We did make it to the non-monkey temple, which was amazing, and actually far nicer without the glaring and somewhat scary monkeys. Think I might have got ripped off in a tourist shop by paying 900 rupees for skirts for Twins and myself and Hubby and I had a little spat in the car regarding my useless haggling skills. Until we realised that we were arguing about whether I paid seven pounds or eight pounds for the skirts, which isn't much, either way. On the way back we went to pick up a leather skirt I've just had made, which is lush and all the kids fell asleep in the car, missing an interesting sight of lots of Lady Boys in fancy dress - or maybe that's how they usually dress - in rickshaws. Dinesh told us that the procession was because it was 'Cow Day' or something, but his (limited) English and our (even more limited) Nepali didn't lead to any further explanation. I can only begin to wonder why men wearing make up and high heels swanning about in bicycle-powered vehicles has anything to do with the deification of cows...

In the evening one of Hubby's colleagues came over with ice cream (hurrah) and regaled us with tales from her extraordinarily tangled love life. She also told me that there's a wives' trip to Calcutta (Kolkata?) planned for November, which got me all excited, until I realised that the sole purpose of the trip is to go to Marks and bloody Spencer  to get Christmas stuff. Pul-ease! Surely there must be better reasons for flying to Calcutta than visiting Marks & Spencer?

Last night I got invited round to someone's house to watch three-month old episodes of Coronation Street (on video) - which is not quite as tragic as flying to India to get English gravy and stuffing, but is still a bit mad. Still, the company was lovely and so was the wine and chocolate, so I may be tempted to become a Corrie fan, just while we're in Nepal, you understand.

Went out today with Sanu, our housekeeper, to buy a sari for Teej. I'm chuffed because the trip took half an hour and my sari is about half the price of anyone else's. Very efficient. And I'm sure nobody will know that the beading on mine was done by machine and not by hand. 

Oops Snow White has finished, time to do bed time...