The big city - Beauty or Beast?
on Adventures in Nepal (Nepal), 28/Dec/2009 11:03, 34 days ago
Kathmandu is a complex city. There is so much beauty here: the people, the temples and offerings to the hundreds of gods that might be worshiped here (indicative of a worldview where the sacred is very integrated into daily life, and a worldview of flexibility and openness), delicious food, and ubiquitous shops that sell the most vibrant and colorful material I've ever seen as well as unique and carefully handmade gifts.It is also an ugly city at times, however. Dogs here are treated so terribly, roaming the streets without anyone to take care of them. I have walked by dogs that have huge open wounds and that are barely living. People just walk by without paying any attention to them. I have felt sick to my stomach more than once. And yesterday I walked by a dog that lay stiff on the side of the road, dead. It wasn't that the dog was dead that bothered me so much per se - I understand what challenges come with true poverty and I know that all life must end at some point to give way to new life. It was that there was no ceremony for this dog. Nobody to bury it. Nobody to thank it for the company and protection that it offered them. No regard at all for the life that had passed.Cows, however, are treated as sacred beings and have the "honor" of going wherever they like and doing whatever they like - including eating trash in the middle of a busy intersection. The picture above was taken on one of the largest streets in Kathmandu. The garbage company is on strike this week, so trash is piling up in all of the streets. And the picture is cloudy, because Kathmandu is a smoggy city.I've learned to find some peaceful and quiet spots where I don't have to pass through chaotic traffic and heaps and heaps of trash. But the dogs - they are everywhere. And I can't escape the absolute feeling helplessness as I pass them and can't take each and every one home with me. Kathmandu is a stark reminder that nothing is ever simple. Beauty is beauty, because it is opposite something that is, well, not beautiful.Luckily, the trash strike ends tomorrow. And I've decided to carry around something special with me - maybe cornmeal, maybe dried flowers - so that if I come across a dead dog again in the future, I will feel more equipped to say my own goodbye to it's life.Above (top): highly detailed woodwork from a doorway in Durbar Square. One can find woodwork like this all over old town._uacct = "UA-3483228-1";urchinTracker();