Wild Dog of Kathmandu
In 1971, I was a Peace Corps Volunteer living in a small Brahman village a few miles south of Baglung in the Baglung district of the Dhaulagiri Zone (now part of the Gandaki Province) in Nepal. Speaking the Nepali language, I taught math and Biology in a local school serving both local children and students housed in a primitive dormitory.
I had decided to return to Kathmandu during our summer break. There were a variety of reasons. First, I wanted to retrieve my property. On the advice of experienced volunteers, I had left my camera, radio and a number of other items in a storage bin until I had become known in the village (strangers were suspected of being “CIA agents). Second, I wanted to talk with the Peace Corp Doctor because, while on station, I had become seriously sick and had lost more than thirty kilograms in one month. Although I had regained some weight, I was seriously underweight (in total, I had lost ninety five pounds since arriving in Nepal). Third, I needed some basic supplies. Finally, as part of my justification to return to Kathmandu, I wanted to help develop hands-on curricula for science (there was an open invitation to all volunteers to help).
When I arrived and was checking into the Peace Corps Headquarters, a fellow volunteer from a previous group of volunteers invited me to room with him and two others from his group. When he saw me hesitate, he assured me that it was an “American friendly” hostel, clean, safe, not very expensive and only about an hour's walk away from headquarters. I didn't hesitate too long and accept his invitation. The Peace Corp Doctor was not working that day but would be in the next day.
My new friend and I were soon walking south to the hostel which was near the Durbar Square in the heart of the city. As we trekked along the busy streets, I listened as my heavy backpack squeaked with each step I took while clutching my umbrella, chatted with my new friend and kept track of our route. Occasionally, I used my robust and over-sized umbrella to steady myself and support. The umbrella was unlike those I had used back home. It was large enough and strong enough to use as a walking stick with a surprisingly sharp metal tip. Its fabric was thick, black, dense, strong and porous because its purpose was not to keep me dry but to protect me from the monsoons that swept up the Kali Gandaki river's gorge. The rain was so heavy and violent that a normal umbrella would be shredded in seconds and the huge drops hit with such force that they left welts on unprotected skin. The umbrella was to break up the drops and lessen their impact. As we wended our way through the city, I was confused by the street names and quickly realized I needed a different strategy to keep track of where I was. Instead of street names I noted significant buildings, idols and road features.
Along the way we passed a great number of idols. Some were very large and prominent inside temples, others massive idols dominated street intersections and some were much smaller and usually within alcoves. My new friend told me the smaller idols were “family” gods. My new friend described most of the smaller idols as “family icons” for personal prayers. The most popular gods seemed to be the elephant-headed Ganesh (remover of obstacles, god of wisdom) and Vishnu (Preserver and protector of the Universe).The most disturbing idol was a massive Kali figure. She is the “wife” of Shiva and goddess of maternal protection, liberation, destruction, death and time. Kali is portrayed many different ways, but what I saw most often was an angry, vengeful Kali painted black with fearsome teeth, a necklace of skulls and a belt of severed arms.
We walked past dozens of street vendors sitting on the pavement with goods spread out on blankets before them. Other merchants were standing behind tables filled with fruits, vegetables and carbonated drinks in corked bottles. Near Buddhist temples were vendors of candles and other religious paraphernalia. At one street corner sat an Astrologer surrounded by his charts and tables. Astrology is important to both Hindu and Buddhist beliefs. Everywhere, Mongrel dogs seemed to appear out of nowhere and then disappear. I noticed that most of the mongrels seemed overly thin with their ribs showing through their skin. One large dog had an ugly tumor dangling from its side. One street was blocked by a lounging Brahma bull. On one street we passed short trees with huge black shapes hanging from their branches. #hen we got closer, I recognized the dangling pods were fruit bats with their wings wrapped around their bodies. Near the trees were huge clump of Marijuana plants, their eight foot long stems gently curving over into the street.
We eventually came to a traffic circle dominated by a statue of Juddha Shumsher standing on top of a very large, stepped plinth (He was a significant Prime Minister in the early twentieth century). From there, it was only a short walk to Durbar Square (sometimes referred to as “Durbar Market). It was a large, very busy courtyard with a central temple. The square was packed with eager sellers of everything including unrecognizable lumps of fresh meat and men hawking clay bowls of crusty yogurt.. Although the yogurt was tempting, to me it was taboo. During our training at Cactus Corners in California we had been warned that when dead flies and debris accumulated on the yogurt's crust, the sellers would simply fold the crust into the yogurt to hide them from buyers. Many of the merchants sat on the ground , their wares spread out on blankets in front of them and protected themselves from the sun with makeshift canopies of cloth and sticks. Most of the sellers were women who were incessantly calling out to every passing person in hopes of a sale and to negotiate an unfair price. A few enterprising merchants had established temporary tables or had converted a nearby alley into an enclosed room to do business.
A short way past the temple, my friend turned down a narrow side street, and keeping an eye on recognizable landmarks, I saw an unassuming two storied building with a small shop on the first floor. There was a small, incessantly yapping Tibetan Spaniel in front of the shop's door challenging anyone who dared to approach his territory. The shop had no signage, but my friend told me that the “bakery” catered to visiting hippies and specialized in “laced brownies” and “special cubes” of hash. Drugs were frowned on in Nepal but not illegal. Some Tea Shops even offered roasted garbanzo beans flavored with marijuana.
Walking about fifty yards down the side street we came to a narrow alley to our right. It was a relatively short alley ending at an iron-gated six foot high wall. On our right, just outside the wall, was a partially hidden, low-ceiling, poorly lit and murky tea shop with roughly hewn wooden tables and benches. The gate was open and we walked into the small front yard of the hostel. The four storied building was an almost blinding white with no outstanding features except the plethora of evenly spaced, unglazed windows. We had arrived!
Climbing up four flights of narrow stairs with a heavy backpack made me feel a bit claustrophobic, but luckily we didn't encounter anyone else on our ascent to the top. I asked my new friend about not seeing anyone else including a manager and he assured me that it was normal. To pay the rent, the volunteers who were staying together simply pooled their money together to pay and left it in a secure box near the entrance. We really didn't have much choice in living arrangements. We each received only seventy dollars a month (that was equal to seven hundred rupee - a generous amount in Baglung but not in Kathmandu). All over Kathmandu other volunteers were doing the same thing. Volunteers and employees that worked in Kathmandu received very generous housing stipends.
Our shared room was expansive. It was furnished with four platforms to use as beds but tenants had to provide their own bedding (we had all been issued sleeping bags when we were first assigned to a post). There was a single, bare light bulb with a pull chain hanging from the very high ceiling. The cement floor was painted white, matched the heavily whitewashed walls and ceiling. As I gazed around, a pale brown gecko scurried up one wall and disappeared. Multiple bare openings in the walls offered fresh air and abundant light. On one side of the room was a doorway to a small balcony. The bathroom was on the next floor down and offered running hot and cold water, flush toilets, sinks and a real shower. It was luxury! I was delighted! I had lived for months without electricity, water was from an aquifer half a half mile away and no bathroom facilities – everyone, including me, bathed in public at the aquifer and relieved themselves in the terraced fields, usually before sunrise. I used candles at night to read and prepare my lessons.
I claimed the one remaining platform and went out to explore. By nightfall, I had wandered about the immediate neighborhood. After a somewhat decent rice dinner in the tea shop outside the hostel, I returned to the hostel where I met my fellow Peace Corp roommates. We chatted for a time, but when my roommates stuck a small ball of hashish on the end of a unbent paperclip and began inhaling the fumes, I retreated to the balcony and spent a pleasant hour or so looking out over the city. In the distance, a tall building with what appeared to be an observation deck dominated my view. At first I thought it might be a Muslim Minaret, but I later learned that it was the Dharahara Tower built in 1832. When I returned to our room, everyone else had gone out. It was the first and last time they did something like that when I was present.
The next day I got up at daybreak, had a Nepali-style breakfast in the adjacent tea shop and headed back to the Peace Corps Headquarters. My memory was very good and I had no difficulty finding my way back through the labyrinth of streets. At headquarters, after chatting with my fellow volunteers and checking in with the Doctor (I had issues that he was concerned about and I was still underweight, but that's another story), I borrowed a bike and, following the directions given to me, I wended my way though a maze of streets to the outskirts of Kathmandu. My final destination was a huge, whitewashed mansion. I was told that, before the 1950-51 revolt, the rich and wealthy of Nepal had competed in seeing who could build the largest, most ostentatious home in the country. After King Tribhuvan gained control, all those mansions became government property. The mansion I was to work at took up an entire city block. There was a stone and cement wall surrounding the mansion and a guarded open iron gate in front. I rode up, got off my bike, showed my ID to the guard and walked in. I suddenly stopped when I startled a pair of pheasants that had been strutting around.
The mansion was a three storied high fortress with hundreds of unglazed windows evenly spaced on each level. Most of the statues that had once adorned the place were gone as were all the other gaudy displays of wealth. They had long since been sold or put into museums. I found myself pushing the borrowed bike down a very wide and long hallways lined with massive, tall doors. I had been told that the mansion had over a thousand high-ceilinged, spacious rooms. Twenty years ago, the mansion had been a grand display of decadence, but now only a few of the rooms were being used. I followed directions to a second floor room where I would help in developing hands-on Physics projects for various grade levels. The activities needed to address specific learning outcomes, use easily obtainable materials and be inexpensive. The hands-on projects we developed would be incorporated in the approved curricula of the country. My first day there I was introduced to fellow teachers, given a list of objectives and shown the procedures. We worked at folding tables surrounded with boxes of preferred materials. After that first day, everything became routine.
That first day I discovered that the mansion wasn't very far from the hostel, so the following days I walked instead of borrowing a bike. It was not long before I found shortcuts through the city using alleys and narrow, twisting back streets. Of all the hands-on activities I worked on, I only remember the satisfaction of finally making an electric motor using thin, coated copper wire, a small magnet and a battery. After developing a few activities, my participation in the curricula project waned considerably and I started spending more time playing chess with the Doctor, exploring and hanging out at the Peace Corp Headquarters house with other volunteers (the administration and medical complex was in a two storied block building behind the house).
Life became somewhat routine after a few weeks. I still returned to the curricula project every few days but I had lost my enthusiasm. Sporadically, I would visit an American-style commissary behind the American Embassy and close to a nearby USMC facility (that was my understanding at the time). There was a phone in the commissary that could be used to call someone in the United States but I was never able to make the right connections. The commissary had great rice pilaf which, in my opinion, was worth the effort getting there. The better food I was now eating and long, exploratory walks were good for me. Every day I felt myself growing stronger and gaining weight. As I explored Kathmandu, one of my discoveries was a street that catered to Sherpa guides and had shops outfitting mountain climbing expeditions. The many vendors offered all sorts of gear including camping and climbing equipment. Other streets near the hostel specialized in cookware, furniture, appliances, cameras, film and electronics. Along the street that specialized in clothing, I hired a tailor to custom make a shirt for myself. Everywhere I went, there were temples, idols and rites being observed.
One afternoon, I walked around the “Buddha Stupa,” one of the largest round Buddhist temples in the world, On its cupola it had eyes facing toward each cardinal point. I was told that no animal was to be used for labor within sight of those eyes (but at night the eyes couldn't see). It had streamers of colored flags and was festooned with colorful paint. Flitting about every street were doves, pigeons and other small birds. Once in a while, I would see one of Kathmandu's many wild dogs but I never saw a cat. I knew cats were around, but they kept themselves well hidden. About a quarter of a mile west of the hostel was the Bishnumati River which flowed southward to join the Bagmati River.
One day, as I was reading the “Andromeda Strain” by Michael Crichton in the living room of the Peace Corp Headquarters house, I overheard two volunteers talking about the attrition rate of my group of volunteers. I was a bit surprised to hear that, unofficially, nine more volunteers from my group had quit. Since the start of training at Cactus Corners in California, about half of my group was gone. The “Culture Shock” we had been warned about was real. Evidently, two of my fellow volunteers had to be “accompanied” home for their own safety. The rumor had surprised and saddened me. I grabbed my umbrella and headed back to Durbar Square.
A few weeks later, I was visiting the commissary and enjoying a wonderful pilaf when I noticed a hand-written sign inviting Americans to join the USMC for a “movie night.” That was so, spotting a nearby marine, I asked him about the invitation. He assured me it was legitimate. The marines frequently enjoyed watching movies and would sometimes invite fellow Americans to join them. He wrote down directions for me and said, “Hope to see you there.” There was no doubt in my mind. Evenings were dull and I hadn't seen an American movie in over a year, The one Indian movie I had attended had been Hindu not Nepali and I hadn't understood any of it.
That night, I walked to the USMC enclosure from the hostel. Using my shortcuts through allies and narrow streets, It took me less than an hour to get there just as the sun was beginning to set. As I walked through the open gate, a marine welcomed me to their “movie night” and pointed toward a nearby building. Inside, an impressively large meeting room with a very high ceiling was filled with metal folding chairs arranged in rows on either side of a wide central aisle. At the back of the room was a 16mm movie projector aimed at a large screen in front. It was dim inside. A little light from the setting sun made its way inside through the open windows ad only a few of the overhead lights were on. Most of the chairs were already occupied so I settled myself in a back row seat., awkwardly stowing my huge umbrella next to me. I wondered why I hadn't left it at the hostel. Then the remaining lights were turned off and the movie started. It was “Night of the Living Dead.”
I had never seen such a movie! I was accustomed to horror movies about huge monsters, mummies seeking revenge, aliens from space and terrible “B” productions. By the end of that black-and-white movie I was terrified. It was a whole new genre of horror that I had not been prepared to watch. At the end of the movie, all the overhead lights were turned on and an officer stepped in front of the screen. He thanked everyone and wished us all a good night. I left the compound feeling so very shaken that I didn't look around to see if I recognized anyone.
Standing outside the gate under a full moon, I felt strangely vulnerable and on edge, It was dark but the sky was clear so, confident in my street knowledge and my well known shortcuts, I was sure I would be home in less than an hour. I headed home at a brusque pace. After a few blocks, I left the main road and strode down a much darker, smaller street starting on my first shortcut. I was looking for a “family idol” of Ganesh, the multi-armed elephant-headed god of wisdom. It marked where I would make my next turn. Unfortunately, when I spotted the idol, the nearby alley I customarily took was was not there. Thinking that I just found the wrong idol, I continued on feeling a bit confused. I knew I had to take an alley to my left, so I turned into the first alley I found. For a long time I continued guessing at where I was going until I eventually realized three things: first, some alleys that existed during the day disappeared at night when homeless people would barricade them to create a safe place to sleep; second, some places that were alleys at night became temporary stores during the day; and third, I was lost.
After wandering around for hours with images of the “walking dead” plowing through my mind, I emerged onto a street running parallel to a river. Much to my relief, I recognized it as the Bishnumati river. Looking around, I recognized a distant bridge and spot the top of the Dharahara Tower. I finally knew where I was and how to get back to the hostel. My watch said 3:00 am.
My feelings of anxious dread was quickly ebbing. A sense of comforting relief was just welling up inside me when I saw a dog emerge from an alley a few hundred feet away. He saw me he froze... and I froze. Suddenly, with a loud bark, he lunged toward me with a pack of wild dogs following him from the alley. A burst of both fear and panic exploded within me. I ran for my life. My hope was to reach the hostel before the dog pack reached me. I knew the gate would be closed but in my mind I saw myself climbing over the wall like a desperate animal.
In seconds, I realized my folly. The dogs were quickly catching up to me. I had no choice. I would have to find protection and make a stand. I desperately looked for a place to minimize the packs access to me. I raced into a small intersection of alleys and spied an alcove. There was an idol at the back and the remnants of a recent sacrifice at its feet. I threw myself into the depths, turned and faced the hungry pack.
Behind me was a black idol of Kali with multiple arms, sharpened teeth, a necklace of skulls and a belt of severed arms. In front of me, forming an arc of fangs, was a pack of wild dogs. Without warning, the alpha dog leapt at my throat. Acting with shear, primitive instinct, I raised my hands as a shield.
An instant later, there was terrifying silence! The leader of the pack was dead at my feet! I had forgotten about my umbrella. Somehow, the massive dog had managed to skewer itself on the sharp end of my umbrella. The tip had gone through its open mouth and out the back of its neck. I was as surprised as the rest of the dog pack. For a moment that seemed an eternity, we stared at each other, until I had the inspiration. I began to quickly open and close my huge umbrella, wielding it as if it were a weapon.
The confused dogs retreated and, realizing exactly where I was, I ran to the hostel. I knew I couldn't climb the six foot wall, so I used the hinges on the gate for footholds and climb inside at the edge of the metal grating. I quietly made my way upstairs and went to bed. I thought it would take forever to get to sleep, but I was asleep before my head hit the pillow.
This is a true
story. However some liberties. I remember the sign inviting Americans
to the movie, but I don't remember exactly where. Since I remember a
marine telling me about it, I assumed it was in the commissary. As
for the commissary, I don't remember it actually being called that,
but since it was behind the American Embassy I made an assumption.
Also, my description of what I saw in the streets is greatly
abbreviated and probably a composite. I walked down dozens of
streets.
The pictures are meant to complement the dialog and hopefully help readers visualize an environment that might be strange them.
