There’s no doubt that you have heard about people prescribing nada for any given psychological crisis or ailment. For combat veterans sifting through the charred flesh of humans amid the debris of burnt houses? Nada. For visitors of orphanages and homeless shelters? Give them a dose of nada, or nothing. Nurses and doctors working the emergency room? Pull your plunger back, Doctor, and ignore the bubbles – for there are none – and inject them with nada. I could name many more stages of horror, and the panacea would remain the same: blot it out, numb it, ignore it, spit on it. It all boils down to artificially numbing your senses the way you probably haven’t since 9/11.
Not surprisingly, Kathmandu is always a good candidate for the consumption –some would argue the excess or overdose – of nothing. The tourist must be well aware of this on his way to the jungle or the mountains. You will gaze at the ancient stupas and chuckle at the serenity of the orange-clad monks as well as at the shrieks of the orange-bottomed monkeys. Then, out of nowhere, quicker than a Tornado razing a trailer park, there will be the Bagmati River, the world’s biggest sewer attacking your nostrils like a well-timed whiff of ammonia. You will have to dig down deeper and numb yourself even more when you see the hundreds of primitive tents pitched along that deep river. A further dose is needed should you be unfortunate enough to spot any of the tenants.
Luckily, tourists can’t ignore the many faces in Kathmandu for too long. At the entrance of Thamel, one of the Meccas for tourists seeking alternative holistic lifestyles or simply just a good puff of weed, you will find the poor mothers lined up all the way past the Royal Palace. Whereas you will find other boulevards in major cities inundated with prostitutes – and you have those here, too – here it’s just the dirt poor young women (quickly approaching middle age, from the looks of it) clutching their babies with emaciated fingers and covering them with blankets begging for another commodity (soap). The little babies and toddlers they are cradling in their arms already have the wide-eyed look of an antelope that has miraculously escaped the suffocating muscles of a python. You can’t help but wonder –unless you’ve numbed yourself sufficiently first, then you won’t- just what awaits this poor little kid at the end of his long and dreary road. An orphanage? Prostitution? A one-way ticket to a sweatshop? Even giving money to these wretched dwellers doesn’t satisfy your questions or ease your conscience.
People like to tell me that you shouldn’t give them anything, that the introduction of a micro nanny state in its infancy sets a bad precedent for a country already in dire straits. But it’s not about the money, I tell my numbed interrogators, it’s about something far more important: faith in human kindness and good will. That’s why people are out there. Of course the mother wants to buy bread for her toddler. 99% of the time she will be frustrated in her efforts and often go home hungry. The 1% keep her going, not with the money they hand them, but by showing that yes, there are human beings willing to help a fellow human. These aren’t elephants in a zoo snagging the peanuts from your hand. The 1% that gives a damn might be just as numb as the other 99%, but they are at least willing to feel bad about the strangers they have just seen and feel good about what they have done before they numb themselves. Most people just go straight to the medication.
But even I, a worldchump, can only numb myself for so long. Last week, a pair of ladies was spotted riding on a motorbike past the Phora Club. They pulled up short of the East entrance and dropped off something bundled in clothes. I would like to tell you that this story will have a happy ending, that there was a baby inside who was taken in by some widow or catholic nun, nursed back to health, and will go on to achieve great humanitarian milestones. What is true is that there was a baby inside the clothes. This baby, though, was dead. Try numbing that.
Not surprisingly, Kathmandu is always a good candidate for the consumption –some would argue the excess or overdose – of nothing. The tourist must be well aware of this on his way to the jungle or the mountains. You will gaze at the ancient stupas and chuckle at the serenity of the orange-clad monks as well as at the shrieks of the orange-bottomed monkeys. Then, out of nowhere, quicker than a Tornado razing a trailer park, there will be the Bagmati River, the world’s biggest sewer attacking your nostrils like a well-timed whiff of ammonia. You will have to dig down deeper and numb yourself even more when you see the hundreds of primitive tents pitched along that deep river. A further dose is needed should you be unfortunate enough to spot any of the tenants.
Luckily, tourists can’t ignore the many faces in Kathmandu for too long. At the entrance of Thamel, one of the Meccas for tourists seeking alternative holistic lifestyles or simply just a good puff of weed, you will find the poor mothers lined up all the way past the Royal Palace. Whereas you will find other boulevards in major cities inundated with prostitutes – and you have those here, too – here it’s just the dirt poor young women (quickly approaching middle age, from the looks of it) clutching their babies with emaciated fingers and covering them with blankets begging for another commodity (soap). The little babies and toddlers they are cradling in their arms already have the wide-eyed look of an antelope that has miraculously escaped the suffocating muscles of a python. You can’t help but wonder –unless you’ve numbed yourself sufficiently first, then you won’t- just what awaits this poor little kid at the end of his long and dreary road. An orphanage? Prostitution? A one-way ticket to a sweatshop? Even giving money to these wretched dwellers doesn’t satisfy your questions or ease your conscience.
People like to tell me that you shouldn’t give them anything, that the introduction of a micro nanny state in its infancy sets a bad precedent for a country already in dire straits. But it’s not about the money, I tell my numbed interrogators, it’s about something far more important: faith in human kindness and good will. That’s why people are out there. Of course the mother wants to buy bread for her toddler. 99% of the time she will be frustrated in her efforts and often go home hungry. The 1% keep her going, not with the money they hand them, but by showing that yes, there are human beings willing to help a fellow human. These aren’t elephants in a zoo snagging the peanuts from your hand. The 1% that gives a damn might be just as numb as the other 99%, but they are at least willing to feel bad about the strangers they have just seen and feel good about what they have done before they numb themselves. Most people just go straight to the medication.
But even I, a worldchump, can only numb myself for so long. Last week, a pair of ladies was spotted riding on a motorbike past the Phora Club. They pulled up short of the East entrance and dropped off something bundled in clothes. I would like to tell you that this story will have a happy ending, that there was a baby inside who was taken in by some widow or catholic nun, nursed back to health, and will go on to achieve great humanitarian milestones. What is true is that there was a baby inside the clothes. This baby, though, was dead. Try numbing that.
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