Last India Overland (62 page)

It was. Patrick said he didn’t see any reason to leave.

I said to Patrick, “Well, if you’re staying put, Dr. Livingstone, would you mind some company until I can scrape together enough cash for a plane ticket out of here.”

He looked at me, real amused. “Not at all, Mr. McPherson,” he said. “I’d be absolutely delighted.”

“Great,” I said and I flopped myself down on a bed near a window and watched light play across the ceiling for the three minutes it took me to fall asleep.

from Kelly’s diary

Dec. 19

There was a mist, almost celestial, in the air when we stopped for the last pici-stop, our Promised Land awaiting, after all our trials. Patrick took his pictures & then, on the drive down into the sparkling city, Pete asked Pat. to write down everyone’s name, put them in his hat. I wouldn’t have put it past Pat. to put only his name in the hat, but he didn’t, Pete picked C.’s out. C was less than overwhelmed. But she did write the last entry in the daybook so it was appropriate, & she did say no to S’s offer of 100 rupees for the d.b. Pete gave us the run of the bus & then took off with D. without even saying goodbye. Highly uncivilized, said Pat., but understandable. My souvenir is Pete’s binder of notes. Then we got settled into the penthouse suite of the Hotel Blue Star & Pat. ordered up 6 limcas & took out a mickey of rum & offered a libation to the gods for allowing us to survive the journey. Basically forced to join in on the spirit of the thing. It turned into yet another late night. That was last night. This morning C & T. & Mary & I moved into the Snow View, a hotel within our budget & standards. M opted for staying with Pat. in the penthouse suite. He’s completely broke. C offered to try to sell Lucille for him & it almost broke his heart to hand it over. Later. We just got back from the Tibetan refugee camp on the edge of town. C sold Lucille, along with Rob’s SX-70, for 800 rupees. A lot of money, for them, but they thought the SX-70 was magical. Not quite enough money for M. to buy a ticket to Bangkok. But I don’t think you can buy SX-70 film in Nepal. C’s opinion: there’s a guilt trip almost everywhere, if you look hard enough. A teenage Tibetan girl who bought my shampoo & thong sandals asked us if we were going to see Dakshin Kali tomorrow, told us all about it: live Hindu ritual sacrifice, right in front of our eyes. Can’t miss that, said C.

Mick

When I woke up next morning everyone was moving out so I picked up Lucille and sang “The Last Thing On My Mind.” Charole came over, said she was going out to the Tibetan refugee camp, did I have anything I wanted to sell. She was looking at Lucille. You’re kidding, I said. She said she heard a rumour that I had money waiting for me in Bangkok. Who’d I say that to? Dave must’ve let the cat out of the bag. Dave says I’m going to have a visitor tonight and if the TV screens aren’t lying it’s going to be hasta la vista, he’ll be on the midnight train when it pulls out. Dave, that is. I don’t believe it but he says it’s not necessary I believe it. The room is changing. The wall in front of me is suddenly one huge TV screen and I can see my old man in shadows eating linguine spaghetti drinking wine and close my eyes but it turns out I had them closed and when I open them there’s just the room, breathing, in and out, this worn down pencil in my hand the last pencil I have it’s late candle’s burning low. My wick too. Charole sold Lucille. That really depressed me. But she brought back money. She sold Rockstar’s Polaroid and gave me the money for that too. Almost enough money she said for a plane ticket and Patrick said well that’s reason to celebrate dinner’s on me and the three of us headed down to Freak St. in the back of a taxi, some Chinese place, nothing better than gook food the old man used to say not that he was a racist or a bigot that’s just the way he talked, spade, gook, frog, the people who knew him understood, it bugged the old lady though, maybe she didn’t know him, maybe she thought there was no excuse. I’ll never forget her face after he died, aged ten years in three weeks never really recovered, but I don’t think she’ll miss me, I think she’s too far gone, I just wish I could see Hasheeba again. If I had a last wish I’d see Hasheeba again. We had a good thing, brother and sister thing going. I could call for a stomach pump but it’s in my system I can feel death crawling up my legs like mice. I cried a lot after the old man died and after Peggy dil-Schmidt told me she didn’t love me any more, she loved someone else. I haven’t cried a lot since then but I shed a tear for Lucille that night over eggrolls and roasted duck in black bean sauce, our pre-Christmas repast Patrick called it lots of white wine. Just a tear or two but Charole saw them and she asked me if I was mad at her and I said no I was just a sentimental soul at heart and she said yeah, you are, aren’t you, and it’s true, it’s been my downfall in life I always get too involved I never sit back in the bleachers always had to be in there like a dirty sock when it was round ten and the heart was getting a good solid punchout. There’s a girl I met down in Seattle at a Van Morrison concert. Went out a couple times, neither one of us made a move. It was just too far from Vancouver. I didn’t want to become an American. She had a good job. I still think about her sometimes. She had auburn red hair and a heart-shaped face and crooked teeth and she was beautiful and thirty-three. She looked a lot like Peggy dil-Schmidt, a little like Hasheeba. I should be settled down in Seattle right now, a rug rat or two underfoot.

Charole asked us if we wanted to go out to Dakshin Kali

the next day when we were standing outside the restaurant “Silent Night” wafting our way from some other restaurant down the street clear sky above us. Not a lot of streetlights in Kathmandu we could even see stars. What the fuck, I said, is Dakshin Kali. I thought she said Kelly but she spelt it out for me. Kali, goddess of destruction. Maybe goddess of mushrooms. Patrick said sure so I said sure. Might as well see the sights, might never see Kathmandu again. Or maybe I was going to live there forever if I didn’t get more money. It was kind of a nice thought at the time.

Dakshin Kali was something else. This huge blue man, belly like a beer barrel, he’s painted blue not sad or anything, eight arms knives in two of them, slicing the heads off chickens pigs and then this yak, with an axe. Sacrifice to the gods. Yak buckled to its knees, didn’t go down. Kelly was there, the four of us, she turned her head away, couldn’t watch but she must’ve heard the whack whack as the yak finally went down pouring blood, more whacks till the head came off.

I liked this one kid in a blue T-shirt, it said Hail Kali and it had this skeleton on it doing a dance, almost like a Deadhead T-shirt.

Charole said this must be where they get the heads to scare the Living Goddess. Pete had told us something about a teenage goddess who gets the gig if she can yawn through a night of decapitated heads and the soundtrack from
The Exorcist.

Patrick said this has made me hungry let’s check out the cream pies at Aunt Jane’s. Kelly and Charole just looked at him, never ceased to be amazed. Patrick looked at me. I was feeling a little famished, I hadn’t eaten a lot except for Lomotil and that duck in black bean sauce. And I do have a sense of occasion. I said maybe later.

We’d rented these big black bikes. War models. World War I, I think. On the way back to town stopped at the Kathmandu zoo, sad place, hungry yaks and elks and bears and something that looked like a cross between a raccoon and a coyote.
²⁸
Kelly was all for setting them free but we voted her down. Took a tour through this suburb
²⁹
nothing but temples pagodas something that Patrick called stupas. Everything quiet. That’s what I remember best about Kathmandu. And all those nifty little shops on Freak St. yak-hair coats hanging high along an alley. Paintings of the wheel of life, Patrick bought one of those, brown and green oil on canvas. It was like an astrological wheel said Kelly except it only had eight houses. Naked people between the spokes all of them screwing. That’s what life comes down to basically, sex, no getting around it, the ball keeps rolling, it’s the only way, people get so fucking hung up on it though. Didn’t feel like many hang-ups in Nepal somehow. Wonder what sex with a Nepali woman would be like. Or with Soon. I didn’t have my sex life in order, never met that woman where the sex just gets better and better even ten years down the line. That would have to be better than money and World Series tickets for the Red Sox.

We did eventually get to Aunt Jane’s. She had Boston cream pie. To make good Boston cream pie, that’s a talent, that’s an art, and this pie was so good it brought tears to my eyes. I was feeling a little fragile that day. But it was a good day, beheaded yaks and all. It felt peaceful. Kathmandu has this weird energy. It was like a magical place and for a while I thought nothing bad could happen there, and I said to myself, if I don’t get enough money for a plane ticket out of here, well, like Hasheeba used to say, c’est la vie.

I was feeling so good after that Boston cream pie that when Patrick suggested we take a trip over to the Soaltee-Oberoi for a drink, I said sure, and everyone else was up for it too. Turns out the hotel had a casino in the basement, the only one for a couple thousand miles. When we got there Patrick said well, Mr. McPherson, this is your lucky day. Given your psychic abilities you should clean up in such an auspicious place. I phoned up Dave. I said Dave don’t fail me now. He said he wouldn’t think of it. Put your money on twenty-three. All of it. I did. The wheel spun. Marble wound up on twenty-three. The guy spinning the wheel grinned and said we’ve got a winner. Charole let out a whoop and gave me a kiss on the cheek. I looked at Patrick. He said I’m impressed, but are you on a roll, Mr. McPherson, that is the question. Dave said put it on eleven. Guy spun and it came up eleven. I suddenly had thousands of rupees. Patrick picked up all that cash, took out what he said was plane fare to Bangkok and stuck the rest in his pocket. Let’s just say, he said, that we’re even, your monetary debt to me is eradicated. I said fine. Dave said try seven but this has to be the last time. Can’t be greedy, gotta leave some for the other guy. I passed this info along and then I stuck that plane fare on seven. Charole and Patrick put some money on it too. Marble came up seven. Charole let out another whoop and gave me a kiss on the other cheek and gave me this strange look. You really are psychic, she said. Can you read my thoughts? I’d never do that, I said. Just try it, she said. So I phoned up Dave. He said she wants you to go up to Nagarkot tomorrow with her and Kelly and Tim and Teach and Patrick. So I said that to her. She looked at Kelly. He really is psychic, she said. Yes, said Kelly, he really is psychic. Scary, isn’t it? Charole looked at me, smiled. Said oh, I don’t know. So will you come? I said you try reading my mind. She said you will come. See? I said. You’re psychic too. She smiled. I looked at Kelly. She didn’t look too happy.

Looking back on it now, I’m kind of sorry I acted like that. Real sorry, actually. It wasn’t a nice thing to do at all.

from Kelly’s diary

Dec. 20

Woke up this morning to the sound of S. throwing up. She thinks it was the Moo Goo Gai Pan she had for lunch at the Red Dragon on Freak St. Good thing she didn’t go out to Dakshin Kali, it would’ve only made her sicker. I used to be able to eat teen burgers, sweet & sour shrimp. But after watching Dakshin Kali it’s lettuce & pasta for the rest of my life. It had the feel of a malaria nightmare. I think this is 1 Pluto girl who’s in for some changes. Like Neil Young said, there does come a time. Last night I dreamed I was drowning in pig blood & a green-faced Sissy Spacek was holding the pail above my head. I was bound tight with snakes that hissed & writhed. I love Kathmandu. There’s a silence here, a freshness to the air. The temples are like icons of the human spirit. The zoo I could do without. Tomorrow it’s Nagarkot. S’s in a snit. She just packed her bags & left without saying a word. A first for her, said C. I’m painting a picture of Kali.

Dave says I should maybe mention what happened to Suzie. She got a bit miffed that Kelly didn’t ask her to go out to Dakshin Kali with the rest of us. Even Kelly could only take so much of that Aussie bray of Suzie’s. So she caught the first Air Nepal flight heading south, didn’t leave a note, nothing. This is what Charole and Kelly were talking about early the next morning at the downtown bus stop, the sun still behind the peaks a thick mist in the air only a few Nepalese on the streets on bikes, in taxis. Kelly was mad at herself, said well she thought she was sick. Guess she spent one morning at the Snow View throwing up. Charole told her not to worry about it, life’s too short. Then Tim and Teach walked up, both carrying backpacks sunny smiles fresh breath that almost glistened but it was just their fresh-brushed teeth catching the sunlight. Ready for the big life change? said Kelly, smiling that almost phoney smile of hers, eyes big, hands in her pockets, she could look gawky at times, a big gawky kid hoping for a popsicle, I liked that about her. But mostly I liked her skin, the way it stretched across her cheekbones and Kelly, if you ever read this, I really liked your eyes, I could’ve stared forever into your eyes over hot chocolate after some foreign movie not
Himalayan Man.
I wouldn’t have minded examining your angst my angst from every direction trying to make sense of it in the dark candlelit hour after good sex, good love. I was like you. I stopped loving people for a long time, didn’t want to take the chance except for Hasheeba, it was too late to stop loving her, but I know I would’ve taken the chance with you.

And I was kind of thinking things like that, that morning after this small panel van arrived and we got in the back, sat on planks along the sides and gazed out the open door in back at the road appearing out from under the bumper, Kathmandu dwindling in size, disappearing from sight. Kelly talking to Teach and Tim about the ashram. Dave says Tim was talking about how it’s necessary to empty the soul of itself so it can gain a perspective, what he called, spell it Dave, arthamatranir-bhasam svarupashunyamiva, and how that comes from communication with something he called ayoni,* that which did not come from bhaga,
³⁰
 in order to find sambhogakaya. * * It was Greek to me but it had a nice ring to it and Kelly must’ve bought it. Spent the morning stopping in small villages picking up people, mostly Sherpa farmers and their kids. Happy kids that stared at us and got real shy, little girls giggling and looking away. Real cute. The van got so full that there were teenage guys hanging out the back. Through the forest of legs I got glimpses of terraced farms and what looked like deep valleys and lots of trees, sawed-off trees, lots of trunks. Country’s going to be deforested by capital interests in the near future said Tim deLuca. I was sitting with Charole on one side of me my arm couldn’t help but be pressed against her right breast that’s how tight it was but she didn’t seem to mind made no move to slide away, and on the other side of me was an old woman who kept barfing into her shawl. Charole said it was probably either motion sickness or somebody’s meat-eating smell. She meant my meat-eating smell