Day 28

      We met up with the Irish and got in a cab to the bus station to find it totally empty, at the required arrival time. We're stupid for not learning our lesson from last time – the bus always leaves late. 

       On the way there, I walked past the last of my signs that had remained up for 2 days and saw that someone had removed the photo on the front, so it is literally telling you to not "do it" with bullshit:

      While waiting at the bus station, I talked to a nice Indian who was shocked to learn hitchhiking is illegal in the US. He asked why and I don't really know.

Here is the worst toilet ever:

      The bus ride is typically shaky, loud, and cramped. We're on Rohtang pass, which means "many dead bodies," and it just started snowing! 

      At some point, that guy I talked to's daughter was pointing and laughing at the guy behind her. It took me a minute to realize why: he has no legs. Jim judged the girl's father for this behavior, assuming they were in an upper caste who looks down on the poor, but I explained it away as the behavior of an ignorant little kid. Her dad was a really nice guy who told us the monsoon was starting in certain parts of India already. Not looking forward to that.

      We stopped for food, and I overheard some loud chanting. My instinct is to ignore large crowds, but Jim said this is a Tibetan exorcism! The passengers stood around and watched. My wish to see a Tibetan clown was also granted:

He looked a lot like Smokey Robinson:

      He did a lot of the oldest verbal form of comedy: Making fun of the straight man in the routine. Jim tried to translate from Lahauli, but it's very different from Tibetan so he had trouble, but he said the clown was saying things like "your clothes smell, they aren't pleasing to the Gods" and all the locals were laughing so hard because that's about as inappropriate as life gets out here. They were both excellent actors. I could pick up on all the beats they hit and when they were improvising versus sticking to the script. Jim claims they travel all over the Himalayas doing this many-hour performance, then, according to Jim, they pin flags to the guy's flesh, and break rocks with their bodies. We left before that b/c the actors were really drawing it out (justifiably because it's the only entertainment in the whole province, so people are ready to sit through a 6 hour performance when they arrive).

I did get to hear the best song ever though:

      We returned to the bus and I had an excellent conversation with Katie where I told her that, to accomplish her goal of changing the prison system she needs to not get inside but rather work backwards and do what MLK and Gandhi did before she gets too old to care about large problems. I need to implement my own advice, though it might be too late.

She also asked if I'm good at taking selfies:

 

      It's crazy that I hadn't seen any entertainment in 2 weeks until that Tibetan ceremony, and haven't been interrupted by a phone in 3 weeks. I hope my habit of checking it every 2 seconds ends for a while.

      The driver was so fast and reckless on those narrow mountain passes that we got here in 12 hours instead of 17. Going to dinner with Katie, Aaron, and these two European guys they introduced us to on the bus.

Later:
      Wow, me and Jim had both forgotten what having other friends is like! Had a good time at dinner, then got drunk in the hotel room and had awesome conversations unlike anything since I left college. This German guy told me that German companies aren't legally allowed to fire you for something you do outside of work, because that's the start of discrimination. A good policy. Current and future employers, I hope you consider the validity of this as you read this blog.