You Can Check Out, But You Can Never Leave

So, after our little adventure, in which we were saved by two Nepalis cattleherders (who, as a reward, asked for some cup o' noodles), we spent a quiet night at the lodge. In the morning we played with some friendly children who kept shouting "aiyaaa!" I'm not sure if this meant the same thing that it means in Chinese. Come to think of it, does it really mean anything in Chinese? Aiyaa! I suspect they learned it from a kungfu movie.

We headed back on the same road we had mistakenly taken the day before. We decided to forego the peak, Sundakhpu, and just go to Rimbick. it was a little disappointing, because it's always nice to reach the top of a trail, but we were feeling rather Buddhist about the whole thing. It's about the journey and not the destination, right? Plus we had train tickets for Varanasi and to Delhi, where we were catching our flight back to Bangalore.

We were told that there were no jeeps leaving from Rimbick after noon, but we figured that there would be some sort of vehicle on the road, and at any rate we had to go to Rimbick sometime. We reached Rimbick at around 5 in the afternoon, tired from three days of hiking and getting lost. It occurred to us that our Nepali cattleherding friends must have walked to Rimbick and back the day before for some shopping. They were certainly capable of moving twice as fast as us, if not faster.

We entered the Rimbick town square at around 5 pm and started asking around for jeeps, but soon realized it was a futile exercise. The last jeep had pulled out hours ago. We were prepared to spend the night, so when a young girl told us there was a hotel down the road we resigned ourselves to taking a room there. It turned out that she was the daughter of the owner, of course. We asked the owner if we could get a jeep in the morning, and he said yes, starting at 7 am. So we had dinner, watched an action movie, and went up to our room. Before heading upstairs, Gilles asked again if we could get a jeep, and the man at the counter said yes, downstairs at 7.

What we didn't realize is that all the jeeps leave on the dot, at 7, and you need a ticket for them. We thought there were jeeps on the road from 7 to noon. In fact, one set leaves at 7, and another set leaves at noon. We don't quite understand the logic behind this, but who are we to argue with local tradition? So when we went downstairs at 7:05. we were told that the jeeps were already gone. We searched up and down for another vehicle, but the only thing we found were several SUVs belonging to a British tour group. Gilles tried to charm them into letting us ride in the back of one of their SUVs with their luggage, but he was met with quizzical stares.

We gave up on the tour group, ordered some porridge, and explained our situation to the young restaurant manager. When we showed him our train ticket and he realized that there were $60 at stake - our ticket was refundable if we reached the train station in Darjeeling by 1 PM, and worth 50% if we reached it by 2, but after that we were out of luck - he sprung into action. He started making some calls, and with five minutes he had dug up a car. He told us we would pay $30 to the driver, which was a ripoff, of course, but as they seemed to own the only vehicle in Rimbick we had few options.

When we saw the van we had some doubts as to whether it would make it to Darjeeling, but after all it was downhill all the way, so the engine didn't have to be that good. The wheels did seem mildly important, but having chartered the last vehicle in town we were not picky. There were four of them, after all. Not including the steering wheel.

The drivers were two young men with smiles ear to ear. The younger man, who must have been about 16, took the wheel. He started the car and let go of the clutch. The car lunged forward, slamming Gilles and me into the front seats. (Needless to say there were no seatbelts.) He started again and we rolled out of town. We rejoiced to be leaving the town square. Then, at the top of the hill heading out of Rimbick, the car lunged forward again, this time sending the seats about two feet forward. An animated discussion ensued, and the two young men switched places. The second driver seemed more skilled than the first - he didn't cause anything to move in unexpected ways, at any rate. The young two men were quite excited, laughing and shouting "Darjeeling!" out the windows at everyone they passed. We were obviously providing some entertainment to the village. They tuned the radio to an Indian pop station and ploughed down the cobbled road.

About halfway down the road the van finally stopped working. We should have known it was inevitable - after all, was it really possible to escape the Rimbick vortex? Gilles had a look at the back wheel and told the drivers there was no way we were getting back into the car. Apparently something holding one of the back wheels had broken. The boys searched vigorously for some scotch tape, and we started looking out for another car. A driver offered to take us to the next village, and we tried to pay the young men a portion of what we had promised, but they wanted more. Finally, after some negotiation, the new driver agreed to take us to Darjeeling, and the three of them negotiated the division of funds amongst themselves.

We set off on the road again, our new driver shouting "Darjeeling!" out the window at anyone he passed.

We've decided that "Rimbick" will be the name of our first dog.