Kathmandu, Nepal is massive. It’s overwhelming, disorganized, poor, and amazing. I spent three weeks living there for a photojournalism internship. I lived with a host family to fully immerse myself in the culture and lifestyle. And it was a wild ride.
Each morning I would wake up at 5am to a chorus of bells ringing. The mother in each house performs Puja twice a day. Puja is an offering to the Hindu god of the house and for the families in my neighbourhood it involves ringing bells at an altar.
I went to bed around 8:30pm. When I was in Nepal it was winter. I lived in an unheated concrete home and the nights were a chilly 7 degrees celsius.
I would take the bus to work. I rarely got a seat and generally spent my hour-long ride standing really, really, really close to a ton of people I had never met before.
Most engines were diesel and the pollution from the traffic was awful. I had black boogers for three weeks. And the smog often covered the view of the gorgeous mountains that surround Kathmandu.
Then there were the people. The people were wonderful, smiling and caring. Through all the adjustments I needed to make to get used to the cold, the smog, and the getting up early I had a wonderful and caring host family. I met nice people on the job and nice people on the bus.
Nepal has a much more collective culture than Canada does. I was on the insane crowded bus once and I was wearing my backpack. I had my passport, my Canon Rebel, my wallet and my laptop in this bag. And a man beside me who spoke English says to me, “would you like me to put your bag on some one’s lap?”
The experienced traveller in me was like, “NO WAY.” You do not hand some one your bag with your passport and really expensive equipment in a foreign country. He wants to steal my bag!
But he didn’t. This was a common occurrence on the buses. Everyone would help the elderly lady with her massive bag of rice onto the bus. People sitting would hold on to stuff for people standing. In most aspects of Nepali life there’s a vibe of “we’re all in this togetherness.”
Overall Nepal was crazy different and crazy cool.
Sara Shyiak: Flight Risk 