The spectacle of traffic congestion

Kathmandu traffic jams are more than just a nuisance—they’re a stage for camaraderie and quiet rebellion.

There is something tremendously wholesome when two buses pass each other from opposite directions on a highway, and the drivers honk, startling and even annoying the vehicles ahead of them, just so they can get what looks to be the equivalent of people fist bumping. The noise is always brief, never the relentless blaring that follows when one is stuck behind an unattended vehicle blocking the way, whose driver has stepped out to buy the most random of things from the roadside Kirana Pasal , or situations as absurd, which I guess can only be commonplace in South Asian countries.