The Critic Afoot: No Power, No Water, No Fuel: Life in Kathmandu

It is raining out this morning, and thundering; this is the first time we have had real rain since I have been here. Sometimes it will pour for about fifteen minutes in the afternoon but this is the first sustained rain and the only time it has rained in the morning. But we need it. Hopefully it will clear up the air a little too.

I have been hanging around Kathmandu for the past couple of weeks, doing a bunch of work for Initiative Outdoors, Chandra's company. He is starting a new program with a new international baccalaureate program next year. Right now we are busy designed courses so I have been writing course outlines and handouts for many topics including climbing, backpacking, navigation, and first-aid.

A Monkey

In recent days, amenities such as water, fuel, and power have been hard to come by. There is an ongoing shortage of all of them, but in the last few days it has been more noticeable.

We have 16 hour power cuts each day and that has been ongoing. However there is a battery and inverter in the main part of their apartment so it is easy to forget that most of the city is without power. The battery provides enough power to run lights, the TV (though cable frequently goes out), and the computer. Large appliances such as the refrigerator, toaster, and water pump only work when the power is on. As such, the refrigerator keeps things more or less chilled but we only buy perishable items when we are going to use them. For example, we buy milk each morning and it comes in pint sized plastic bags.

There is also an ongoing shortage of water. City water only comes in the morning every three days, and if you don't have power when the water comes, you are out of luck. This is the case in our kitchen, so we frequently run out of water there. We are lucky however that we have well water in the bathrooms (city water is treated and cleaner so we have that in the kitchen). Many people, who do not have wells, have to go to town pumps to fill water jugs and carry them home. The well provides us with sufficient water, though it is also getting low, but again it relies on an electric pump to bring it up. I'm not really sure what the problem was but for some reason the pump was not filling the storage tank on the roof when we had power, so we have been running out of water the last couple days. I think that they fixed the pump yesterday, so we might be fine today. Either way, we fill buckets when we have water in case we run out later.

There is also a shortage of fuel and it has gotten more severe recently. Apparently there is a strike in southern Nepal which is cutting off fuel supplied to the Kathmandu valleys. This is making lines at gas stations even longer, and they are rationing the gas to about 6 liters for motor bikes and 12 liters for vehicles. Chandra drives his motor bike sparingly now because getting gas can be an all day task.

Long gas line on right side of the road

The other day I went out for a walk and to run some errands with Chandra, and along the way we ran into the chariot. It is a structure that they build from scratch, mostly of wood and hand made rope. Then they parade it through town to a temple, a task that takes about four days. Now this thing is about 40 or 50 feet tall, with a narrow base, it is kind of wobbly, and the roads are less than even. And, it is really bad luck if it falls over (it fell over last year and the year that the king was over thrown).

It was quite amazing to watch, the streets were full of people cheering every time it made any forward progress, or even straightened out. It is pulled by a bunch of men, kind of like one sided tug-or-war. And they are so energetic about it. It is also assisted by people holding other ropes and running along side or on adjacent rooftops, to keep it from falling over. And there are people on the tower, directing all of the pullers. It is really quite a sight.

At one point it tipped over so far that two of the wheels came off of the ground. People jumped up onto the wheels to pull them down, as all of the people standing under the tower ran away, lest they be crushed by the falling structure. At that point the even brought in a crane to straighten it out, which worked until they started moving again and it slumped back over.

Other than that life here has been pretty quiet. We went rock climbing in a park right outside of the city. It was a rock wall with about 20 bolted routes. As we were leaving a couple and their two guides came to climb. No one had climbing shoes or helmets. The guides lead climbed the routes in combat boots and then let the clients climb. When a client got stuck. The guide free climbed along side of her to give her pointers. The whole situation looked really sketchy. I was glad that we went with our own equipment and knowledge.

On the way back, we got stuck in a traffic jam after two trucks tried to pass on a narrow stretch of road and got stuck against each other. After sitting for a while, we decided it would be faster to walk past all of the commotion and get another taxi--one without a flat tire.

I have also walked around and visited a bunch more temples, including the Buddah Stupa and Pashupatinath Temple. Pashupatinath is on the holy but filthy Bagmati River. This is a place where many people are cremated. While we were there, there were two bodies burning on platforms next to the river. An office behind the cremation site, read "cornea excision center".

The Bagmati River (between Kathmandu and Patan) - The Buddah Stupa

And finally, a couple of weeks ago, we went to a movie theater and saw Fast and Furious 4. Movie theaters here have assigned seats and ushers, and an intermission just like Reel Pizza.