It is the 13th of April. I am seated at my desk in the teacher's room in Masan Jeil Girls' Middle School, Changwon, South Korea. Two weeks ago I was trying to decide what to do with my life when my contract ends in June, and I decided to check the price of flights to various places. The first place that caught my eye was Kathmandu; a one-way ticket from Seoul costs $400. I bought the ticket.
Two weeks later, and my plans are further advanced. I not only have a plane ticket, but also an Amazon 3G Kindle, a Lonely Planet Guide: China, Lonely Planet Guide: Tibet, a booked 8-day overland tour (Kathmandu - Lhasa), and a friend in Kathmandu arranging the tricky Tibet Travel Pass from the miserly Tibet Tourism Bureau. Things move quickly.
I arrive in Kathmandu on the evening of the 10th June. My plan is to take several days exploring the Kathmandu valley and sampling the cultural tidbits on offer, while arranging for a longer trek to one of Nepal's more remote and elevated spots. Most likely is the well-recommended 14-day Annapurna base camp trek.
After that I will join a tour group and head over the Himalayas and into Tibet for an 8-day tour, culminating with two days in Lhasa, the ancient seat of the Dalai Lama at the Potala Palace. After that my plans are less definite, except that I'll be riding the highest railway in the world out of Tibet, and that I have to be in Hong Kong before the 1st of August to extend my Chinese visa. Some of the things I'm looking forward to, however, are the terracotta warriors, Sichuan hotpots, Shanghai cityline, Yangtse river valley, and many many more...
With luck I'll fly out of Beijing around the 15th of August to start the mandatory training for the new EPIK intake in Seoul the next day. And I'm not going to sleep through the training. No sir, not I.
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