Pokhara 13th July 2006

Here I am a month later. I didn’t feel like writing too much after Wolf died, lots of things happened that wouldn’t be right to put on a website.

Wolf was cremated in Kathmandu and we had a lovely day. Des, Oliver and I went to the German Embassy, where Wolf’s body had been moved to and we gave Wolf a motorbike escort to the burning ghats. When we got there we removed Wolf from the body bag and wrapped him in a shroud before placing him onto of the wood. We then dressed the body with orange garlands. Mo had spoken with Suzanne (Wolf’s girlfriend) and they asked me if I would take photographs of the ceremony. So I was busy running around taking photographs of these really picturesque ghats whilst kids played and men and women sat around.

Over forty people turned up for the cremation and the lady from the German embassy told us that this was “not normal, usually only zoo or zree people for foreigner”. Wolf’s friend from Germany brought a couple of crates of beer and everyone sat around, had a beer and told stores as our friend burned away in front of us. I’ve been to a couple of cremations before in the London, and they are horrible, impersonal affairs compared to Wolf’s cremation. We had three Baba’s there (holy men) who Wolf knew, we had goats walking around trying to eat the flowers (Wolf would have liked that), kids playing and normal life going on less than twenty metres away. Cheddup was excellent and he tended to the fire to make sure that the body burned properly. He’s burned many bodies (I didn’t want to ask…) and he was running around getting logs and straw. We went back to Cheddup’s bar (Jazz Upstairs) and he had laid food on and we had a really good night.

I ended up taking over 500 hundred photographs – I only had one chance to get this right. The photos came out really well and as a result of this I’ve had various little photography jobs and have even done some Photoshop training for someone. I burned copies of 100 of the photos onto CD and gave them to Rick and Mo to copy and distribute. I also did a couple of photo montages which I also put on CD, I’ll try and put some of the photos on this site.

I’ve met so many nice people here in Pokhara. I spent a week hanging around with two South African swimwear models (I was like the cat who had the cream – shame they both had boyfriends back home), drank with the head of the army (and his armed bodyguard), I’ve partied with a radio producer from Warzaw, had dinner with a mountaineering journalist, had numerous lunches with a Scottish journalist and have made so many amazing contacts. I’m also a paid photographer and graphic designer. I designed a logo and flyers for Rick and Mo’s business and there is plenty more of that type of work here for me to do. So many people have come up to me to compliment me on Wolf’s photos and one photo in particular which I never even took! It was a photo that Rick took and he thought it would look nice to frame it and put it in front of the burning ghat. The only problem was that Mo was sitting on her motorbike in the photo beside Wolf and there was an ox cart and other stuff in the background. I told them that I’d see if I could do anything with it. I ended up extracting Wolf from the photo and combining him with a photo of the fog / clouds I had ridden through on my way from Daman to Kathmandu, and it really worked.
Some guy from the Himalayan Enfielders (motorcycle touring club) in Kathmandu asked me to train him in photography. He’d just spent four days training with a professional Indian photographer and wanted to learn more. I asked him if he knew how to use Photoshop and he told me that he had a copy of CS2 (the latest version) but he never used it. I told him that I could improve his photography more in two hours using Photoshop than I could in two days teaching him photography. He told me that he’d pay, but I told him not to bother. Did I mention that he also runs a trekking business? He brought some photos that he took in a studio with the Indian photographer and they were technically ok, but lifeless. I showed him how to correct colour, remove spots, soften wrinkles and basically turn normal common garden people into super models, and it works. He couldn’t believe what I’d been able to do to his photos, actually, he couldn’t believe what he could do and he was dying to email the photo’s to the people in them.

I’ve tried to leave Nepal a couple of times in the last two weeks and get back on the road. I’ve failed every time, the latest attempt being yesterday! I said all my goodbyes and we had a few drinks and I woke up in the morning and couldn’t go. My visa runs out today (has it really been two months?), so I’ve got to head down to town and get a one-month renewal.