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Part I: Six Packages, Six Journeys, One Big Wooden Door

From The Chosen: Battle with a Cerberosian Prince by Theo Nefale

THE CHOSEN · BATTLE WITH A CERBEROSIAN PRINCE

28 29 The Chosen: Battle with a Cerberosian Prince way, but now it was becoming real. Overwhelmed by his thoughts, he tried to give his mind a break. Unfortunately, he couldn’t get much sleep on the flight. The only exception was the 20 minutes he did get during the flight’s ascent, and that was because of his body’s exhaustion from the previous flight. As much as he wanted to sleep during this flight, to give his mind a brief rest, the influx of thoughts denied him that luxury. His brain was in overdrive. Overdrive that was driven by speculation rather than fact and knowledge. He kept thinking about being in a foreign land for the first time. Being in a strange environment. How different will it be? To what extent will I stand out as a non-native? Who will I be able to trust, and how will he know whom to trust? Once again he asked himself about the legitimacy of this whole thing. He remembered reading up on one site that many locals knew how to speak English. He wasn’t sure if it was specifically in Kathmandu, or other parts of Nepal. He thought about all the movies he had seen where tourists were taken advantage of by locals, particularly Americans. Food was another stress point. What do they eat in Kathmandu? How will my stomach react to the local cuisine? What if I fall ill while I am in Kathmandu? Medical services. Do I have coverage? What is the quality of the health professionals? These questions would continue until the plane touched the ground. Chapter 2 Journey to Sagarmatha Five hours of persistent questioning and concern. He didn’t have a single moment of brain inactivity. Amidst his distractedness, TJ had missed all the in-flight announcements. They had landed in Kathmandu, and it was time to exit the plane. The passengers had been handed arrival papers to complete, which TJ had forgotten about. He took a few minutes to fill them out, but missed the business class exits. This resulted in him being caught in the masses of people who were headed to baggage collection. Fortunately for him, he didn’t have any checked luggage, so he avoided the pushing and shoving by the luggage conveyor belt. It was crowded and chaotic. Once he was done with the immigration queues and currency exchange, he had to figure out how to get to

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