Anu and Jyoti
Kathmandu 2003
I was buying a bag of fresh popcorn from a man's cart when Jyoti (on the right in the photo) said hello. She introduced me to her family and soon I was stopping by almost daily to play games of Ludo, Snakes and Ladders, and Fish.
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A girl washes at a spigot
Betrawati 2000
A young girl cools off under a spigot near my school.
Out of the frame on the left, a large electrical tower was being built to bring more power from Trishuli Bazar's hydroelectric plant down river.
Out of frame on the right stands a house, half of which collapsed during my first visit to the school. Dozens of us worked for an hour or so to save the family cow that was pregnant and trapped inside. The cow, once rescued was hot and exhausted but I believe both the cow and the unborn calf survived.
Nepal, being Hindu, holds the cow as sacred.
The cow was also one of the family's most important assets.
"What about the bull," I asked my brother Binod, "…sacred?"
"No."
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Here is a shot of the partially-collpased house a few days after it happened. The aforementioned electrical tower was still being assembled, so it cannot be seen yet.
Here is a shot of the house taken about two months later.
You can see the now-completed electrical tower in the background.
The tower can also be seen (from the vantage point of the school up on the hill) behind the children playing in this photo.
Samjana and Santi
Betrawati, 2005
Santi and her daughter Samjana live in a house that hugs the valley slope. In addition to small strips of terraced crops, a fruit tree stands nearby.
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Friends
December 2002
From left to right: Ramesh, Sareeta, Joagmaya, Dann (baby), Sabindra (boy), and Sapanah
I remember that I had a tough time finding anyone from this photo again—I must've carried the photo around in my bag for a couple of weeks. Whenever I walked past this area, I would look around.
One day, Ramesh was walking by, saw me, and he asked after the photo. I think I was so used to the layout of the photo, that I half expected him to be sitting in the same spot. I showed him the couple of photos I had and he said (basically) "Yeah, that's me!" and I was like "Oh my gosh, of course it is Ramesh, here you go!".
It was a load off of my mind to find him, as I wanted everyone who I had told I would give a photo to, to actually receive their photo.
The tray in front of Ramesh holds peanuts. The little space-capsule-shaped can is the way to scoop the proper amount into a little home-made paper bag when they are bought. The metal jug by Sabindra’s leg contains pani (water).
If my memory serves me correctly, the sunken place behind the barbed wire was a small pitch used for football (soccer). There may also be a small school building at one end.
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Mother and child
Manamaiju, Kathmandu 2003
I had taken many photos in the area so when I walked past her house this woman recognized me. She motioned me over excitedly and, as I navigated the thin squiggly trail to her house, she brought her baby out from inside.
Her house is just out of frame on the left;
behind me there are terraced fields;
before me, there is the beautiful smile of a very proud mother.
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Anup
Betrawati, November 2002
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Santoshi
Uttargaya Secondary English Boarding School, Betrawati, 2000
[text below from a postcard I wrote on Tuesday, October 24th 2000]
"A few days ago during lunch I poked my head into one of the school’s class rooms. There, in a dim empty room filled with only six bench/desks and the sounds of one hundred children playing outside, sat a small girl.
Her arms were folded on her desk, her little face resting upon them. She seemed neither outwardly happy nor sad, but more resigned as if this was where she would be most comfortable—a warm bath in a cold house.
“Wouldn’t you rather play outside?” I asked her. She shook her head.
“We could play…”.
Again, she shook her head.
“Okay” I said smiling at her. I leaned across the bench/desk separating us and shook her hand goofily."
[from a postcard two days later]
"Yesterday I stopped by the orphanage on the way back from Trishuli Bazaar and for the first time I heard Santoshi’s (san-toe-see) voice. Since the day I found her alone in that class room at lunch, I’ve made it a point to walk into her class, say hello and shake her hand. I walked up to her today at the orphanage, said
“Hello Santoshi!” and gave her a goofy handshake.
She smiled, then laughed, then asked (in English) “What is your name?”
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Santoshi running across the rock-strewn football field to class.
Sukiyah widening the road
Along the road to Dadagaun, Kathmandu 2005
Outside of a tea shop, a group of five men work with tools of wood and flanged metal; widening this dirt road that branches away from the city. Digging and moving tons of dirt, hacking away at a buried tree stump. The sun presses down, but the road's thin enough that the plants along the side provide for a bit of shade.
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(Sukiyah’s image above was scanned from a 4x6" that I had had printed with a white border. As such, it's not quite a full-frame image; the image is a little tall for it's width, but I was hesitant to crop it any more)
Nisu and Nisan
Kathmandu, 2003
I met these two siblings walking along one of the main roads in Kathmandu. Since they weren’t in front of their house, I asked where they lived so I could come by a few days later with their photo. Nisan pointed off to the distance saying the name of an area. Though I tried repeatedly, this is one of the few photos where I was never able to find the people again.
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Sujal, sitting on the stairs
Dadagaun, Kathmandu, 2005
I was visiting friends when I happened to see Sujal, a child of my friend’s neighbors. Sujal sits on the stairs outside of his family’s apartment. When he can manage to get out of the loving arms of his mother, his aunt, or one of the neighbor girls, he’s starting to walk.
I believe Sujal—just 18 months old—had just had his bath. His mother had then lovingly applied a small tika to Sujal’s forehead and kajal around his eyes.
The stairs behind Sujal lead to the roof, which is unfinished but provides a space to dry laundry in the air, or vegetables in the sun. The stairs themselves also provide a space to lean pots to dry after they have been washed at the nearby communal spigot.
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(Sujal’s image above was scanned from a 4x6" that I had had printed with a white border. As such, it's not quite a full-frame image; the image is a little tall for it's width, but I was hesitant to crop it any more)
In this photo showing the same steps, you can see two pots drying. After they have been scrubbed clean inside and out, a thin coat of mud is applied to the outside. I believe that while the mud still allows for the transfer of heat, it keeps the pots from getting black from the fire of the family stove.