Yesterday I met up with a nice young Swiss guy, Andrien, who I met at Chokyi Nyima’s monastery when I was there to hear Rinpoche give a dharma talk. Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche was feeling tired from his trip back from the U.S., which I could totally sympathize with, so the talk was cancelled. Andrien took me to a local tea shop where a cup of tea was 5 rupees a cup. We had a long talk, and also talked with a Tibetan man who spoke great English. He was from Dharamasala, and teaches Tibetan there. After that, we separated at lunchtime, as he lives with a Tibetan family who feeds him his meals, and we met up again and went to Durbar Marg by taxi, about twenty minutes away. Durbar Marg is more like what we would expect in a shopping district in the West, a much more expensive place than Bodhnath. We also went to the Dream Garden, another oasis, which you can see in the picture here (along with Adrien's back). We spent a lot of time there relaxing on the grass, reading and talking philosophy. Then we went to Thamel, which was not too far to walk to. We went into a large three story bookstore. I’m definitely going back there sometime. They have a lot of Buddhist books, lots of all sorts of types of books, almost all in English. Then, after some intense bargaining by Adrien with a couple cab drivers, we went back to Bodhnath by taxi paying 130 rupees (a little less than two dollars), a bargain for sure!