After the sun goes down and the power is out, the streets of Patan and Kathmandu become very dark. One would think that it might make this time of night quite peaceful and quiet. Sadly, this is not the case. While there are fewer vehicles on the roads (and hence, fewer honking horns), the cacophony of dogs barking takes its place.
Everywhere you look, on every street and in every alley, is at least one stray dog.
This did not surprise me, as this has been the case in many other places that I have traveled. Dogs are rarely pets here in Nepal, but instead they call the streets their homes. While the dogs here are very peaceful, and I have yet to see one of them become aggressive, they become quite the annoyance at night.
It starts with one dog barking at something moving in the wind or someone walking home in the dark. This encourages the dogs in the surrounding few yards to start barking, which inspires more and more voices to join the unpleasant melody. Within a few seconds, it seems as though hundreds of dogs have taken up the call – and they are all within a few hundred meters of the initiating culprit.
Words really can’t do it justice. It is amazing how much noise they can make. It is a combination of barking, howling, yapping, and (at least it sounds like) screeching. I tried taking a video of the ruckus, but it just can’t seem to capture the essence of what goes on outside of my window at night. It makes me miss our neighbor’s annoying yappy dog back at home, because at least that’s just one dog instead of a hundred…
No comments:
Post a Comment