A Nepali band and the coronavirus

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The photo doesn’t have much to do with the discussion but is a collage of photos from the Nepali Hindu wedding we attended recently. Can you see the huge, upcurved instruments? When played, they sounded like elephants bellowing. They were only used at the beginning and end of the ceremonies. I’ll add a short clip of them playing at the arrival of the bridegroom’s party. What I really wanted to write about was the huge impact the coronavirus is having in Nepal, not so much – yet – because of the illness itself but because of the impact on business. Our guesthouse owner said he has normally 80 to 90% capacity during January/February which is when the Chinese flood into Nepal on holidays. However, all bookings have been cancelled. I guess he will have to lay off staff too. And he says it is the same throughout Pokhara. There are dozens of new buildings almost finished in Pokhara and the owners would be counting on Chinese tourists to fill these during the coming months. To increase the difficulties, ‘horde’s’ of Nepalese will be returning from China where apparently many have been working. They’ll be coming back to a country that has no employment opportunities. Heaven knows where this will all end. We leave for Lumbini early tomorrow and again I’m not sure if we’ll have wifi. We’ve certainly been lucky so far.