Chapter 3 Fortunately it didn’t rain the next day. The morning was a bit nippy but the sun gained some life and glowed gracefully toward the noon. I’d once been to our rendezvous Swayambhunath a month earlier with guys. That was our third day in the city. It was a one-hour ride in cab from Dilibazaar (including the laden traffic). But Kunja’s proximity was greater than me. So I had to leave earlier now. The guys left the hostel at two after the meal. They said they had to do lots of shopping for Mahanayak’s birthday. Mahanayak was also from our college. His first name Rajesh being same as that of Rajesh Hamal, a Nepali movie superstar, he had gotten the nickname. His father was one of the greatest businessmen in Pokhara, so this party too was going to be extravagant. The tent-house had already started arranging seats, his mother who was here for this occasion had hired a local catering service which would appear in the evening with readymade foods. My roommates were pestering me to come along for the shopping, but I was adamant. I asked Big Ass to buy me some present for the birthday boy and gave him some three hundred bucks. Now, he was the only other guy in the hostel who knew about my plan. He gave me a mischievous ‘all the best’ and left. I took a bucket-bath at two (the hostel shower was not working), I wore the shirt I’d bought day before from Bishalbazzar with friends, a khaki pants and my usual addidas shoes. I used some extra hair gel, some extra deodorant, extra mirror, registered my name in the reception and left. I phoned her once while leaving. She sounded excited, or maybe it was merely what I felt. I rolled the prayer wheels on the gateway and embarked my journey to the holy 365 steps. The elegant Buddha statues accompanied by some Bhoté merchants welcomed me on the way. This part of the valley looked mesmerizing with lush vegetation and enchanting wildlife with monkeys the most dominating species of all, succeeding to name the entire place after their tribe: The Monkey Temple. Swayambhunath has a long history back to about 2000 years. Once the valley was a widespread lake with a divine lotus flower in the center. Then later a Tibetan Buddhist, Manjusri: the bodhisattva of wisdom and learning, saw the lotus and slashed a gorge at Chovar to drain the lake. “Couldn’t he just use a boat?” someone had commented during a history class. “No boats at that time,” another had replied. An inhabitable valley was created. The lotus flower on the hill then transformed into a holy stupa. Thus, being self-created, it is called Swayambhunath. During his stay in Swayambhunath, Manjusri grew a long hair on which grew lice. The same lice are said to have been changed into these monkeys later. In the halfway, I decided to take a breather and leaned against the railing for a while. On the other side was a woman selling gems. I’d left many gem-stalls down already and still had to come across many. But I walked into this one. There was something in my mind. Those stones looked beautiful. A girl would definitely admire them. My eyes fell into a ruby love pendant. She loved ruby, she had once mentioned me about this. “I love everything that you love,” I’d replied. “Is that a ruby pendant?” I asked with the woman. She was an ageing lady with a tan wrinkled face that had dark patches on cheeks. Despite it was summer and hot, she was dressed on a typical Tibetan dress. A pink felt longer than her fingertips, black robe worn down to the knees, a multicolor striped apron and a lavish exposure of accessories on neck and hands as if she was trying to be the mannequin of her own stall. “Yes, it is,” she replied. I took one, gave a proper look from all sides. “A real ruby?” I asked. “Yes, a real ruby,” she replied with several blinks. Her Nepali was poor. “Come, sir. Gems. Very cheap,” she said as a group of foreigners passed by us. “My name is not James,” said one white guy with a smile. Others laughed, and left. Her eyes looked pale as if jaundiced, her teeth too had lost their fairness, she smelled something like jimbu. “So you want to buy it?” she said desperately turning back to the Nepali costumer. I can’t believe why these merchants are so foreigner oriented. This is the one thing I personally dislike about them. I agree that they’re our guests and should be given more priority, but sometimes these merchants just ignore people from their own nation and treat them like second grade costumers. “Yes,” I said. “How much it costs?” “For foreigners it is fifteen hundred,” she said looking at my face. “A real ruby it is.” She took one from the stall and started wiping it with the hem of her felt. “You give a thousand.” Yeah, this may be the answer to my aforesaid question. “Too expensive,” I said. “How is eight hundred?” “Ha,” she smiled exposing her horrendous teeth, wiping the same piece of pendant. “I myself have bought it at nine hundred.” She put the piece down and looked at me again. “Okay. You are my son age. Give nine hundred fifty.” “Fine.” I could not be certain if Kunja would accept the pendant or not. Her admiring the ruby was one thing but to accept a thing such as love pendant from a boy was other. The implication might be something else. It’d been nearly two years since I’d met her and before this, I’d not given anything to her except a wall clock with a menial happy birthday greeting card wrapped along with it in her last birthday. Valentines’s day has never meant anything to us. Every time before I did anything, I had to consider that she had a boyfriend and we were merely friends. But this time, I was determined. Some residential monkeys welcomed me too. Some sitting on their haunches like patriarchs, looking at me with their curious eyes as if trying to say, “I think I know him.” Some were picking ticks from their friends. Some on the trees were scratching their armpits. Some were napping. How could they evolve from someone’s lice? After about a twenty-minute-climb, I finally made it up to the top. Exhausted and wet. It seemed there were more monkeys than people up there. I checked my watch, it was five to three. I gave a brief look for Kunja down the stairs and around the temple too. The area was large. Rolling the prayer wheels idly, I walked for a while, clenching the pendant in my pocket, trying to imagine Kunja’s reaction to my action. I wanted it to be equal, but not opposite. It seemed Kunja had not arrived yet. Her fragrance was missing in the air. I looked for her down the stairs to see if she was wiping her sweat sitting somewhere in the hundredth or some two hundredth step, but all I could see were some monkeys and a few foreigners taking their snaps. I wanted to phone her but my mobile balance was so meager that I preferred biding my time for some more while. The activities were slackened that day at Sayambhunath. Not many people were around. Not even one percent of what those appeared in Buddha Jayanti or Loshar. As I was used to tolerating her delays, I waited some more during which I sat on a wooden bench nearby looking at the scenic panorama of the valley. ‘Scenic’ is a ridiculous adjective for the valley but it literally looks so from this height. The piousness of the temple sanctifies you and every mess down there vanishes. There were some couples around, of different ages. Their physical attachment, the way they smiled, laughed, took photos, cooed, held hands. Fascinated me. Made me feel more impatient. I tried to focus on the aesthetics. It was 3:20 already. I looked down at the stairs once again. The woman was nowhere to be seen. There was the other way for cars too which I scanned for her. But she could not be found. Later when I tried to make her a call, all I heard was the ominous switch off message. I damned, but tried again. The response was the same. Then speculations took place in my mind. Did something wrong happen to her on the way? Did she know the way to Swayambhunath? Did she lose herself in the hullabaloo of the city? Is she stuck in the traffic somewhere? Is she peeking at me from somewhere? Trying to make me impatient (which I already was)? Or did she not get the permission to leave her hostel? But why was her mobile switched off?? I made another attempt owing to the unreliable network information of Kathmandu. The same thing repeated. Half an hour passed. An hour. Finally my phone rang. It was a text message from Kunja. Like a hungry child unwrapping a biscuit packet, I unwrapped the message. It said; So sry gyanu, cudn’t come. I know u must b angry, had my own reason. Sarvesh is in the town. I’d come with hope and was now taking a vile disparity with me. Finally I hired an auto and returned in frustration and agony.
Posted on: Wed, 24 Jul 2013 10:53:07 +0000
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