• TOPICS
KATHMANDU, DECEMBER 6
Long ago - in fact barely a couple of decades ago - the Buddha's eyes from Swoyambhu hilltop, when they scanned the green valley below, would see more temples and vihars than the number of houses therein today.
They would locate not only the towering Nyatapole at Taumadi Tole, glittering siblings of Charumati and Boudhanath, graceful Pashupatinath or all-stone Krishna Mandir at Patan, but also the tiniest ones scattered across the valley.
A coloured pebble in a street corner, a scary demon-head pinned on a brick wall, images-studded deep wells or sculpted dhunge dharas: they all represented temples, and Swoyambhu's discerning eyes would 'detect' them all.
Like Barbarika's head witnessing every single detail of the Mahabharata war from atop a hill, Swoyambhu's eyes have witnessed the stunning metamorphosis – for good or bad – of the city ever since the fabled lake dried up. They are all the same at a loss sometimes: where are those myriads of temples these days? Well, they are very much there. It's just that a dark, invasive and monstrous concrete jungle grew in the valley, eating away alluvial, tillable soil at a spectacular pace, and overshadowing the 'city of temples'!
From the city of temples, the valley has been transformed into a city full of jumbled structures, dust, smoke and noise among umpteen other nuisances.
Even Swoyambhu's eyes may have failed to notice how fast the emerald valley, full of grace, beauty, age-old temples and palaces and filled with pleasant sounds of bells, crumbled into an eyesore, sadly and irrevocably.
In stark contrast to Swoyambhu's eyes or even to a valley-dweller's eyes, a visitor from Europe once told me: Kathmandu is a city full of shops. It had not dawned on me until then. Obviously, a city cannot live only on giant supermarkets.
Small convenience stores and shops are just as vital.
But then, when nearly every house has a 'shutter' – even some very ancient heritage houses have been renovated to make room for a shutter - an arthabeed like Sujeev Shakya would succinctly quip it as 'shutter culture!' Now, let's get to modernism!
How could anyone not notice their ubiquitous presence in Kathmandu City? Swoyambhu's discerning eyes will again fail to count their number: how many motorbikes are there in Kathmandu? No one knows because nobody cares anymore. However, one thing is for sure: Kathmandu has a cacophonous swarm in its 'full of' list: a sea of scooters and motorbikes. They now definitely outnumber the temples, vihars and houses put together. At least, contemplative Swoyambhunath knows it.
A version of this article appears in the print on December 7, 2021 of The Himalayan Times.
