My mother always wanted to explore Nepal. Most people would be hard put to find the place on a map but I know a little bit about it from hearing the stories when I was growing up. Her father, my grandfather, was involved in the shipping business and sometimes used to travel to the East on work-related matters. When she was a child, she and her mother had joined him on a trip to India and had made a brief sojourn into Nepal. It was an experience she would never forget.

Thousands of miles and many decades later, she often talks to us about it, quite wistfully – of a landlocked Hindu kingdom with its beautiful and ancient Hindu temples and towering mountains (seven of the world’s ten tallest mountains, including Mt. Everest, are supposedly in Nepal). In my mind’s eye, fed by those childhood stories, Nepal looms like the legendary Shangri-La and continues to retain this mythical status in the face of any modern news on the woes and politics of the land. I remember as a child looking at travel books my mother would buy, with pictures of exotic-looking women in colorful tribal costumes and peaceful mountain villages swathed by mist.

I sometimes dream of taking my mother for a visit to Nepal. I believe that in these days, it doesn’t take more than 3 flight connections from the States to Nepal and staying there is not very expensive. On the downside, would my mother’s health and more advanced age permit the journey? I know her eyes would sparkle and she would perk up immediately if I so much as mentioned it. Perhaps I could ask my daughter or my husband to take out some time and join us for a two week vacation there. The more I think about it, the more possible it seems. Maybe one day soon, I’ll take out some of my savings and make my mother's long-cherished wish come true.