We carried our backpacks through bazaars on the edge of Patan without a destination. The dirt road stretched out like a ladder to be scaled, its rungs carved by the wooden wheels of commerce. Nepalese potteries and screen paintings of Katmandu sunsets gleamed behind bargainers waving to foreigners. I stopped at a table of statues. With fatigue, I ran my fingers over the fused beads of steel clumped on Buddha’s head, the color of dark tourmaline. I paid for the figure and handed the elderly merchant an acrylic of the Temple of Lord Shiva I had worked on all of June. She hovered her hands over the carved rose brick foundation, then the two tiered golden roof, then the silver doors. She took one of my hands and her easy smile buoyed me in the buzzing world around me, humming of happiness displaced.
Photo taken by dorgel1 on flickr
Akashio 