The fact is that I'm hungry. I'm looking for a place to eat my first dalbhat in sacred land. It's full of delis, more or less assorted, more or less dirty. I see a sign, "international cuisine, first floor".
Good, I tell myself, at least I'm away from the traffic. It's an all-wood building, there's a room with ten seats or so, and it's deserted. Bad sign, I tell myself. Not if you consider that it's five in the afternoon. It's all or nothing.
And it went, the dalbath is good. After lunch-dinner, I recover my embrace with the city. I walk with a certain lightness of spirit, I cannot allow myself any other kind of lightness, my body is bound by the sprawling traffic. Never was a metaphor more appropriate: the traffic of Durga - Khali, the goddess with many arms. A guy sticks to me. He is a boy of not even twenty, he speaks a little Italian. Yes, he sensed that I was Italian, no one knows from what but he sensed it. He talks and talks. Of course I will have to fork out a tip later but since he is good as an improvised guide, I let him do it. He leads me into the heart of Kathmandu, narrow streets with a temple for every dog piss but the dogs here probably don't piss, they are very calm, they sleep all the time, zen dogs that dangle indifferently between motorcycles and human beings, lots of dogs that sleep lying on the edge of the road when taxis and SUVs and buses pass them by a few centimeters away. I start taking some photos: a temple, the eyes of Buddha on top of a stupa, the relief sign of a junk shop, at the entrance of a temple there is an individual in a wooden relief with a huge phallus who masturbates, there are two who are fucking satisfied, there are others who are agitated in an unidentified sex: the kamasutra. On the pediment of another temple my improvised guide points out a relief, a goddess with many arms.
- She's Annapurna, - he tells me - today we celebrate her feast. She protects hikers. -
- Look, - I say - it's also one of the Eight-thousanders. I wanted to do the Annapurna ring, then I chose differently. -
There's a stall with lots of lit candles. The boy lights two, one for him, one for me. Then he takes a bowl with a red ointment, dips a finger and makes a sign in the center of my forehead.
- It's the kika, your third eye. -
I observe the temple with the relief of Annapurna.
- Look carefully, - the boy tells me - each temple is divided into three orders, one is the order of words, the other the order of the body, finally the order of the spirit. - And he smiles.
When the time comes for us to say goodbye, I take my wallet, I intend to leave him something. He tells me:
- No, I don't want money, if you want to give me something buy some food for me and my family. -
I find it a dignified answer.
- What do you need? - I ask him.
- There is a grocery store a stone's throw from here, - he tells me. At the store we take some bags of pasta. We naturally say goodbye with a heartfelt Namaste.
At the end of the street there is a square with an enormous stupa, stupas are the equivalent of Christian chapels, with the inevitable eyes of Buddha on top.