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The Karma of Kathmandu By
Sophia Hufford-Jones
“The wildest dreams of Kew are the facts of Kathmandu,” British writer Rudyard Kipling wrote in 1895 of Nepal’s exotic capital city at the base of Mount Everest.
Nepal is a country unlike any other place on earth. A tiny slice of land sandwiched between two giants, China and India, Nepal is an exotic land of deep spirituality and mystic charm. Kathmandu, its capital, is at the base of Mount Everest, nestled in a valley surrounded by the Himalayas. Kathmandu is near the top of the world, on the opposite side of the globe from my home in Milwaukee. So, when I told my parents of my dream to do a summer internship in Nepal, they humored me but questioned how serious I was. I knew it would be nearly impossible to convince my parents to let me travel to a Third World country just out of a 10-year civil war, but something about Kathmandu stuck with me, and wouldn’t let go. After six months of research, contacting organizations and international volunteers, my parents began to realize how serious I was about traveling to Nepal. To pay for my trip, I landed a job at one of Milwaukee’s finest restaurants, working long weekend nights as a food runner. Through the wonders of the Internet, I found a Nepali family that rented out rooms to medical interns and I landed an internship at an English publication in Kathmandu. Emails I’d received from directors of international nonprofits, a professional journalist and a chief administrator of a hospital in Kathmandu convinced my parents that life in Nepal was generally far less violent than in the U.S. And, I pointed out, I was already a veteran domestic traveler who had navigated LaGuardia, Los Angeles’s LAX and O’Hare on my own. I was confident that I could handle the New Delhi, Amsterdam and Kathmandu airports. My parents finally gave the OK. Within a few months, my distant dream was becoming reality. Everything was planned. But the day before I was to leave for Nepal, I was visited by a good omen and an amazing fluke of fate. My grandmother in Iowa was reading the newspaper and noticed an article on Nepal’s new ambassador. The new appointee was an Iowa native and had been a schoolteacher at a tiny Iowa high school. My mother recognized the new ambassador’s name; Nancy J. Powell had been her history teacher 35 years before! So, it seemed, I had already experienced Kathmandu’s strange karma. From
Iowa to Kathmandu
This story takes place in Kathmandu, but it really starts in a tiny town in Iowa 35 years ago. In 1972, a young high school teacher named Nancy Powell was teaching her history students at Dayton High, one of the smallest high schools in the state––only 100 students for four grades. My mother, 16 years old then, remembers Ms. Powell’s salt-of-the-earth teaching style and enthusiasm. At that time, neither teacher nor student could have possibly imagined that someday––35 years later––their lives would intertwine again in Kathmandu. While Ms. Powell was teaching world history in the 1970s, the brutal dictator, Idi Amin, was ravaging Uganda. Twenty years later, the small-town teacher would, in fact, become ambassador to that African country. After six years of teaching at Dayton High, Nancy Powell passed her entrance exam for the Foreign Service, which today holds over 265 posts abroad. Before she knew it, Ms. Powell was on her way to Pakistan, far from her classroom in rural Iowa. From 1990 until 1998, she would serve in Togo, India and Bangladesh in various diplomatic positions. In 1998, Nancy Powell took her first oath as a U.S. ambassador––in Uganda. Later, in 2001, when the World Trade Center towers were hit in New York City, Osama Bin Laden escaped to the hills of Pakistan. Nancy Powell was Ambassador to Pakistan at the time and had the awesome responsibility for managing the United States’ reaction in Pakistan and our government’s pursuit of Bin Laden in the Pakistani hills. Two years later, in 2003, Nancy Powell took another oath as Ambassador to Ghana in Africa. Most recently, on August 10, 2007, Powell took the oath to become the new U.S. ambassador to Nepal. After ten years of civil strife, the country is now a budding democracy, so Ambassador Powell, who is fluent in Nepali, French, and Urdu, starts her diplomatic work at a crucial time in the country’s history. Only two hours before Ambassador took her oath before Nepal’s Parliament and Prime Minister, I got an early morning interview with her at the embassy in Kathmandu. But how we met was an amazing coincidence and nearly didn’t happen. Magical,
Mystical Tour
When I arrived in Kathmandu, after three days of traveling and connections, I could hardly believe I was halfway around the world. Stepping out onto the balcony of the four-story building that was my new home, I peered over the edge. The view was incredible. Colorful, bustling streets lay below, the sounds of Nepali music and laughter spilling from tea shops and temples. Prayer flags and brightly painted buildings. Rooftop gardens brimming with flowers. A misty mountain range––the Himalayas and Mount Everest––surrounding the city. I immediately fell in love with Kathmandu. I loved the tiny fruit market that I passed on my way to work, with bananas hanging from the ceiling to the floor. I loved the groups of schoolchildren dressed in starched blue uniforms who would smile and yell, “Namaste Didi!” which means “Greetings, Sister” in Nepali. I loved the old man who would always tried to convince me to let him polish my sneakers. I loved the little lizard that lived on my ceiling, And I loved how the sun rose at 5 in the morning, and the fruit man who sang from the street below, my Kathmandu alarm clock. Everywhere you turned there were amazing pictures waiting to be taken. Children selling bright pink cotton candy on tall sticks, Buddhist monks in maroon and orange, ancient Buddhist temples two thousand years old and colorful statues of Hindu gods & goddesses.
Naughty monkeys overran the temples, sometimes accosting tourists, and cows––considered sacred by Hindus––wandered freely and snarled traffic. Holy men, powdered a dusty grey and painted in almost hallucinogenic colors, carried orange flowers and wore dreadlocks, some to their knees. Street children played in the Kathmandu rain. Sometimes, I would sit at a temple for hours, just watching, wondering. I understood why Nepal is a country of pilgrims in a constant quest for find inner peace. Perfection? I think so. One of my most memorable experiences was when my close Nepali friend took me to the holy Bagmati River where I witnessed a Hindu cremation. The body is wrapped in a white sheet and placed on a stone pillar along the river bank. The entire river is lined with these pillars. On one side, commoners are cremated, and on the other, royalty and the wealthy. The eldest son in the family lights the sheet on fire where the face is covered. At first, this was deeply disturbing for me but, as I sat watching, it began to make sense. The face is the source of life and emotion. Hindus believe that, by lighting it, the soul is released to rise into Heaven. The family chants and prays. Then, the ashes are sprinkled into the river with flower blossoms, carried away with the strong current. Near the river, there was a stone staircase winding through the jungle and the screeches of monkeys echoed within the canopy of trees. Ancient temples lined the pathway lit by torches. Inside the temples, holy men sat cross-legged, meditating. Expat’s Paradise
One of the most colorful areas of Kathmandu is Thamel, a bright bohemian hangout for old-hippies, trekkers and travelers alike. A melting pot of music and culture, Thamel became famous in the ‘60s and ‘70s for visiting rock-and-roll icons: The Beatles, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones. And their music can still be heard today, blasting from bars and teashops along the bustling, cobblestone streets. Thamel is a haunt for medical interns, peace workers, volunteers, expatriots, and graying hippies from it seems every country imaginable. At a favorite hangout called the Buddha Bar I met people from England, Australia, The Netherlands, France, several African countries, China and Ireland, all sharing stories of their Nepal adventures. At Buddha Bar, Nepali musicians sang Bob Dylan tunes and other rock classics, as well as their own country’s folk music. Namaste,
Nepal Ambassador Powell had very graciously given me an hour out of one of the busiest and most important days of her life. And, for all her high-powered titles and globe-trotting career, she was still as down-to-earth and warm as my mother remembered. Proof that you can take the girl out of small town Iowa , but you can’t take the small town Iowa out of the girl… or…ambassador.
Before boarding my plane out of Kathmandu, my house mother, Rama, had smudged a red tika on my forehead as a blessing for my long three-day trip home. Rama’s blessing––and maybe Kathmandu’s karma––stayed with me. Later, while sitting in the Amsterdam airport on another layover, I ran into my childhood friend and next-door neighbor on her way home from Greece! We were booked on the same flights to Detroit and then Chicago. We sat together for the remainder of our trip home, grateful for each other’s company and sharing our adventures. When I arrived home in Wisconsin, Rama’s tika on my forehead was now a smeared mess, but I refused to wash it off. I just lay in my bed, listening to Cat Steven’s song, “Katmandu” over and over and over. “Katmandu, I’ll soon be seeing you,” he sang. “And your strange bewildering time will keep me home.” Yes, someday I will
return to Kathmandu and my Nepali family and friends, and a democratic country
U.S. Ambassador Powell will have helped along the way. But until then…Namaste,
Nepal. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
I
was horrified to see children smiling and laughing in the streets, who would turn
to reveal one side of their face hideous with the rotting flesh of leprosy. In
fact, Nepal has one of the highest rates of leprosy in the world. There, the much-feared
disease continues its scourge among Nepal’s poor, who cannot afford modern
cures. Kathmandu has a leper colony and clinic called Shati Sewa Griha (meaning
“Peaceful Helping Home”). But, the Nepal government recently dropped
funding for this clinic and colony. The children at this colony, especially girls
who are disfigured by the disease, are the most desperately outcast in Nepali
society. Yet they can still smile. There, I realized the resiliency of the human
spirit. .
