf down the dosa plain. I will not post recipes for dosas because just as you can buy brownie or cake mixes in grocery stores, if you go to an Indian grocery store they definitely will sell dosa mixes. Then, as long as you have a frying pan, you can follow the mix's instructions and make a dosa!
While in Nepal, we did a trek to Gosaikunda with Peace Nepal Treks. You can see the trek
here and maps of it below.
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| This map includes the points along our trek. |
During this trek, I saw Nepal food preparation in action! Like Des Moines being surrounded by corn fields, Kathmandu is instead surrounded by rice paddies.
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| Rice paddie. |
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| Houses built in-between paddies. |
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| A house being built between paddies. |
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| Tomatoes being farmed by the rice paddies. |
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| Alternating between corn and rice. |
While rice certainly is the main staple for Nepali people, there were also many terraces of corn.
You may have noticed that not all those crops were just corn! Marijuana is harvested both for its non-potent seeds to be used as a spice in dishes, and for its potent leaves used for...well, you know.
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| The religious use of marijuana; at Muktinath temple. |
Lastly, seeds, rice, vegetables, and spices are often dried for preservation and transport. Here are some typical pictures of this.
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| Outskirts of Kathmandu. |
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| On the way to Chisopani. |
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| At Phedi, saag being dried within the lodge to preserve it for winter. |
That's all for now! Stay tuned and namaste.
