Day 7 - A day in Nepal and the Lama Temple

After breakfast, I bumped into another backpacker who I thought I'd seen the last of a few days ago. He invited me out to Peking duck but I didn't get the note in time, and by then he had checked out of the room. He's also Filipino and from the U.S. -- I guess I'm sort of the quadruple whammy in the backpacking world - I'm a solo female Asian-PacIslander traveller from the U.S. Many people that I've met can't get over the fact that I'm alone, but a few have actually pointed out that its rare to see an Asian woman travelling under these conditions.

We rented bikes and rode down to the Embassy area -- he's going into Pakistan in about a month while I'm headed to Nepal in a few weeks, so we both needed to apply for visas. I chuckled as we parted,

"Have fun in Nepal!"
Good Luck in Pakistan!

After filling out my application, I rode my bike southwest toward Tian'an'men for a douzhi shop in the area. I rode .. and rode .. and rode. In circles it seemed. For reason, I thought I was riding in search of doughnuts, because douzhi just sounds like doughnuts. And that would be so convenient because I would love to eat many many doughnuts right now. But then, I realized, "no, they are not catering to westerners" and upon scrutinizing the article text, douzhi is actually some sort of fermented bean soup. Still sounded good to me.

Well, I got lost again. And this time, I'm absolutely positive that I actually found the shop I was looking for after all the time I spent lost except I was told in broken english that I was at the wrong restaurant and that I needed to go further west. The restaurant I was looking for is a Chinese Muslim establishment, marked by arabic lettering. They are NOT common. And the place that I stumbled upon just happened to be exactly where the guide told me it would be, except the street address was incorrect (VERY common).

I settled for a fast food joint in a busy shopping area (ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH!) but I think it was a Japanese chain since it was some sort of meat curry over rice with potatos and a seaweed soup.

After riding back to my lodging, I was met with some very bad news - the agency that I'd commissioned to purchase my rail tickets had not yet done so and tickets to (Chengdu) are sold out. I made a last minute decision to fly there which will be double the price of Rail. So much for my 28 hour train ride! I was really looking forward to it.

**

The Lama temple --


MORE ON THIS LATER!!