Ashes to Ashes, Funk to Funky

I just finished Forget Kathmandu: An Elegy For Democracy, by Manjushree Thapa. While it's an excellent, if a somewhat limited and, at this point, a somewhat outdated account of Nepali Politics, there was one point in particular that was especially interesting.

In describing the media coverage of the funerals following the Royal Massacre in 2001, many Nepalis, especially from the Kathmandu Intelligentsia, got their news from western or at least foreign sources. This coverage seemed to make a big deal of the fact that Nepal was a Hindu Kingdom. They mentioned it when describing the Hindu funerary rites, especially in explaining why no autopsy had been conducted. Thapa notes that Nepal usually required autopsies in situations like this (as would most Western countries, even when that would conflict with Jewish or Muslim laws on burial, for exactly the same reason that it conflicts with Hindu practice).

While Thapa speaks of this in terms of Said's Orientalism, one interesting thing about all of this is the fact that Nepal's culture often appears split between contradictory or at least dual norms. On one hand, it does have a modern civil code. On the other, this was codified as and has largely remained a work of primarily Hindu law. The country is amazingly tolerant of different cultures within its borders, but local television often makes fun of groups that the mainstream of Kathmandu society deems backwards. The country has rapidly modernized in the past 50 years, but 80% of its population is still in agriculture, often substinence agriculture. The country has not fought a foreign war in quite some time, but produces the best soldiers in Asia. Religion is intimately connected with daily life, yet no one has any interest, let alone the money, in maintaining the local shrines.


I went on a mountain flight today. It was nice. I also found a copy of the Dark Knight.

In the category of things I wished I had known earlier, I found out I can get a shave with a straight-edge razor for 100 rupees in my hotel.