Walk to school

As I have said before, it takes about 20 minutes to walk to school from our house to the school. Our home is halfway down a deadend alley from a main street. Since none of the streets here have names we go by points of interest to find our way around. At the opening to our alley there is a culvert and a pile of yellow sandbags, which is how we know where to turn in. The neighborhood itself is what would be considered in Canada a slum, but actually isn't as bad as many areas in Kathmandu. Urban decay is extensive everywhere. The brick paved road is crumbling and many buildings are falling down or apart. Make shift housing is built in, around and with the ruined building debris. Between the nicer houses there are garden plots and feilds, usually tended by women who hunch over thier large baskets of who-knows-what. Sometimes they tend to fires which is the only way to get rid of garbage here.

On the way to school we walk along a road that is uneven and piled with garbage. We pass dress shops filled with beautiful silks that sit next to butcher shops with carcusses that hang in the open air and heat. Live animals are tied outside if you would rather make your own selection. I have gone vegetarian now for the duration of the trip.

Yesterday on the walk to school we saw a funny but not uncommon sight; two men were perched on the back of a motorcycle with a large brown goat balanced on the seat between them. All on the way to the shop. I wish I had my camera ready for them.

Along the path closer to the school runs a stream, gray and slow moving with pollution. It bubbles in a sinister way, like little mosquito larvae in a puddle, except there's no way anything is alive in there. The stream smells like rotten eggs. Rickety bridges cross over the stream every few feet to one final row of houses and huts before jungle towers up, high, behind them.

I know that I have used a lot of negative language here, but you must understand that beyond the urban decay it is truly beautiful here. The decay is elegant and measured by the love and use that generations and communities have gained from this area. It has been lived on by the Nepali people for over 1000 years and is very much a part of them. A goal for their future is cleaning it all up.