Children relaxing on Krishna Mandir temple
Patan, Nepal, Saturday, October 10th, 2015
Two friends enjoy a snack on Patan's Krishna Mandir temple (built in 1637).
If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
Shoba dancing
Betrawati, September 16th, 2015 – Teej
Shoba has a shop next to the bridge,
where her one-year-old son is adored by all comers,
with smiling neighbors vying for a turn to hold him.
If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
A short video clip of Shoba dancing.
Deepak
Betrawati, 2002
On a wooden bench near the bridge, Deepak has a rest while he takes in a view of his village around him.
If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund, please click here.
If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund, please click here.
To his left, here’s a view similar to what he’d see.
In the above photo from 2000, you can see the bridge that crosses the Falakhu river—tributary to the mighty Trishuli—in the background.
Below is a June 2011 photo taken looking up the Falakhu river from the middle of that bridge.
Friends laughing beneath a tree
Futung, Kathmandu, 2002
I found this group of friends sitting beneath a tree on the top of a Suess-esqe little hill (see panorama below). I asked if I could take their photo and they said yes, but the first photo I snapped, they all looked deadly serious. When I mimed my best impression of their serious faces, they burst into laughter and I took this second shot.
If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
The tree where I took the photo is on the top of the little hill that, in the photo, is above and a little to the right of the little house-like building on the left. (click to see larger)
And here is a small version of that first photo that I described above.
Sunil at his families fruit stand
Naya Bazaar Marg, Kathmandu, 2011
I would walk past this shop—one of many set up along the busy thoroughfare Naya Bazaar Marg—every day on my way to Balaju.
This long road is a constant stream of traffic: enormous lumbering TATA trucks, motorcycles, buses with thunderous horns, vans with passengers packed like gum balls, tempos with little puttering engines, bicycles loaded down with long bending lengths of re-bar, men, women, and children in school uniforms dodging puddles.
Large colorful posters for the latest Bollywood and Kollywood films are displayed on free walls. I happened to see some posters being wheat-pasted up one day; a pair of boys, one with a ladder, the other with a large bucket and a brush so rigid from the glue that the bristles had curved over like a hook.
If you would like to donate to Mercy Corps’ Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
If you would like to donate to UNICEF’s Nepal Earthquake fund please click here.
(I believe you can see Sunil wearing a red top in this panorama of Naya Bazaar Marg—he's basically under the "A" in "MANIA" on the big red billboard)
P.S. — The first Nepali movie I saw was called Dharmaputra and starred Rajesh Hamal, colloquially known to children countrywide as "the hero of Nepal". The movie was about three hours long, with plenty of dancing, romance, and singing.
A month or so later, I picked up a videocassette of Star Wars in Kathmandu to show the children of my host family. About 30 minutes in, my bai [younger brother] turns to me, unimpressed, with his arms out and says, essentially, "What, no singing?"
