Maoist and Their Strong Hold

Logan and I went to bed to the sound of clapping and cheering for no apparent reason. It seemed as though the crowd was listening to the speech of some leader near our hotel. There is a Maoist office flying an old Soviet flags directly accross from the Sargamatha National Park entrance. There is a strange feel in the air here. I can see it in the eyes of the population. There is anger in the eyes of the lower class and fear in the eyes of the upper and middle class. The people with money seem to be in denial about the state in which local politics have finally reached out to the lowest part of the population.
Nepal is divided in to a long standing class structure that seems to have been here since the begining of time, since kings where kings and peasents were peasents. The class structure will not be broken easily. However, as idealistic as seeing the class structure broken is, I have disdain for the communist movement and how it is being faught here.
In their enthusiasm, the Maoist have made many wrong manuverse. They have started to take young boys from villiages in to their army to strengthen and stabilze their control over those towns. I have heard from local sources that they enter villiages in large numbers where the people barrely have the means to feed themselves and demand to be fed. They demand money from trekkers and climbers in the north and the south, giving out small reciepts to those that pass and must pay. That money is used to buy weapons from accross the border and they are brought in without notice through the mountains from countries that border Nepal.
The air here is filled with resentment. I am affraid that it could turn in to an inner battle, much like what happened in Cambodia. We have heard news from within the Kumbu that the Maoist have smashed up a printing house for the national news paper. There was a bombing in Kathmandu a week before we flew in that targeted people at a transit station in downtown. It is painfull to watch these great people divided by ideaoloy, propoganda and terrorism. They are truly a great people.
In the streets there are loud speakers that men are carering shouting sloggins of the party. I'd write what they are saying but I don't understand.


Logan and I are trying to escape from this place. The airstripe is shrouded in fog and the flights have been stopped for the day. We hope that they will start again once it lifts. I want to leave this place and go to Kathmandu. There we will try and find tickets home. I will probably end up in LA and try to get a flight back to SF.

Until then,

James