Kathmandu: then and now by Guest Editor @santoshpradhan

Hello Amazing People!

One can feel the contrasting difference of its surrounding when they experience same place with some time lag (as opposed to the frog in the warm water).

Kathmandu Valley has 7 out of 10 UNESCO World Heritage sites of Nepal- Kathmandu Durbar Square, Patan Durbar Square, Bhaktapur Durbar Square, Swayambhunath, Bouddhanath, Pashupatinath and Changunarayan; remaining 3 being- Lumbini, Sagarmatha National park (Mouth Everest is) and Chitwan National Park. Kathmandu Valley was blessed with God/nature gifted and man-made developments, and it still is. It is also blessed with a very cosy climate (not to hot or cold), it could be termed natural air conditioning weather.

Memory from 2004
My last photographic memory of Kathmandu Valley is still afresh from 2004, when there was still clear blue sky and you can see greenery at most places.
Two years ago when I visited Kathmandu the air was dusty and visibility was misty for the whole 3 weeks stay. Greenery was replaced by greyscale landscape of disorganised buildings and pile of rubbish. Blame it on never ending incomplete road works or earthquake regenerative works or the dilapidated vehicles throwing black smoke, and ever increasing population of Kathmandu valley due to village displacement, the air seemed so cloudy that then I realised the value of clean air we used to breathe but never had time to appreciate. The chaos of traffic rules and its violation (if there was any) was very much frightening, and unsurprisingly the road traffic incidents were on the rise exponentially. There was a shortage of daily supplies like petroleum products other goods due to an undeclared blockade on the southern border (2015/16). This added further chaos and disruption to development and improvement work. People were losing hope and were engulfed in maintaining bare minimum fundamental requirements like queueing for petrol, gas, waiting for water supply to come during electricity supply, daily food supply maintenance etc. People could not think beyond their essential requirement since they had difficulty fulfilling those.

Recent visit
In my last visit to Kathmandu, I could see some developments- almost nil load shedding (continuous supply of electricity), completed buildings and houses, road work to near completion, clearer sky and more importantly people with hope and vision. Roads were blacktopped; traffic had some sense of direction, daily living supplies were adequate. The water supply was still intermittent, but people could manage with external water supply. People seemed more happy and content. The potential to continue to improve in daily living has given me hope.

(Source:dissolve.com)

The road to Bouddhanath was still under construction hence the journey was dusty, crowded, disorganised and difficult to access and I was surprised that the Nepalese authorities have not given adequate attention to the World Heritage site. But once you reach there, the view is mesmerising, you realise material impermanence, and you forget all crowd, dust and noise. That could be the reason authorities forget to put improvements in this area as they realise its temporal impermanence. 😃😃😃

My only thought was, despite these challenges, difficulties, chaos Kathmandu Valley is so beautiful, if only it had all resources and organised management as of the western world (like the UK), how is the experience going to be? That will be food for thought for the future.

Jai ho!

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(Thanks to @riverflows for this GIF)