501 Places

View from Tadapani guest house

The latest guest post on 501 Places is written by Kathryn Bullock, a travel industry entrepreneur who has just returned from a solo trip to Nepal. Kathryn shares with us a glimpse of her 6 day Himalayan trek and gives some valuable insights into her experiences of visiting Nepal as a solo female traveller.

Following his successful jaunt around Laos on trail bikes last year, my partner Dave proudly announced he was back off to Thailand this February. He would travel with his biking buddy for a jaunt around the hill tribe villages on a trail bike. I prefer more active holidays so I decided it was time to book a ticket to the country I’d wanted to go to for years: the stunning Himalayan kingdom of Nepal.

Nepali family at lakeside village

As it was too late to persuade a friend to join me I thought, why not just book it anyway? It’s been all of 24 years since my last solo adventure around Indonesia so I was well out of practice. I loved every minute of it! I had read that as a woman if you want to meet people you just need to sit at a bar and not sit at a table. So I tried this at a little bar in Kathmandu and I met some really friendly locals.

Bandipur child

The city is overwhelming and I was a bit concerned about getting lost the first night. It’s such a labyrinth of small lanes which all look the same and are jammed with signposts of every shape and colour. I did some reading ahead of time and booked the first two nights in Kathmandu at the charming Hotel Courtyard which was blissfully quiet. I left the rest to chance. The freedom this gave me was liberating. I stepped into a small travel agency and had my ticket to Pokhara booked and paid for within minutes for the next morning. I enjoyed the first glimpse of the Himalayas in their full glory peaking above the smoggy clouds over the Kathmandu valley as I gazed out from our tiny Guna air plane.

Dal and I at Poon Hill

On reaching Pokhara I explored the trail on the ridge between Serangkot Hill and Nau Danda, watching the paragliders in full flight. February is the best month for thermals in this dreamy place. I hired a bike to explore the lakeside villages and was invited into a friendly farmer’s home for tea and a chat, whilst we enjoyed the last of the sun’s rays on his terrace, watching the world go by.

The 6 day trek around the Ghorepani and Chomrung circuit was a real highlight. My expert guide Dal is a seasoned trekker and recounted enchanting stories of seeing snow leopard in the Mustang Valley and other amazing trekking adventures through snow drifts. The views from the guest houses in the early morning sun were breathtaking and everyone must have heard a series of excited exclamations as I stood on the balcony each morning taking in the views. You have to earn this treat as you climb the very steep staircases for what seem hours on end – but they really are worth it! A tip is to make sure you take at least one walking pole or ideally two, as they do help especially up to Poon Hill (3200m) on the ice for the very special Annapurna panorama at sunrise.

View from Poon Hill at sunrise

On returning to Kathmandu I decided on the slower route back and stopped off at the charming medieval village of Bandipur which is nestled in the hills. I loved the peace and quiet of the place. I imagined that I was living there in medieval times as it was so dark and quiet at night with the power cut and traffic banned in the village centre. I also stopped off at the original Nepali capital of Gorka and climbed another 1500 stairs to appreciate the views from the Hindu temple above the town, and saw the women preparing the goat sacrifice for the gods.

Main Street Bandipur

On coming back to Kathmandu I stopped in at the very friendly Everest Irish pub in Thamel to see a great Nepali blues band I had seen on arrival. I encouraged some new Dutch trekking friends to come with me and we had an amazing night of blues magic. The band had been thrown in prison and beaten up for playing just 10 minutes after a noise curfew at 10pm last year and  have the scars to prove the brutality of the local police.

I learnt a lot from my new Nepali friends about life in this country and I’ve already bought my maps to plan my next trek. I would book another trip in a heartbeat. The only challenge now is to knuckle down to some work to pay for it and stop day dreaming about my trip.

For all the pictures on the places described above and more in Nepal, please visit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kb_adventures

Kathryn Bullock is a frequent traveller and an ecommerce expert and entrepreneur who has worked in the travel industry for the past 25 years. She is now working on a new business venture in social media for travel and is a regular blogger for business owners at:  www.enterprisebritain.com and her blogs can be found at http://anothereb.blogspot.com/

There are great stories in each of us

There have been many interesting discussions in recent months that are related, in some way at least, to this question. Whether it’s the journalist vs blogger debate, or the controversy over press trips and the value of the content that results, the subject sparks strong opinions on all sides.

I did read one sentiment that stuck in my mind although I can’t recall who wrote it (speak up and take credit and I’ll add your link), and it’s hard to disagree with this as a principle. It is this: if you’re going to add something to the mass of content that’s already filling the online world, make it something that is of value to your readers. Good advice I reckon. So let’s probe this a little deeper. What gives a blog post (or any online content for that matter) that necessary value? Here are a few of my suggestions.

1. Tell a story. Yes, it’s my favourite subject, but a simple point to remember that makes any post come to life. We are all storytellers, and we all love to read a good story. Think about the great speakers from history or your favourite lecturers, and they’ll almost certainly be connected by one trait: their effective use of stories to paint a vivid picture of what they want you to take away.  The blog should be the perfect medium for a good story. A typical post only takes a couple of minutes to read and you can even add a few photos to illustrate the message. A good post will put the reader in that place and time, and for that short time make them relive your experiences as if they were there.

2. Be original. It can be very hard to come up with an original topic, but it’s not so hard to add your own angle to a well worn subject. Thousands of people write about a day out in Paris, and describing a trip to the Eiffel Tower is not original. Your experiences of talking to an old lady on the Metro who invited you into her home and showed off her photo collections from her younger years as a showgirl at the Moulin Rouge will make one hell of a story. It’s certainly harder to create original material without straying off the beaten track.

3. Challenge commonly held beliefs. I am often far more drawn to a headline that makes me uncomfortable than one with which I instantly agree. Seeing a title of a post about ‘Why I hate the British’ will immediately draw me in, and I’ll want to know what bad experiences this person has had in my home country. A headline of ‘Thai meal for $1′ on the other hand, will not grab my attention.

4. Make it relevant. ‘A walking trip around Lima’ will be relevant to those who live in Lima, have just been there or are planning a Peruvian trip. To others, this story might have limited appeal. The post could however describe what made that walk around Lima so special, the sounds, the smells, the reactions of others and why it’s so different from a walk around London. That way it will start to draw in those people who might never intend to visit the city, but who are captivated by the quality of the story.

5. Provoke a discussion. Sometimes the strength of a blog post is not in the author’s words, but in the discussion that follows. If the sign of a good blog post is that it touches its audience in some way, what better evidence of this than in a string of comments that agree or disagree with the author. If I see a post has 10+ comments, I’ll be more inclined to find out what it was that motivated others to add their opinions.

6. Give useful information. Many blog posts focus on giving tips rather than telling stories. This can be very useful if the reader is planning a trip to that place. But even in a factual post, the message sticks in the mind so much easier when there is a story attached to it. Karen Bryan’s post about a stay in a York hotel is an example of this. I still remember the name of the hotel instantly, and it’s purely down to the way Karen shared her adventures  using words and video.

I remember attending a presentation some years ago on ‘How to deliver a great presentation’. I left the room thinking the speaker had been ok, but not great. But I did take one message out of that session. He said that as a speaker you should have one aim when preparing your presentation to any audience: that they leave the room having changed their thoughts in some way. Maybe they’ll be more accepting of a situation of which they had been intolerant; maybe they’ll feel inspired to change their habits or behaviours or challenge their fears; maybe they’ll enroll in a public speaking course. As long as there’s a way in which you’ve made one change, however small, then you have served a valuable role. Surely that same rule applies to blogging?

Souvenirs for sale, Luang Prabang

Our house is full of stuff from our trips. As I type this post I have a set of Malawian drums on the shelf above me alongside a strange unnamed string instument from Uganda. On the wall hangs a cartoon map of Argentina and a watercolour from Bristol (of all places). There’s a pottery piece from Peru and a Sri Lankan elephant on the window sill. It’s nice to have these mementos, although they’re a nuisance when we decide to move house.

As the years have passed we’ve become more sensible about bringing these bits of junk back from our trips. We normally settle for a painting or a batik, mainly for the ease of rolling it up and stuffing it in the pack without adding to the weight of what we carry. But it wasn’t always like this.

Perhaps our most impractical gift was not even for us, but for my brother. We had just visited the Terracotta Army in Xi’an in 1995, and we passed on the chance to buy the $30 clay figurines that were being sold in the shop on the site. Outside the kids were selling what appeared to be identical figures, although our guide warned us against buying these as they had not been properly fired in the kiln and would break when exposed to frost. A strange objection, and one we chose to ignore as we were offered 5 figures for $3.

These must have weighed almost 10kg between them and doubled the weight of the pack instantly! What seemed like a bargain at that instant soon proved to be a millstone around my neck (literally) as I had to carry these clay pieces for a further two weeks around China. Fortunately, my brother and his wife were thrilled with the little men and they still adorn their living room 15 years later.

We see many ridiculously bulky items for sale to tourists as we travel. We came across thousands of large wooden dolphins in northern Cambodia (there were probably more wooden dolphins than there are tourists passing by in a whole year), we saw tourists buying large pots in Laos and opting not to ship them but carry them on their trip, and even strange animal statues that serve as garden furniture in Africa, again often seen at the airport being packed into the hold and thrown to the mercy of the baggage handlers.

There are countless opportunities to buy useless rubbish when we travel. The item that looks fantastic on a street stall in Bali can often turn into a embarrassing and tacky eyesore when it’s back home in Birmingham. But people must buy them, or they wouldn’t be there in the first place. Anyone care to own up?

Outside the laundry shop, Phnom Penh

I don’t know what it is about travelling, but we seem to be particularly aware of the extreme levels of service when we are away from home. We all have stories of the appallingly bad; whether it is imcompetence, incomprehension or service given with added undiluted hostility. Occasionally though we also experience the very highest standards of service, and often it’s found in the places where we least expect it.

One such case for us was in the suburb of Phnom Penh where we staying over Christmas. We were overdue for a laundry day, and needless to say the hotel we were staying in was not an option (it would have come to around $50; exactly what we paid for a night’s stay). Walking through the neighbourhood we didn’t find any of the $1/1kg laundry signs that were so prevalent in the tourist hot-spots of Laos. But we did find a place that looked as though they might wash our clothes (a general store with a clothes line hanging limply from a streetside pole along the side of the shop). I tried to ask the family seated around a table in the shop whether they do laundry but none of them understood a word and after many smiles and blank faces we walked away.

Undeterred, I returned later with a rucksack full of dirty clothes. It must have been around 5kg worth, and the main man greeted us and tipped out our laundry, carefully separating it into neat piles and all the while tapping numbers into his calculator. I feared the worst while he added the items and he seemed to add on many extra fugures before showing me the final figure: $4.81. I nodded with a poker face and he signalled I should come back at 8 o’clock the next morning.

And here’s where he excelled. When we walked past the shop that evening, we saw our washing hanging in the street. We went up and found that it was completely dry, so asked him if we could take it there and then. He was not happy for us to take it as he signalled that it wasn’t finished. After much persuasion he allowed Sam to take a couple of items she needed and he hung on to the rest. When I collected the remaining clothes in the morning, every item was neatly pressed and carefully folded. He was full of gratitude and the family later waved and smiled warmly at us when we passed the shop again during our stay.

Why have I shared this very ordinary story? For me he personified what it means to excel in delivering customer service. He could teach many businesses much bigger than his own about the essence of customer service. The pride he took in doing the job to the highest standards was striking. He could have easily let us take our clothes away and spare himself the extra task of ironing. We would have been happy customers at that point. But it wasn’t enough for him to leave it at that. He insisted on finishing the job properly, whether we appreciated it or not. How many of us will go the extra mile when our own pride in the quality of our work is the only reward?

“Social media is revolutionising our world. It is changing the way we interact with others, and the way in which companies and individuals do business.” “The old ways are dead; long live Twitter and Facebook.”

Presumably this brave new world comes with its own set of new rules. In search of these new commandments I have pondered my time spent reading others’ interactions and have gleaned a few observations (I’m sure I’ve missed many more):

1. Be nice. Thank people when they promote your work, give credit to those whose work you share with your connections.

2. Laugh and the world laughs with you. Having a positive (while realistic) outlook on everyday issues will attract others to listen to you.

3. If you’ve nothing good to say, say nothing at all. It’s easy to sling mud, especially when hiding behind a veil of anonymity. Nobody likes to lose face, and stepping back before launching a critical tirade can often preserve the dignity of all sides.

4. Like it or not, we are judged not only by what we say but also by the words we choose to convey that message. Filling our communications with profanities inevitably puts the messenger in the spotlight at the expense of their content.

5. It is very easy to add labels to ourselves. Guru, expert, no.1 whatever. I look at the self-written descriptions of the widely recognised leaders in a field. None of these words ever show up. Why? Because they don’t need to tell anyone how good they are; their achievements speak for themselves. If I see a person describe themself as a guru, an expert, or ‘The Leading’ whatever, my immediate impression is not a positive one.

6. Friends come and go; they will follow others for as long as it suits them and drop them when they no longer serve a purpose; people have their own agendas and when yours coincides with that of another more inflential person you can make great progress very quickly; it’s best not to take these things personally.

7. Nobody likes being sold to, but we all appreciate others who can listen and provide an answer that meets our needs.

8. It’s easy for anyone to shout. Loud enough and people will hear. The challenge is getting them to listen.

If you hadn’t noticed, I never used the term ’social media’ once in these rules, nor mentioned any technological platform. Isn’t that the point here? That the rules of how to use social media are in fact not at all new: they are the same rules that have applied to human communication long before the advent of electricity, the telephone and even the printing press.
Social media is not rocket science. While there are particular nuances to adapting our social skills to any new outlet, one basic principle holds true: whatever the next great new advance will be, the ability to communicate intelligently with others will always be the cornerstone to using it successfully.