"Why are they stopping cars? What are they looking for?," I ask my Mom and our driver at yet another police road block in Kathmandu. If monkeys roaming free, goats, people desperately seeking a non-existant sidewalk, chaotic drivers and their one-step-away-from-the-scrap-metal heaps of vehicles, chickens, pedi-cabs, and pseudo-rickshaws...oh, and stalled out cars and toppled over trucks and heaps of trash aren't enough to bring the incessant flow of traffic to its inevitable halt (I don't think we ever saw the speedometer go over 15 miles an hour anywhere in Nepal) then I guess the police checkpoints will take care of any travel progress.
I guess they weren't looking for us because our car and driver were continuously waved through....I still don't know what the police were looking for and I guess I never will. As with so many things in Kathmandu, some things are best left not understood.
It has taken me a few weeks to share my thoughts about our travels to Nepal. Please understand my thoughts about Kathmandu are distinctly different from the rest of Nepal. I haven't written about Kathmandu because I did not want to come off as an insensitive, lacking in compassion, Western-Hemisphered, industrialized- nation dweller and yet the risk I take in what I share is that I may come off as sounding like all those things and more.
Realize I am describing a place...not a culture...not its people who are some of the kindest and welcoming people. That's an important distinction. However, very often our first impressions are formed long before we meet the locals. We see things. We feel things. We smell things. Opinions are formed.
Landing at midnight, after 25 hours of collective flight time from NYC, I decide to reserve my first impressions until after we have had a good night's sleep. I'm going to disregard the security checkpoint at the ground's entrance to our accommodations, the Hyatt Regency, where men dressed as soldiers (remember, having just arrived, I don't know yet if they are actual soldiers or dressed like some. Is this a welcoming look when soldiers greet us at our hotel?) pass a mirror under our vehicle and pretend to check the car for explosives. Really, what can they see in the dark at midnight?
Mom practically crawls out of the car. She's feeling stiff...it's been a long journey. "Felt like there are a lot of potholes in their roads", she said. "I'm not sure, Mom. Hard to tell". Hard to tell because there are no street lights, no traffic lights, headlights and taillights on cars seem to be optional. Something tells me all will be revealed come morning...
Getting out of the car, I finally realize it's about 90 degrees...at midnight. Hhhhmmm, yet another military/security officer is opening the doors to the hotel lobby...military as doormen? Is this a 5-star resort or a military compound? Again, I'm reserving judgement until morning but I have come to the conclusion that I am probably not going to need the fleece outerwear and Gore-tex vest I brought in my luggage. 90 degrees....midnight....got it.
Beds. We need beds. We sleep. Zzzzzzzzz.
After a breakfast complete with yak cheese and Himalayan goat cheese and baked curd, we decide to venture into Kathmandu. As we make our way into town, I now see that which was only felt the night before. It's like this. In order to have potholes, one must have a road. There is no road. Not like we would define a road. There are cars but no rules of the road (although I did find out later there are some road rules such as : A driver making a left turn always has the right of way and does not have to stop before turning...and evidently doesn't have to signal either. Signals, what's that? There are no lane divisions so feel free to travel in whatever direction you deem necessary and oh, if one comes to a roundabout, the drivers entering the roundabout have the right of way NOT the drivers already in the traffic circle). All of this is a moot point anyway because THERE ARE NO ROADS. There may have been some paved roads once, maybe back in the 1960's, but they have not been repaved since and the once-existant roads have now been reduced to dirt paths that criss-cross the chaos that is Kathmandu.
See, I know this all sounds harsh. I know Nepal is a third-world, underdeveloped country with corrupt individuals that wield power whilst giving nothing back to the people. It is a nation of poverty beyond description. Absolutely nothing, no matter how much reading one does to educate herself about Kathmandu, no matter how many pages she thumbs down in her Lonely Planet Nepal guidebook, nothing can prepare a traveler for the reality that hit us from the moment we landed at the airport.
The air pollution from all those vehicles going nowhere is so thick I can see it. I can taste it. I can touch it. Combine it with the suntan lotion I have on and believe me, I am now wearing the air pollution as well. The layers of dirt that peel off of me after a few hours of sightseeing in Kathmandu could fill a small potted plant with the soil it needs to grow. Filthy. Everything, including me, my clothing, the air I breathe is filthy.
Here it is....and I am sorry as I write this but I swear I'm sugar-coating it when I say Kathmandu is a sensory cesspool. Yes, it has pockets of cultural fascination. The temples of Durbar Square adorned in brilliant red material accents against dark wood ornate facades...multi-colored prayer flags billowing in a rare breeze when one least expects it. The Garden of Dreams which is an oasis of gardens with wisteria trellises and trumpet flowers replete with marble-like white elephant statues all hidden behind a blink-and-you'll-miss-it brick wall. Alley ways that lead to a hidden town square with temples replete in marigold laden streamers. Merchants around a corner selling everything from bolts of fabrics to cotton candy. A vendor selling rice by weighing it with an old-fashioned weight-and-balance metal scale. It's fascinating and beautiful BUT (I abhor that I have to put the BUT here) combine it with the pollution, the hoards of humanity seemingly going nowhere and everywhere all at the same time, making our way with them through the labyrinth of unmarked dirt roads that are the streets of Kathmandu and add to the mix goat meat being sold unrefrigerated in what is now a balmy 100 degrees mid-day and the smell of diesel fumes spewing from thousands of cars and trucks with no emissions standards and dodging all the afore-mentioned poultry and don't forget the wild, roaming monkeys and oh, I forgot to mention the holy cows and those ever-present mounds of garbage created by humanity-at-large (and the sad fact that there is always some unfortunate soul digging through that garbage)...and what am I meant to say? I do ask myself..."What happened to Shangri-La? It's more like Shangri-Ha-Ha except the first and lasting impression is that, unfortunately this is nothing to laugh about."
I wanted to love Kathmandu. But it's hard....Kathmandu is a hard place to love. I want to see the good. And we do....we see the good in the beauty of its people, in their ever-present gentility combined with their resilency. Kathmandu is a reminder that we must take nothing for granted.
Here's the thing. I flip a wall switch in my house and the electricity turns on. I won't lie to you. I take that as a given. I expect nothing less. If it did not turn on, that would be the surprise factor. Now imagine a country where even in its largest city, electricity is a luxury.
"Mom, the lights are out again", I say after what has to be the sixth black-out in 3 days. Our hotel had its own generators so we are spared the darkness we saw all around us; every house and building without electrical power for as far as we could...or could not see. All of Nepal, if electricty exists at all, is on a system of rolling power outages. If I live on the west side of Kathmandu and it's a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday between the hours of 6p.m. and 10p.m., I better have a lot of candles on hand because the one thing, guaranteed, I will not have is electricity.
We turn the faucet handle at home and water flows in our sinks. If we are not being too fussy, we can even drink that water. We have choices as in hot or cold water, fast-flowing or a trickle, whatever we need. Simply picture a city where indoor plumbing is a luxury. If water is needed, grab a bucket or whatever to carry said water from the communal water spigot (which could be miles from your home) back to your place. This is city life, Kathmandu-style.
It has been hard to write about Kathmandu because usually when I write about a place, I want to take the reader there with me, at least in spirit. I will fail miserably in that objective this time around and I'll tell you why. Until one walks with a useless map in hand which is useless because one can not discern a road from a path from an alleyway from a dead end and besides, there were only 2 street signs in all of the city that we ever found and those were badly mangled metal signs encrusted in dirt and pointing, well, not toward either street option rendering it comical; until one gets so lost that one feels like she will never find her way back to anything recognizable; until one has a drunk man (mind you, a very nice, helpful, polite but nonetheless drunk man)lead you to a taxi stand on the fringe on the maze that is Kathmandu (note even the drunk man can find his way better than sober people. Note to self: Next time, I'm navigating Kathmandu, have a few drinks first :); until one can smell the garbage along with the farm animals and the curry wafting from cauldrons behind where there should be doors and until you can taste the polluted air on your tongue whilst seeking shade in the blistering heat...until one experiences all this and more in one sensory moment, believe me, one knows nothing of Kathmandu.
We are persistent though.
"Mom, lets take a look at the map again. Hhhhmmm...pretty colors. I think we are right here. Nope. Maybe. Wait...if I hold this upside down and compare it to..." Mom and I are standing somewhere. This is what we know for sure. I couldn't tell you where we were even whilst we were standing there. We don't even remember where we were trying to go and maybe that's a good thing. We start laughing.
"Maybe we'll just let Kathmandu find us".
It sure did.
I guess they weren't looking for us because our car and driver were continuously waved through....I still don't know what the police were looking for and I guess I never will. As with so many things in Kathmandu, some things are best left not understood.
It has taken me a few weeks to share my thoughts about our travels to Nepal. Please understand my thoughts about Kathmandu are distinctly different from the rest of Nepal. I haven't written about Kathmandu because I did not want to come off as an insensitive, lacking in compassion, Western-Hemisphered, industrialized- nation dweller and yet the risk I take in what I share is that I may come off as sounding like all those things and more.
Realize I am describing a place...not a culture...not its people who are some of the kindest and welcoming people. That's an important distinction. However, very often our first impressions are formed long before we meet the locals. We see things. We feel things. We smell things. Opinions are formed.
Landing at midnight, after 25 hours of collective flight time from NYC, I decide to reserve my first impressions until after we have had a good night's sleep. I'm going to disregard the security checkpoint at the ground's entrance to our accommodations, the Hyatt Regency, where men dressed as soldiers (remember, having just arrived, I don't know yet if they are actual soldiers or dressed like some. Is this a welcoming look when soldiers greet us at our hotel?) pass a mirror under our vehicle and pretend to check the car for explosives. Really, what can they see in the dark at midnight?
Mom practically crawls out of the car. She's feeling stiff...it's been a long journey. "Felt like there are a lot of potholes in their roads", she said. "I'm not sure, Mom. Hard to tell". Hard to tell because there are no street lights, no traffic lights, headlights and taillights on cars seem to be optional. Something tells me all will be revealed come morning...
Getting out of the car, I finally realize it's about 90 degrees...at midnight. Hhhhmmm, yet another military/security officer is opening the doors to the hotel lobby...military as doormen? Is this a 5-star resort or a military compound? Again, I'm reserving judgement until morning but I have come to the conclusion that I am probably not going to need the fleece outerwear and Gore-tex vest I brought in my luggage. 90 degrees....midnight....got it.
Beds. We need beds. We sleep. Zzzzzzzzz.
After a breakfast complete with yak cheese and Himalayan goat cheese and baked curd, we decide to venture into Kathmandu. As we make our way into town, I now see that which was only felt the night before. It's like this. In order to have potholes, one must have a road. There is no road. Not like we would define a road. There are cars but no rules of the road (although I did find out later there are some road rules such as : A driver making a left turn always has the right of way and does not have to stop before turning...and evidently doesn't have to signal either. Signals, what's that? There are no lane divisions so feel free to travel in whatever direction you deem necessary and oh, if one comes to a roundabout, the drivers entering the roundabout have the right of way NOT the drivers already in the traffic circle). All of this is a moot point anyway because THERE ARE NO ROADS. There may have been some paved roads once, maybe back in the 1960's, but they have not been repaved since and the once-existant roads have now been reduced to dirt paths that criss-cross the chaos that is Kathmandu.
See, I know this all sounds harsh. I know Nepal is a third-world, underdeveloped country with corrupt individuals that wield power whilst giving nothing back to the people. It is a nation of poverty beyond description. Absolutely nothing, no matter how much reading one does to educate herself about Kathmandu, no matter how many pages she thumbs down in her Lonely Planet Nepal guidebook, nothing can prepare a traveler for the reality that hit us from the moment we landed at the airport.
The air pollution from all those vehicles going nowhere is so thick I can see it. I can taste it. I can touch it. Combine it with the suntan lotion I have on and believe me, I am now wearing the air pollution as well. The layers of dirt that peel off of me after a few hours of sightseeing in Kathmandu could fill a small potted plant with the soil it needs to grow. Filthy. Everything, including me, my clothing, the air I breathe is filthy.
Here it is....and I am sorry as I write this but I swear I'm sugar-coating it when I say Kathmandu is a sensory cesspool. Yes, it has pockets of cultural fascination. The temples of Durbar Square adorned in brilliant red material accents against dark wood ornate facades...multi-colored prayer flags billowing in a rare breeze when one least expects it. The Garden of Dreams which is an oasis of gardens with wisteria trellises and trumpet flowers replete with marble-like white elephant statues all hidden behind a blink-and-you'll-miss-it brick wall. Alley ways that lead to a hidden town square with temples replete in marigold laden streamers. Merchants around a corner selling everything from bolts of fabrics to cotton candy. A vendor selling rice by weighing it with an old-fashioned weight-and-balance metal scale. It's fascinating and beautiful BUT (I abhor that I have to put the BUT here) combine it with the pollution, the hoards of humanity seemingly going nowhere and everywhere all at the same time, making our way with them through the labyrinth of unmarked dirt roads that are the streets of Kathmandu and add to the mix goat meat being sold unrefrigerated in what is now a balmy 100 degrees mid-day and the smell of diesel fumes spewing from thousands of cars and trucks with no emissions standards and dodging all the afore-mentioned poultry and don't forget the wild, roaming monkeys and oh, I forgot to mention the holy cows and those ever-present mounds of garbage created by humanity-at-large (and the sad fact that there is always some unfortunate soul digging through that garbage)...and what am I meant to say? I do ask myself..."What happened to Shangri-La? It's more like Shangri-Ha-Ha except the first and lasting impression is that, unfortunately this is nothing to laugh about."
I wanted to love Kathmandu. But it's hard....Kathmandu is a hard place to love. I want to see the good. And we do....we see the good in the beauty of its people, in their ever-present gentility combined with their resilency. Kathmandu is a reminder that we must take nothing for granted.
Here's the thing. I flip a wall switch in my house and the electricity turns on. I won't lie to you. I take that as a given. I expect nothing less. If it did not turn on, that would be the surprise factor. Now imagine a country where even in its largest city, electricity is a luxury.
"Mom, the lights are out again", I say after what has to be the sixth black-out in 3 days. Our hotel had its own generators so we are spared the darkness we saw all around us; every house and building without electrical power for as far as we could...or could not see. All of Nepal, if electricty exists at all, is on a system of rolling power outages. If I live on the west side of Kathmandu and it's a Tuesday, Thursday or Saturday between the hours of 6p.m. and 10p.m., I better have a lot of candles on hand because the one thing, guaranteed, I will not have is electricity.
We turn the faucet handle at home and water flows in our sinks. If we are not being too fussy, we can even drink that water. We have choices as in hot or cold water, fast-flowing or a trickle, whatever we need. Simply picture a city where indoor plumbing is a luxury. If water is needed, grab a bucket or whatever to carry said water from the communal water spigot (which could be miles from your home) back to your place. This is city life, Kathmandu-style.
It has been hard to write about Kathmandu because usually when I write about a place, I want to take the reader there with me, at least in spirit. I will fail miserably in that objective this time around and I'll tell you why. Until one walks with a useless map in hand which is useless because one can not discern a road from a path from an alleyway from a dead end and besides, there were only 2 street signs in all of the city that we ever found and those were badly mangled metal signs encrusted in dirt and pointing, well, not toward either street option rendering it comical; until one gets so lost that one feels like she will never find her way back to anything recognizable; until one has a drunk man (mind you, a very nice, helpful, polite but nonetheless drunk man)lead you to a taxi stand on the fringe on the maze that is Kathmandu (note even the drunk man can find his way better than sober people. Note to self: Next time, I'm navigating Kathmandu, have a few drinks first :); until one can smell the garbage along with the farm animals and the curry wafting from cauldrons behind where there should be doors and until you can taste the polluted air on your tongue whilst seeking shade in the blistering heat...until one experiences all this and more in one sensory moment, believe me, one knows nothing of Kathmandu.
We are persistent though.
"Mom, lets take a look at the map again. Hhhhmmm...pretty colors. I think we are right here. Nope. Maybe. Wait...if I hold this upside down and compare it to..." Mom and I are standing somewhere. This is what we know for sure. I couldn't tell you where we were even whilst we were standing there. We don't even remember where we were trying to go and maybe that's a good thing. We start laughing.
"Maybe we'll just let Kathmandu find us".
It sure did.
Estelle, I saw your profile pic, you look great! Loved your blog! I was in India & real dissappointed that we didnt have the time for Nepal, Now im ok with it! Great pics, interesting story, i will go someday;)
ReplyDeleteDon't expect anything in kathmandu.... it's a 3rd world city with 10 years of civil war up till 2007 and a corrupt government... it there is one...
ReplyDelete