Thoughts and experiences from the end of April to mid-May.
Rain:
My roommate in on a three-week trek on some enormous snow capped mountain; I’m alone in the house. I lay awake at night scared and irritated. It’s like I’m stuck in a 3D surround sound box. Flashes of lightening and booming thunder play tag with eachother outside my window. The pessimistic wimp in me starts to think of flooding, earthquakes, etc. And, more importantly, how I will escape such disasters: Should I open the door now so I can have an escape route?- If a quake starts to rumble I’ll go for the ‘triangle approach’ because I have serious doubts about my doorframes’ sustainability. It’s with these thoughts that I finally drift off to sleep to the sound of pattering rain. The next morning I’m in the bathroom battling worms. The rain has brought them in droves. I maliciously whack away at them with the squeegee and then finish them off with a squirt of bleach for good measure. When I was in college I’d be late for class every time it rained because I couldn’t bear to walk by all the drowning worms so I’d pick them up and bring them to drier ground. Oh how living in this city has changed me.
Puppies:
As I was walking to work, taking in the view of garbage meandering down the grey, foamy Baghmati River, two fat liquid spats hit my arm. Having lived in Kathmandu for 8 months I instantly thought “ Ah man! I just got spit on…again” But I soon realized it was beginning to rain in typical pre-monsoon fashion of brief but violent downpours. I whipped out my umbrella and continued ‘round the corner. It was legitimately raining at this point and I past a small puppy slowly walking down the road, head down and teetering. I was a few paces past him when it started to hail. I stopped and turned to watch if the thing was hustling towards shelter; he was slowly crossing the road and then fumbling on his front legs as the hail assaulted him. I sped over to give him some umbrella shelter; he got up and started walking again. His leg looked mangled from the inside and he had a pusing sore on the outside. I walked with him hoping he was trying to go somewhere in particular but before getting much further he collapsed in a grassy puddle and whimpered pathetically. At this point I knew he was dying so I sat in the mud getting drenched and gave him what I could, my umbrella, because I’m a coward and didn’t want to touch it for fear of ‘oozing dog leg syndrome’ or the likes. I can’t even make it through a National Geographic special without chocking up when the lion catches the gazelle, and now I have to watch a puppy die in a puddle? Kathmandu is beating me to an emotional pulp these days. Why am I here? Before I had time to rouse my courage towards something more proactive a young boy rounded the corner and peered through the raindrops, curiosity blooming with each step. When he reached us he clasped his hands behind his back in the fashion of an old stooped man and gave the situation a good review. I looked up at him and said “it’s dying, what to do?” in my fumbling Nepali. He didn't answer, instead he poked the puppy, recoiled, waited 5 seconds and then gingerly picked it up and troted away saying he’ll put it under cover. And that’s it. I got up and I finished walking to the office. I spend the rest of the day looking up funders for our HIV/AIDS prevention program on the computer in wet clothes and don’t mention the puppy to my 9-5 coworkers.
For the past few months as I’ve been tied to this city by work and school I've been becoming increasingly unhappy. My days tend to be cursing people instead of enjoying them: their selfishness, rudeness, how ugly they make the world. But on this day that kid restored a drop of my faith in us.
Trees:
It’s spring in Nepal. This statement makes about as much sense as saying it’s spring in Vermont in April- every New Englander knows it’s far more accurate to say ‘mud season’. So, let’s say it’s ‘pre-monsoon’ in Nepal. I’m convinced that Dr. Seuss must have visited Kathmandu during this time because as I walk the crumbling, polluted streets I’m smacked in the face with the view of these incredible, branchy trees furry with the most ludicrously colorful blooms. The leaves have all fallen just days before the flowers burst out in bright lavender, magenta, and jock-o-lantern orange. They help to remind me that the world still has delightful treasures to show me at a time and place where I have to search long and hard to recognize even glimmers of beauty.
