Mile-High Pub: Happy Hour in the Himalayas

Included among the signatures is that of Reinhold Messner, one of the world's best climbers. In 1978, he became the first climber to summit Everest without supplemental oxygen.

"I met him many times, but I never looked for his fingers," said Yogi, unaware that Messner had seven toes and three fingers amputated after a climb in which his brother had died. "His friend came in here and took all of his fingers," said Yogi, pointing to Messner's Abomimable Snowman footprint sans toes.

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Rajbhandari has worked at Rum Doodle since the bar opened in 1979. Back then, employees used to stand on the street, trying to lure customers with coupons for free rum punch.

But in 1984, with the help of a bartender who knew how to make "fancy cocktails like screwdrivers," said Yogi, referring to the simple orange and vodka drink that was considered exotic in Nepal, the madras- and polo shirt-wearing set in the 1980s anointed the Rum Doodle the happening place.

Today the menu offers drinks like Pong's Revenge, a potent mix of rum, vodka, gin, tequila and orange juice. There's also the Egg Nogg, with rum, brandy, raw eggs, milk and sugar. (Salmonella anyone?) Yogi even has a drink named after him, the Yog Special, which mixes orange lemon, squash, sprite, soda and cream.

Bishnu Subedi, who runs Nature Trails, a travel and expedition guide company, brings many of his clients to the Rum Doodle after a trek.

"We come here and kind of set some dreams," Subedi said. "OK, next year climb 7,000 meters or we go to Tibet and climb a little bit higher."

When climbers summit Everest, they make their way to the Rum Doodle with two passport-sized photographs so Yogi can enter them into the records books he has kept since 1982 and create an "Everest Summiteers Club" card, which offers them free food for life at the Rum Doodle. Nowadays, Yogi said, he confirms the Everest ascents with the Nepal Tourism Board because many people arrive at the Rum Doodle pretending to have summitted the mountain.

Sitting by candlelight during one of Kathmandu's periodical power outages, Wongchu Sherpa eats his free chicken chili dinner. He reached the top of Everest in 1993 and 1995.