The momo shop owner, Mr. A is almost five feet tall but when those aftershocks come, he seems to develop coil springs on his feet. He can literally jump out from his shop a nanosecond. If he were to be drafted in the NBA, then he would probably be dunking left and right. Somebody just has to shout 'Ayo' to make him jump. The dunking part would be easy as long as he can grab the basketball and keep hold of it until he drops it in the net.
Mr. A and his son both are the first ones to bolt and head to the middle of the street whenever the aftershocks hit. His wife and daughter stay put and keep on making momos as long as the tremors don't exceed five seconds. I guess the son has acquired most of the genes from his father's side of the family while the daughter gets hers from the mother's side.
The son is employed next door at a café. He didn't show up for work for a week after the 'Thulo Dai' struck. He didn't show up for work for three days after the 'Sano Bhai' came roaring. Now, the neighbors have started a betting pool to take bets on how long he will disappear depending on the magnitude of the earthquake.
He hasn't been home since April 25. It's not that he doesn't like his family or don't want to sleep inside the house. The local youth club has placed tents on open grounds for temporary shelter and even provides free meals. I guess it's more fun to hang out with your friends than listen to your parent's rants every evening when you come home late.
The local momo shop opens for business at six in the morning. They only sell momos after 11 but before that it's all roti, aloo tarkari and chiya. A bunch of taxi drivers, local carpenters, the barber, and the meat shop sahuji all gather to drink chiya and outwit each other on who felt the tremors last night. Nepalis do get excited the most when the conversation is actually meaningless.
At 6:15 am, the conversation gets loud and heated and most of the neighbors are confused and scared. Was there another earthquake? Is somebody fighting with someone over who ordered his milk tea first but got it last?
The barber is a religious man. He thinks that the big one struck because we have all forgotten our Gods and Goddesses. We need to do a mega puja, most likely a puja of all pujas to keep the Gods happy and seek their help to divert the aftershocks and any other big ones to another place. The taxi driver, who seems to be agnostic, reminds the barber that if there were a God then he or she wouldn't take sides like our politicians or choose whom to save and whom to let suffer.
The meat shop sahuji tries to convince the rest of the 'Chiya Guff Club' members that the 'Bhara Bhuri' will keep on coming for a year. We won't be witnessing another 'Big One' for at least a year or five or a decade or even another eighty years. He really seems to be reading the newspapers, googling everything about earthquakes, and keeping himself up to date with everything the United States Geological Survey (USGS) seems to hash out online.
The barber makes fun of NASA. He blames the NASA scientists for eating too much hamburgers and coming up with stupid comments about earthquakes. I guess he's not familiar with USGS or it's much easier to say 'NASA' than USGS.
The meat shop sahuji reminds the barber that it was the NASA technology that helped to find buried earthquake victims and even saved many lives. The barber refuses to give credit to foreigners or even our own citizens who were involved in relief and rescue works after the big one struck. He claims that astrologers had predicted the earthquake and that the world will probably end before we get to celebrate the Nepali New Year 2073 BS.
The taxi driver can't take it anymore. He tells the barber to keep his trap shut and focus on cutting hair, shaving, and giving bone-cracking massages to his customers. The barber makes fun of the taxi driver because his business is slow these days. The meat shop owner tries to calm the two with an offer to give them the best parts of the mutton. Everybody seems to be happy.
A 4.4 Richter scale quake hits somewhere in the country. The shop shakes for barely a second. The momo shop owner breaks the world record for high jump. He lands in the middle of the street. The barber runs in four legs. The taxi driver jumps into his taxi. The meat shop owner just sits where he is enjoying his tea and his usually morning breakfast of nicotine stick. The wife and daughter duo are busy making aloo parathas. The son has probably woken from the tent and he will probably not show up for work for half a day.
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