Well, I thought getting into Humla was difficult. Getting out was much more difficult! Renu Chetri (the Journalist) Decided to leave wed. The 29th of Oct. She had a new job as senior Journalist at the Kathmandu Post starting on the 1st. The week we were in Humla was Tihar celebrations, which is a very big religious holiday for Nepali’s. Every day seemed to have another theme to it. Well, from what I could see, the overall holiday theme for the local men were drinking and gambling in the streets. Come to find out it wasn’t only Humla that had this festive atmosphere. In the early hours we all sat on the hospital porch drinking Black tea filled with Pepper and said our goodbyes to Renu. The conversation continued and we reminisced about all the adventures and stories we heard from locals. Slowly, realized the flight was much too late. Dr. Yeshe called the tower and asked what the problem was and if there is a flight. They didn’t know the answer. We stared at the horizon for a few more hours. The flight never appeared over the Himalayas Wednesday morning.
The next day David, Yeshe and I were also heading back. No flight! We got word that due to Tihar all the pilots got drunk and the planes never left Kathmandu. We got a phone call from the tower later on Thursday and they said definitely there would be a flight by next TUESDAY! We also were hoping for a random helicopter to show. Every day we took a walk to a new corner of Simikot, but never far enough away to prevent us from running back to catch a plane the minute we heard something on the horizon.
Finally, Saturday morning we got confirmation a flight had left Nepalganj and we had seats on it! We were all sad to leave Humla, but a refreshed to actually have a flight out. I guess it’s better then having drunk pilots driving the plane?
