Medieval France and Nepal

 As I walked the medieval streets of Bretagne thinking about the life back then, I first thought life must have been brutal and hard.  But also it seemed somehow familiar.  Like I had maybe lived back then.  And then it dawned on me that in a way I had.  When we went to Nepal in 1955 it was a medieval kingdom.  There was no electricity to the average person.  Only one short paved road in all of Nepal.  There were Chateaus (Palaces), and common homes much like the medieval homes, dirt and cobblestone roads.  Magnificent Cathedrals (Temples).  Bullock carts, horses and largely agrarian.  Women washed their clothes in the streams and there was no indoor plumbing or indoor toilets except in the palaces of the aristocracy and a few special buildings. There was no modern medicine.  The people were largely illiterate.  They were generally well fed. And...mostly happy. I mention that because I was thinking that life must have been hard in the middle ages, but my experience in Nepal taught me that no, it was just life. The people laughed and sang and loved and raised their families and were largely content. It was and still is the wars or the aristocracy, the greed and cruelty of the few, that brought the pain. They had their Gods to explain the unexplainable and to offer hope and solace.  And while Nepal has suffered the ravages of modernity there are probably a few places in the world still living this simple life and quite happily.  So while given the choice, most people would not go back, I believe most people back then just lived much as now, just trying to get by and be happy.