I spent 2 and a half months there. Spent 2-3 weeks in Kathmandu, and hiked around Manaslu, Annapurna circuits and from jiri to gokyo valley and back to Lulka. Got violently stomach I'll twice and pretty sure I nearly got gangrene on my big toe, pissed blood after drinking bad water and then passed out in a tea house. I loved it, best place I have ever been, but the exploitation of workers there is absolutely disgusting. Frankly, Sherpas are the lucky ones. Half the workers in the mountains are from Kathmandu valley where it is 30 degrees all year. I was at a lodge right before Larkya la pass and there were some French tourists there was as well. Probably about about 10 tourists and maybe 2 dozen porters. It was about minus 15 with knee deep snow and while the tourists were in their nice tents (and to be fair I was in albeit very basic dirt floor room, a dry room none the less) the porters slept huddled under a big tarp. There was about an inch of snow on it in the morning. Next day I saw one of the porters walking through knee deep snow in a pair of running shoes with plastic bags in them, jeans and a sweat shirt, no mittens. We got to a steep section and he had this giant wicker basket full of metal pots and pans in it that was swaying all over and he kept falling into the snow in his bear hands, which were red and clearly in pain. I had an extra pair of mittens so I gave them to him. That was just on eggregious example, but this sort of thing is the norm there. I seem to recall when I was there that a progressive legislation limited the max weight you could give a porter to 70 kilos....

We had a guide too, but he had decent knock off gear and we gave him a 400 dollar tip in addition to his 25 dollar a day rate, which we figured was pretty reasonable for a 10 day trip. He was from the Ganesh himal region and so not a sherpa, but a mountain person.