Once upon a time, a very long long time ago, 😀 when I was teaching at a school that had been set up — and owned — by an oil company, a dear friend, jokingly, accused me of “selling my soul to oil!” I promised to “buy” it back — by returning to Nepal, at some point, and working in the education of the next generation of Nepalese children from low socio-economic backgrounds, as per one of my childhood dreams.
I have been back in Nepal for almost four years now trying to do just that, but, in the process, I seem to have lost…my soles! 🙁
Pictured above are the really really comfortable Italian leather shoes I bought sometime in August 2011 in Doha, Qatar. They served me well, really well, for the time I worked at Qatar Academy.
They had been perfectly fine when I had packed them away — in late April 2013 — preparing to return to Nepal when, following an incident in the cafeteria, my second year at the school had come to a premature end two months earlier. (I would end up spending 12 days in jail before I could return home.)
And going by the photo above, taken yesterday morning, you wouldn’t be faulted for thinking that they could still be serving me well….almost six years since I first slid my feet into them!
They are not! 🙁
In “The Waiting Place…”[…] “No! That’s Not for [me]!”, I mention how the roads in Kathmandu are sometimes a source of amusement! Well, they are under construction ALL the time! Sure, some may NOT find that amusing, but, if you read Never End Piss And Love, you’ll understand why I find that amusing!
What’s more, Kathmandu roads are a real hazard. For one, the dust they kick up is a hazard to the lungs, they also reduce visibility and are an eye sore. For another, the perpetually under-construction roads are also a hazard for the drivers and are hard on vehicles.
Forget d mountains, visibility is so bad even d Pink Palace is almost invisible from Durbar Marg roundabout. #KathmanduDustBowl pic.twitter.com/1tLairQ5S3
— Dorje Gurung (@Dorje_sDooing) March 1, 2017
Littered with potholes, pebbles and stones, they are also a “hazard” to the feet as well as the shoes.
(I hate to think what it must be like for girls and women wearing high heels! I must say I don’t see many of them out and about very often though! The reason, I suspect, is the road conditions. Or, those who done them regularly, might be shuttled around in vehicles.)
It may have been around two years after my return that I discovered the shoes had kind of lost their soles…to the streets of the metropolis of Kathmandu! (I documented the appearance of the shoes only yesterday morning though!)
So, as good as the top looks, here’s what the soles look like.
As important as it is for me to try to “buy” back the soul I “sold” (as an international teacher at a really wealthy oil school) by working for the education of children from marginalized communities, I also discovered that, living in Kathmandu, I needed to also be a sole survivor! I needed to make sure that I didn’t lose more of my soles to the streets and roads of the city!
And I think I have found just the soles…in my Merrell Westward Chukka Boots (see below)! They have thick, rugged Vibram soles. Furthermore, the shoes are made of yak leather to boot (excuse the pun)! 😀
Yak, if you didn’t know, is to us ethnic Tibetans from the mountain regions of Nepal as water buffalo is to Hindu Nepalese!
Do you live in Kathmandu and are you a sole survivor? 😀
What do you think?
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July 18 Update
The reincarnation of the old soles…
