The Nepal Earthquake

The Nepal Earthquake: Humbled and Helpless (Part 1)

About one year ago I survived the deadly earthquake that struck Nepal. Clocking in at a 7.9, and followed by days of strong aftershocks, the disaster ultimately killed over 7,000 people. Here’s my story of the experience.

The back of Sam's Cafe, where I woke up that morning

I awoke that Saturday morning on a dirty mat in the back room of my favorite local cafe. My fellow volunteer, a pale red headed Brit named Patrick, slept on another dirty mat in the next room. The owner Sam was a friend of mine and he had thrown me a going away party the night before. I’d spent 3 months in rural Bhanjyang volunteering at the the Tashi Choeloing Buddhist monastery, and had befriended many local Nepali's in my time there. In the mornings I’d teach English to little monks, and in the afternoons I’d sit in Sam’s cafe drinking rice beer and smoking cigarettes. That night we reminisced and drank long into the night. The cafe was two minutes from my monastery, but the large gated doors were locked at 8 every night. Fortunately in typical hospitable Nepali fashion Sam let us crash on the two beds he reserved for displaced travelers and drunks.

 A symphony of clucking chickens, screaming goats and barking dogs rang screeched through my hungover ears as I helped clean up the mess, and wait for Patrick to rise. Eventually he did and we nursed our hangovers with tea and french toast (Or “eggy bread” as the Brits call it). Then we headed up to the monastery. We’d planned to leave that morning and head into the heart of Kathmandu to attend the 5th Annual Nepali Tattoo convention. I gathered the few belongs that I hadn't sold or traded, but when it came time to leave I couldn’t find any of my monk friends or students to say goodbye. I learned they were scattered around the monastery and town, so we went back to the cafe and decided to wait until lunchtime for them to return. We sat for hours quietly drinking tea and smoking cigarettes. Around 11:50 we left the cafe, walked back up the hill and passed through the large monastery gates

“Namaste,” I said to the old, uniformed guard, as we passed. By now he was well used to seeing me come and go.

Patrick followed behind and we continued up the hill.

We were standing by the monastery’s large stupa, a square shrine with a row of prayer wheels on each side, when we heard the first rattle. The rattling sound grew louder and I looked up at the stupa expecting to see little monks causing mischief. The rattle grew louder and louder and turned into a low roar. Then the ground began to shake.

“Oh fuck it’s an earthquake!” shouted Patrick.

Almost the exact spot where I was standing when the earthquake struck.

The shaking grew stronger and it became hard to stand. There is nothing you can do when the whole world is throwing you around. We expected the ground to open up and engulf us. I’ve never felt so helpless and humbled in my life. When everything shakes, you are nothing. You are a speck and can only be in the right place or the wrong. But we were lucky. I gained enough composure to look up and check if anything could fall on us. Luckily, there wasn’t. We stayed on the side of the hill in relative safety as the world continued to throw us around. With a good view of the farming valley below, Patrick and I watched helplessly as half a dozen mud brick houses collapsed in huge clouds of red dust.

 The shaking died down and we became very as nauseous as we tried regain our equilibrium. After a few moments of dizziness we recovered enough to run the rest of the way back up the hill to the monastery, which was in complete chaos. Although nothing had collapsed, the monks were in an absolute panic. Westerners take for granted that we understand the gist of the science behind earthquakes, but the monks didn’t have this educational luxury. They were convinced that they were all going to die. A group of about 20 young monks even brought out a portable DVD player so that they could watch one last movie before death.

The Stupa

As we gathered in the monastery courtyard, a huge aftershock, clocking in at a 7.6, rocked us again. It made anyone who hadn’t already shit in their pants to finally do so. All we could do was wait, huddle together, and pray there was enough toilet paper left for us all. The aftershock wasn’t nearly as bad as the initial quake, and we were moderately expecting it, so it came and went pretty fast. After the shaking stopped I ran over to the fancy hotel that was used for yoga retreats, where there luckily was still a wifi connection and made a quick post to reddit about how strong the earthquake felt. Little did I know that this would be my last link to the outside world for the next 3 days...

I spent the next hour with Patrick trying to educate the young monks on the basics of plate tectonics. Patrick and I both knew that the worst of the shaking was probably over, but the monks still expected to die at any moment. It was truly terrifying to see the look of utter helplessness and panic on the faces of the such usually happy and carefree group of kids. I will never forget it.

The Courtyard

 After the panic began to subside, Patrick and I decided that we would still head back to Kathamandu as initially planned. After a weird, uncomfortable goodbye, I gathered my bags and we hopped in a cab headed down the mountain. Thats when the true magnitude of the destruction began to sink in. On the 30 minute journey back to the city, we saw house after house that had fully or partially collapsed. Every brick wall we passed was now lying neatly on the ground, but with the bricks still in order. What was a brick wall yesterday was a brick path today. Unfortunately, however, we still had yet to see the worst of the destruction...

Fear and Loathing and The Living Goddess

Well, for another couple of minutes I’ve kept my head out of my ass and my hands on the keyboard. Spending the morning smoking hash and drinking rice beer in this opium den was a good decision.

Burning Bodies

The day after my arrival I learned that five other volunteers had arrived at the same time, and that they were all staying in Kathmandu for the week to take a “Language and Culture” Course. I decided to join them and get acclimated. During the days we visited ancient Hindu Temples and holy rivers, spun Buddhist prayer wheels, saw monkeys fighting stray dogs, smelt burning bodies from funeral pyres, caught a glimpse of a living Goddess, saw monkeys fighting stray children, got blessed by both Hindu priests and Buddhist monks, and met other travelers from around the world. During the Night, we had other adventures. 

To avoid tarnishing the reputations of those involved in the debauchery, and seeing as I don’t have a damageable reputation anyways, I’ll leave out the names and keep it as brief and hilarious as I can. I made some good friends and we saw and did some fun, bizarre shit. Gorkah and Everest beers were drank, dances danced, Nepali’s befriended, cigarettes extinguished on fingers (drunkenly dubbed Kathmandu tattoos...), and many memorable times were had. Kathmandu has a great nightlife and surprisingly great music. We saw live bands playing tons of western songs and Nepali songs and danced accordingly. The only downside was that most places closed at midnight, except Club OMG. 

One of those first "early" nights, before we understood the sad, weird, late-night glory of Club OMG, five of us stumbled back to our hotel at midnight, riled up and disappointed. We felt we couldn't give up on the night this easily. We were in motherfucking Nepal. The streets, however, were dark, deserted and hopeless. We began drunkenly shedding our clothes and preparing to sleep. Then, suddenly, two of us had a whiskey fueled, third-world inspired burst of motivation. Though beyond my personal recollection, I apparently went on a loud, nonsensical, new-age rant about how,

 "THIS IS OUR ONE, ONLY CHANCE TO EXPERIENCE THIS MOMENT!"

One Canadian was convinced. Too irrational to redress and too motivated to care, we stumbled back out into the night, seeking one last grasp of drunken grandeur. Sadly, we failed. Not barely clothed nor coherent, and after pissing off the balcony onto the street, we stumbled shoeless down to the lobby and demanded that the front desk guy take us to an open bar. Being terrible at Nepali and blackout drunk made communication difficult. We were deranged. He was clearly horrified. According to his lies, there was nowhere to go. Our demands turned to pleas, but were to no avail. After an impressive effort, hope began to fade and exhaustion sank in. Defeated, we said "Fuck the moment," staggered back to the room and succumbed to the darkness.  

At the end of the week the group dispersed, each of us leaving to different projects around the country. Ultimately, I couldn't have asked for a more enjoyable and culturally vibrant experience. My alcohol, weed, and Adderall detox was, however, off to a slow start.  The only drawback was that it shifted my focus away from the real challenge that lie ahead. I nearly forgot that I still had two-and-a-half months teaching in an isolated Buddhist monastery. 

The journey into my mind had only just begun.

Sorrow's and Bullshit

As a result of my incessant bitching and seemingly unappreciative attitude toward life, I feel I must clarify the reasons for my first world anguish. Well, fuck you, because I don’t understand the source of my discontent any better than you. Back home I always have hot water, nice clothes, delicious food, unlimited entertainment, the ability to communicate instantly with friends around the world, heat when its cold, A/C when its hot, hundreds of types of good beer to get drunk from, dank weed to get high from, and with just my phone I can read nearly any fact or idea that any human has ever written or discovered about our world and Universe. And I’m a fucking white American guy. Yet too often I wake up with a heavy, hollow, useless spirit which pervades every fiber of my being. I lie in misery. 

In February, I left. I rode over Poland with a window seat, a numb ass and a full bladder. The path to the toilet blocked for hours by a fat, sleeping American. Our flight continued south through Europe toward war-torn Ukraine, and then, for the final leg, flew into the coveted heavens above Iraq and Syria, right over, yet out of reach of thousands of bloodthirsty, freedom-hating, brown people.

I arrived in Kathmandu on February 9 at midnight and met my ride from the volunteer organization (the Rural Community Development Project, or R.C.D.P), outside of Tribhuvan Airport. We quickly threw my shit into the van and went flying off into the dark, weird streets of the city. The driver, Sujan, with both eyes glued to his phone, wove with maniacal ease in and out of unmarked lanes into oncoming traffic. One hand typed away furiously as the other steered casually and honked without mercy. After a harrowing 15 minute drive we veered into the tiny alley which led to our final destination, a hostel run by R.C.D.P. The next morning I woke to the sound of stray dogs fighting and old women hocking phlegm. So I made it. My journey to Nepal and into the bowels of my mind had officially begun. Time to start clawing up away from all the sorrows and bullshit. But I guess part of the cure is searching for a purpose, which is why I’m here. 

I’ve also had this one thought which helps keep me moderately sane. Bear with me. Human beings are animals, built to survive. On Earth, millions of different animals have lived and died with one shared goal, survival. It took about 200,000 years for our species to figure shit out, but we human beings got really, really good at survival. Suspiciously good. For tens of thousands of years we hunted wooly mammoths, fought saber tooth tigers, and lived in the fuckin dark, but continued to thrive. Every second of human progress has built up to this day and provided us with our ridiculously lavish, modern existence. This is a day and age where I rarely have to think about actual survival. My only problems are that I’m spoiled, whiney and sad. Sometimes, however, I remind myself how ridiculously unlikely it is that I get to exist at all, much less that I get to exist NOW, in this era where knowledge, compassion and creativity are cherished on a scale never seen before on Earth. That shit blows my mind. I’m reminded that no animal in Earth's 4.5 billion year history has ever had as much potential to wake up tomorrow and go watch, listen, travel, read, feel, create, help, sing, play or love as you or I do. 

So yea, I should probably quit my bitching.