Not made in my home....

Long ago and far away, or so it seems, a young man decided to go hiking. He had been on the Grand tour of every whore house in South America and the Med, courtesy of the US Navy, howsomever, carousing with five thousand or so of your closest friends didn't fill the void of his wandering soul.

He was determined to find real adventure.

Boy, Howdy!

I don't know that he spun a globe and threw a dart while drunk and blind folded, but I wouldn't be surprised.

His first hike ever, he decided to go to Nepal.

Talk about gettin' out of town.

At one point in our history I had given him some nonverbal indication that bad things were about to befall him, at my hand. When we got past that, with out legal or medical involvement, we actually became friends.

Imagine my surprise!

When I got the news that he was about to risk his life gallivanting about the Himalayas, I extended an offer for help and education. I taught him some lessons that I had learned the hard way about caring for his feet, advised him on foot ware and taught him some things about what to do when the above didn't work.

I should have told him not to eat anything that you didn't see cooked. Poor sap caught something in Thailand that cost him about twenty pounds and two weeks of work before it left his system.

Partly because of my efforts on behalf of his feet, and somewhat because of my efforts at anger management on behalf of the rest of him, he asked if there was something small he could bring me. After lengthy discussions regarding the possibly difficulty in transporting small Thai ladies in carry on bags, I opined that a knife would be nice.

The above pictured blade came from half a world away.

The style is from Nepal; the bent, leaf shaped blade with "eating knives" in the sheath. The blade is .333 thick and seven inches long. This design and workmanship are out of history. The tool marks indicate the shape was chiseled from whatever came to hand and then shaped with basic tools to it's present finish. Over all length is 13 inches.

The decoration is carved into the steel with a chisel. Some one spent considerable time drawing what appear to be a dragon and coi into the blade. The brass fixtures are riveted to the tang. The grip is yak bone, hand carved and the grooves filled with ocher and copper rivets. The triangular piece on the grip is copper.

The sheath is wood covered in leather, and decorated with hand carved copper brass and what appears to be nickle silver. The metal is covered in designs from end to end. The decoration is held in place with wire rivets, and tacks. Interestingly there is cardboard under the metal and inside the sheath.

I am ashamed to say I never looked at it closely until I sat down to write this.