We arrive.

Monday 15th April 2013
When I woke up on Sunday morning, there didn't seem any rush as I had done most of my packing the day before but as the day wore on I kept remembering more and more things that I had forgotten.  Where was my camera charger?  Should I travel in jeans and were they clean? etc, etc.  By 3pm, I had been running up and down the stairs non stop like a frantic budgie.
My private car (yes, private ) to Heathrow arrived on time, driven by a very nice Turkish man with an incomprehensible accent.  After 15 minutes I gave up and pretended to be asleep. In the departures lounge I was met by the very dapper Ernie who whisked me up to the Premiere Class check in desk.  I told him that I was travelling in Economy but he insisted and I thought, wow I've been upgraded, apart from the fact that there was a huge queue for the Economy.  No such luck and to rub it in, the Economy passengers had to pass through the Premiere class section with flat bed seats and complimentary champagne. But before that we had to go through rigorous security checks.  Men went in one queue and women in the other.  One by one we were called into a little tent and told to stand on a podium where a very grim faced security lady frisked us with an electronic wand.  One woman set off the alarm with her hip replacement and had a really hard job explaining.  And no,  for all my former students who said "Why do I have to learn foreign languages?", they don't all speak English.
It was a seven and a half hour flight but we had 25 films to choose from on our individual screens. We arrived in Delhi to a hazy day but it was 25 degrees at 7am.  Of course we had lost 5 hours somewhere in the night so I was completely wrung out on arrival.  Delhi airport looks pretty new and frankly you could have been at any UK airport with the usual WH Smith, Body Shop and McDonalds.
I had by this time met up with the other ladies on the programme and broken the ice.  One was in Premiere Class but the other was slumming it like me.  As we were heading towards the departure gate for Kathmandu, an electric buggy, the sort that transports old people! pulled up and the driver asked us if we would like a ride to the gate.  Not sure whether I was pleased or upset.  Only a one and a half hour's flight now to Kathmandu, what could go wrong?  And then it happened.  Having dodged the chicken curry on the first leg, I was presented with it on the second. I quailed as I peeled back the tin foil and inhaled the smell that I fear.  Did I eat it?  Yes, most of it.  Did I enjoy it?  Not much but too cowardly to leave it untouched.  But everyone says that Nepali food is more delicate than Indian so I still have some hope.  Currently my mouth is on fire.