“Robbie, my good friend, Robbie.”
A persistent voice was following him across Durbar Square. Robbie snapped out of his bleak thoughts. He was returning from Maria’s guesthouse. Santos had received a message from Maria, that she was okay, would return in a week or so. In her own handwriting. No message for Robbie.
He looked around. Tourist Baba, shaking his trident to get past a group of tourists, was hot on his trail.
“I am Tourist Baba. My friend. You remember?”
Did he remember? That first day in Kathmandu. The visit to the Kumari, so outlandish then, was now part of the confusing canvas of tradition and renewal, contemplation and globalisation that formed this city. Kathmandu hung above the clouds, suspended between antiquity and the future, not knowing which way to turn, nor having
