Kathmandu

By Chris Bruton

Copyright ©2025

I arrived in Pokhara in a monsoon downpour.  I’d spent ten days on the Annapurna loop and was thinking only of a soft bed, a hot shower and resting my leech-bitten feet.  But after a day of lounging in Pokhara, I got bored.  A waiter told me about some Buddhist caves on the outskirts of town, so I went to view them.

               The caves were in an area of roadhouses, trinket shops and video arcades.  I bought a ticket and got into the queue.  Dank stairs and the Buddha among stalagmites.  People lighting candles and incense.  There were children skittering about, parents glancing at cell phones, teenage couples making moon eyes.  But some were devout.  A soldier prostrated himself, touching his forehead to the ground in rhythmic fashion.  It didn’t amount to more than local color, though.

               I emerged from the caves a little underwhelmed and stopped in a cafe for a beer.  It was empty except for a girl who, when I asked what they had, coolly informed me that she didn’t work there.  I apologized and the girl continued to look at me, a little unnervingly.  She was maybe eighteen or nineteen, kind of nerdy with black, tear-shaped glasses.

               The lady appeared who ran the place and I ordered an Everest.  I asked the girl if she was from Pokhara.  No, she said, Kathmandu, she was there visiting with her family.  I invited her to have a drink with me.  Sure, she said with alacrity, coming over to my table.  She ordered a cola.

               Her name was Raksha.  She was small, short, with very fair skin, an apple-shaped face and pointed chin.  She did not look Nepali and pooh-poohed her people, the superstitions.  She chain-smoked.  Her English was flawless.  She seemed to think it exotic that I had been teaching English in Kuwait, that shithole.  I’m married, I told her.  I’m not, she said without blinking.

               I was a bit discomfited when her family showed, swarthy father, self-effacing mom with the red dot between the eyes and a couple of smaller siblings, a regular gaggle.  I stood and shook hands like some would-be suitor, though I was the parents’ senior by at least a decade.  Raksha refused to speak Nepali.  The mother, the father glanced diffidently at their daughter as she blithely smoked.   Well, we are just leaving, the father said in heavily-accented English.  Would you like to walk with us? Raksha asked me.  We let the others go before us, and suddenly her younger sister, a gangly girl of about thirteen, ran up and punched Raksha in the arm.

               “What was that about?”

               “She’s always doing that.  She’s very jealous of me.”

               “Jealous of what?”

               “That I am with you, of course.   A foreigner.”

               We were about half a block behind the family.  From time to time the parents stopped and looked back at us.  When they reached their car Raksha turned to me shyly.

               “I have to go and visit my relations now.  Do you have a cell phone?  I want to call you.”

               She copied my number.  We were both going back to Kathmandu the next day.  Holding out her hand, she giggled nervously, and ran to her waiting family.

               I took a moto-taxi back to town and walked down by the lake.  There was a guy that sold pot in the woods along the shore and I bought a couple joints off him.  Then I rented a canoe and paddled out.  I didn’t really want to get high, it was more a restlessness, a craving for a different mood.  Heavy monsoon clouds cloaked the sky.  Parties of young men and families dotted the lake, their voices caroming across the water.  I was used to being alone but their laughter made me gloomy.  I stowed the paddle and lay down in the boat, thinking about the girl.  Nothing would come of it, I was sure.  But she hadn’t said when she would call and every thirty minutes or so, I checked my cell phone.

               The next day I boarded the bus for Kathmandu.  Not thirty miles from Pokhara some component of the transmission gave way, and we ended up parked beside the road for hours, next to a vast, stone-filled river gorge speckled with trash.  Men sat on their haunches chewing the fat, women braided their daughters’ hair, children scampered.  A foreign, ruddy-skinned young woman perched on a rock, reading almost vehemently a novel or travel guide.  Finally a man on a motorcycle arrived bearing a part wrapped in newspaper, the engine roared to life, and the passengers climbed back into the bus.  Two hours later we had a flat.

               The bus pulled into the capital at dusk. I took a taxi to my hotel on Durbar Square.  It was basically a flophouse but the rooms looked right out on the bustling plaza with its street vendors and stupas, a scene like something out of ancient Tibet.  Having grown up in the Sixties I had envisioned Kathmandu as a moldering backwater filled with stoned hippies just off the Magic Bus, and there was still that element, but it was dwarfed by the teeming diversity and vigor of everyday Nepali life.  They still burned bodies in Pashupatinath.  Old, bearded men wandered the streets naked, covered in colored ash.  Occasionally they would stop a passerby and smear a bit of ash on the forehead, which was considered good luck.

               After washing up I took a pedicab to Thamel for dinner.  I had heard many a story of travelers felled by dysentery in Nepal and was determined to avoid the same fate. I glanced through the windows of half a dozen restaurants, inspecting the waiters and clientele, and settled on a place with white linen tablecloths called Taste of Firenze.  I ordered a pizza.  It wasn’t very good, but the cutlery was spotless.

               I had been in Nepal nearly three weeks and done what I had set out to do: see the Himalayas.  I was fifty-four years old.  In a couple of days I would be meeting my wife in Bahrain.  I was in love with my wife, I did not need any adventure.  That was what I told myself as I poked around some of Kathmandu’s lesser-known temples the next day, when my phone rang.  It was Raksha.  She wanted to meet me.  I told her to meet me in front of my hotel.

               I waited for her on a bench among the pigeons and shoeshine boys.  A pair of men in rags sat alongside me.  When Raksha arrived, wearing a crisp white and green print dress cut just above the knee, they could not take their eyes off her.  With her trim figure and fair skin she looked like a freshly cut flower.  She muttered something to the men in Nepali and they immediately decamped to a stone parapet nearby, but continued watching her, transfixed.    

               “So which is your hotel?” she asked, lighting a cigarette.

               I pointed to the facade behind us, Hotel Sutra.

               “I was surprised when you told me you were staying here.  Most tourists stay in Thamel.”

               “Thamel is so crowded.”

               She inhaled deeply.  “I’ve always liked this area.  It’s very Nepali.”

               “Do you want to get a beer?”

               “Not now.  I want to see your room.”

               It was good the servant boy was at the reception.  He handed me my key without batting an eye.  I led Raksha up to my third floor room.  There were two sagging single beds, a writing table, and to the side a tiny bathroom with a shower tube that flowed onto the floor.  Raksha went to the window, parted the threadbare curtain, and leaned out so that the back of her dress inched up.

               “It’s lovely.  You’ve got the best view in Kathmandu.”

               “I agree.”

               Grinning, she sat opposite me on the other bed.  “I want to smoke again.”

“What about a kiss first.”

               “Okay.”

               She was one of those girls whose clothes belie the figure.  Her body was small but exquisitely shaped, her breasts like Cézanne pears.  She had never had anyone go down on her.  She had never gone down on anyone.  She wasn’t squeamish, though.

               Afterward, we put a blanket on the floor and lay on our backs side by side.  Sweat running down.  The street noises muffled below.  Raksha lit a cigarette and I had one with her.

               “That was nice,” she said.  “Wasn’t it?”

               “Yes, but I’m too old for you.”

               “You’re not old.”

               “Sure.  And you’re what, all of eighteen?”

               “I’ll be twenty in August.”

               “Do you have a boyfriend?”

               “Yes, but he’s such a boy.  So innocent.”

               “You have sex, right?”

               “Of course.  But he doesn’t know anything.”

               A gobbet of ash fell on her breast.  She told me she had wanted to sleep with me the first time she saw me, in Pokhara.  She was like that, she said, doing things on a whim, without thinking.  Her parents had given up trying to influence her, they thought she was ruining her “prospects.”  She worked for a graphic design company, as a receptionist, and had left the office early complaining of a headache.         

               “Did you see the look on the boy’s face downstairs?  He probably thought I was a prostitute!”

               “He was just envious.”

               “Do you think I’m attractive?”

               “Very,” I said, tracing a line from her breastbone to her navel.

               “I think I look boring.”

               “Bullshit.  What does your boyfriend think?”

               “He doesn’t count.  He already wants to marry me.”

               “What’s wrong with that?”

               “I don’t want to have anybody’s babies.  I want to travel, I want to explore.  If I marry I will be controlled.  That is the way here.”

               “You’re a funny girl.”

               “That’s what everyone says.  Raksha, the funny one.”

               I noticed the condom had a tear and pulled it off.

               “I don’t have any more,” she said.

               “I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

               Her mouth tasted of the cigarette.  Her body lay white and hard beneath me and my attitude was like that of some obscure artist awarded a major prize: triumph mixed with humility.  It lasted only a minute, maybe less. 

               “That was fast,” she said.

               “I’m sorry, I got carried away.”

               We showered and took a pedicab to Thamel.  By then it was dark.  Raksha bantered with the driver, an older man extremely slight of frame.  She accused him of overcharging us, because I was a tourist.  We came to a steep section and the guy had to stand up on the pedals.  I suggested we walk the rest of the way.

               “No,” Raksha said.  “That is his job.”

               We went to the same Italian restaurant.  The waiter snapped to attention upon our entry and ceremoniously pulled back Raksha’s chair.  I ordered a large pizza and a bottle of wine.  We both ate heartily.  A middle-aged couple sat a few tables away, German or French, speaking not a word as they huddled over their plates.

               “I could eat a horse.  Isn’t that the expression?”

               “Your English is amazing.  Why didn’t you go to college?”

               “I wanted to.  But my parents spent all their money on my brother.  He’s in medical school.”

               “I bet you’re smarter.”

               “I am.  Even my brother says that.”

               “Have some more wine.”

               “I’m not used to drinking wine.  It’s very bitter.”

               “Dry, you mean.”

               “Stupid.  I knew that.”

               She drank only a little but got tipsy.  I had to steady her as we left the restaurant, and the couple stared.  We took a taxi to her home.  I walked her to the door and gave her a chaste kiss, fearing her parents might see.  We arranged to meet after she got off work the next day.

               I woke early and went to look for breakfast.  All I wanted was a roll and coffee but there was nothing like that among the warren of streets surrounding the square; people ate at curbside stalls, hot milky chai and bowls of rice porridge.  Finally I spotted a bakery and bought a kind of fried pastry from a pile of them stacked on the counter.  I carried it to a cafe near my hotel and ordered tea.

               Later I visited Boudhanath, one of the more important Buddhist shrines, the stupa round and white like a mammoth mushroom.  There were stalls on each side of the square selling Tibetan jewelry, mandalas and trinkets.  I wanted to buy something for Raksha.  When I thought of her I felt no desire or even attraction, but didn’t regret what had happened, any more than you would regret a splendid butterfly landing on your arm.     

               It hit me about noon.  A throbbing at my temples, a kind of fluttering in my gut.  I began to sweat.  I could not focus.  Abruptly I sat on the curb, in the way of passing tourists and worshipers, wondering if I was experiencing the first onset of some virulent flu or sexually transmitted disease.  Dazedly I made my way back to the street, caught a taxi to my hotel and took to bed.

               Day turned to night.  I would alternately shiver and pull the ratty wool blanket over me, then throw it off when I became drenched in sweat.  My head was pounding.  My belly felt like a ticking bomb.  I would summon all my strength and lurch from the bed to the toilet, then nothing.  I could not sleep for the pain in my head and was so wracked with chills the entire bed rattled.  It felt as if a noxious black tide were creeping over me, snuffing out my defenses one by one.  I needed help.  The only person I knew to call was Raksha.

               She left work and phoned me from the hotel lobby.  She had brought water, juice, medicine.  But the manager would not allow her to come to my room.

               “But why?  You did before.”

               “That’s what I told him.  He said it was a mistake.  You’ll have to come down.”

               “I don’t know if I can make it.”

               “You must try.  I will wait for you.”

               I put on my flip flops and staggered down the stairs.  Raksha sat on the lobby settee, glaring at the disapproving manager behind the counter.  Her mouth opened and I fell in a heap beside her, the sweat breaking out on my forehead like beads on a glass.

               “Oh my God.  How are you feeling?”

               “Not so good.”

               She touched my forehead.  “You’re very hot.”

               “My head is killing me.”

               “Here,” she said, removing a capsule from the foil packet, “this is for headache.  And here is some juice.”

               I swallowed the pill and a little juice.  The room swam about me, I heard Raksha haranguing the manager as though from a far distance.  Suddenly, like a fire boiling up and breaking through the upper windows of a house, the fever overpowered me.

               “How can you call yourself Nepali?” Raksha was saying when I came to.  “Aren’t you ashamed?  He’s a guest in our country.  He should be in bed.”

               “Has he been taking any drug?”

               “What are you talking about?  Are you mad?  Look at him.  He’s ill, he has some infection.”

               “You don’t know these foreigners.  They come for the opium, they come for the hashish—"

               I stood unsteadily.  I have to go to the bathroom, I said and took a step, and it was as if someone dealt me a crushing blow on my back.  There was a little cranny underneath the stairs, a place to store luggage, and I lunged for it just as the vomit erupted.  The manager shouted and the servant boy hastened to stick a plastic pail beneath me.  Raksha gripped my forehead.  When the nausea passed I stood and began mounting the stairs.  Go, I heard the manager say to Raksha. Go, be with him.

               Taking those stairs was far harder than climbing to Annapurna.  I had to focus on every step, each one was a new challenge.  In the room I collapsed onto the bed.

               “Try and drink some juice,” Raksha said.  “You will be dehydrated.”

               “Thank you.”

               “You must have food poisoning.  Something you ate.  We are an underdeveloped country, people here know nothing about proper hygiene.”

               I remembered the donut, bringing on a new spasm of nausea.

               I slept the sleep of the dead.  Raksha stayed through the night, waking every few hours to check my fever, her hand cool and soft. In the morning she ordered breakfast and insisted that I eat.  I could only stomach a little egg, a couple spoonfuls of soup.   Looking none the worse for wear, Raksha ate with gusto and told me she would go straight to work.

               In the afternoon the servant boy, on Raksha’s instructions, brought more soup and I managed to keep down half a bowl.  I did nothing for the rest of the day.  The fever had passed, but I felt lifeless.  Even sitting up in bed made me dizzy.  Raksha called to say she had to attend a family event that evening, which relieved me.  The next day she asked if I was up to meeting her at her favorite bar, so I willed myself to shower and get dressed.

               The bar had a cave motif, rock walls and dark lighting, with thudding techno music at low volume.  Raksha and a girlfriend sat at a booth just in from the door, both smoking.  The friend was quite dark, almost black.                       

               We ordered a round of draft beers.  Raksha’s friend, Poona, was telling a story about a boy she had recently dumped for having sex with her while she was passed out.  Raksha ridiculed her and Poona’s take on the event was one of gleeful detachment.  The owner of the bar stopped by, a laidback Nepali in his thirties.  He helped us to order an assortment of kebabs which were the specialty of the house.

               I couldn’t finish a single beer and the mere sight of the kebabs sickened me.  Raksha pretended not to notice but from time to time would glance at me as if to say, Where did you go?

               “I’m afraid I won’t be able to drink with you guys.  I’m not myself yet.”

               “It’s okay,” Raksha said.  “Does our smoking bother you?”

               “No,” I lied.

               “We’ll just have one more round.”

               “Okay.”

               “So you’re flying back tomorrow,” Poona said.

               “Yes.  In the morning.”

               “To meet your wife.”

               “Yes.”

               It was like saying, It’s hot today.  They smoked and drank and the moment passed.

               “Okay,” Raksha said abruptly.  “Let’s go, it’s obvious you need to rest.”

               I hailed a cab and escorted her home.  I meant to say good-bye to her there, but at the doorstep she insisted on meeting me at the airport in the morning.

               “But why? It will be a lot of trouble for you.”

               “I want to.  It’s the Nepali way.”

               She was waiting in front of the airport when I arrived.  She presented me a sack of little green apples, saying they would give me strength.

               “Please, take these,” I said, handing her my leftover rupees.

               “Don’t do that.  People will think you are paying me.”

               “But I don’t have any gift for you.  I was looking for one when I got sick.”

               “Your friendship is a gift.”

               “I got the better end of the deal.”

               “It’s not a deal.”

               She gave a little smile, a shrug.

               “I won’t forget you, Raksha.”

               “Don’t say that.  It’s like something they say in a movie, when they know they’ll never see each other again.”

               She pulled out a length of white fabric from her bag.  Here, she said, draping it over my neck.  It’s a Nepali custom.  To ensure a good journey.

               I wore the fabric onto the plane, then removed it upon take-off.

               Four hours later I landed in Bahrain.  My wife wasn’t due in until late afternoon.  In the arrivals section I spotted a Dairy Queen, ordered a hamburger and fries and wolfed them down.

               The airport was frigid.  I must still have had a bit of fever and began to shiver uncontrollably.  I carried my bags outside to a bench in front of the terminal.  The humid gulf air swaddled my limbs but still I felt cold and dug into my suitcase for a sweater.  I sat there, shivering in the heat, waiting for my wife’s arrival.

About Chris Bruton:

Chris is a writer and Spanish translator living in-mostly-San Antonio. He is in the final stages of finishing a novel entitled Like Barabbas.